venstresida.net

I am glad you agree we should hold a better tone amongst ourselves. You are of course right in implying that I was at a couple of instances tempted to reply to you in a similar tone. I apologize for that. It also seems that I was mistaken in believing that you had a very US-centric worldview, as it seems you have expanded your gaze considerably, possibly to a greater extent than I have. Still it seems we have to a large extend expanded our knowledge in different directions, which may explain something of the minor "culture clash" I believe is behind parts of this debate.

I also never meant to imply that you were in any way an orientalist. I merely meant to point out that the problems you have with these groups you mention in the US is not at the forefront of the debate here, and therefore it did not seem natural for me to evaluate such aspects of f.ex. Ice Cube.

I am glad you read Antonio Gramsci - I believe the key to understanding modern capitalism is in understanding his thoughts around hegemony. You can see some images from my visit to the Gramsci-museum here: http://omicron.leftist.net/gramsci.pdf (looks dead - i'll get it back up later)

I have also read some Subcomandante Marcos, although he sometimes gets a little bit too colourful and metaphoric for my personal tastes, I believe he has many interesting things to say. The biggest drawback when it comes to Zapatistas and this form of creating pockets of alternate societies within a capitalist world, is that is seems to have a problem of spreading. I am perhaps therefore more in line with Tariq Ali when he sees the new "Pirates of the Caribbean" as the axis of hope...

However this is digressing - but hopefully also showing that we have some common ground.

Let me try to make a few central points in this debate about my stance on different hip-hop-issues.

About record-label deals
You write "As far as using hip-hop to be famous...you were the one that said you would take a "good record deal." "

Again I must reply to that twofold:
1) It was partly a humorous remark. I have never sent a single demo to a single record company (underground or otherwise). The idea therefore seems quite academic. (And I believe this also shows it is not something I am working very hard for :) When the underground RedStar Budapest label has published my albums it was on the background that one of them had heard my music online, and wanted to (and I said go right a head, and sent them a copy of the album in the mail).

2) On the other hand: If I would take a deal it would simply be because I believe that would mean I could spread my lyrics to a greater audience, and at the time of this interview – I probably believed it would, but I have of course not gone in to any form of serious thought about what type conditions etc. as it is as I said an academic question, not a realistic one. I do not believe the prospects of such a deal are completely bad here in Norway though. The communist group “Gatas Parlament” I mention in my interview have published a couple of albums on a major label, but that doesn’t stop them (merely postpone a little) putting there music out online for free at http://www.gatasp.no/last-ned/

I completely agree with you in your support for file sharing. We put out a little post here on this site when TPB went offline for 3 days after the police-raid you probably heard of which was very popular. (In Norwegian, but the links (mostly still) work in all languages http://omicron.leftist.net/?q=node/41 ) I have also written a lengthy article on how file sharing and open source-production is the start of a new socialist economic from within capitalist society (also in Norwegian http://omicron.leftist.net/?q=node/141 ). So I believe that is a central tool, but it you can reach even more people by pushing plastic cds in addition, I believe that’s all good.

When you say “The industry does not want to destroy itself by producing music that undermines capitalism.” I believe you are both right and wrong. No capitalist will undermine his own position, but if a capitalist can make a profit in the short-term by doing something that may undermine the entire capitalist system in a much longer term – I believe he will very often do it – not of his own will, but by the short-term-profit-logic of modern capitalism. But I still believe the _economy_ of file-sharing music will be a much more central tool in destroying capitalism than the lyrical content of the songs downloaded. It’s all about removing parts of the economy form the capitalist logic.

About the Gængsterr and sex-thingy:
“I am more confused to why you would utilize "sex" to sell your album then its similarity to the name of one of my albums.”
- I don’t sell my albums. I put them out for free at http://www.jamendo.com and other sites. RSB work completely non-profit as well (as far as I know anyway).

I can see you are confused by the Gangster-attitude I put out. This also has a twofold answer.
Partly the answer is humour. I am partly simply making fun of that part of hip-hop, and being semi-satirical. If you and many others can not see that aspect (no matter how far I try to pull it in some songs) I am possibly not doing a good enough job.

However there is another aspect of it as well. When I started with hip-hop back in 96, basically it was (west-coast) Gangster-rap that was da shit. And why not then try to take some of that raw street anger, and try to channel some of it in a constructive political way. Make the wild unfocused class-struggle into a focused one so to speak. Now that part of hip hop is more or less dead (at least over here) and naturally, also what is left of my gangster-image has moved to an even lager extent over into the (self-)irony described above.

Finally you write: “It seems you may use hip-hop to vent (yep..now I'm psycho-analyzing you)…”
The only psychotherapeutic thing about my music might be a few of the rather angry and filthy tracks about the final stages of a couple of relationships. A few of these things feel good to get of ones chest, so they have helped. I rarely write tracks like that when I’m in a well-functioning relationship.

So about my position when it comes to hip-hop:
You ask of me “So are you hip-hop or not?”
I must reply: I listen to hip-hop. I sometimes make hip-hop. But am I hip-hop? No. Probably hip-hop makes up about 5-10% of my cultural consumption, and a little more of my production.

It seems that hip hop is much more to you than it is to me. To me it is not that all-encompassing culture, and I was hoping you could accept that.

At times I however do not think it looks like you do:
“You still do not believe you had made a error in being undereducated about the art that you appropriate for your own means. The time excuse is what peasants tell workers when they try to educate them about solidarity. Lest we never say ignorance is because we have no time. Mutha fuckas will get no where with that ideology.”

Well, no I do not. When it comes to culture, I tend to listen to, read and watch whatever I find most interesting at the time, and I do not intend to sit down and school myself extensively on any particular subject more than that. In that case cultural consumption would become an energy drain on me, and not the input it should be, and I would probably end up learning less.

I am currently working on several political projects it does not seem I have the time to finish. That I find very unfortunate, and I am currently evaluating how I can free more time, not how I can bind more up. If you think that is “what peasants tell workers when they try to educate them about solidarity”, well you go on believing that. I still won’t have the time. (However I obviously do have the time for this debate so maybe… well, I’ll give you this – everything is priorities).

I hope this was clarifying in this discussion, and that we may now understand each other positions better.

Live long and make Revolution
Ice