Re: FW: RUN-DMC?

[Rmsarig <Rmsarig...>]

As someone very interested in Jewish culture and popular culture, and who 
writes about pop music (very often hip-hop), I think I should lend some 
perspective to this thread. I think I may one of the few people on the list 
who knows more than a little about rap, so...

>  I also recently read that a former Israeli, observant
>  Jew has managed Public Enemy all these years...

Lyor Cohen is the head of Def Jam, one of the earliest and most influential 
rap record labels. The label was once independent, and released the early 
albums of Public Enemy, LL Cool J, and many others, including the (Jewish) 
Beastie Boys. Cohen is not the manager of any of these groups. Now that Def 
Jam is owned by Universal Music Group (Bronfman's company), Cohen serves an 
executive in the larger corporation, and continues to play an important role 
in the release of rap albums.

>  The man who is the main force behind the business and success of Rap
>  and Hip hop music, including Rap's violence, misogyny, anti-Semitism
>  (Public Enemy) is Lyor Cohen, born to Israeli observant Moroccan
>  parents in America, and the great grandson of Israeli Rabbi Daniel
>  Sirkus, a signer of Israel's Delaration of Independence.  You can read

Cohen is by no means the main force behind hip-hop music. He is an important 
record executive, but has no role in writing rap lyrics and is not even 
primarily responsible for rap's marketing success (I'd credit that to many 
people and, in large part, to the fact that kids like it).

>  about all this in the April 23, 1999 front page article of Jewish Week.
>  He was/is the agent for Run-DMC, Def Jam, Public Enemy, and a whole
>  slew of others.   He is seen as the one "who helped rap and hip-hop
>  cross over from urban America to become the dominant musical taste of
>  the white suburbs, in whose shopping malls 65 percent of all rap
>  records are bought.

Again, many record executives helped usher rap along to become popular with 
white kids, but it became popular because kids like it.
  
>  Why did I raise this issue?  Most rap lyrics have been condemned as
>  glamorizing ghetto life, inciteful speech and lyrics that the
>  Anti-Defamation League called "toxic" in its 1992 special Report on
>  Hateful Lyrics in Rap and Rock.  The article says "The report

to say "most" is frighteningly inaccurate. there are thousands of rap songs 
released each year, and the vast majority have nothing to do with Jews or 
anything political or racial. Most are about having fun, or about love/sex, 
just like any pop songs. there is, of course, a relatively large portion of 
songs that address ghetto life and violence. some of it is worthy of being 
condemned, and a lot of it is at least exploitative, but most of it simply 
involves young people talking about, for better or worse, what they see.

>  specifically targeted Public Enemy, a group signed to Def Jam
>  Records, and whose members were devotees of Louis Farrakhan."
>  Cohen staunchly defended Public Enemy when their songs rapped about
>  Jews crucifying blacks and made comparisons to Jesus a few years

There have been less than a handful of times where blatant anti-Semitism has 
appeared in a recorded rap song (there is a larger issue of anti-Semitism in 
the black community, just as there is an issue about racism in the Jewish 
community, and some rappers have been known to express anti-Jewish thoughts 
off the record). P.E. has perpretrated a most noxious kind of anti-Semitism 
on two occasions. Noxious, because the group is largely seen (otherwise 
deservingly) as offering among the most intelligent and well-written 
discussion of the problems and issues facing the black community. While their 
credibility in this area is ruined for me by their occasional anti-Semitism, 
for those who don't know better, unfortunately, their general credibility 
lends a degree of credibility to their anti-Semitism. The first case of 
P.E.'s anti-Semitic lyrics came in the early '90s, when the group recorded 
for Def Jam. At the time, I never came across any instance of Cohen 
"staunchly defending" the group (and I read quite a bit about it), though it 
wouldn't suprise me given that he's a businessman interested in protecting 
his business. I do recall, however, that Def Jam's publicist, Bill Adler (who 
continues to work in the rap world), wrote a book-length refutation of an 
outrageously anti-Semitic Nation of Islam publication (The Secret 
Relationship Between Blacks and Jews) after rapper Ice Cube cited the NOI 
book as "worth checking out"
P.E.'s second instance of anti-Semitism came this year, on a song not 
released by Def Jam (but rather by Atomic Pop, an Internet music company run 
by Al Teller -- just what? -- a Jew).
As for Cohen (and Bronfman and others), I agree that they bear a 
responsibility for what they put out, and don't always live up to it. But we 
must not overstate the issue of anti-Semitism in rap, and we certainly should 
not rely on Jewish Week for our information about the music.
-Roni Sarig

---------------------- jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org ---------------------+