What's happening folks?! Welcome back to another entry concerning the world of hip-hop. Let's get right to it, shall we? Last night was the BET Hip-Hop Awards of 2014. Typically, when I hear about an upcoming presentation of the Hip-Hop Awards, I tend to roll my eyes because BET's version of what "hip-hop" is, consists of what's popular with the 106 & Park audience (is that show still on anymore?). For this generation of listeners, people like Ty Dolla $ign, Rich Homie Quan, Migos, and the cringe-worthy Young Thug are the spokesmen for the new school of rap. My feelings have been widely known about the subject. However, I do tune in for one reason most purists tune in for: the cyphers. Before I get into the cyphers, let's get into the high moments, as well as the low moments. First the low moments so I can get them out the way.
ANY performance by Young Thug, to me, screams total and blatant ratchetness. Naturally, when the Rich Gang members get on stage (Thug, Quan, and Birdman), I'm shaking my head ready for the next segment. The next low moment was Bobby Shmurda. How in the hell do these NYC cats continue to sound like they're from the South? How long is this going to keep happening? The song is wack but the "Shmoney" dance is even worse. They brought a chunky lil dude on stage that I've been told is named Terrio who tore that dance up, but still the dance is just wrong. It's cats like him and Troy Ave that aren't really bring NY back to prominence in any way. Also the T.I. and Young Thug performance of "All About The Money" was very basic and plain, complete with shooting fire in the back. I've seen better on stage vigor from Tip.
Now I'll mention the high moments. Without question there were two particularly poignant moments. The first was the exhilarating performance of Common's standout cut from his excellent Nobody's Smiling album "Kingdom". He had a choir in the back, in which a choir is featured in the production of the song in the first place, but his cohort of the song, Vince Staples, showed that he's among the future of hip-hop that we can actually LIKE. However, he also brought on stage the enigmatic, yet highly anticipated, Jay Electronica. He added a verse that only be described as crazy (Jay, enough already, we need Act II: Patents Of Nobility. Please make that happen in 2015). The biggest moment of the performance occurred near the very end, when the parents of Michael Brown walked on stage (Mr. Brown was looking too old to be dressed how he was dressed however). It was a moving moment to see them, as Mrs. Brown was still noticeably and understandably shaken by her sons death over the summer. They, along with Common, Jay, Vince, the choir, and even the audience had their hands up in the "hands up, don't shoot" stance, while having a moment of silence. Powerful stuff.
The next big moment happened when Doug E. Fresh was presented with their Lifetime Achievement Award. Doug E. Fresh was very, very big in my upbringing as a young student of hip-hop so this, to me, was long overdue. While accepting his speech, he thanked God, his six children, his wife, his father, and the original Get Fresh Crew. Once he got to thanking his mother, he was overwhelmed with emotion, as he very tearfully stated that his mother had passed five weeks prior to the awards. With his mother's face on the back screen, it brought everyone in view of the camera to tears. However, the mood was lightened when awards host Snoop Dogg (who was as high as you can imagine but nevertheless had a great time and was damn funny in the movie skits with the ever gorgeous Nia Long) came out and asked Doug E.'s assistance with Snoop's legendary version of "Ladi Dadi" from the iconic Doggystyle album. This was truly a wonderful moment.
The DJ Mustard performance with YG and others was basically average. He came off like a west coast version of DJ Khaled, but he was obviously going off the momentum of his award he had won earlier in the evening for Producer Of The Year. A better performance came when Brandy performed the remix of her hit from twenty years ago, "I Wanna Be Down" with MC Lyte, Yo-Yo, and Queen Latifah. Clearly showing that Black don't crack, those ladies looked exceptional twenty years after the hit was made. They were performing against an all-white backdrop, much like the original version in 1994, which made the visual look nostalgic, yet memorable.
Now, on to the cyphers. The first one involved Wiz Khalifa and his Taylor Gang. It was unimpressive to say the least, in spite of the legendary Premo on the wheels. Hard to say who took the crown on this exchange because frankly it was very mediocre. You be the judge.
Next was a cypher involving new jacks and vets. Very impressive cats of former Bad Boy prospect King Los, Chicago's Vic Mensa, and perhaps hip-hop's next femcee in charge, Snow Tha Product held down the younger generation, while Treach showed he still had the skills to shut the party down, it was Mississippi's own David Banner, looking like a dapper elder statesman with his suit, bow tie and his grey beard, who took the title in this fierce cypher that arguably was the cypher of the night overall. Here's a look.
Next up was a cypher involving Detroit's next-to-blow femcee, Detroit Che, Dee-1, Troy Ave (yawn), Lil' Mama, and Def Jam's newest signee Logic. This was a little better than the Taylor Gang cypher, but was not as potent as the prior one. Lil' Mama wasn't spectacular, but wasn't terrible either. Truth be told, Mama got bars, albeit inconsistently. Dee-1 was decent and I'm looking for good things from this young southerner. The clear winner was Logic, who's album Under Pressure is already critically acclaimed before it even drops next week. Take a look.
The next cypher involved underground commodities Jarren Benton and Corey Channon, as well as hip-hop's Romeo & Juliet, Papoose and the recently paroled Remy Ma. While Benton and Channon did fairly decent jobs, it clearly belonged to Pap and Remy, as they HANDLED the back-and-forth techniques used in the past by the likes of Stetsasonic and Nice & Smooth. Peep it out.
The final studio cypher involved Busta Rhymes student O.T. Genasis, southern rapper Kevin Gates (who recently had issues with Young Thug seemingly squashed), west coast underground cat G-Eazy, and battle rap giant Loaded Lux. Genasis showed that he's one to watch in the future, as is G-Eazy. Gates brought nothing jaw-dropping or rewinding (truthfully I put him into the same category that I put Quan and Thug in as talentless, ignorant wannabes with limited futures in this game), thus leaving Lux to venomously clean up the pieces. Check it out.
Another slightly mediocre cypher involved another battle rap notable, T-Rex, along with Goodz, Rain 910, and Tsu Surf. While all are more than capable of bringing heat to the mic, this cypher looked like it fell apart. This one was a letdown, though not the worst.
The final one was an on-stage cypher involving notables in the battle rap arena. Arsenal, Couture, Calicoe, and battle rap monster Murda Mook were exercising their lyrical daggers in front of the live crowd. Couture was unimpressive, while Arsenal and Calicoe were average at best. However, leave it to Mook to bring the viciousness, including a dab at Drake. I'm very ready to see another Lux vs. Mook encounter, meanwhile if I was Drake, I would question whether or not to respond to all this shit talking Mook has been doing towards him. As we've seen in the past, if you're not from the battle culture, don't start becoming one. Here's a look at this final cypher.
Overall, the BET Hip-Hop Awards was fairly decent, though it showed that hip-hop as a culture has a long way to go before we are seen as a formidable, cultural giant instead of the sideshow coonery that we've become over the last eight years. It's a shame that cyphers are the only thing that holds substance in this hip-hop awards show, other than the icon award. Was there ignorance in abundance? Emphatically yes! Was there talent at all during the show? Absolutely. While emotional moments like the Common performance and the Doug E. Fresh speech were very special, moments like these are the minority and not the majority in terms of impact and being memorable. Even this year's cyphers were overall down in quality as compared to classic ones like the Shady 2.0 cypher and the G.O.O.D. Music cypher. Being that VH1 has done away with Hip-Hop Honors, which was some of the best three hours of television, this is what we're left with unfortunately. Cyphers will not clean up the minstrel show that BET presents as hip-hop. One day, hopefully, someone else will step up and show these kids what hip-hop is instead of the wack to barely above decent talent they're being exposed to.
That's all for now folks. I'm going to leave you with two joints of the week. The first one is hot new Black Milk and his Random Axe cohorts of Sean Price and Guilty Simpson. This is the latest off his forthcoming album, If There's A Hell Below..., coming at the end of October. With three distinct beat changes, the RA boys show their lyrical asses and makes the anticipation grow for a 2015 release of the sophomore Random Axe album (if you're not up on their self-titled debut, smack yourself!). The next cut is the first official single from PRhyme, which consists of DJ Premier and Royce Da 5'9. Earlier this week, Premo revealed the artwork and track list for the nine track album and quite frankly the game will start being on life support come December 9th. Here's the track "Courtesy" . Hold it down until next week guys and gals.
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