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Waka Flocka Flame: The Leader Of Hip-Hop’s Tea Party Movement : The Record : NPR
The Record – Music News From NPR
03:30 pm
December 23, 2010
by Jay Smooth
December 23, 2010
Enlarge Raymond Boyd/Getty ImagesIn These Streets: Waka Flocka Flame on stage at WGCI-FM’s “Big Jam 2010″ concert in Rosemont, Illinois on December 19, 2010.
Raymond Boyd/Getty ImagesIn These Streets: Waka Flocka Flame on stage at WGCI-FM’s “Big Jam 2010″ concert in Rosemont, Illinois on December 19, 2010.
Anyone who names himself Waka Flocka Flame is clearly not afraid to be ridiculed. And the rapper who goes by that name has indeed become one of the most reviled and mocked of recent years. But Waka Flocka Flame has also built up an equally fervent and loyal fan base, who take that scorn and ridicule as a badge of honor, and have embraced Waka Flocka as their leader in a culture war of sorts against hip hop’s intellectual elite.
Waka Flocka Flame comes out of the Atlanta hip-hop scene, which in the last 20 years has come to rival New York and California as a mainstay of the hip-hop industry. Atlanta has produced rappers like T.I., Ludacris and OutKast, who show that a Southern rapper can have all the complexity and sophistication of their New York counterparts.
In recent years Atlanta has also given birth to a very different generation of rapper, including Gucci Mane, OJ Da Juiceman and Soulja Boy — who basically thumb their nose at all that northern sophistication with a far more raw and simplistic style of rap. Waka Flocka Flame has become the rapper that carries that anti-musical, anti-intellectual hip hop to its ultimate conclusion.
Waka Flocka’s Atlantan elders — like Outkast or Ludacris — would use a song to showcase their verbal dexterity and lyrical complexity. On his hit songs, Waka Flocka Flame shouts some the simplest couplets imaginable, mixed with an “ad lib” track full of wordless grunts and growls that often threatens to drown out the lead vocal (over a beat that sounds like the marching band that might accompany the four horsemen of the apocalypse as they destroy the Earth). Check, “Hard in da Paint.”
Source: YouTube
For Waka Flocka’s detractors, that lack of musicianship and absence of lyrical skill represents everything that’s gone wrong in hip-hop music with this younger generation. Waka Flocka’s fans would point to that extreme simplicity as something that adds to the emotional catharsis his raw, aggressive music provides.
So for those who still struggle to make sense of Waka Flocka Flame, think of him as the leader of hip-hop’s Tea Party movement. The other Tea Party has built up a passionate following by appealing to people’s desire to rebel against the Washington elite, and to vent its frustration with the establishment by aligning themselves with outsiders who hold up their lack of Washington’s traditional qualifications as the most attractive asset you could have.
A movement fueled only by catharsis can be hard to sustain in the long-term, and you might well question whether Waka Flocka Flame or the Tea Party will still be viable around 2012. But for the moment it shouldn’t be hard to understand the allure of the untutored outsider that’s made Waka Flocka Flame such a big hit. Those Americans who can’t align themselves with the Tea Party might even want to try Waka Flocka Flame, as an alternative way to shout their stresses away.
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Lou Paris (LouParis) wrote:
Sorry but Waka Flocka really epitomises what is wrong in hip-hop. In the Golden Age someone with no skills would have been dissed, but now they are embraced.
Sad state of affairs. Give me Mos Def, Talib Kweli, Common, Lupe, etc.
December 23, 2010 7:40:34 PM CST
Charles Norwood (cnorwood) wrote:
BOAW BOAW BOAW FLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
December 23, 2010 6:17:08 PM CST
Dominick Brady (FireBrand) wrote:
I think it’s refreshing to see that NPR is taking a chance by challenging boundaries. It’s unfortunate that this isn’t done enough in Hip Hop anymore. I’m always encouraged by an act brave enough to attempt not walking the worn road.
December 23, 2010 5:50:18 PM CST
Nicole S (Nikki1913) wrote:
Though I get your anology you still kinda lost me with comparing Waka Flocka to hip hops version of the Tea Party (really reaching if you ask me).
Anyway, I attended college in Atlanta in the 90′s and heard tons of this bizarre, slow and (in my opinion) unintelligent version of hip hop. I gleened what I considered good southern rap (Outkast, Gooddee MOB, etc.)and was happy not to have to listen to the other mess when I traveled home to Maryland.
Well, Flocka is just the latest in the spreading of this cancer in hip-hip (or, what I and my friends call hip-POP). The ultimate dumbing down of this genre not only void of skill or talent but actual words strung together to create a coherent sentence! Many of the hip hop artists I grew up with were and prided themselves on being educated (or, at the very least well read) and would’ve been poets if the genre never existed. I compare the individuals of this sub-genre to kids who see playing sports (sans any real talent or love for the game) as a way of getting rich. The difference between sports and music though is that all too many talentless individuals DO make it big in music…(shaking my head)
December 23, 2010 5:17:45 PM CST
Spelman Rho (SpelmanRho) wrote:
HAVE YOU COMPLETELY LOST YOUR MINDS ! Never, Ever, EVER should Waka frickin’ Flocka warrant a commentary on NPR ! WHAT THE DEVIL WERE YOU THINKING ? He IS the LEAST of the LEAST talented. What happened to STANDARDS; What ever happened to TASTE ? I expect WAY more from NPR ! NPR used to be FAR better than this !
December 23, 2010 5:07:34 PM CST
Thomas H (iobjectifytom) wrote:
This article is bad and you should feel bad.
December 23, 2010 4:43:41 PM CST
