Thursday Special: Please Forgive my Heart; I am the Hood

A little while ago a friend said to me "HipHop is Dead". The more I think about it, the more I wonder if they were being sarcastic. It seemed like an awfully blanket (and for that matter kinda cliched) statement that when you look at it really isn't saying a whole lot. I'm very much of the opinion of that if we think something is worthless, dead, or wrong, that it says more about our lack of understanding of the object than it does about the object itself. Creations and forms of expression,  whether someone might be trying to honestly share something with you or not, should especially be handled with the utmost care.

Now here's why. There's a real reason and life behind creation, and whether it's motivation was money, fame, fortune, or an attempt at sincere communication and outlet, understanding that human aspect is hugely important. Think now of Bobby Womack who, after twenty years of failed career silence because of drug addiction and a recent  diagnosis with Alzheimer's disease, made  Please Forgive my Heart. The content alone of that song would have been powerful enough to move me. But to understand the context that Bobby Womack was writing in, and the sincere human who created that message, makes me understand that the writer is saying something beyond the words in his song.

Now enter Lil B. I won't explain what he's doing or saying, but I would claim that there's so much more to his music than just the content of what he says. That there is a person making those songs and that he should be understood even if the content of his message cannot be. Because no matter how many "Charlie Sheen's" we get, there will always  be an "I Am The Hood" that makes us remember that there is a deep well of humanity that composes each and every one of us which deserves to be wrestled with if only for the fact that it is our humanity alone regardless of what we might try and say. 

In the end, how can HipHop or anything else we've made be dead when there is so much pained, hurt, and frustratingly beautiful human life that created it? And if we do think that it really is dead, then maybe that means we've just stopped trying to care about the people that made it.

Enjoy.