Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America FROM THE PUBLISHER
From its beginnings in hip hop culture, the dense rhythms and aggressive lyrics of rap music have made it a provocative fixture on the American cultural landscape. Black culture expert Tricia Rose takes a comprehensive look at the lyrics, music, themes and styles of rap and grapples with the debates that surround it. 10 illustrations.
SYNOPSIS
A comprehensive look at the lyrics, music, cultures, themes, and styles of rap music.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Rap music often blasts African American rage into mainstream American culture and with its call-and-response choruses and violent, no-holds-barred lyrics, questions societal tradition and authority. These assertions aren't hard to prove. The problem lies in explaining all this without forgetting that most of this music's impact depends on having a good beat and being danceable. Rose, an assistant professor of history and Africana studies at New York University, is generally successful in putting rap in the context of the urban noise, technology and socioeconomics that nurtures it and of the ``slave dances, blues lyrics, Mardi Gras parades, Jamaican patois, toasts and signifying'' that preceded it. Rose addresses sexism, both in the plight of women rappers and in rap lyrics, partially excusing the latter by saying, ``Rap's sexist lyrics are also part of a rampant and viciously normalized sexism that dominates the corporate culture of the music business.'' Supporting her thesis are direct interviews with rappers, personal remembrances and anecdotes, as well as deconstruction of lyrics and videos. Although her analyses are often fascinating, in sentences like ``Rappers are constantly taking dominant discursive fragments and throwing them into relief destabilizing hegemonic discourses and attempting to legitimate counter/hegemonic interpretations,'' Rose becomes unnecessarily obscurantist, forgetting to let the music speak for itself. Photos. (Apr.)
Necessary reading for pundits, professors, and politicians, but most of all, for those who love hip-hop's rhymes and reasons.
Library Journal
Although a decade of stylistic and technological evolution has transpired since 1994, this book remains undeniably influential. Drawing upon her own experience as a black American, Rose cogently relates the complex interrelationships among culture, history, politics, and economics in black America. Essential for all academic and most large public collections. (LJ 5/1/94) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
This ethnographic study is the first detailed exploration of rap music within its social, cultural, and artistic contexts. Rose (history/Africana studies, NYU) carefully analyzes each defining element of the genre. For example, her study of the cultural and technological implications of sampling-a pillar of rap-is both impressive and unprecedented. Further, Rose's hermeneutics extend beyond the music itself to such corollary expressions of hiphop style as rap music videos and breakdancing. Rose constructs a solid bridge between hiphop and academe: she explains the former in the language of the latter and does so splendidly. However, even the most powerful words cannot recreate music. Since academicians may be unfamiliar with the works discussed, an accompanying CD or cassette would have been helpful. While Brian Cross's less-rigorous It's Not About a Salary (LJ 2/15/94) remains a better choice for public libraries, Black Noise belongs on the shelves of almost every academic collection.-Bill Piekarski, Southwestern Coll. Lib., Chula Vista, Cal.
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