Da Death of De Hip Hoppy

Found these two interesting articles deconstructing Hip Hop music culture. Once again those who beleive that culture or the counter culture is revolutionary miss the point. Culture is political, and it is the dialectical creator of capitalism and its creature, it always reflects the values of capitalism. P. Diddy is a good example of this. Even the counter culture can only exist within the confines of commodity production. Its the war of the brands; Che versus Coca Cola.

David Drake's The Death of Hip-Hop

Krisna Best - A Reply to David Drake's Opinion on the Topic of the Death of Hip-Hop

Drake attempts to show from the outset that capitalism and hip-hop are and have always been joined at the hip. Hip-hop is a cultural superstructure that exists in motion with the ideas and institutions of capital. A case could be made for each, and often individuals fall on one side of the spectrum that either hip-hop is "capitalist" (which is not even grammatically correct, let alone theoretically) or it exists in opposition to capitalism. Any responsible and dialectical approach would show that hip-hop is indeed an offspring of people of color and poor folks living under capitalism, but that within hip-hop a mass of contradictory ideas exist which are pushing it forward.

See:

Hip Hop Gun Culture

Gangsta Hip Hop

Blame 50 Cents


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