The Vinyl Ain't Final!

In their comprehensive collection of pieces in The Vinyl Ain’t Final, Dipannita Basu and Sidney J. Lemelle provide several diverse essays on the origins and permutations of hip hop on a national and global level. The first half contains essays about hip hop in America; the musical genre’s beginnings in the ghettoes of New York, and hip hop’s relation to African American culture and struggle. The second half of the book expands to discuss international hip hop, a phenomenon that has caught on from Japan to South Africa; the essays explore both positive and negative considerations regarding hip hop’s cultural globalization.

Weaved throughout The Vinyl Ain’t Final are various recurring themes: the question of authenticity (what is real hip hop? are international incarnations of hip hop authentic in their own right, or are they rip-offs of African American hip hop?), the definition of blackness (what does it mean to be “black” or “brown”, and how have these communities been empowered or fettered by hip hop and rap? How do black people of other nations relate to African Americans through hip hop?), and the globalization of hip hop (has this resulted in a flattening out of culture, or a resilient indigenization/localization of American-based art forms such as hip hop?). Overall, the book presents a distinct collection of viewpoints and cultural analyses that explore effects of nationalized and globalized hip hop, and weigh the positive and negative sides of hip hop culture both domestically and abroad.

In terms of authenticity, a variety of articles address the questionable direction of hip hop, both nationally and internationally. On a national level, there is concern about the hip hop’s recent application and subject matter. Many critics worry that this once rich art form, originally used as an oppressed people’s outlet for cultural struggle and economic discontent, has deteriorated into a genre focused on materialistic, shallow, or trivial content. In “A Rap Thing” Mumia Abu-Jamal considers this concern when listening to a song by R. Kelly that annoys him; he defends his discomfort by arguing that “one must understand how love songs sound false and discordant, out of tune with [hip hop’s] survivalist realities” (23). Perhaps worse than trifling content, is the potentially harmful themes Abu-Jamal considers, such as the egregious misogyny that has arisen recently in popular rap. This begs the question: is a musical form that has empowered African American youth justified in it’s occasional assertion of violent male power, which can be seen in some ways as a rebellion against the White Man? Basu and Harris address the issue of women further in “Nobody Knows My Name”, in which they acknowledge that “the ideological power of maleness in a mass mediated [hip hop] culture … makes it s difficult to fully appreciate African-American women’s creative and expressive participation as anything other than subsidiary to men’s” (57). As for Abu-Jamal, he believes that misogyny (and many of the other misguided themes of hip hop) is due to and propagated by the materialistic, capitalistic, corporation-centric nature of America, which has infected hip hop culture.

The commodification of hip hop is also a concern in relation to globalization, and the trend of hip hop appropriation, marketing, and localization throughout the world. Has the power of an African American art form been lost “under the corporate control of Whites”(211), who have marketed it around the globe? And has the spread of this American art form throughout the world Americanized, flattened out, or homogenized other world cultures?

It’s interesting to consider whether or not the message behind hip hop has been lost in a location such as Japan. In “Negotiating Ethnicity and Authenticity in Tokyo’s Club Harlem”, Rhiannon L. Fink addresses the unique position of hip hop within Japan’s culture. The popularity of hip hop in Japan brings up, once again, the concept of authenticity: what is true hip hop? One side of the spectrum are people like author Eric Prideaux, who believe the Japanese have essentially taken an art form from African Americans with little cultural context or understanding; he asked various Japanese youth associated with the hip hop scene about Malcom X, and was disheartened by their scanty knowledge of a figure so central to African American history. Others believe that familiarity with an individual like Malcom X is hardly the point- what matters is that Japanese hip hop artists have taken something that has been marketed to them from America, a powerful capitalized force, and then localized it to relate to their cultural niche. While it may seem that Japanese hip hop has appropriated some aspects of African American hip hop culture (Fink gives the example of Japanese hip hop artists wearing “bling” and dreadlocks, and of course, naming their club “Harlem”), Japanese artists are rapping much more in their own language, and about issues that are a concern to Japanese youth in particular. And while Japanese may not share the “blackness” that black South Africans and French Africans do with African Americans (a relationship discussed further in Magubane’s “Globalization and Gangster Rap: Hip Hop in the Post-Apartheid City”, and Helenon’s “Africa on their Mind: Rap, Blackness, and Citizenship in France”, respectively), Fink argues that “Japanese nationals are certainly no strangers to oppressive social mores and stratifications, and these issues are becoming more and more prevalent in Japanese hip hop” (201).

As Japanese hip hop artist “Key-Kool puts it, [true hip hop fans do exist in both countries, … and dopeness is simply dopeness’” (206). Almost all authors in this anthology agree that, whatever the “authenticity” status of hip hop in Japan, Arusha, Samoa, Cuba, France, or South Africa, each location has developed a locally-tailored permutation of American hip hop; this “localization” of a globally marketed commodity, shows a resiliency on the part of various international cultures in their ability to remain unique. Not to mention that many artists and critics still debate the meaning of real hip hop in America (since many people believe it has lost touch with it’s roots); if even African Americans contest the meaning of genuine hip hop, who is to say what is “authentic”? Basu and Lemelle do a good job of providing an incredibly diverse variety essays from authors of different genders, ethnicities, and nationalities, each of whom argue quite different things. However, most contributors to The Vinyl Ain’t Final agree that hip hop is a culture that has grown larger than itself, into something beyond narrow definitions. It has become a lifestyle and a labor of love for millions of people, and thus almost all authors agree, has at least the potential for cultural understanding, positive expression, and progress.