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TUESDAY, JANUARY 20, 2015
arts & features
Trending The 'race' for ownership over hiphop: Azealia Banks, Iggy Azalea tweets criticize racial representation in industry
LYNDSEY HAVENS
@LyndseyAlana
Twitter feuds, girl fights and empty threats frequent the Internet almost as often as a "Friends" rerun airs on TV. The most recent digital drama encompasses all three of the previously mentioned antics and started between two female hip-hop artists, Azealia Banks and Iggy Azalea.
Edited by Emma LeGault
However, looking back 50 or 60 years, a similar prediction could have been made about the blues and soul music.
The issue here is not that Azalea stole anything, the issue is that artists and analysts are suddenly ripping her apart for simply crafting her own sense and style within one that already exists. And in the end, is that not what artistry is?
Though the threat involves an alleged sex tape of Azalea, the issue that fuels the feud is more serious than scandalous. This particular spat started on Dec. 3 with a tweet from Banks, in which she called out Azalea for her silence in regard to Ferguson, Eric Garner and police brutality, among other topics. Banks wrote, "Black Culture is cool, but black issues sure aren't huh?"
Hip-hop artist J. Cole chimed in on the intersection of genre and race as well. In an interview last week with Angie Martinez on Power 105.1 FM, a New York hip-hop and R&B radio station, he said, "I fast forward 20, 30 years from now, and I see hip-hop being completely white."
In the 1960s, the genre of blue-eyed soul was created as a predominantly white subtype of soul. The differences between soul and blue-eyed soul are less than minor — there is crossover in influence, message and sound — and in fact, the one true difference is that of skin color.
No title or label applies exclusively to white hip-hop music today, which brings into question whether or not it is necessary to differentiate at all. As Australian rapper Adam Briggs said, "It's not about white rappers or aboriginal rappers. It's about good and bad rappers."
J. Cole's recent release "Fire Squad" has kept alive the premise of the feud between Banks and Azalea. The lyrics of the song reflect how history repeats itself, calling out Elvis, Justin Timberlake, Eminem and Macklemore as white artists who have taken something that Cole thinks ultimately belongs to the black community.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTOS
Just because Azalea has yet to take action or speak up over social media, does that mean her music is an attempt to detach hip-hop from its roots? Tom Barnes, a writer for MusicMic, wrote in a Dec. 22 article that Azalea is garnering attention from "stealing black musical sounds and styles and using her whiteness to sell them to the masses"
Aside from J. Cole, other artists were quick to take to Twitter in defiance of Azalea, such as hip-hop artist Q-Tip. He sent out 40 consecutive tweets directed toward Azalea and backed his blasts up with facts. He wrote, "HipHop is a artistic and socio-political movement/culture that sprang from the disparate ghettos of NY in the early 70's", and that while the genre is fun, it can never detach itself from being a movement.
Ashton Bell, a junior from Wichita, is a rapper and producer under the stage name Brother Ashton. He recently released an instrumental mixtape titled "DNA Tape."
RYAN WRIGHT
@ryanwaynewright
To onlookers, Ashton Bell seems like any other student on campus, staring intensely at his laptop with his headphones on. But Bell, unlike most students, just released his first mixtape and might be working on his next.
"Most of the time you'll see me around making stuff or going over sounds that I've made before." Bell said.
Bell is a junior from Wichita majoring in journalism after transferring from Butler Community College in El Dorado, as well as a rapper and producer who goes by the stage name Brother Ashton.
His instrumental mixtape, titled "DNA Tape," was a collaboration project with his friend, DJ ThirdEye.
Bell said he's inspired by a variety of artists, first and foremost being Kanye West. He cited Flying Lotus, Sounwave, Pharrell and J. Cole as influences as well.
While at Butler, Bell had a football scholarship but eventually decided to quit, saying he grew tired of the sport that he had started playing when he was only eight.
"I just felt like I was quitting while I was ahead," he said. "That's also when I started taking my music seriously. Music became so important to me, I had to pursue it with more time than football allowed me to."
Bell said his parents' taste in music was crucial to developing his own sound.
"I liked to listen to whatever my parents did, so I was influenced by everything from West Coast stuff, UGK and Nas to music like Mary Mary, Mary J. Blige and TLC," Bell said.
As both an artist and a student, Bell has had to work on managing his time accordingly. However, Bell said music is more important to him.
"Music trumps school a lot of the time because I have a lot of confidence in school. Music takes a lot more work for me to get things the way I want them," Bell said.
Bell is currently working on a new rap EP which he will self-produce. Bell has yet to perform in Lawrence, but he plans on hitting the stage sometime soon.
"Hopefully this semester," he said. "That's one of the biggest parts of getting out there."
To listen to "DNA Tape" visit Bell's SoundCloud page at soundcloud.com/thecodeforlife. For more information, follow Bell on Twitter @BrotherAshton.
Edited by Miranda Davis
TOP 10
LYNDSEY HAVENS
@LyndsevAlana
Things we all (most likely) did over break
"Top 10 Tuesdays" will be a weekly feature within the arts and features section. It will be a compiled list of 10 items related to the life of a college
student, our University and Lawrence. Each Friday, The Kansan social media accounts will announce the coming weeks topic and the rest will be up to you, our readers, to vote on what is worthy of making the list. As
10. Finished an entire series of a television show on Netflix
we all sluggishly settle back into this thing called class, let's first look back at the top 10 things we all most likely did over winter break.
Edited by Hannah Barling
8. Took too many selfies with your pet
(Editors note: "Twin Peaks" anyone?)
9. Found sunshine one way or another
7. Woke up as the sun was already setting
.
6. Made a New Year's resolution
5. Broke a New Year's resolution
4. Made plans to get lunch/coffee with a high school friend
3. Bailed on plans to get lunch/coffee with a high school friend
WARNER BROS
2. Already made, or attempted to make, Spring Break plans
1. Accidentally drank too much at a holiday party
'Inherent Vice takes viewers on nebulous ride
Andrew Hoskins @KansanNews
I do know much about hippies, but I've spent enough time with neo-hippies to understand that to them, life is lived in sort of a vague haze fueled by the chase of one hapless experience after another toward an ill-defined — or often nonexistent — final goal. In all my years of movie-watching and analysis, I have never run across a film
that flows by this mantra until Paul Thomas Anderson's newest flick, "Inherent Vice."
In near total contrast to the slightly sickening — yet somehow intensely addictive and gratifying — flow of his previous films, the revered writer/director takes audiences on a powerfully smooth and relaxing ride with "Vice." Riding off his expressed feelings of personal gratification with his
SEE VICE PAGE 6