Since Jan 1 2009 I Have Only Listened To Rap Music

 

First Things First. 

 Bierut is right when he says the designers which took part in the manifesto 'have specialized in [designing] extraordinarily beautiful things for the cultural elite, not the denizens of your local 7-eleven.'  Though this is one of my main beefs with art/design in general, I don't think it is entirely wrong. Before real change is to happen, the people calling the shots need to be converted, their the ones who own all the "space". That age old issue of space, who's space? It's definitely not mine, and its rarely owned by someone with a soul. Thats what a lot of this boils down to. space.

The Designers.

 This is why First Things First didn't start the revolution it intended, the designers, the "play it safe's" of the art world. Most designers I meet are in design because it is one of the few ways to earn a steady paycheck as an artist, its sad but its true. A majority graphic designers are nestled deep in the bosom of materialism, settling to be art slaves, held captive by the life they think they must sustain. My generation is no different, its made obvious by their work, that's why classes like this are so valuable, especially at this time. I hope after this course some of them will want more out of life than to design brochures and be comfortable. 

Average Joe.

Is in need of rescue, thats what this is all about. His brain has been fried from too many flashy advertisements. I thank CBC because I can watch the Oilers without some computer effects exploding in the top left corner to tell me the score. I don't think anyone realizes what this does to our brains, how much space this takes up. ZAPPED. Go to a Wal-Mart in West Edmonton, the situation is grim.

The Gravediggaz

Six Feet Deep. 1994. I have listened to this album weekly since I re-discovered it this January. It was a side project of The Rza's before he released the first Wu-Tang album. Prince Paul on the beats, and aided by Poetic and Frukwan, the Gravediggaz were a group of young drug dealers on the verge of making it big, and intent on making it out of the ghetto. The album sparked a small sub-genre of rap called horror-core, as all the lyrics were derived from horror films. After reading some interviews and listening to the album over twenty-times in the last two months, my mushed brain finally realized that this album was a metaphor for the dead soul of a ghetto dweller. They commonly refer to "resurrecting the mental dead" from the "graveyard"(the ghetto). "Long has the ghetto dweller been caught in a death trap".  The same can be said for the suburb dweller, though it is a different kind of death trap. The ghetto dweller is held down by the strong arm of the man, the suburb dweller is held down by the strong arm of lease payments.  

"another day another ducat"