This week I watched the Wu-Tang Clan: Live at Montreux 2007 DVD. I think it was like the first time I watched a whole live show of them. It didn’t blew my mind away but it was very worth watching. It’s impossible to ignore the energy they transmit throughout the footage, even though this was their first group performance since the departure of Ol’ Dirty Bastard. Not gonna extend myself over the DVD, read a full review here, I totally agree with it (it’s in portuguese, sorry foreign fellas).
I decided to post ’bout the Wu-Tang not just because of the DVD, and not only due to the fact this is probably the best rap group of all time and they’ve been very slept on over this last few years…I’m writing this post cause I keep hearing people dissing Hip-Hop without further knowledge, and specially some friends of mine who can’t understand how can I drive to an hardcore show listening to Kanye West, or just have the RZA and Blacklisted on my winamp’s playlist at the same time.
One thing I’ve learned over the years is that music is just sound. Words, choirs, harmonies, melodies, beats, riffs, whatever…it’s sound structured, and you interpret the way it makes you feel. It doesn’t have boundaries, it’s made by humans but it’s not made to please every single person in the world. Your perception of music depends very much on your own ability to understand what surrounds you and the knowledge a priori that you have ’bout the world, ’bout your own culture, others cultures, other lifestyles.
When people ask me how did I started listening to hip-hop when I still had an hardcore band, how it became more than 70% of my usual weekly playlists and how can I still love hardcore and separate it from my other musical tastes, I tell them ’bout the first time I heard “C.R.E.A.M.” by Wu.
When I was like 14 or 15 I hated Wu-Tang Clan. That clip with the stone age costumes (Gravel Pit) and all that shit was ridiculous…for me it was just niggas dressed like the Flintstones acting stupid. I just hasn’t able to understand it at the time. Years later I started hearing some portuguese hip-hop, then some american stuff, and somehow I ended up downloading 36 Chambers…due to the naming of the mp3 files the first song I heard from the album has “C.R.E.A.M.” and it just changed my whole perception of hip-hop.
Here were some guys (I didn’t even know names nor faces of the collective by that time) painting a perfect picture of the world around me, talking ’bout stuff I had experienced myself, stuff I saw everyday on the streets, stuff I heard ’bout on the news…I related to those words, it was real talk, sincere and honest lyrics like I was used to listen to on hardcore tracks.
Still today I compare the first time I heard “C.R.E.A.M.” to the first time I heard “New York City” by Madball. So much street knowledge, so many lessons and values those tracks taught me…that’s the music that transcends the sound, that’s the music you learn to love.
And just yesterday I had proof that hip-hop and hardcore can coexist in the same room as friendly cultures. The Carhartt Xmas Fest was a perfect example of breaking musical boundaries, joining different people and showing the kids how similar these two worlds are…Besides a great start for the guys on Reality Slap, a new band bringing some old school back with some hard knocking grooves, Bob Da Rage Sense was a very nice surprise, a true lyricist, and Dealema confirmed my assumptions, they are the best hip-hop group in Portugal, no doubt ’bout that.
And just to finish things, here’s some of the realest lines ever wrote:
“But as the world turns I learned life is Hell
Living in the world, no different from a cell
Everyday I escape from Jakes givin chase, sellin base
Smokin bones in the staircase
Though I don’t know why I chose to smoke sess
I guess that’s the time when I’m not depressed
But I’m still depressed, and I ask what’s it worth?
Ready to give up so I seek the Old Earth
Who explained working hard may help you maintain
to learn to overcome the heartaches and pain
We got stickup kids, corrupt cops, and crack rocks
and stray shots, all on the block that stays hot”
WALKtheWALK 