BedBunker Safe: Guns & Money Under the Mattress!

BedBunker - Concealed Gun Safe

I hope I don't have to explain why this fine product, the BedBunker concealed gun safe, might be of interest to various segments of the hip hop community!

From the press release:

"The BedBunker safe...replaces the box spring under a bed and is compatible with most standard twin, queen and king bed frames, and a lighter version is available for RVs. Two safe sections bolt together from the inside, which makes it virtually impossible to move once the two safe sections are bolted together in place....

"Product inventor/designer John Adrain conceived of the idea while looking for an improved gun storage solution with limited space available. "Traditional gun safes are very obvious to an intruder and can take up a big part of a room"...

"The safe can hold 35 rifles and 70 hand guns. You can nearly double the number of rifles if you put them in socks and double stack them."

Only 35 rifles? Guess I'll have to put mine in socks and double stack!

Woo hoo!!

MySpace: BedBunker Demo Video

[Photo courtesy PRNewsFoto/Heracles Research Corporation]

Beanie Sigel Promotes Solution w/Anti-Violence PSA

Beanie Sigel gets great coverage on a FOX affiliate for his anti-violence PSA and his new album, The Solution.  He could not have gotten that positive coverage without the PSA.

On the one hand, artists that make art glorifying violence saying that you shouldn't do violence just in time for a relatively violent album release is pretty f*cking ridiculous.

On the other, Beanie's come a long way from the dumb-seeming thug with serious flow on Backstage.

So it's good he's speaking out about violence no matter how bizarre it might seem.  And it's nice to see Sigel turn out to be something other than an idiot savant which was my initial assumption.  Seriously.

Idiot savant isn't quite right.  A generally belligerent, potentially dangerous, mentally/emotionally disturbed street poet would be more accurate regarding my first impressions of Beanie Sigel.

Update:
On a related note, Tupac's Thug outsells Life and Rizoh is right on all counts, they should have released it as a double cd and thug love has led to a "proliferation of pseudo gangstas in the game".

Young Buck Inspires DJs To Address Hip Hop Violence

Although Young Buck says he didn't do it, djs are responding to his alleged attack on a club dj who played The Game's It's Okay (One Blood) by refusing to play Young Buck's music.  So far, some Atlanta radio stations have also joined in and there will certainly be more action on the way.

First, let me make clear that I'm incredibly happy about this development.  The violence of far too many hip hop artists and their associates, some of whom include djs, has kept hip hop from developing in a positive and productive manner.

Although I would like to see such action come from the writing community, anyone familiar with writers, especially in the mainstream media (that includes Vibe, XXL, etc.), knows that writers do not generally have each other's backs.  In part, that's due to the actions of editors and publishers who directly benefit from hip hop violence and keep writers in line when it comes to touchy subjects that might alienate advertisers.

But back to the djs because, as one dj stated regarding the Young Buck situation in relationship to hip hop as a whole:
We gotta do today what we can do to prevent any more negative sh*t in hip-hop. We're already on the line now. DJ's are the only thing keeping this balanced because the artists are out of control.

And, you know what?  He's absolutely right.  No one else within hip hop is positioned to make the kind of change that club and radio djs can make if they are truly unified.

Everyone in the industry knows this, that's why Young Buck immediately went into damage control and why BME sent out a Young Buck-free version of Lil Scrappy's Money In The Bank mighty damn quick.

I know I tend to hope for too much when I see signs of organic political action in hip hop, as occurred with Jay-Z's Cristal boycott which I initially mistook for a political maneuver, but that's fine with me.  I'd rather live in the belief that individuals working together based on their self-interest can effect positive change in the world than simply accept the status quo and stack dollars.  The latter is a punk move, in my honest opinion.

In any case, such actions are long overdue and ProHipHop will support them whenever possible.

The Ave: 5 Years After 9/11

The Ave magazine takes a look at the loss of civil liberties since 9/11.

Also worth checking out:

A roundup of 9/11 links at Notes From A Different Kitchen.  [via The Rap Up]

Eskay pays respect to the innocent people who lost their lives.

Let's Start A Fresh Conversation About Marketing With Guns

I've been trying my best not to write about all the interesting stuff I'm finding on marketing and ad blogs that isn't directly hip hop related but this ad about banks featuring a gun seemed close enough.  Like many striking images of ads, it arrives via Coloribus:

The entrance of the Mass Rapid Transportation transformed to resemble a bank, so that people will feel as if they are entering the lobby of a bank. As they enter the station, they will see a bank teller pointing a gun at them, communicating that a bank is robbing you with high interest.

I like this ad for a lot of reasons.  In particular, it's a great twist on the bank robber concept and makes creative use of everyday movement through a physical space.

But it's also an opportunity to start adding some nuances to my ongoing discussion of guns and marketing.  The reality is that I'm drawn to a wide range of gun references in art and media but the unwillingness of many in the hip hop blogging scene to do anything but dismiss critiques of gun images has put me in a position where I've generally taken a fairly hardline stance.

Why do I take that stance?  Because I've observed that the images and language we create and consume has a material impact on our lives and I've seen that both personally and on a much larger scale.  Given that shootings are becoming a mundane occurence in some sectors of hip hop, I think it's incumbent on artists, media people and marketers to start considering the effects of what we do in a manner that goes beyond stacking bills.

To be honest, I find it incredibly strange that people involved in the arts and media (including marketers), who know how powerful music, language and images have been in their own lives, will dismiss the notion that music and art can have an actual material impact on the world.  It's like, as soon as someone's asked to take even limited responsibility for the effects of what they do, they start arguing that it's all just fun, entertainment, i.e. not that important when we have larger issues to consider.

Although I feel that some artists and business people say such things because they don't want anybody f*cking with their money, I have the feeling that some folks who dismiss my concerns really do believe what they're saying.

However, I'm willing to leave the one-sided discussion behind if other folks are.  I've never advocated censorship, despite claims to the contrary.  I have always advocated responsibility for what one puts out in the world and responsibility for whom one associates with.  Often my concern has been not that someone thinks a particular image or statement is fine with them, but that they have to dismiss any possibility that words and images might have a negative impact on the world in order to remain comfortable with their own desires.

Such a discussion doesn't need to happen here, though I'll certainly keep posting on the topic.  I just think we, as hip hop writers, fans, business people and artists, need to up our game on breaking down the effects of our words and images and start finding more ways to creatively live with the contradictions in our lives.  I believe that if a critical mass can build within hip hop, one that does not present a one-sided kneejerk reaction to social issues but is also unwilling to evade responsibility, we can have a positive impact not only on hip hop but on society as a whole.

And if that leads to better music, it's all to the good.

Gravy Discovers That Fame Requires Visible Wounds

Nice piece in the New Yorker by Ben McGrath on Hot 97's history of weirdness featuring the "shooting" of Gravy.

As Funkmaster Flex states:
I wonder—no one has ever really seen the wound . . . Probably the person who treated it is the only one who saw it. It couldn’t have been excruciating pain. He was moving his hips up there. I mean, I’d like to see it. I’m sure we all would.

Nevertheless, Gravy's learning from the experience:
Gravy was sitting in a car, listening to Hot 97, when the devastating news [that his music would never be played on Hot 97 again] was delivered. “If I died, or if I had to go through a sh*t bag—you know, where you get shot in the stomach and you can’t sh*t regular, got to wear the bag—they’d be playing me like crazy,” he said, still incredulous. “You have to damn near die to be famous these days?”

Not only that, he's discovering there's more to marketing than Hot 97:
"New Yorker? How many people see that sh*ts?” He reflected a moment. “Damn. Who needs Hot 97? I got New Yorker and MySpace.”

Lots of other good stuff in there.

Via Music Filter.  It's back and it looks like Oliver Wang's sticking around for the summer plus Paul Shrug has joined up.

Marketing Violence: Leveraging The Tru Life/Dipset Beef

In a move eerily reminiscent of hip hop media's boosting of the Tupac Shakur/Biggie Smalls beef, Hashim Warren at Hip Hop Blogs boosts L.I.F.E. DVD magazine with an "exclusive" video of Tru Life making violent threats against Cam'Ron and Dipset, describing Cam as wanting to be like 50 (shot numerous times) and Pac (murdered in a shooting) and stating "my Dominicans will put one in your face", etc., etc.

Beneath the video Hashim states:
Because I'm feeling how L.I.F.E. DVD gets down, I joined the team to help them push this web video movement. Cop the latest DVD - it's crack.

There's at least one version of the core threats with clearer audio as well as at least one other "exclusive" video [Hashim is treading a well worn path here] posted at YouTube.  In my aging curmudgeonly fashion, I must point out yet again to members of the hip hop media, exclusive doesn't mean you were the only one talking to the interviewee at the time or that you had a unique camera angle, exclusive means you were the only one who has anything.

I know, I know. I'm too damn serious for my own good, expect too much from bloggers, only look at the surface of things, read Bill Cosby and Stanley Crouch when no one's looking, and so forth.

Besides, beef doesn't kill, members of rappers' entourages do.

Marketing With Guns: Revolutionary Fantasies & Cynical Opportunists

I've been checking out the n*ggaz With Guns mixtape about which I've previously expressed my concerns.  I'll have to say it's a more complex mix of ideas via song selection than I expected.  Unfortunately, the political program seems to be to encourage black people to stop shooting each other, to buy Ice Cube's next album, to turn the guns on the oppressors, to hookup with Urban World Wireless and what?  Use your mobile devices to coordinate armed revolution?

I get the buy stuff part.  But if you believe you can pull off a black armed revolution at this point in time, keep dreaming, yo.  Picking up the gun in self defense when people are threatening you with guns is an understandable choice that has worked more often in the South than has been told, at least when black people have responded to localized violence from an enemy they know well.

Picking up the gun and starting armed revolution in the States?  That's a fantasy if what you're after is peace, the end of poverty, etc.  Such a program faces overpowering force (police, military, incredibly well armed rednecks and conservatives), a sophisticated economic and political system that requires poor people in the mix for rich people to exist and a whole lot of people that would simply take advantage of chaos for personal gain.

I won't say that Listen N Learn mixtape producer Mike Johns is a cynical opportunist because I don't know the man.  But if I take this project at face value, I would have to say it's trafficking in revolutionary fantasies in order to move units and that offends me deeply, whatever the intent of the creators.

On a related note, let me say that SOHH's Most Violent Rap Videos series is a deeply cynical piece of work.  I just hope their inability to create proper site navigation keeps them from making much money off it.

Marketing With Guns: Gnarls Barkley & Ice Cube

I'm not really into guns and I mostly don't like gun talk in hip hop at this point in time.  It's just such a cliche and, in light of rap's gun problems, I think you need a really good reason to bring guns into the picture.  Unless, of course, you're marketing to people that dig gun talk and the brandishing of weaponry.

The above image, that I found at FreeNYC, was left out of my Gnarls Barkley graphics post, though I am very interested in the way these guys play with gun imagery.  I think they're mostly making fun of the omnipresence of such imagery in hip hop and, possibly, in American culture.  But, on its own, I just see a crazy guy pointing a gun at me.  And I don't like that, whether its Danger Mouse or 50 Cent, though Cee-Lo's antics with the gun do strongly suggest parody.

The above image, part of the press materials for Ice Cube's n*ggaz With Gunz mixtape sends a different sort of mixed message.

The press release refers to Rob Williams and Negroes With Guns and, with Ice Cube's involvement, obviously also references NWA or n*ggaz With Attitude.  However, though it is part of the Listen N Learn mixtape series and is said to be against gun violence, looking at the track listing and the cover art, I can't help but feel strongly that this is one of those situations where the listener can enjoy gun talk while the artist can claim to be presenting a cautionary tale and yet benefit financially from gun talk.

However, since I haven't heard the mixtape, I requested a press copy to follow up on my concerns.  Once I get that, I may also be interviewing Mike Johns, the creator of the Listen N Learn mixtape series, to see how he looks at the situation.

On a side note, I think Rob Williams is a really important figure in Southern history and in the liberation of black folks.  To some degree, I see him as a link between the nonviolent Civil Rights movement and the emergence of the Black Panthers, though I haven't looked closely at the matter.  I do know that the history of armed resistance by black people in the South is a largely untold story and I believe that is partly due to the fact that Civil Rights careerist reformists have been so adamant about distancing themselves from revolutionary movements.

But, while I think that such history is important to understanding the present day, I'm not convinced that gangsters with guns are a revolutionary force.  That's like the fantasies left hippies used to have about the Hells Angels and they paid for it at Altamont and in numerous settings that have only occasionally been put down in writing.

Marketing Violence: Chris Lighty, 50 Cent, Elliott Wilson

Oops - The Media Chin-Check link that got this post started showed up in my newsreader today but it's from February.  Nevertheless, this is a good opportunity for me to begin examining the use of violence in hip hop marketing.  Let's just call it a blast regarding the recent past.

Chris Lighty, perhaps best known for Violator Management and his involvement with the career of such figures as 50 Cent, tries to wave the it's just entertainment magic wand over violent lyrics and images in hip hop.  Of course, that would be the logical thing to do when one is making money off violent lyrics and images from artists who are portrayed as violent or "used to be violent and I can be again if need be".

I'm not proposing censorship and I agree with Lighty that one cannot claim that people go out and kill because of a 50 Cent album but I think that simple minded causal logic, A leads to B leads to C, has long been bankrupt as a formula for understanding human consciousness.

A number of the commenters on his post put Lighty on blast in a variety of ways while Hashim Warren focuses on the marketing angle at Media Chin-Check:
Lighty doesn't believe that music can move people to violence, yet part of what he does at Violator as a marketer is to convince companies that rappers can move kids to buy and eat all sorts of junk that they don't need or may even be bad for them. And corporations bank millions on hip-hop's ability to make kids do just about anything.

It's strange for the head of a company that brokers advertising deals to claim that music has no effect on people. It seems like Lighty wants it both ways, but it can't be like that.

In reality, Lighty appears to be playing a valuable role in a cynical game, that of apologist.  It makes one almost appreciate the morals free approach to marketing 50 Cent and XXL taken by Elliott Wilson when responding to concerns about an XXL cover featuring 50 with a crossbow:
50 is the only MC that gets it: All publicity is good publicity.

Wilson also stated:
50 is like Puffy, he's a marketing genius . . . He wants to stir it up and be the most controversial artist in hip-hop today . . . he wants to push everyone's buttons to gain attention.

Cynic's Take: At least Wilson comes across as honestly out to make the buck and damn the consequences for anybody else.  And that's worthy of some kind of twisted respect in a world of raptor capitalism.

Related coverage:
50 Cent and the Violence of Money

Hip Hop Bloggers on the Hot 97 Shooting

Well, I just checked out commentary from Oliver Wang and Jay Smooth and it's hitting me how bad this is going to be for hip hop.  Hopefully it'll make the wanksters think twice about playing gangsta on the Internet, but it will probably just heat things up in all sectors.  Already, I'm seeing people in Jay Smooth's comments section trying to redirect folks to the "real" issues.

You know, every time a person shows they care about something there's always somebody around to tell them that their concerns aren't worth their time.  This whole thing is disgusting and using George Bush as a foil to stop hip hop from dealing with internal problems is just not an acceptable response.  Besides, it's becoming a cliche that doesn't really accomplish anything.