“Rap is something you do; Hip-Hop is something you live.” Words spoke by one of Hip-Hop culture’s philosophers and celebrated artists, KRS-One nearing the end of what is considered the genre’s golden age of its creativity and influence in the mid-1990s. For some, the statement is self-explanatory and almost reverent in it pronouncement. For others on the outer periphery of rap music and its associated culture, the delineation between the two may be murky. Nonetheless, the statement has much to do with identity, authenticity and how one associates themselves within the scope of the urban music genre and that of the broader social and ethnic context. Adam Krims’ Rap Music and the Poetics of Identity seeks to break new ground by focusing on
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Krims strenuously details the song’s musical structure and breakdowns its sections into groups and configurations all in the interest of attempting to establish the relation of sound to the “black revolutionary identity.” Unfortunately, his line of argument can best be described as an academic reach. Surely, a historian could find some meaning using a 1990s-rap song as a primary source and Krims documentation. There are plenty social, political, and ethical meanings from Ice Cube’s lyrics alone that can hold significant value. None of this is Krims argument. The text tries to establish that certain timbres and rhythm patterns coincide with specific lines from Ice Cube lyrics with the intent to depict and identify the “black revolutionary.” While there is no doubt, one can look at Ice Cube’s lyrics and form an argument he I; calling for social activism in regards to the African-American community’s treatment. However, as Chris Kennett of the Music & Letters review suggests of Krims’ argument, “[He] veers between rhapsodic and the impossible-to-prove with alarming facility when claiming the density of percussion instruments in one sample is deliberate.” What becomes frustrating about Krims’ argument is the amount of detail taken to illustrate his theory and others parts of the book, yet is so short-shorted in regards to certain aspects of his
Krims strenuously details the song’s musical structure and breakdowns its sections into groups and configurations all in the interest of attempting to establish the relation of sound to the “black revolutionary identity.” Unfortunately, his line of argument can best be described as an academic reach. Surely, a historian could find some meaning using a 1990s-rap song as a primary source and Krims documentation. There are plenty social, political, and ethical meanings from Ice Cube’s lyrics alone that can hold significant value. None of this is Krims argument. The text tries to establish that certain timbres and rhythm patterns coincide with specific lines from Ice Cube lyrics with the intent to depict and identify the “black revolutionary.” While there is no doubt, one can look at Ice Cube’s lyrics and form an argument he I; calling for social activism in regards to the African-American community’s treatment. However, as Chris Kennett of the Music & Letters review suggests of Krims’ argument, “[He] veers between rhapsodic and the impossible-to-prove with alarming facility when claiming the density of percussion instruments in one sample is deliberate.” What becomes frustrating about Krims’ argument is the amount of detail taken to illustrate his theory and others parts of the book, yet is so short-shorted in regards to certain aspects of his