White artists "stealing" black music
- Thread starter D'wards
- Start date
SpookyFrank
Don't swallow the cap
Really? I should probably listen to him then...
Yeah, Black on Both Sides is a classic album. Arguably a bit racist though.
quite. the blues probably owes more to english folk music than it does to any african styles (although it is still there)
music progresses through cross-polination. twas ever thus.
best song:Really? I should probably listen to him then...
i think he has a bit of a reputation for being like social worker hip hop though
kained&able
Here for the football.
D'wards
IT'S YOUR DECISION DANIEL
I sort of like that about him though - been listening to a bit of Biggie Smalls recently - good music but the some horrific lyrics - pretty childish really. The song Gimme the Loot whilst being a good song is hardly very responsible seeing as he was an, albeit reluctant, role model to da kids, man
Fictionist
Serving Eargasms....
See below:
In the olden days of white culture, people used to look up to Kings and Princes. These were the people that they adored, and every night they wished and hoped that somehow they could wake up and be just like them. But with Royal Families crumbling, that role has been filled by one man: Mos Def.
He is everything that white people dream about: authentic (”he’s from Brooklyn!”), funny (”he was on Chapelle show!”), artistic (have you heard “Black on Both Sides?”), an actor (”he’s in the new Gondry film!”) and not white (”I don’t see race”).
He has done an amazing job of being in big budget movies (The Italian Job) and having one of his songs become a white person wedding staple (Ms. Fat Booty) but still retaining authenticity and credibility.
If you find yourself in a social situation where you are asked to list your favorite actor or artist, you should always say Mos Def. This way you can name someone that everyone has heard of and you don’t look like you are trying to one up anybody. The only possible negative consequence is some white people might think “I wish I had said that first.”
D'wards
IT'S YOUR DECISION DANIEL
See below:
In the olden days of white culture, people used to look up to Kings and Princes. These were the people that they adored, and every night they wished and hoped that somehow they could wake up and be just like them. But with Royal Families crumbling, that role has been filled by one man: Mos Def.
He is everything that white people dream about: authentic (”he’s from Brooklyn!”), funny (”he was on Chapelle show!”), artistic (have you heard “Black on Both Sides?”), an actor (”he’s in the new Gondry film!”) and not white (”I don’t see race”).
He has done an amazing job of being in big budget movies (The Italian Job) and having one of his songs become a white person wedding staple (Ms. Fat Booty) but still retaining authenticity and credibility.
If you find yourself in a social situation where you are asked to list your favorite actor or artist, you should always say Mos Def. This way you can name someone that everyone has heard of and you don’t look like you are trying to one up anybody. The only possible negative consequence is some white people might think “I wish I had said that first.”
Don't really agree with that much - his films are fucking awful (apart from 16 blocks maybe), and i never would imagine Ms Fat Booty as a wedding staple. Fact is he seems like an intelligent man in a sea of immature, boastful to the point of insanity idiots who may be able to put beats together and rap, but have the lyrical ability of an 11 year old naughty boy
I just like his songs!
Reckon that is more for people from the US of Stateside, references are all wrong for uk
This whole argument had some weight to it back in the 50s and 60s and maybe even the 70s too.
But now it doesn't. That's because it's fundamentally always been about money and power. And hip-hop is now pretty much THE globally dominant musical genre: it's a massively portable, adaptive, hugely influential and lucrative thing. It's made billionaires out of Afro-American rappers and singers. Eminem (and the Beasties) aside, there haven't been white inroads at that kind of level of cash success, at the top of the hip-hop tree.
So when Eminem came in and had massive success, he wasn't really occupying space that anyone in particular could justifiably lay a claim too. He wasn't standing on anyone's toes.
But now it doesn't. That's because it's fundamentally always been about money and power. And hip-hop is now pretty much THE globally dominant musical genre: it's a massively portable, adaptive, hugely influential and lucrative thing. It's made billionaires out of Afro-American rappers and singers. Eminem (and the Beasties) aside, there haven't been white inroads at that kind of level of cash success, at the top of the hip-hop tree.
So when Eminem came in and had massive success, he wasn't really occupying space that anyone in particular could justifiably lay a claim too. He wasn't standing on anyone's toes.
That "more" is debatable, especially with people like Skip James or Robert Pete Williams. Or Big Boy Cleveland or Henry Thomas. In the case of the latter two, you can really hear an Afro-Peruvian connection.
Kaka Tim
Half Arsed and Slapdash till I Die
Not sure about the extent of 'english folk music' influence on the blues.
You can hear a clear echo in the blues of african chant, african rythms, praise singing and call and response vocal styles. The music that came with the slave ships was then mixed in with european hyms and folk music till you end up with gospel and blues. The varied musics of the southern states were all cross fertilising each other for decades - centuries even. i.e you can hear the blues in hillbilly music and you can hear hillbilly in the blues. The musicans of the time would also take tin pan alley fodder and reinvent to their own style (i.e. leadbelly and 'goodnight irene').
I've also heard a theory that the different blues rythms of the south correspnd to whcih parts of west africa the origninal slave populations came from and that the same effect can be seen in the different creole and calypso rythms of the carribean.
The whole 'white people stealing balck music' argument has some truth in the context of segregated music of the 50s - songs would be big hits on the 'race' music chants and would then be cleaned up and prettified, given to a white artist and become a big hit - often with the original artist getting nothing.
I dont buy the Elvis 'racial drag' accusaiton - his music was electrified hillbilly, or rockabilly (like early jonny cash) - but singing speeded up blues songs - so part of the mixing up of genres of styles that had been going on for a long time in that part of america. It ceraintly wasn't a sacherine sweet, nuetered version of the blues - it was something fresh, exciting and played with passion and verve by people with love and repect for the music that was all around them.
The issue is really about the appropriation of raw musical stlyes by the music industry whcih then turns it into processed, smoohted out pap designed for a mass audience. Thats as true of what happend to blues or reggae as what happened to punk rock. There's defineitly a racial element in there but its not the whole story.
Load of oversimplified bollocks.
Yeah, and even Elvis's voice doesn't sound really fit that apocryphal Col Parker quote ('If I could find a white boy who could sing like a nigger...').
I mean, Elvis just doesn't sound like his black soul contemporaries. You can hear that he's trying to sound like them, but his voice is a strange, wobbly, camp thing: it's a misreading that ended up being unique, slightly silly, but indisputedly Elvis. Just like Bob Dylan's mannered misreading of Woody Guthrie's voice.
I mean, Elvis just doesn't sound like his black soul contemporaries. You can hear that he's trying to sound like them, but his voice is a strange, wobbly, camp thing: it's a misreading that ended up being unique, slightly silly, but indisputedly Elvis. Just like Bob Dylan's mannered misreading of Woody Guthrie's voice.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Kaka Tim
Half Arsed and Slapdash till I Die
I don't really agree but for the iconaclasm. Dylan was massively talented but a right arsehole.AnnO'Neemus
Is so vanilla
Eva Luna
Well-Known Member
Well I dunno about that, but imo Elvis should not have made the comment about blacks being only good enough to shine his shoes...... Very interesting debate tho. For me, its not about music, its about money. People can make whatever sounds they like as far as I am concerned, but folk should get paid for it. Not not paid for their skin colour. 
Music industry's a load of bollocks anyway.
Music industry's a load of bollocks anyway.snopes says FALSE http://www.snopes.com/music/artists/presley1.asp
as do loads of other google results.
Nanker Phelge
Leave the gun. Take the cannoli.
Was this not just a case of people drawing on music they discovered they liked and wanted to perform.
If white musicians hadn't found a black influence then white music would have remained fairly static, and quite dull. Frank Sinatra and Fabian forever more?
It's not stealing to be influenced by something and to use that influence to create something else (better or worse).
Muddy Waters was grateful to the Stones for highlighting his music to new audiences and reviving his career, they also did a huge amount to raise Chuck Berry's profile and to ensure that black artists got on TV alongside them to perform, as well as giving a platform to Tina Turner in the UK.
There's a classic scene where Brian Jones tells a music show host to just shut up and listen because the great Muddy Waters is about to play.
Lots of bands have shown support for the black artists that inspired them, Dusty Springfield hosted a motown special on Ready Steady Go which was practically an all black show on british tv in 1965, The Beatles consistently publicised Little Richard, Chuck Berry and all the motown acts.
Elvis may have been moulded along the way, but I think he started out fully aware of where the music he made popular was coming from.
There was a lot of nasty records producers and execs who manipluated black artist's careers and took advantage of them by claiming writing credits on their songs and swindling them out of their cash, but these people were ruthless businessmen, not musicians.
The British Music Invasion in the early 60s was paramount in bringing US black music to US white people and ensureing that records companies wanted to put those original black artists on the shelves alongside their white counterparts.
It may be a shitty truth that black artists were treated so poorly, but through influencing the white musicians and having their songs re-produced by british bands ensured the longevity of many bands.
..anyway...I don't see being iinfluenced as stealing.
If white musicians hadn't found a black influence then white music would have remained fairly static, and quite dull. Frank Sinatra and Fabian forever more?
It's not stealing to be influenced by something and to use that influence to create something else (better or worse).
Muddy Waters was grateful to the Stones for highlighting his music to new audiences and reviving his career, they also did a huge amount to raise Chuck Berry's profile and to ensure that black artists got on TV alongside them to perform, as well as giving a platform to Tina Turner in the UK.
There's a classic scene where Brian Jones tells a music show host to just shut up and listen because the great Muddy Waters is about to play.
Lots of bands have shown support for the black artists that inspired them, Dusty Springfield hosted a motown special on Ready Steady Go which was practically an all black show on british tv in 1965, The Beatles consistently publicised Little Richard, Chuck Berry and all the motown acts.
Elvis may have been moulded along the way, but I think he started out fully aware of where the music he made popular was coming from.
There was a lot of nasty records producers and execs who manipluated black artist's careers and took advantage of them by claiming writing credits on their songs and swindling them out of their cash, but these people were ruthless businessmen, not musicians.
The British Music Invasion in the early 60s was paramount in bringing US black music to US white people and ensureing that records companies wanted to put those original black artists on the shelves alongside their white counterparts.
It may be a shitty truth that black artists were treated so poorly, but through influencing the white musicians and having their songs re-produced by british bands ensured the longevity of many bands.
..anyway...I don't see being iinfluenced as stealing.
Fictionist
Serving Eargasms....
Quite simply not true - it might be far more accurate to state that Electro-Funk might not have come about if it had not been for Kraftwerk.
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