Infinity Tha Ghetto Child
Pain
MCA
I don’t know. It just seems that the ghetto used to produce better music: Stevie Wonder’s “Livin’ for the City,” Donny Hathaway’s “The Ghetto,” Marvin Gaye’s “Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler),” Curtis Mayfield’s “Ghetto Child Running Wild,” hell, even Elvis, and let’s not forget klezmer music. But apparently nowadays, the ghetto’s not only caught up in the spirit-draining cycle of poverty but also the mass-mediated circle of shitty artists and music. In the ‘hood, shit is real. Well, no, not exactly. What’s on Pain is just about as representative of the PJs as Oz is of suburbia. There is joy as much as pain, overworked folks as well as welfare recipients, etc. In other words, ‘hoods are neighborhoods – with damn near every kind of imaginable person walking their streets. However, that don’t get you the funky dollar bill, y’all. No, it’s all about the pimps, the hos, the guns, the drugs – the exact same shit satirized by Schoolly D in ‘86 and NWA in ‘89. It’s the exact same thing that suburbanite AfAms like Ice Cube have ridden straight to their multiplex mansions in Bel Air. Therefore, Infinity with his Crip-&-Blood scowl, tattooed pecs, and “keeping-it-real” ghetto platitudes is riding that thuggish stereotype loop ad nauseum, saying everything you’ve heard before to music I’m personally tired of hearing. It’s the same, tired, old bullshit we’ve been hearing since the majors have decided that there’s money in the rap game. And I refuse to play – allowing Sony (and the like) to tell me what life in the ghetto – or blackness really is.
MCA Records: http://www.mcarecords.com
