RE: FW: RUN-DMC?

[Reyzl Kalifowicz-Waletzky <reyzl...>]

Dear Roni Sarig,


>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.

You many know "more than a little" about rap music next to the _little_ 
knowledge I know about rap music, but that doesn't mean that you know 
enough to say what you say.   A history of "writing" about hip-hop music, 
whatever that means, doesn't necessarily mean that the writer is truly 
knowledgeable about hip-hop music, myself included here.   I don't know why 
your opinions should be taken at face value over what the Jewish Week has 
reported about the role of Jewish leaders in this industry.   From some of 
the naive comments you have made below, I wouldn't assess that your 
knowledge about this industry is superficial, even though you may be very 
familiar with the rap repertoire (while I, on the other hand, have made 
sure to forget anything I heard.)  Newspapers make mistakes ALL THE TIME, 
but this was a lengthy front page article in highly awarded paper and front 
page articles get a lot of care in newspapers.   As a regular reader for 
the last 17 years of Jewish Week and (several other Jewish newspapers - I 
think I read about 6 a week), I have high confidence in just about 
everything I read in the Jewish Week, unlike some other Jewish weeklies. 
 The Jewish Week is a major information source for the whole American press 
and I can't remember when facts in it were successfully challenged.  You 
have expressed enough inaccuracies and naivete here for me not to accept 
anything you have written below.

I can't access the article now, so I can't quote from it directly, but I 
will say the following.
I think I made it pretty clear that in April, Cohen sold his Def Jam 
company to Bronfman's company.   It was his company until that point and he 
has now joined Bronfman's.   According to the Jewish Week, he was Public 
Enemy's manager and in fact made one of the main guys (Russel Simmons) a 
partner.   Since there was a quote from Simmons there to that effect, I 
don't know why you think you know better.   Cohen released only the first 
albums of PE?!?!?!?  I don't know how you write that, but I am not going to 
the web page to check it, but maybe you should.

>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).

This is simply your opinion.  If the role of writing lyrics is so 
important, I would really like to know when and where have we had a 
lyricist, any lyricist whose contribution was limited to lyrics, succeed in 
becoming a main force in any part of the American music industry?   Since 
when is writing lyrics the measuring stick in assessing power in a music 
business?    We are talking about business and not emotional influence 
here, of let's say a Leonard Cohen or a Dylan, but then of course, they 
didn't become this rich from just writing lyrics to important songs that 
other people recorded.   They became a force in the industry once they 
recorded their own songs themselves, which is a whole different musical 
function.   You make rap music sound here as if we are talking about 
geniuses of the likes of Cole Porter, Ira Gershwin, Larry Hart or Sir 
Gilbert.  There aren't any in rap - with or without industry power.

If the credit goes to others, when and where has highly shrewd Master 
Bronfman Jr. or any other equivalent industry powerhouse offered anyone 
$150+ million dollars for their business?   What other rap label or great 
record producer did he buy out or bring into Polygram?  If Def Jam is only 
a middle size, albeit "important" record company, how does is it that 
Polygram can reach control of 25% percent of the whole music market with 
the mere acquisition of this company?

>I'd credit that to many people and, in large part, to the fact that kids 
like it.

And how did suburban mall kids who know nothing about living in ghettos and 
crude daily violence get to like this low-level music?  Yes, of course they 
just "naturally" liked it.   Sorry this too naive for a response.
>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.

Well, that's your opinion and I bet you are young, childless and feel 
little responsibility for kids' moral values.   The "thousands" of rap 
songs that come out today are mostly derivative.   Mr. Cohen produced and 
marketed the first important ones, the ones that set the tone, pattern, 
content and attitude of the whole genre.   As for the love/sex obsession, I 
think they are stupid, disgusting, and highly destructive to the all kids, 
but especially black kids.   I am angry when I see pre-adolescent kids, 
black or white, singing those inappropriate songs with their inappropriate 
focus.  Young adolescents and teens (5-15) are the ones who buy those 
records and the whole genre is inappropriate for them.   Furthermore, just 
because "some" of the "total" number of produced records are innocuous, 
doesn't mean that this genre is innocuous for it's target audience.   Just 
because lots of kids watch those violent cartoons, doesn't mean that they 
are good for them or that we should sit for their being shown to children, 
and, indeed, people haven't.   Millions of parents, health professionals 
and communal leaders have continuously condemned this music from the very 
start, so I don't think that this is just a matter of my own personal 
"prejudiced" or "paranoid" opinion.   We have all felt this way before and 
after Littleton.   Second, other companies and producers may have come 
after Cohen, but he was the first and the most important one and he made 
this stuff a markettable musical genre according to my information.   If 
none of the above would be true and if Cohen would not be a master at this, 
Bronfman wouldn't have asked him to stay with the label.   You have to know 
a little about corporate business to understand that and I do read trade 
papers.

>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.

Sorry, you don't know what you are talking about.   I don't know what you 
were reading at the time or since, but I myself remember how much heated 
verbiage was spilled on TV, radio, and newspapers at the time on their 
anti-Semitic remarks, because no one could understand how the record 
company (=Cohen) was staunchly defending PE.   Furthermore, the article not 
only writes about that very strong defense, but both Cohen and Simmons are 
quoted there on the importance of Cohen's strong defense of PE at the time. 
  Since I live 13 blocks from 770 Eastern Parkway, I was closely observing 
such issues after the Crown Heights pogrom (1991).   But, what I didn't 
know at the time was that the owner was not only a Jew, but an Israeli.

>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.

I gave a list in my writing of what is troublesome in rap music and it 
isn't limited to anti-Semitism.   I have no idea how many instances of 
anti-Semitic lyrics there are in rap music, but I don't believe that you 
know either.   Second, when you write that PE did it again just last year, 
it's obvious that they haven't learned anything from nearly a decade of 
discussion.  Quantity isn't always the critical issue in these kinds of 
things as much as the quality, i.e., the power of the person(s) making a 
remark.   A hundred rappers in Harlem recording heavy anti-Semitic or 
misogynistic remarks is still not equal to a Public Enemy or a Michael 
Jackson making one tenth the strength of a similar comment.

You must be very young, you must come from the suburbs and like this music. 
  I live not that far from Bedford Stuyvesant and very glad that my teenage 
kids don't listen much to this music anymore...


Reyzl


----------
From:  Rmsarig (at) aol(dot)com[SMTP:Rmsarig (at) aol(dot)com]
Sent:  Sunday, July 11, 1999 6:09 PM
To:  World music from a Jewish slant
Subject:  Re: FW: RUN-DMC?

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



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