From Library Journal
Seminal rapper Chuck D of Public Enemy once asked the musical question, "Who stole the soul?" In this anthology, perhaps the first to deal solely with the business of black music, Chuck D, editor Kelley (author of the Nina Halligan mysteries), and other name contributors (including Courtney Love) attempt to come up with some answers. This is not a study of the appropriation of African American musical styles which was ably covered in Leroi Jones's Blues People: Negro Music in White America, among other titles but rather an examination of why white-owned entertainment conglomerates have profited so much and blacks as a whole so little from the worldwide explosion of hip-hop. Kelley's introductory piece sets the tone, describing the current state of the music industry as a continuation of a "structure of stealing" that has plagued African Americans for centuries. The history of the modern recording industry, including the gray line between major and "independent" labels, is dissected in several eyeopening contributions that should be required reading for anyone interested in popular music. The collection comprises 20 pieces (seven are new and two are substantially revised) from a variety of journalists, music industry insiders, and historians, as well as an interview with Rap Coalition founder Wendy Day. Recommended for larger public and all academic libraries. David Valencia, King Cty. Lib. Syst., Seattle
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
This book's message is that the pop music business has ripped off black performers and fans for years. The copiously referenced pieces in it, whose writers include both academics and musicians, identify the industry's sins, general and particular. David Sanjek, director of the BMI Archives and consultant to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, critiques a never-made-public Harvard report on the early '70s "soul market," which found that Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk possessed almost no "soul content" and recommended strategies for leveling the industry playing field. As Sanjek reports, the effects of those recommendations have been mixed. Former Public Enemy member and rap legend Chuck D. details the "morphing of" certain "black folk into a new race: the Niggro. The Niggro is rewarded by ignorance [and] lauded in
Vibe and
Source for its thug spirit." As D. sees it, Niggros accept "'nigger ways,' confusing it with the soul root of black people," and become easily entertained members of lucrative marketing demographics. Hot stuff for politically and economically astute pop-music collections.
Mike TribbyCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Book Description
Who profits most from the spectacular success of black music? For generations, African-Americans have created and driven varied musical genres: gospel, blues, jazz, r&b, rock & roll, funk, hip hop, etc. Black musical creativity has, in fact, fueled the modern music industry. Yet, of the country's ten largest black businesses, not one is a record company.
Given that hip hop music alone has generated more than a billion dollars in sales, the absence of a major black record company is disturbing. (Even Motown is now a subsidiary of the Universal Music Group.) Nonetheless, little has been written about the relationship between African-Americans and the music industry. Here, for the first time, is a collection of voices and perspectives that provides a nuanced investigation into this sorry history of economic theivery.
In R&B, Public Enemy's Chuck D, author Norman Kelley, and other journalists and musicians combine forces to examine how black music has been developed, marketed, and distributed within the structure of American capitalism. The anthology dissects contemporary trends in the music industry, and explores how blacks have historically interacted with the business as artists, business-people, and as consumers. R&Balso considers how the changes and developments within the music business—from the frontier of digital technology to the consolidation of the giant music conglomerates—might affect the future roles of African-Americans in the industry.
"Want a scathing social and political satire? Look no further than Norman Kelley's second effort featuring 'bad girl' African-American PI and part-time intellectual Nina Halligan—it's a romp of a read..."—Publisher's Weekly (starred review) on The Big Mango
Norman Kelley lives in Brooklyn, and is the author of the Nina Halligan political mystery series, which includes The Big Mango (Akashic) and Black Heat (Amistad/HarperCollins).
About the Author
Norman Kelley has written for Newsday, the Village Voice, The Nation, and New York Press. He is the author of "The Head Negro in Charge Syndrome (Nation Books 2004), and the Nina Halligan mystery series -- Black Heat (HarperCollins), The Big Mango (Akashic), and A Phat Death (Akashic). He lives in Brooklyn.
