In 1979, Margaret Thatcher was sworn in, Cambodia overthrew Pol Pot, Jimmy Carter held the American presidency, an Iran hostage crisis debilitated us, the Unabomber struck, McDonald’s introduced its Happy Meal, the first Sony Walkman went on sale, and the Sugar Hill Gang released Rapper’s Delight, the first rap record to crack Billboard’s Top 40 chart. Though Rapper’s Delight was by no means the origin of hip hop music, fast forward through the next nearly forty years, and the ever present genre has barely skipped a beat. Evidence? From May 5-7 in Bayfront Park, Rolling Loud will take place featuring the industry’s biggest names. Of course, the city tried to stop it, but like Woodstock, Coachella, Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, and Ultra, the show must go on.
The clash between emerging 1979 hip hop and reigning disco has been the subject of Baz Luhrmann’s gorgeous, $16 million per episode Netflix production, The Get Down. Luhrmann, who also directed Moulin Rouge, The Great Gatsby, and Leonardo DiCaprio in Romeo & Juliet, assisted in the design of Miami Beach’s crown jewel, the Faena Hotel. He is genius. In The Get Down, lazy, shiftless Bronx stereotypes meet ambitious, rags to riches, Bronx stereotypes; obviously, these incomplete stereotypes persist today. There is no telling whether Frank Carollo, chairman of the Bayfront Park Management Trust, had some stereotypes in mind when he recommended a vote to decide 2017’s Rolling Loud fate, then unanimously voted with others not to cancel when threatened with a polite $30M lawsuit. SMH!
1979 featured Chic’s Good Times, Niles Rodgers anthem sampled in Rapper’s Delight. 1979 also gave us I Will Survive, YMCA, We Are Family, and Bad Girls. There is terrific irony here; people argued in the streets about how fleeting rap would be, and how it could never supplant disco. Soon thereafter, disco died, while hip-hop remains, it seems, at no risk of doing a Bill O’Reilly.
Of course, misogyny is one thing that FOX culture, Bill Cosby, and hip hop share. Whether fueled by a desire for masculinity or authenticity, it is not easy to defuse, debunk, define, and deconstruct the degree to which contempt for women thrives globally and hip-hop often hits with a bullseye. Rappers, of course, serve as ideal targets for such criticism, but simply, the category is much more complicated, and to discuss it here and now will not do.
The primary Rolling Loud headliner is Kendrick Lamar, this generation’s Tupac, Biggie, or Jay Z. He is that important! Then come Future, Lil Wayne, A$AP Rocky, Travis Scott, and Young Thug. Then Migos, Run the Jewels, Lil Yachty, Action Bronson, and Chief Keef. Beyond these are another few dozen niche rappers known well by fans who will bob, weave, sport the latest fashion, and drown in their milieu. Perhaps you think these “strange names” mean a different, inferior universe, but so was the world in which Elvis, Dylan, Lennon, Jagger, Hendrix, Morrison, Clapton, Jackson, Prince, Cobain, and Winehouse ceaselessly irritated detractors. This is just how time goes. 78s surrendered to 45s which gave way to vinyl 33’s aka LP’s. The 8 track yielded to the Walkman, then the boom box, CD player, MP3 player, iPod, Napster, iPhone, and streaming. Frank Sinatra goodbye; James Brown hello. Rolling Loud is music for this Soundcloud, Apple, Mixcloud, Spotify generation.
Ultimately, disco died and got caricatured, and while Donna Summer, the Village People, and Bee Gees remain beloved, Public Enemy and A Tribe Called Quest get respect. To boot, Ice T, Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, and LL Cool J are established personalities, and Jay Z happens to be the husband of America’s sweetheart. If the nuisance and danger some suspect from Rolling Loud with its explicit language and violence, may seem frightening, Elvis’ gyrations, Beatle haircuts, and scowling Rolling Stones also petrified traditionalists. If we truly fear bad language, we can avoid reading the transcripts from Brother O’Reilly’s twenty years of TV work. If we worry about violence, we can turn off CNN. Finally, if all this is still too much, avoid Bayfront Park during the festival but do not monitor your kid’s freshman year, Instagram photo experience.
Remember, it is no longer 1979.
