Kansas City Star Scribe Defends Kendrick Lamar Super Bowl Halftime Show

For the record . . .

The best rap music diss track of all-time is Ice Cube's "No Vaseline" released in 1991. 

It's a furious diatribe against former bandmates backed by a hard hitting sample crafted from disco jazz band Brick's "Dazz" with a few well-timed sound effects added for good measure. 

No Vaseline sounds like a prelude to prison assault . . . It's mean, profane bordering on vulgar, homophobic, really antisemitic yet still dance-able and NOT something that anyone would want to listen to with their grandma at a Super Bowl party.  The reason why the track holds up over time is because of its rhythmic musicality combined with brutal lyrics shouted in full force that offer listeners insight into the defamatory intrigue of the music industry from a safe distance.

By contrast . . . 

"Not Like Us" is full of bad puns, seems almost playful and contains insinuations of assault of innocent victims by a rival rapper but no outright accusations. 

In a smart move to keep the rap battle from delving into a fight for REAL street cred, rap-star Drake has taken legal action against Kendrick Lamar's label . . . Because lawyer's fees are still much easier for a millionaire to pay than ending up like Tupac. 

But all of this prelude offers just a tiny bit of insight into rap music that a Pulitzer Prize winning author for the Kansas City Star didn't bother explaining to her readers.

Instead . . .

She offers effusive praise for political posturing for a performance that has drawn some valid criticism beyond reactionary complaints. 

In fact, we agree with some of the critiques that question the performance  . . . The Super Bowl is SUPPOSED to be a happy time for families and it's not that we don't love political expression but let's not pretend that Serena Williams "Crip Walking" was an uplifting moment in American history.  

Moreover, our position is that the Super Bowl halftime show isn't really a powerful venue for protest considering that it has mostly served as a setting for Gloria Estefan to smile at legions of her Florida fans. Fun fact: "The Latin music superstar has the distinction of being the first artist to hit the Super Bowl stage three times."

But here's what we REALLY don't like . . . 

So much effusive praise for the Super Bowl halftime show is merely a tit-for-tat reaction to very understandable criticism. In fact, accolades for Kendrick Lamar's performance rarely extol, explain or detail any virtues of the spectacle beyond mere partisan praise.

Today, the newspaper goes down that same path . . . Check-it . . .

"The Super Bowl halftime show by rapper Kendrick Lamar, with appearances by Samuel L. Jackson and Serena Williams, is still going to be what a lot of America looks to and loves. One thing that I think the conservative journalist Andrew Breitbart was right about is that politics is downstream from culture. And art is not so easy to contain."

Read more via www.TonysKansasCity.com links . . .

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