Leon N. has just directed me to a Harvard-based group called Rhythm, Rhyme, Results, which is apparent not a joke. Words fail me. You need to see — and hear, hear, hear — this for yourself. But I can't resist highlighting a few choice bits. The slogan:
Educational hip hop is here.
What are you waiting for?
Lyrics to "The Bill of Rights":
The right to free speech and the freedom of church
Are guaranteed by amendment one
Amendment number two says it's true that it's all up to you
If you choose to possess a gun.
The government can't force ya to house and feed a soldier
Says amendment number three…
I really don't envy these fools their self-appointed mission: the framers didn't do them any favors by front-loading the BoR with two of the doofiest, most anachronistic amendments out there. (No, I don't mean the first amendment, although I would try to think of some riff on that theme if my wits hadn't been utterly discombobulated by this ridiculous discovery.) Then again, do we really need a bunch of Harvard students to teach "at-risk" youth that it's "all up to [them]…[to] choose to possess a gun"? I would have thought that non-educational hip-hop had already delivered that message more than adequately.
The other demo track, "The Circulatory System," is pretty much the exact same song as They Might Be Giants' "The Bloodmobile" from Venue Songs, but, without ego, I'd wager that I'm the only person likely to make this connection.
What is wrong with everyone? Has this kind of thing ever worked at all, except at the level of kitsch? Doesn't anyone remember being a kid — specifically the aspect of being a kid that consists in effortlessly perceiving the transparent trickery of adults who think that they can make lame things seem cool by lamely pretending to be cool themselves? Besides, Cam'ron's already cornered the market on educational hip-hop:
Looking back on school
Arts and crafts
Fucked half the staff
Beat up half the class
I was like Dr. Dre, though —
I have to laugh —
N***a with an attitude
Meet me after math
(Liveblogging discovery: you can't enter the Aftermath web site until you pick your language — English or German. Was?!)
And I'd be remiss if I didn't throw in Cam'ron's other pronouncement on education, this one in prose form:
My whole life I heard, 'Go to school. Get a education. Go to college.' What the fuck for? So I could get a job making thirty thousand a year and pay back my fucking student loans? Plus, how the fuck am I going to buy Lamborghinis, Ferraris, and go to Miami ten times a year doing that dumb shit?
Rhythm, rhyme, results.
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