The What?! Hip Hop, Questions, Legends and ListsThis week Sidney Madden & Rodney Carmichael from Louder than a Riot join Nyla and Mouse to discuss misogyny and journalism in Hip Hop. Tune in and comment in the socials below.
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What's up, guys, and welcome to what hip Hop Questions, Legends and list I'm not with Simone.
And I am the man that puts the jucks in juxtaposition Mouse Jones, I just want to put you out there.
I hate when you do that.
Do it.
No, it's okay, because I wasn't gonna do it to you. Why do you want to start like this because you're sitting in this zen ass positions pissing me off.
I was just telling our guests how I stay mellow. Then before I got here, I did what needed to be done. Anyway I do because it's just be a lot man, especially when I got to deal with the energy like mouse Jones.
All right. Now, see now he's starting with me.
No, no, no, let's get into it because we were having a great convo before we turn these mics on.
So we have a very special guest in the building. Mouse, you want to do.
Listen.
This is the whole reason I got into doing any of this ship all right, talking on microphones, talking to people you admire, who's worked you truly admire. Uh So I would think that these are you know, colleagues of all and friends of all real journalists real journalists because it is a dying thing. Real journalism. It's a real thing where real people who do it. We have with us today one of my favorite podcasts, if not my favorite, Louder than a Riot Sidney.
Madden and Rodney the Voice welcome. Oh, Michael Wolton, Man, look at that.
Thank you appreciate it.
Yes, we appreciate y'all coming.
Man.
How is going from season one, where you know, everybody was inside and it was the pandemic to now season two and everybody's outside and this and everybody's paying attention and seeing what's going on? What's what's that?
Been like different?
It's been real different. So yeah, as you said, and we talked to you about season one, O God the next Door back in twenty twenty, it feels like ten years ago.
Yeah.
Season one was all about the relationship between hip hop and mass incarceration because rit large Louder than the Riot is about rhyme and punishment. It's about hip hop as a genre, as a culture, as a cultural force, speaking back or sometimes perpetuating things in society. And so season one, I feel like we made some noise, we did, but people were inside, like you said, So for season two, which we wanted to fully expand the idea of what rhyme and punishment could mean. We're kind of looking inward at the culture and what the culture perpetuates, specifically around misogynistic and homophobic double standards. And with us coming up on fifty years of hip hop and the girls and the gays running things, running things, it's been really, really great and I feel like rewarding to see the reactions in real time and get to physically talk to you all about it.
I'd be listening to these.
There's a juxtaposition between you two right, like there's a kndra like, you know, a younger one man of coloring or more season. Yeah, I was about saying, oh, I've seen the way your eyes looked at me. But black man, we're close knit.
Actually great, that was great.
It's funny. Oh, come one, guess what's.
Be going on?
You let people come in here and break us apart. That's the problem right now.
I'm Jesus cross. You see what I did that? Guys at home, you gotta gotta listen, you gotta come back. You'll understand that one next week, y'all.
He's realistic, according to Yeah, that was crazy.
But but I do want to talk about that that that I think much like me and Nila, where we may be close in age but represent different parts of our different errors and and genre and and hip hop.
I think the same thing happened with you guys. But you guys, with that.
Journalistic take, has it been any not even has been what's been that functionality figuring it out?
You know?
Are we leaning a little too young? We leaning a little too heavy?
You know because the topic, the topics that you're speaking about aren't just you know, running the mill, you know, internet diet tribe, like it's your You guys are unpacking real shit. So I just always think about, like are you do you guys have to be cognizant of are we leaning too young?
Are we leaning too old?
I mean, we just embrace it, man, you know. I mean that was the appeal from the beginning, you know, me and Sid coming together and having these dialogues that we would have in the office after hours, and you know, shit, hip hop is fifty like that. That includes all generations. That's your kids, that's your your mom and them, that's your your your cousins and all of that. So for us, even when we were really kind of like positioning the part cast at NPR. We knew that that was that was one of the benefits.
You know.
It's like, hey, we're gonna touch all audiences in terms of in terms of hip hop and in terms of who cares about the culture. And at that particular time, especially when we were starting season one, I feel like you don't hear quite as much now, but there was a lot to talk about.
The generation gap, you know what I mean.
It was like, you know, I mean, I don't want to take us back too far, but you know, with the kids and the mumble rap and all this kind of stuff, you know what I'm saying, And so I think that was a strength. I think, you know, we got the we got the gender gap bridge, we got the the generation gap bridge, we got the we got the regional gap bridge, you know, because it is, you know, from East Coast North and I'm from the south. So between all of that, you know, it really gives us some range, I think, you.
Know, So let's take it back for the viewers who aren't familiar with you guys.
What is louder than the riot? And how to did you guys get started?
You want to start it no, you go ahead.
So for anyone who doesn't know and is never heard, Louder than a Riot, Louder than a Riot is a podcast, but overall a project that looks at rhyme and punishment in America. So again, we started really started tinkering this with this idea when we both started at NPR back in twenty seventeen, right, yeah, twenty seventeen, because we knew that hip hop deserved it. Hip hop deserves narrative stories, investigative work, really nuanced and conscientious type of profiling, and that has really been few and far between in the audio space. There's definitely been that before, Like Mogol was a huge beacon for us with Combat Yup, and we wanted to tell stories not about hip hop in a way that didn't come at the genre, come at the culture in a like an anthropological sense and like a diluted sense, And it wasn't like a straight profile of a rapper. It was really grappling with the odds and ends and the decisions that go into leading to some of these consequences. So for season one, which we started piloting and got a green light for all the way back in twenty eighteen. That was about the connection between hip hop and mass incarceration, and if y'all remember in twenty seventeen Meek Mills whole why Am I Losing It? The parole, the probation, and perpetuity, that was something that became a lightning rod in hip hop, Like a lot of people really campaigned around him, gathered around him. But what we were thinking about was what's missing in the conversation, and it's that the carceral state and hip hop has always been at odds and it's very rarely dissected and talked about how it ebbs and flows and how one influences the other and all that stuff. So for season one, we dug really deep into stories of lyrics on trial, stories of the power of the prosecutor in the carceral state, stories of women's populations, which is actually at the time one of the most fastest growing populations in the carceral state in America. So that was season one. Season two, we wanted to really stretch what rhyme and punishment could mean because, and this is a nod to our latest episode that came out, accountability is a part of love, and if you love the genre, you got to know when to hold it accountable, how to hold it accountable in a way that's not completely destructive, in the way that's not like I got to opt out of hip hop because we love it. We want to continue to tell these stories, but we want we want better for these stories and better for these people making this art as well. So Season two is really honing in on massage noir, which is the specific racist, sexist inequality that falls on the shoulder of black folders of black women in hip hop but also in society.
I know you already know what I'm talking about. You guys should have never told me that word. By the way, I was like, wow, I'm about to use.
But you'll be able to put it out everywhere. And now I mean, yeah, belt it. Yeah, But now.
I'm like, there's a word for this, yeah, because I just call everything, Oh, that's just misogynistic.
Yeah, but it's another lad podcasts.
I'm saying it on the damn show. Thank y'all for teaching all of that. Thank y'all.
Yeah, I'm glad you know it though, And I'm glad you're.
Sh in the space that I exist. And it's you have to write like and that was one of the questions. I want to ask y'all later on, but since we're here, like, one, let me ask y'all when it came to, you know, deciding what you guys were going to talk about or cover see and two, what led y'all to land on this specific one? And what was that conversation like before you even brought it to anyone to get a green let just between youtuboe, like what was that? What was that thought process? Like she know here should we go?
Here?
You go, oh, this is where we're going? How do we go about it?
Yeah? I mean we knew. First of all, we knew it was going to be hard. We didn't want we did not want to talk about mass incarceration in season two. We knew that because we don't want to replicate stories of criminality, Like you don't want to perpetuate the thing you're trying.
To catch out right, That's the all that's all there is to talk about in hip hop.
Yeah, yeah, and then I mean you see it all all the time. Sometimes when hip hop stories get to big networks, they become nullified, they become diluted to just talk about like criminality. So anyway, we didn't want to. We knew we didn't want to do that. And then the same way everyone in hip hop had their eyes and ears on the meat meal probation case in twenty seventeen, everybody had their eyes and ears on what happened between Megan and Stallion and Lanes in the summer of twenty twenty. So as we were dropped, as we were getting ready to drop season one, we were already percolating on season two. We're like, Yo, this is the next this is the next culture shift, this is the next wave that feels like it's just social media fodder and debate right now, but it's speaking to something deeper and more insidious. And once we were on the same page about that, because it didn't really take long to get on the same page about it, like we just had to figure out how to get to it, how to tell it.
Yeah, I remember we went on break.
I guess said was the end of the year holiday break, and I think we were both thinking about it because the first time we met and talked about it in January of what twenty twenty one, we just honed right in on it and then it was just about like, you know, and then over the course of the next you know, year or two is determining what this looks like in terms of whose stories were telling and how expansive if this topic is, you know, because it could be real easy to just tell the Meg story, you know, or the Meg and Toy story. But I think we wanted to show that what was happening in the Meg was not unique, you know what I'm saying, and show how much it resonates throughout the culture and how much it kind of hip hop is kind of you know, it's an it's underpinned throughout hip hop, you know what I mean. And so we wanted to tell stories that went back historically and contemporary stories and and you know, talk to artists but also talk to people that cover the culture, just to show how kind of like, you know, pervasive.
It is yea in this, you know, in covering this, you know, this entire season, even an episode that haven't been dropped yet. I guess it could be a question for both you, But I'm kind of zeroing on you. Has there been any time or has this been like a big mirror for you, like and to look at misogyny or how it plays a part in your life, if at all right, like how it's been how you've you know, might have you know been been an actor in it before in your life or not now or has it been a piece of you undoing and unlearning?
Because it's like that with me.
So that's why, like when when what led into this question was when she was like, oh, you know the word yeah, being on the grapevine for them, the years did not go like I had to be accountable for what I said and I had and you know, having this for lack of a better term, that's awakening, right, and I have understanding that. Okay, well, I'm gonna position myself I hate to word ally, but I'm gonna position myself as someone who lets, you know, the black LGBT plus community know, hey I got you, let black women know, hey I got you.
Right, and really have to to do that.
You really have to learn and unlearn. And that gets uncomfortable for men, specifically black men, because we might say, you know, we hear it all time.
Like yo, we we all want women to win. We all want females to win.
Up until a point, up until a.
Point, and we have to get into that level. So that's so, has this been that for you.
Definitely, man, I mean, you know, like you said, I mean, I don't think you could come out of you know, the era that I come out of, and and and say otherwise, you know, if you grew up, you know in my era, you know, consuming the culture, being part of the culture that we were part of in that era, it's it's touched you. It's tainted you in a certain kind of way. It's shaped your mindsets, it shaped your your your worldview, your lens and so, you know, not on you know, before we got into the making of the season, you know, obviously we kind of foresaw that coming. I think for me, it really started to be real when we got a team together.
You know what I'm saying. We got a team.
We got a whole new team and we had in season one, and we got a hellified team, right, you know, we got a hellified team in terms of you know, our editors Ray Shockley, our producers Sam and Mono, our lead producer Gabby.
Was Gabby the one that opened the episode with you uh, the Kim episode.
No Sam Sam. Sam Sam was my producer and co reporter on the episode. The most recent episode, which is the episode about sexual harassment and hip hop media and it's and it's uh revisiting the case of Kim Osorio versus the source, but no, I mean and also you hear our team a lot more this season too, Like the first episode, we reported live from the from the trial of Tory Lanez for the assault of Megan thee Stallion, and we had to break we just as a matter of being able to sprint and take on reporting the whole trial, we had to break it up. And so you hear Gabby, who's our senior producer. You hear her in the first episode. You hear a lot of our producers, which.
I love about it.
Everybody at some point I love. I love breaking that. I call it the fifth wall.
Like I love when you get to hear it's bigger than us, right, So I love Like that's one thing I love about doing this show is deep block does not mine hopping on the microphone too, Like.
How many tricks are you getting from the show yourself? A talent check on one in But I love that because I love the art of podcasting and I love the world. That's you know, we've all been a part of building. So let's hear you know, just saying way I would love. I love seeing a documentary and I love seeing I love seeing the camera. I love seeing them filming somebody filming something. So that so I love that y'all doing. I love it.
I love people that are taking that extra step when it comes to podcasting.
Let's get controversial. Let's talk about journalism, all right.
That's controversial.
Where I'm going is all right, So it's specifically around the term journalist. Every one today is calling themselves a journalist. I don't think me and Nila refer to ourselves as that. Uh, there's a lot, there's a lot of work that goes into that media personality.
Host DJ.
Yeah, like I get to do.
Cool things, but I haven't haven't gone to school, I haven't studied the ethics that go into journalism, so I would I feel like I would be being disrespectful.
I feel like when you do interviews, you do journalism work prior to doing the interview.
But you would hope research, yes, I mean some people.
You would hope yeah, yeah, research so to that extent, but not like like I used to write for the Source, I had to actually really do mad research. I don't do that type of research for my interviews. So that's the difference.
I feel like what you guys do with NPR and loighter than the riot.
That's you guys are live on trial, you know what I mean, Like you're actually on the ground.
That's not just giving your not just not just giving your all.
This is terrible doing this.
That's the realistiction distinctly, the hot take in the in the people perceiving their opinions as facts and promoting them as facts and willfully and.
And the thing is people believe it though.
Yeah, well that but that goes in you know, That's what I'm saying. That goes into journal But that goes into being a journalist knowing that the words I say right now on this medium will have an effect on somebody reading this.
What do I want that to be? Do I want it to be.
Me informing them? Or do I want it to be me leading them? And I don't think anyone is so, like like I said, we're being controversial. So somebody like Norri, right, somebody like Norri who constantly just as a journalist, you know when he does that ship that right there, Journalists work. I just did journalism that I studied them and then I brought it.
To you that was method acting.
I think that too coming for your ask brother. But like he'll go on Wikipedia, or he'll have his nephew.
I hope Wikipedia is not his source.
I said it multiple times.
He goes on Wikipedia, writes it down to questions, or he'll have his nephew, who I'm pretty sure is doing the same exact thing. Send him the questions, and then he'll look at his phone there about uh so nineteen ninety five, and before you can answer the question, he starts talking about a different story.
But that is but he calls himself a journalist.
So what is the difference between what you guys are doing with lot in the riot and what others like that are doing with their platforms.
I mean it's it's you already know the distinction, which is good because I think a lot of people who who call themselves media personalities do not, you know, or do not care to understand the nu ones between them. I feel like it's a really big distinction because I'm not a media personality. I don't I probably don't have the personality to be.
You have the voice.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
Man, that right there, you just dropped that. I was flattered. I've never been flattered my life, you know, I was just flatter. It's getting crazy, no.
But it's real.
Like I think that hip hop is really in an interesting place, and it's not just hip hop. We understand that this is the state of media now. A lot of it has to do with the fact that there's been so much divestment. You know, there's just not the funding and journalism from a local level to a national level, from from print media to the TV media. It's been going on for decades now. So the whole that's feeled that is entertainment. And sometimes the entertainment looks like we bought what it's always looked like to us, you know, rappers rapping, and sometimes it looks it looks different, like rappers saying their journalists and still doing some some cool shit, you know what I'm saying.
I mean, I love I love all of the all of the podcasts.
I mean, you know, for the most part, I watch them.
I watch them.
I think it does add to something. Let me say that. I do say that because I know I'm I'm cognizant of where I stand in this and how I might say something.
People are like, see he hates everything.
But I do understand the benefit to that, right, Like, if you're into hip hop, certain artists just aren't going to have that conversation with me. With you guys, no matter how good we are with our jobs, it's just not gonna happen, right, Certain legacy acts aren't gonna believe like, yeah, I can be this open with this young guy.
But they'll go to Norril, They'll go to whoever's.
Doing a podcast at time and be like, you understand it, you were there, I could talk to you you about this thing. Yeah, but I don't think that makes a journalism And I think it gets very dangerous when we start just putting that stamp on stuff.
Well, see, the thing is now in this era, it's been so long that we haven't we've had a lack of it and avoid of it that I think, you know, a lot of a lot of folks consuming the culture at this point, they don't even know to miss it, you know what I'm saying.
And that's that's kind of a scary.
Thing too, is really we can go We've it's been a long time since we had some real consistent deep diving quality, you know, hip hop journalism and I think you can see it in terms of what the culture produces, you know what I'm saying, because it's a it's an ecosystem, and you know, everything feeds everything, and so if we don't have the kind of critical you know, critical attention being paid to the culture and and and what people are producing and what we're consuming, it just it just don't it don't circulate and hit the sign, you know. So I think that's really one of the big things that's missing.
I know, relationships in hip hop, especially hip hop journalism is like essential. Is that like tricky for you guys when it comes to producing.
It definitely can be. I mean it's always it's always a negotiation. It's always a tight rope block. But I do before it falls out of my head, I want to sorry before it falls out of my head. I do want to go back to one thing you said about going to school for it. I don't think this journalism is a profession that you necessarily need to go to school for. I don't think you need to go to school or college for a lot of professions these days.
But you do somewhere. You got to learn ethics, and that's what I missed that's that.
Yeah, that's what I'm getting to. Like, you still need to be you still need to know the journalistic ethics that are the foundation, and you need to want to be a student. You need to want to be a suit. Like there's a lot of people going back to what I was saying before about people assuming that because they are I don't know, charismatic, and people laugh at their takes that that is like their statements are facts. I think journalism at a base level is about learning something being committed to learn it. This is across any type of beat and sharing what you learn. And then if you add your own voice, your own identity, your own narrative, your own take on top of that, you still have the base layer of the facts of sharing the facts that you learned. And I think knowing when something is veering into quid pro quo territory is essential. Knowing when this is there are complications and it gets into situations of not all the way blackmail, but like, I know something about you, So if you don't want me to tell D da da da D you know what I'm saying, because it's it is very tricky. This industry is a mix of work and pleasure inherently all the time. So there's always those those different streams to navigate. But I think at the base level, you need to know your facts. You need to know your morals. You need to know your boundaries and your line and what you're not going to cross, and not play it by situations. Not think about what is going to get you to go viral, what is going to get you an ad sponsorship, what is going to get you an exclusive cover? You know, and what is going to get you a big moment. It's more about consistency. What's going to ride you, what's going to be able to drive you to being a consistent source of news? Oh, no matter where you're telling it. Like, going on Rodney's point, we have very few consistent publications, outlets, specific spaces just for hip hop journalism anymore. We have people, we have people we can trust and bylines we can trust. But the way media is going, like those people aren't even safe anymore. So they got to get it how they live at different publications, And at this point, I'm I'm more, I'm more, I guess I'm more comfortable following people I trust rather than.
Yeah, absolutely, I think we're at that point.
Yeah, absolutely, So you currently listen to what hip hop questions, legends and lists.
Will be right back after this break.
To speak a bit more about relationship or you know, kind of expound on that relationships sometimes are bigger than just the linear. I know you, you know me, we're friends. I'm trying like there's there's there's the relationship between which I want to talk about. There's the relationship between fan and you know, person worthy of fandom, which I directly want to talk to you guys about because on your last episode, well not your last episode, last week's episode with Trick Daddy or the two weeks two weeks episodes, because you had a week in between episode four with you guys specifically spoke to trick Daddy and there was a moment in there where he kind of got annoyed.
Let's get back to your relationship with Trina, right your brother's sister relationship, and.
We got I gotta go. Are we over our?
And this whole conversation is about Trina?
Okay, So I thought y'all.
Want to interview me. Y'all asked me everything about Trina.
This happened, like I understand, just y'all treat me, but go ahead, We're gonna ask about three four more questions because we over our already. Now for the record, y'all, I swear we did not set out to treat treat that.
And you guys are talking to him about a very serious topic and giving him an opportunity to be accountable, uh maybe even you know, show some remorse or just come to a different thought process. And it came a moment where.
This typically and I'll be the one to say this typically happening with black men when they're confronted with their misogynal war, and that there comes to this moment where I don't know if you guys seen it, but there's a switch that they go from kind of open to now this, you know what I mean. And I heard that audibly, but you guys had to see it. And I'm pretty sure at some point over the last fifteen years y'all have sung a Trick Daddy song, been a fan of something he's done.
So what is that?
What is it like as a journalist or is anyone talking to someone that there is some type of fandom But you see this thing that you vehemently, eviscerally disagree with in them, like standing on it.
Well, I mean, we already understood what we were walking into when we went to Treat Daddy's house in Miami, because we've seen the Love and Hip Hop episodes.
We've seen him and Trino.
Go back and forth, and the way that he doesn't he tries to take credit for her career, you know, way beyond just the first song that they.
Did together, which is the theme of the conversation.
Yeah.
So, you know, I think that what we hoped the best thing we hoped for was, like you said, that he would be willing to be a little more reflective about their relationship. And you know, this is twenty twenty five years later, now, you know. I mean they were practically kids at the time. You know, we are older and we mature and and that kind of thing you would hope, you would hope, But you know, I think sometimes it's also hard for artists and artists like Trick because it's everything he stands on. Everything he stands on is being the kind of you know, misogynistic, you know, type of dude that he has always been. I mean, that was the appeal when we were bumping Trick Daddy in you know, late nineties, early two thousands. So sometimes I think, you know, the box that you create for yourself ends up in some ways becoming like you know exactly, you know what I'm saying. And so he's I think he's kind of stuck in that place and he feels like then, like you say, he has to defend that position, and you know what I mean. So it was interesting though, because you know, like you said, it happens in front of your eyes, and you know, we're.
Sitting in his living room and he he's.
Got his pit bulls coming in and now you know what I'm saying, and yeah, and it feels very.
You know, one of them was like tangled in the wires of the mic at.
One point something.
I mean, we're sitting on the couch with him, just like we're sitting right here, you know, and you know, it's like you say, when it's in your face, it's a lot different than than than hearing it, you know, on music that you can push pauls on and that kind of stuff.
So I don't know what was your what was it like for you.
Said, I mean, with the second season being about who gets misogynistically marginalized within hip hop, there weren't that many hetero black men who were gonna talk to us about the subject, right, So this was actually one of the few I mean, a lot of people declined to talk to us based on what we said the pitch, but this was one of the few moments where there could have been accountability. And I'll just say, like, being a black woman who's worked in hip hop for so many years at this point, I was prepared for. I was prepared for the response. I mean, it's it's a weird it's a precarious place of when you do want to push back as a black woman in an interview, and then they go from feeling open, feeling like maybe at best it's an intimate space, it's a safe space where you can start talking, like you can really start talking about the music, really getting granular to all of a sudden, but also like sometimes like oh she cut this can be a flirting opportunity to to like nah, nah, she's trying to tell me, she's trying to paint me like that. I ain't getting I ain't going out like that. So I was very I was very prepared for the lack of accountability and the shutdown, And I'm glad, I'm proud of the way we handled it. I don't think well done.
It was like I got to say, you were saying, y'all, like there was parts where you can hear you still you stayed on him here, but then Rodney would come Rodney's voiceover would come in, but you still hear you in the back, And I'm like, Oh, that's tough.
You was not you was acting like.
It was what did you say?
Who said no?
Who said no to do?
In the interview?
Oh?
Who are the people that have said no to talking on the season?
Oh?
A lot of people.
Yeah, I don't know.
I don't know.
If you want to look look at if you listen to each episode, though.
You can you can think you assume together, you.
Know what I'm saying.
You can assume, okay, who who would have been the party in this episode?
And then even in certain episodes like this morning when I listened to uh this morning, I listened to episode five about you know about about the ol G Kim you try to flat out like we reached out and you said no until then we DM them. They know all of a sudden they're checking for It's like, yep, there's always there's always something with these.
There's always something. So yeah, the episode that just came out, I mean again another another opportunity for moving forward, humility, accountability, you know, looking at a situation with fresh eyes and you know, more time between and uh so yeah. The episode is about Kim Osorio's sexual harassment lawsuit against the Source magazine and its co owners back in like two thousand and five, two thousand and six, and how she specifically did not win on the sexual harassment and gender discrimination claim she won on other lesser claims, and what that could have meant for hip hop if if she was awarded, it could have been a real like you know belt, it could have been a real bel to home. It could have been a real culture shift of sexual harassment is not is not to be played with, like it's not condoned in this industry, in this culture at all, but it but it wasn't. So we kind of look at the missed opportunity of it, and so within that we did try to interview, We did our due diligence. We tried to interview ben Zeno, We tried to interview Dave Mays, and Benzino didn't answer for months and months and months, and then we hit him on DMS and his first question, his only question, really was is there a check involved? And we don't pay for interviews, like and that's another that's another journalist standard.
I feel like that would have been a great moment for him, especially the fact that he has daughters and daughters that.
We know that he could have liked.
And then Dave Mays took it even a step further. He never responded to our producer. He never said yes or but he hit us back via his lawyer saying that he sent kim Olsawy a cease and desist, which is so threatening to sue her if she breached her contract if you heard anything on our podcast that indicated she was breaching her podcast.
It was so it was so funny hearing that right this morning on my way to gym, because I'm like, there's no way these two niggas was acting like because over I was telling Nyla and d Block last week or was it the other day? I forget, but I was telling him over the pandemic I had, you know, when clubhouse was and it took me so long to get on it.
Because I was like, what I talked for free? What all right?
And so I was like, you know, if I get on here, I'm going to use this as a space to delve and be respecting journalistic things.
I remember that way. I remember that.
So I did the wrong.
So I did the room in.
That Kim, Dave ben Zeno, every all of them was in his room. And for the next two weeks they both were hounding me. One other person I ain't gonna say the name here because he wants he asked for too much credit. But all three of them were on my neck for the next two weeks. You used to come do this, and you used to come do this, and I'm like, so when I heard, I'm like, wait, people were asking, people were reaching out to you for interviewing. You were begging me to do another like literally begging you should do another room and then I could tell you the story.
And I can tell you the story. I'm like, I don't, I don't.
I mean, but that's the difference. Like the room was about the story days. Yeah, we weren't asking about the glory, you know, was just asking about when it when she got shit got this sticky, she got grind me you know, of what what how the hand, how the situations could have been handled and how they're looked back on now, maybe with a fresh perspective or maybe not.
What do you think hip hop's problem is with accountability?
Mhm, See this is a hard hitting journalistic questions.
Okay, I notice what I said. I said I want to be one. I'm just I know so many people. I know you guys, and I know so many people that work in Like I said, when I say go to school, I just mean you went and learned the ethics. I'm self taught in all this, but I can't learn ethic. I have to go look that up.
And I just but I.
Mean, you are asking like the essential questions. And hip hop's problem with accountability is just society's problem with accountability. To accountability requires you to give up power, and people do that.
But I think most mostly, everything that we're talking about in regards to hip hop culture, it's not just on hip hop culture. It's just American culture across the board. I didn't want to say it earlier because we were not. This isn't it's it's a world renowned problem.
And the irony is hip hop was created because people didn't have power in protests. Yeah, in protest for for the way that black people in America were being forgotten about, marginalized, oppressed. Still to this day, like it's a huge accelerator for hip hop and the messages in hip hop, and the irony of the way that power exchange or inequality of power is replicated in hip hop is what is? You know, it's I mean, it's sad.
It's just a reflection of the culture.
But I do think that now, because you guys are doing think pieces like this, I feel like we're growing into a space where men are changing their ways.
You do I wish?
I mean, look at mouth, I'm an outlier.
I'm an outlier. One more. I'm not reformed. Let's not say that.
But once again, it's once things are put in front of you, you now have a choice.
Exactly am I going to continue to do? Okay?
Growing up, like you said, growing up in this culture, consuming this culture, specifically in New York, it was like, okay, doing this growing.
Up used to be funny.
Now as an adult doing this makes it a whole entire group of innocent people feel away.
Do I still want to be responsible for that?
The answer is I have these debates with my dad all the time about things that was normal to him. I'm like, that's actually mad offensive, and I feel like, you know what I mean.
He's like, you know what, You're right, so.
It mus be nice.
My dad be like, yeah, it's right, like what you said. It's about taking accountability. But I'll say, for me, so far in my journey, like I've ran into both. I ran into like men like Charlottemaye who embrace it in power and constantly like try to big up. And then I ran into guys who've tried to fuck and fuck me over and like try to belittle me or not take me seriously because I'm a woman. So I feel like I feel like I've been lucky. Whereas like I feel like if I came around the nineties, like I've heard horror stories of like men trying to beat up women because they got two mics, you know, from like the source or something like that.
So I say, can we make.
Like a huge conscious effort to protect like women like Nila and women like saying like you're not gonna play like And I think that's what that is what needs to start happening. Is it gonna happen? I think Lotto said it on your last episode it's on the men. The men have to fix it. We can't just like we tell people. Sometimes some people listen to this, but it can't be the burden of the oppressed person to teach the oppressor. The oppressor has to find the error within their ways and then say do I want to continue to oppress or do I not want?
Do I want to liberate?
Well, let me ask you something, because like how you called yourself an outlier? How hard?
How hard is it to be an outlier when because you know, I'm a little older, so you know, I feel like if you ain't starting to come to your senses a little bit about this sage, it's probably ain't no hope for you.
But it's like that a few few ages down as well. It's like, all right, so it sounds super cornoys. So I grew up, So let's just talk about massage in the war, right. I grew up in the church. I was constantly shown what's the word I'm looking for? The hypocrisy and a lot of the messages right, specifically fire and brimstone. If you're gay, you're going to hell. Hmm, that's funny because the Minister of music is gay. I don't care what y'all got.
To say about it. He's gay.
That big ass bow tie is not for any he's gay, but you'll benefit from him making sure your sound sounds good and your your ministry sounds good. But then you'll step on that same pulpit and then condemn him to hell.
Women.
I've watched women be demeaned, both consciously subconsciously watched them, And we could talk about that a whole other topic, right, just the insidianess of the Black Church, but just specifically seeing that on a surface level, being like, okay, so you give this woman all the credit. Oh, the woman you keep the house, she's ahead of my house or the first lady da dah, But she can't pret she's not allowed to priests or you know, she has to damn call you.
Daddy to get some type of It just.
Never made sense to me, right, So then I would always have that critique, right, And then I just didn't want to be a person as a person, right. I didn't want to be a person who's just evil to people that don't deserve it. We were talking about innocent people. So if me running out here, we're from New York, so we know that F word used to fly, and it wouldn't even be at gay people. That would be the thing I could count. And I might be I might be dragging, but I don't think I've ever in my entire life called a gay person the F word. Growing up, it was always a friend to friend thing, a peer to peer thing. But then you realize, hey, this offends people, people who ain't bothering you. That's always been as somebody who don't mind offending people. I am offending people. I'm bothered learn people that ain't bothering me.
Here, let's fix that. Don't nobody want to hear that shit.
Because there comes an access with the disrespect. Somebody's oppression lends to somebody's access elsewhere. And I didn't learn that in full until I was became a cast member of the Grapevine. Now no other place was I sitting My mom and her homegirls were having these conversations, and if they were, they weren't having them around us. My cousins wasn't having these conversations. I was only seeing one side of it, and that's the barbershop side.
Man is dish man, you better, you.
Better watch your selfwere and these big that the only other instance you have. The only other opinion you have is Lauren Hill, if we're being honest, because you listening, like, wait for real, he don't know. And so sitting on that grape vinecast for so long, it was like, now you you're looking at the mirror. Some you got to change, bro, But that doesn't happen on everyone. The same way I looked in the mirror, said some shit gotta change other people and you you can go look at it.
I'm holding that same mirror to other men and they're like, look at this, bro, you wanna keep doing this? And the ands would be an emphatic yes, I want to keep doing this. I want to keep living this way.
I want to keep because there comes an access, and I think that's what everyone needs to understand. I think when it comes to these conversations about misogynal war and all of this, I think there's two things that needs to be examined. One someone's oppression immediately to someone else's access right immediately. It's like the science of it. Right, if I press you here, that means I get access here. That's why people vote the way they vote. That's why people spend the money they ware they spend their where they live, where they live, I outpress somebody, we move this community of people out of this neighborhood. That means brand new apartments for people to come gentrify. Right, So if we keep our foot on these women, that means these niggas keep getting to be mediocre and nobody can challenge them.
That's what That's what Jamilla Lamu's whole piece was out, which was really a guiding light to us when we were starting to do research and we were trying to figure out which stories to tell, because I mean, for the ten episode sprint, you can only tell ten stories. And then you got to match up with what stories you want to tell and who you can get because again people said some people said no, But but I remember so much when we were talking about our research, you kept pulling up that article. I wish, I wish I what was her name?
What was the name of?
Well that's not the full title, but yes, it's Dave Chapelle. It's basically you know, and in response to Dave Chappelle's comedy specialist closer and his transphobic to it.
Yeah, and man, that's a that's a deep essay.
You know, And and actually you know, you were talking a lot about accountability, and that's going to be an aisode a little later in the season where I kind of explore that ground a lot, you know, and I talked to Jamila.
Right, it's just literally one of the smart people I've ever met in my life. You're now listening to what hip hop questions legend listen will be right back after the break.
I'll say this in regards to it's not really accountability, but I guess into like hip hop toxic.
Norms, they're so normal you don't.
Even realize that it's toxic, right, And that's the tricky part.
So it's hard to even because.
I actually want you guys to elaborate a little more about episode three and how you guys broke down the three different stories on the same lens. But just like you don't really realize what you're in because we've just been in it for so long. So it's just going to take a complete lifestyle change, you know. But how are you going to make a lifestyle change when you're just making so much money off of it because everybody is getting and bread.
You mean, in regards specifically to the theme on episode three.
I meant overall with everybody, Like, why would men stop rapping about this if they're making a lot of money off it and people are doing it, why would women stop, you know, selling sex if I'm making all this money off of it.
Yeah, well, I mean on the point of selling sex. I think that was a big That was a big meditation we had for episode four. I do want to talk about three. But but episode four, which is all about sexual agency, it's selling sex for whose I because Trina was You know, Trina is so much of a blueprint for a lot of the girls today because she not only got really explicit on the MIC, but she did it for herself. She centered herself. She turned men into accessories at a time when Uncle Luke who they were treating women as accessories. She literally flipped the script on it. And then she flipped the script again when she outgrew Trick, who prison zumably made her. But I think it's always just about it's about intent, Like what is the end goal to it? And if the end goal is a check you gotta I don't know, you you should think about what your relationship to overall capitalism is, you know, which is another that's underpinning Yeah, that's of hip hop now, and like it's it's a huge it's a huge accelerator to a lot of the decisions we make. Yes, because we live in a capital society, right, But I think it's who are you doing it for? Who are you speaking to? What is your audience? What is what do you what do you want to give your audience? And what are you trying to get out of the art you're creating. Because I don't want to I don't want to discredit anything about the themes in it, because art is Catharsis in a lot of ways. And going back to the black ass lie, a lot of the dehumanization of black women in music historically has come from black men being dehumanized in all other facets and then once they have their own voice in their own microphone, you know, that residual dehumanization to actually get some of their sense of self back. That's a broad over generalization, but going back to Mouse's point of if you're so oppressed, you want to do something sometimes to feel less oppressed, less suppressed, and you got to look around and be like, Okay, who can I residually oppressed so that I can feel like I have some access that I can feel like I have some control and agency over it. So Trina flipping the script and being like not, actually, I'm I'm gonna have you eat my pussy and I'm gonna get the carno on the way out. Thanks, Like you know, she was completely flipping not only capitalists capitalist norms, and not only sex norms. Yeah, so many social norms. But I guess as it relates to episode three, the main theme. The main theme of episode three is body policing, and it's this idea which flows from the male gaze, which is the idea that everything everything done in society, everything that a woman does in society is in the eye of what a straight man wants to see, and in hip hop, it's like a straight black man. So it's male fantasies. And when you don't fit into that very specific box, that very specific mold, you are ostracized, ridiculed, dehumanized in so many different ways. So we looked at how that can happen on a personal level, and then a social level, social media level, and then also on a corporate level. So we talk to three different artists who've had their bodies policed in three different ways that are completely, like you said, normalized at this stage in the game. At this point. So we talked to dream Doll, who got real deep and I can't thank her enough for being so open with me about the real motivations behind all her surgeries, behind her breast augmentations, her BBL. When she had this moment where she was like, actually, this BBL, it's putting toxic chemicals into my body and I need to take it out, Like what was I doing this for? And it all on a real personal level. It all flowed back to a dusty X, like an X who was body shaming her and she was like, I'm gonna get over on him. And then she you know, she became a bodygirl, a body body yadda yadday to a reality start to a rapper, and she's very open with She's very open with all her surgeries on social media, in person, in her music. And then we spoke to Baby Tait. Rodney went to Atlanta and talked to Baby Tait a couple times about that moment. When she was on Afro Punk stage in twenty twenty one, she felt great on stage and then the Internet dragged her. The Internet dragged her because her stomach was not on flat flat, and her ass was not like all all the way up her back, you know what I mean. And so it's just this is this is wild. But again the Internet dragged her and she clapped back, and then things kind of dissipated. But what we want to always do in louder is look at the context of it, take things that sometimes feel like a blip on the radar, and really investigate their deeper meanings. And then for the third act, we talked to Doci, who's on TDE one of the most I feel like one one of them ones, one's a washer in this next couple of years, and the stand that she wanted to take with her debut video on TD for the for Crazy, she was purposely naked. She purposely had an all black female femcast who bared their bodies not for the male gaze but in direct opposition to it, and she was residually censored by by YouTube. They told her she was violating guidelines because what she was putting on the screen with that video was deemed to be sexually gratifying or titillating to men. She's like, it's actually the exact opposite of that. And so it was. It was restricted from trending, it was restricted from a lot of promotion. I mean in that case, it's she's come up off of it. Crazy is a great song. I feel like I hear crazy and commercial TV ads MoU d now, so it's like who got the last lab? For real? But still it's like, these are the battles that people just talk up to up. It's the industry, it's the culture that it's like, No, actually is deeper than that. There's gonna be an there's gonna be a couple episodes coming up where we really, we really get in the weeds, you could say, and like untangle a lot of the misogynistic underpinnings of artists who've had to just deal with it and keep it moving and you know, for the sake of getting their bag, for the sake of for the sake of feeling like they still want to make art, for the sake of sometimes just feeling like they need to stay relevant. What are some examples of that that we could talk about. Oh yeah, so yeah, Rico. I think this was also in twenty twenty one, when everybody started going back outside for the first time. Rico Nascy was the opening act on play by Cardis tour. Yeah, oh and she got I mean, in the grand scheme of it, it's it was a twenty stop tour, but for three or four essential stops, she was harassed non stop, to the point where somebody threw glass bottles at her. And this is not the first time somebody's throwing a glass bottle on stage. This is not the first time someone's throwing a glass bottle on stage at a rapper. But the motivations behind that throw and then what that really? What that really was an echo of of what her fans, who represent a very expansive femme demographic hip hop, what they were feeling when they had to be standing there and watch the person they actually came for get boomed, get ridiculed and feeling highly uncomfortable with me, and then they're feeling accosted by Playwork Cardis fans too, So we get into that really deep. The Maconean episode is a great example of that too.
You're stuck about that, Yeah, yeah, the macconey episode is.
I mean, what happens when you don't fit in the box and what the decision you have to.
Make for it exactly?
I mean everybody knows that. You know, Maconaan and Drake made history together. And you know, pretty quickly after after Tuesday went up, you didn't hear much about macona and there were a lot of rumors and a lot of things that happened. But when we talked to Maconyan, you know, Maconyan was not out at that time, right, you know, this was twenty fourteen, and a couple of years later he did come out and he lives in Portland now, so we went out to Portland and talked to him. He's in a really good space. First of all, he's in a great space. He still making.
Dope music, but he had to remove.
Himself from the industry because the industry wasn't ready. You know, he kind of predates, you know, this this era we're in now exactly where we see uh more queer artists, you know, getting mainstream you know, visibility and success, you know, and really running the industry in a lot of ways. He kind of was was just before that that curve. And so you know, we really get into I really, I really love this episode because of how we end up talking about this, this relationship, this partnership between him and Drake and what it says about black masculinity and what.
It says about the threat that.
Somebody like mcconnan might have been to somebody in Drake's position.
Yeah, you know what I'm saying.
And I think it's gonna be really interesting to kind of go back and look at that era through the lens of where we are now and and really kind of just break that down and see it in a new light, you know. And I hope that macone gets some some some love that that he deserves and really credit for being you know, way ahead, you know, musically, but also just you know, like stylistically, culturally, and a whole lot of other stuff.
You know.
Uh, when we talk about misogyny, misogynye and hip hop have gone hand in hand since I don't want to say since day one, but definitely since the commodification of hip hop. Definitely since the the dawn of gangster rapping all that what we know to be hip hop even before. See so so we talk about that, right even going back to when Drey and Snoop well like, you know, bitches ain't shit, and the Queen Latifah respondsib you know who you calling the bitch?
You know?
Uh, but today it's like the popular female rappers, some of our favorites, it seems that they are in protest or just because that's what they want to do. They're kind of doing the same thing, but turning it inward. So is it still objectification if women are taking control of it?
When you say turning inward? What do you mean?
So?
Like if if so, where drain and snoop or you know, the masses were.
You're a bitch, You're a bitch, You're a bit, You're a bitch, and you ho, you you hol, you sucka da.
But now women are like, I'm a suck to dick, I'm a bitch, I'm this, I'm not, I'm whoever I want to be.
Is that still objectification?
Because I think that's a question on the men that's in the middle, that's trying to figure things out. I think that's a bigger question. That's a big question that I see a lot. So from your standpoint or from you know what you've guys been experienced or reporting on, do you still look.
At that as do women see that as object or do they not care?
I mean, I think that's a person a person question. I remember when taking it back to twenty twenty. I remember when Wop came out. I remember when Wop.
Chop that shit. Everybody was up set.
What a year, what a weird space.
Everybody was inside and upside.
Yo. I was loving I was loving it. I was like, Yo, thank god, somebody gave us something news, something fresh, a complete flip CARDI is always good for that though. Yeah, but it was so funny. I remember I was okay story time. I was packing up one of my friend's apartments and they it had just dropped, and they don't work. They don't work in music. So I was like, Yo, did you see this video? Do you see this video? They were like no. We stopped everything in the midst of all the boxes and we watched this video and it was so hilarious. My friend's reactions. One of my friends was like, Yo, this is fucking amazing. Play it again. These are bad bitches. And the other friend is like, the whole song is about pussy. Yes, I mean it's but but but in that division, in that binary of points of view, it comes down to personal choice. Like we There's another example of this and Ride or Die, which is the book by Shanda Hubbard, who we also reference in season episode four of this season, and it's all about where does the where does agency lie on the line, Like if you say, for example, let's take let's take Megan Stallion, Megan is Stallion, Like she yeah, she'd be twerking for TikTok or talking for where else, But she also just towurks for herself. I'm sure for every little slipper that we see, I mean, her whole camera roll, probably that because that's what makes her feel good. That's what she loves to do, and that's how she celebrates her body. That's what she does in direct like subversion of somebody probably telling her about telling her not to do it. I think there's a line on one of her songs she's like, it's twenty twenty. I'm not still about to argue with you'all about working. I'm not so so when so when all these people came came at Megan and Cardi talking about how this is like completely you know, obscene, and like what about the are that?
What about?
Don't even started on how people try to use their children as shields for morality policing. That's a whole different in every I feel like in every tacit. But but it's all about I don't know, isn't there isn't there a better one in Gracie's corner?
Right, you've been apparently are you serious?
Top patrol? Paw patrol has like never, I'm not gonna speak. Let me be quiet because I don't even know anyway.
I just hear from my patrol is problematic patrols, problematic elements.
I'm hearing from my friends have kids.
Okay, it's okay, we are I definitely watched the police paraphernilia round.
Ye, it's that the police, poor patrol.
But going back to my point, how do you stay? I'm but going back to my original point, it's about the individual choice. I don't think that who I don't know, we could we could insert any name of like rap girl who's running things. I don't think it's fully it in the in the vein of how it was a couple of decades back where it was like this is the only way you can get put on. The space is so big and so expansive, so desparate. Now that you can put yourself on and you can crack of an image or persona that does include sex, and it's not the end result of like getting the attention of a man like I don't think going to starting to go to shows more in this you know what they call like a renaissance of women in rap. These shows are packed out with girls, women and fams who feel empowered. I've seen heard felt want to get up on stage and feel like and it's not for any man in the room.
Yeah, and see that's I feel like the big difference when you look at this era versus the reverse era that you're talking about, is.
Whose pleasure is being centered? Yeah?
You know what I'm saying, because you know I came up on the Luke and two Live era. You know, if you saw a woman on stage shaking ass, there will a whole bunch of men around, you know what I'm saying. And when you go to or see the videos you're talking about, what I don't know is there a single man in the WAP video?
Not straight one.
It's a whole lot of twerking. It's a whole lot of you know, sex going on. But it's.
The South. Couldn't help but coming going on. Sex is going on, y'all? Is sex in the video? It's going on? They said, Rodney, what sex happening. No, it was going on, yo.
I like what you said about it being like up to the individual, and I think across the board when it comes to the top the topic of misogyn are in general, it's up to the individual of men to want to grow and be held accountable and change, and it's up to women on how they want to present themselves. So I think at the end of the day, I guess my beef with it is that there are there are just different types of people across the board.
You know what I mean.
There are men who are womanizers, there are women who do the same thing in return. There are some people who are monestors, some people who aren't. So I think just changing the lens and making it fair is just what's the important part of the narrative that you guys are doing, which is dope.
So that's my flowers to you guys.
But like, and I think we're in an era where with social media and with so many different means to talk to people and connect with people, I don't feel like an artist like I don't know Sweety. I feel like I know so much more about Sweety than I would know about Camore a Foxy because she connects directly. It's not she's not just she's not talking, she's not just rapping about her bbl or whatever it is. She's also doing cooking videos. So showing off her nails, Megan Meghan, the fact that we know so much about Meghan's love of anime as an example, like you see the complex layer, the complex, like people are multifaceted. And I don't think that's that's a grit, that's a piece of grace that was offered to women in a couple of decades or a couple of generations back, and that's not to fold them. Yeah, I don't think it's something where it's like, oh yeah, the these women in the old school were you know, they were silenced or stuck or they had to be tokenized like they were. They were working with what they had, and they're the reason that these building blocks are even there for us as black women working in music, for black women making music to even have the dexterity and even want to show off and and and have the community to have us back up, have what we do be backed up. So I think it really is about it's about showing off more and more multifaceted level or version of yourself and having it always be led by individual choice.
I love that when.
What is it?
What is it? When? Or how how how do we deal with it?
Or point a finger out to put a finger on it when it's it's still much a soogyntal war when women are the actors in it right when we're looking, when we're talking about That's why I asked if both of your friends were both women, because there's the women that are like, yes, empowerment, but then there was women that were kind of siding with the group of men that.
Were like, put your pussy away, stop talking about this.
What a yeah, Jama even Jamaine dupri when he you know, he's like, he said, it's strippers wraps, but which is fine with me.
But we've always gott I know, not like are not culture creators, like the strip club.
The A and rs are the strippers exactly.
We've been saying this for years. Oh I got to go play this in.
A strip club exactly.
That's how you know if you really got something, if it really goes up in it.
So god forbid, they say, you know what, I want to take a stab at rapping tied of sweaty ones if you are tied of sweaty ones, you may not be tied sweaty one just saying, but what happens when it's the women that are the ones saying saying these things? Is that? Is that something that happens in a vacuum?
Is that?
Or is that something that can lend to misogyn wars staying in place?
It's definitely women can be misogynistic. We know that's true. Misogyn noir can come for anybody because we live in a patriarchal misogynistic society overall. So yeah, you can have it be internalizing ways you don't even know. But I think it's really more about opening up the conversation and just changing the mindset, changing in some ways, like the brain chemistry of how you're thinking about it, and like what's the what's the main what's the main issue? Or what is your what is your what is the basis of your issue with it? Because if Quardi b and Megan Stallion want to rap about pussy, what does that have to do? What does that have to do with me wanting to or not wanting to sing along with rapping out pussy? You know what I mean? It's entertainment. You can opt in and opt out, and it's based on again like individual choice. But I think going back to my two friends, and I'm not I. I think, uh, I have a I have a really great, diverse FANK group that has real conversations and real healthy debates and leads with empathy and all of those debates. It's about having a real conversation and space for moments of enlightenment of like wait, actually it's a it's about something on a personal level, like what do you either way you either way you cut it? It's about agency, right and what is your what is your instinct to want to police someone's body? What does that actually say about? Like what your what your basis and the thought processes that. And I will say my other friend who was like the whole song is pussy, she loved that song.
I would say I didn't even see anything wrong with like the video or like my first reaction was like damn nah Megan, snap second versus like let me try yes.
The fact that she's just honor like she has to yo, Oh my gosh, wait, I'm sorry one.
What are you doing? What are you doing? You don't know, you don't know?
Are we doing Megan slander over there?
Okay? As journalists?
Yeah, jo Meghan slander as a journalists.
Is there not a difference between an objective opinion and slander?
Oh my gosh, I asked a simple question.
Look at the.
Man.
I knew we should have stopped that started. No, I just don't think that Megan be snapping. But that's on me. I don't at least I think Megan has the ability to rap very well? Now does Does that is her music that she releases indicative of that skill?
No?
I think the music because you don't.
Know.
I like what she can. Kim rapped about the same ship. Kim was nice when she was nice, and then it was records, you know, in the Lady that was. I think, like it's gotten very steale. It's gotten very stale, and I think was.
Not part of that.
What you gotta say.
I like this, I like the song.
I like what lets I like the song, I like the institution, I like the song, I like like, I like what. But I think, all right, that's fine because I don't want I want you to. I already got ad got you tomatoes.
Throw really good thing.
But it's really good to you over the end, like I'll say you might as.
Well say you got to say it.
No, it's okay.
The guests are asking you to say it.
I'll tell them.
The thing I did want to make mention of there was a part in the UH in episode three. I think you're speaking to dreamed all and I think something was said to the aesthetic of you know, things should be.
About talent and not the way someone looks. Yeah, remember that.
Yeah, She's like, it should be about my talent first, but in the in this industry, it's never about that.
The only pushback I had on that was what it's not for her looks?
Thought for her looks? She would she not she's not for her talent.
Because she's not she When she started, she wasn't good. She's gotten extremely better from the time she started to now.
I'm not gonna lie. I like the early dream doll.
I'm like black, full up skirt skirt where you at that? I mean the hardcore New Dream. The hardcore New Dream is cool, but the other wasn't bad.
It was vibe.
And then you know how it was vibe. Hear the words we use.
You notice how many people like.
Stuff was good?
She had and then showed up in a Cardi record. It showed up in an Uzi record, it showed up in a ue.
And this is before the rebrain where she became all gangster and ship. She was she had something, she was just growing. I don't think she needs to switch up, though.
But I just think that statement alone was just I was like, h it was weird because I'm like, well, there's certain artists who definitely would not be here if not for their look that.
You claim are talented by the way down in here is some of your favorites that you claim are talented by the way.
I don't know who's talking about, but here's the thing. Great players don't always make great coaches. So yes, some of the people that I think are really good rappers, they might say she's talented. I don't trust their eye on talent. I just trust them to make music. Don't put that noughts on me, now, leave me alone, okay.
But looks looks are important across the board, just in the world presentation like your parents says everything about you before you get to open your mouth. So I feel her on that it should just be about the talent, But it's.
Just I disagree. It should never just be about the talent. It's a total package deal with it. We're talking about here, you got to be.
Able, you have I mean, yeah, that's what it is. But I do feel like it should be about the talent. There's my great records artists that go under talent.
She lead.
But now talent is like an accessory.
It's like what has gone so low on the list of essentials.
It's like, oh, she's cute, she got a blue check.
Yeah, well they all got a blue check now, brother month, everybody got a blue check. Yeah, you're right, everybody got a blue check now, fourteen ninety nine.
So that's yeah.
I just think I think my thing with it, obviously, y'all can put your input. My thing with it is I think we get so stushy when it comes to talent, right Like when Cardi started rapping and putting out music, was she the most talented rapper at skill wise? No, but she was talented at selling shit. She was talented at selling herself to people and showing people, hey.
You should give a fuck about this going on.
I think a lot of the girls are and I think the women should have the opportunity to figure out the talent of wrapping it just like the way the guys do know.
But the bar is never that, it's never it's never the same though, Like that's what we're That's exactly what we're talking about. It's never a level playing field.
I agree, I'm saying it should be. I agree that it's not, but it should be. That's why it's it's it's important that when it's important that men say when when you see other men like, oh just here, push you right again, let's astro, let's make some let's make fun of them, Like I have so much fun doing it on Twitter when I see guys be like, oh, puss you right, Like, oh you only pushing the.
Are we gonna start calling it like fucking penis wrap? When he's like, like, what's the fun?
I mean not picking that playlist up?
I mean the thing is like like you're saying, oh, the scrutiny only goes one way.
You don't screw double the look for dudes.
Right and this you know you're talking about that.
That's that episode with Dreamed all yeah, and later in the episode in the Baby Taste, they talk about you know, it's it's a lot of dusty negroes and wrap the dusty Negro aesthetic is like a.
Real who's a dusty Negro rapper?
I mean, don't make don't put it elbows wife beater on stage, just about give me a rapper and hip hop for a long time.
That's to keep it real, aesthetic, keep it real.
Nobody nobody want, nobody want to put it.
I mean, we've been putting the name on everything today, but now we don't want to put.
A name on the dusty Negro wrapper.
It's it's so many, like, give.
Me a d n all said, there's so many, give.
You give me a d n all. Dusty negrapp.
Don't feels.
Not.
Who do you think would yeah, yeah, get eyes big now yeah, dj nihlis. I'm one who is somebody you would identify as a dusty Negro rapper.
I never even heard of this term.
But now we just told you. Right now, break it down again, Sidney, you said as.
Elbows wife beat on stage, real little ginge.
I'm thinking of legends. That's like that that describes legends. Right, No, no, no, no, no no no.
I'm not all Yeah, you get around, real niggas act like a real niggah.
What's going on.
I'm just I'm listening.
Made to Get Away Possession.
We love listening to you guys and all that you're doing. What is next for a lot of Than The Riot once the season?
Right? Oh wow, that is a very good question. I'm still trying to figure that out.
Okay, yeah, yeah.
I don't know how much we want to speak on that said, if you want to, yeah.
I mean, but you know, well, the reality of the situation, which we were talking about a little bit before the mics came on me is crumbling, y'all. Like these layoffs are is a lot of tumble weeds rolling through like it's scary hours whether you know what, there be a print in digital space or an audio space or a video space, like there's been layoffs at ESPN, Washington Post, paper magazine, and that doesn't even that doesn't even factor in hip hop media spaces. Hip hop media is also a very weird limbo right now and Louder than the Riot was one of four narrative long form podcasts that were what's the word? They don't want to see something discontinued, and so this is going to be the last table table.
I don't know. We got to find that table.
MPR discontinued the podcast version of our show. So there's not going to be a season three. There's nothing concrete for season three right now, because the reality is it does take a lot of money to create shows like this. We don't want we don't be cutting corners. We really dig in and we we go for long haul type of interviews, type of chase and type of stories that we tell is the long form, and we want to we want to stay at that caliber and that just you know, it takes a lot of time and a lot of money in addition to the financial situation there. In my opinion, there seems to be a real recoil now in the media space in a lot of different industries about black things. You know, in twenty twenty, everybody was really rushing to start to cover stories. Now, you know, when budgets are getting tight, those are a lot of those black stories are the first things to go. And I do see in a lot of different spaces there is a disconnect between what companies will say that they want for an audience and what there will to put money into and what they're willing to invest in in an intrinsic way get that audience that they're trying to get that.
They say they're scared why or are they scared power?
I don't know, because hip hop the best selling genre and has been for so long.
Same thing with media.
They just believe that white people care white and black people care more about white things than the return that's going to show for a black thing.
I think I don't know how to change that.
I don't know how many times they have to look on YouTube and see all these journalists and see all the money they're bringing in and all the views they're bringing in, or you got to listen to a podcast and see all that.
I don't know.
I give what I do when we do this shit. I don't give fuck about white gays. It's like, listen, if you care about hip hop, if you care about this very black thing that start out this very black way, then this is for you. And I think if we just focus on that and obviously like utopian outlook to have, but.
I mean, but yeah, that's like, that's that's how we enjoy it, you know, that's how we That's that's hip hop for us and to us and by us. You know what I'm saying, So why why cater to to anybody else. I mean, they don't they don't need to be catered to in order to love hip hop at all.
We don't be talking about y'all. We don't be.
About y'all.
Y'all show up. Yeah, you have to have an aunt.
You be like, no, we were just talking about you don't joint in the lab.
Take this thing out of it.
You make fun of somebody and they laughing, which you know we're laughing at.
And we were, i mean super committed to never being like that from the beginning, Like that was one of the one of the temples, Like we are not translating what none of this means, because traditionally the long form podcast space is also another It was meant to be like a disruptive space for radio, but it ended up just being another white dominated space. And so for us, we were making, you know, our pitch to the first season, we were like, we are not doing no. There's this thing at MPR called the explanatory comma, so and we're like, we're not doing no explanatory commas. We're not translating. We're talking to hip hop hip hop audience members first. We're talking to black people who love hip hop first, and everybody else can catch up. Everybody else can like come along for the ride, but like knowing that they are, you know, the second not the second tier, but like an additional kind of like tan general. It's a great example. You you gave about listening to some show and then you got to pause the show and open up another tab. If they say something you don't know who it is, Okay, if we do that, if we listen into something, yeah, yup. There's a lot of examples of that. In the first season. There was the scene about the I think I might have said this already, but the Bobby Schmirder trilogy and Sean Money was talking about an mcm bag and there was remember there was a discussion about like should we just say a bag or should we say what an mcm bag is? Just like, no, we say in an mcm bag, because if you fucking if you know, you know, you know what an mcm bag is.
You know just how much of a headlock mcm bags had. Over verse twenty fourteen, we was hmned up by then mcn bag in the belts in the book bag, Oh my god, green One. I'm just I'm glad we're free.
Some people, Hey, I mean, you go to some parts of Brooklyn, they not, I will say, just to end on the thought of the future of Louder than the Riot, like we're still going to tell these stories. Hip hop is an oral tradition. What we do is an extension of that oral tradition, and it will live on somewhere. We will still work somewhere, Like there's nothing wrong with the formula. It's really just seeing where it fits and where it can be Banker to be honest with you, like right now, it's it's it's floating and it's in the air and it's nebulous, but it's Gonland.
As we discussed earlier, we're not even more so paying attention to publications. We're just tapping in with the people who are part of our tribe. So you guys are definitely part of our tribe, and don't worry about that. We'll be following you, guys regards wherever you go.
Just tell Rynie You'll be like, say something and then we'll follow the voice, follow the voice.
Hey, we appreciate y'all.
Appreciate y'all.
Man.
I tell the people they can find Louder in the right where they can find you. Guys, and you know, continue to follow you, guys, and this as this media landscape gets shaken up.
I mean, I'm I'm I'm pretty much just you know, overhead on Twitter. I do a little lurking on Instagram, but you know, I don't know message is getting lost. I don't don't even hit me on you know, I still don't know how.
To do all that.
But what's the Twitter name?
Oh yeah, Rock find me on Twitter.
Well, and it's not even your name too, so it's not like they can look I.
Am at Rodney Ology, just Rodney with ology.
On the end. O L O G Y.
I like that.
Dissertations for days forty characters are less. Yeah, and you can catch me always clanning on Rodney on Twitter and elsewhere everywhere. It's at sid Underscore, Madden, and you can hear everything about Louder on NPR or wherever you get your podcasts, so Spotify, Amazon, Apple, all that, and you can follow at Louder than Riot on Twitter.
Love that Until next time, guys, Thank you guys for joining us. Make sure you like, share, subscribe, follow. I'm sorry I forgot to hit that, but like, share, subscribe, follow. We'll be back again next Monday, Pace.
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