Hiphop is dead.
Kiss it goodbye, because it’s gone.
Hiphop was doomed from the moment it became Hiphop.
All forms die; only the formless lives forever.
Drake can’t save Hiphop and Kendrick can’t save it.
It’s gone.
Whenever Niggas come up with some hip shit, all it takes is a White man to come along to see how he can exploit it for profit to kill it.
But what is Hiphop? What does it mean?
Is it new or just the same ol’ shit Black folks been doing since the beginning of time?
Hiphop ain’t new.
As Gil Scott-Heron said, “Ain’t No New Thing.”
Bird was playing Hiphop in the ’40s.
Miles Davis’ “On The Corner” was one of the first great Hiphop albums.
James Brown’s “Mother Popcorn” is a great Hiphop record.
Donald Byrd was Hiphop before Hiphop was Hiphop.
So why we keep holding on to Hiphop like it’s the last great thing Black folks will ever invent?
When White people latch on to something in Black culture it has always been the cue to switch gears and regroup.
We been stuck on Hiphop for the past 40 years and it’s killing Black music.
The problem with a lot of Hiphop cats who know better is that they won’t call “Bullshit!” They protect bullshit producers like the Catholic Church shuffles around sex offender priests.
It used to be we produced great singers, musicians and artists. Now all anybody wants to be is a beatmaker or MC.
We are losing our music for the sake of Hiphop. And I say, if Hiphop is getting in the way, let it go.
What was magical about Hiphop at its best was that it was linked to Afrikan Tribal DNA.
Afrikan Tribal DNA is the rhythmic code that exists in all great Black music.
From Armstrong to MJ, from Duke to Dilla; all great Black music has that rhythmic lilt to it.
As Ellington said, “It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.”
Hiphop doesn’t swing anymore.
Hiphop today is a long ways away from “Funky Drummer.”
Most of the young MCs out here today have no rhythmic inflection to their flow.
An album by A Tribe Called Quest still sounds good today.
You’re not going to want to listen to most of this shit today 10 years from now.
Funk is the only thing that lasts forever. This other bullshit has a short shelf life.
“You say Fan-Ta-Saraw. You say hahn, what, you know. It’s that sh–!”
^^^That’s that shit. Funk!
Hiphop don’t feel good no mo’.
Stop chasin’ “Voodoo” and Dilla and get back to the groove.
Everybody’s flamming all over the place and loping the beat tryna sound like machines.
Fuck that; be human.
Don’t let the instrument be you; be the instrument.
All these faux-ducers out here ain’t shit if you take away samples and their machines, but a real musician can make music without a device.
And the argument that Hiphop turns younger people on to older music is wack.
If people didn’t suffer from having short attention spans they could learn the history by doing their homework.
Expand your mind and listen to a vintage Ohio Players album or Kool and the Gang.
There’s way more information in those records than any sample could give you.
Sampling culture has turned in on itself.
It’s not even sampling anymore; it’s a sample of a sample of a sample.
It’s incest.
Sampling has turned Hiphop into the deformed child of a mother who’s been fucked by her own son.
This ain’t no anti-beatmaking campaign; it’s an anti-bullshit manifesto.
Stop looking for great moments on other people’s records to steal and learn enough music to create your own great moments.
The Beat ain’t in a machine; The Beat is inside you.
Time to go back to what made Black records great in the first place; real people playing real music.
Let Robin Thicke and Miley Cyrus have Hiphop.
Let Kenny G have Jazz.
Like the Special Man say, “Let ’em have it.”
Stop bullshittin’ and play some real fucking music.
#BAM
— Nicholas Payton aka The Savior of Archaic Pop
Nicholas Payton 