Did anybody else see Kendick Lamar perform on Colbert last night? Holy crap, that song gave me chills. Hip-hop all too rarely makes an impression on me. Im sure thats because I dont usually make an effort to seek out the good stuff, so all I end up hearing is the shallow commercial crap. But listen to this song, and how it crescendos, building from something small and intimate -- the recollection of a moment -- into a frenzied, dramatic recounting of advice recieved, both good and bad. And listen to how he structures the lyric, anchoring it with a refrain that recognizes the fact of racial diversity, beginning each new verse with, What did the Asian say? Or What did the Indian say or What did the Black man say? Or What did the White man say? Then that sudden, dramatic moment mid-song, as the dynamics lurch from a shout back to a whisper. The sax solo is nice. Then that final build-up, with the climactic line, We dont die! We multiply! Which, coming in the wake of so many stories about cops killing black kids, has a special kind of potency. I listened to it twice, and was moved, both times. youtu.be/6zr9YagWL3w
Posted on: Thu, 18 Dec 2014 05:40:53 +0000
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