The Fundamentals

This is apparently airing (Unbleeped (See update below)?  Really?  At all hours?) on BET (and contains swearing and the repeated use of a racial slur, so might be sonically NSFW):

The song's from "Not a Rapper" Bomani "D'mite" Armah (who, according to his myspace, will be performing at P.S. 1 on 7/28).  The video was animated by Six Point Harness, directed by Tyree "ReAkshun" Dillihay.

And I imagine it'll be passed on into perpetuity; it's a pretty powerful piece of work.  Catchy, funny(*) and simple.  The music's a regular group chant - after the intro, there's never a singular voice - over a repeated riff from Beethoven's Fifth.  Though ostensibly a music video, I can imagine "Read a Book" being remembered as a PSA, the way at least a couple generations fondly remember "Schoolhouse Rock."

But those quaint old clips - soft-sell and huggable, learning was almost incidental - were aimed at Saturday morning cartoon-watching kids.  It's tougher to gauge the appropriate audience for "Read a Book."  Do the same people need to be told "brush your teeth" and "raise your kids?"  Leaving aside the idea that animation is, like Wu-Tang, for the children - because I think we've all grown up past that bias, right? - the methods the song and its video employ are less instructional than disciplinary.  The song is born of frustration, it's meant to shame.  Subjects are to be strapped down Clockwork Orange-style (with a little of the Ludwig von, natch) and sloganed at.  Subtlety is for art, and all art is useless, right?  When your message is basically "grow up and take responsibility for yourself," it might make sense to treat your targets like tots.  But is any post-adolescent with any sense of pride going to respond to that, especially when it comes from the mouth of a bling-coated cartoon rapper?  This is really a rally for the shouters, not an attempt to reach the shouted-at.

As for what all the shouting's about, there's certainly little questionable - epithets aside - about, "Read a book, raise your kids, invest wisely, take care of your personal hygiene."  But there's a dilution of message that might, if not for the rousing call (and product placement) of "It's called Speed Stick, it's not expensive," drone on endlessly, uselessly.

When we hit the hygienical portion of the song, doesn't it feel like the ideas are already exhausted, that D'mite is ticking off pet peeves, or that he's resorted to random rah-rah listmaking?  What about flossing, D?   Or washing your hands before you leave the restroom?  Eventually you hit the well-meaning land of easily-dismissed platitudes.  Stay in School!  Just Say No!

And after these lessons have been sufficiently pounded in, will someone come along and issue a corrective addressing the inappropriateness of incessant swearing?  Let's fucking hope so.

The obvious blight on the piece is one I can't directly quote.  Because me biggum paleface, I've relinquished any right to discuss the sad slur that's repeated incessantly throughout.  Whatever ongoing struggle there is to redefine/reclaim the word, to reinvest/divest the word with/of its power, to use it to divide/unite... that's a struggle that has to happen within the African-American community.  Every now and again there's some well-meaning missionary type - a Lenny Bruce or a Patti Smith or a Quentin Tarantino - who decides they're going to make that decision all on their own, and they wind up embarrassing themselves.

From the start - when D'mite announces that he's going to "go blacker" by forgoing "hooks and concepts and shit" - the song provides plenty of racial self-scorn.  Even settling on a definition of the n-word as someone who acts in a "illogical, self-destructive manner" -- an insult, then -- and even allowing for the humor involved (and subtle ironies, should they exist (**)), that word (and the video) defines the targets of the song as African-American.  And there's no doubt the song - and its insults - will spread well beyond that community; the multiple postings on YouTube alone have almost half a million views.  The cheers and chidings sailing out of white mouths might not necessarily come hurled hatefully - there's always room for unfortunate imitation - but if D'Mite's ultimate goal was to arm ignorant suburban white teens with a new round of racist taunts, he should feel proud of himself.  Grow up.  Take responsibility for your actions.

UPDATE: The censored version BET is airing can be seen here.  You have to drag the ".comMusic Now" selection from the frame into the center.  They bleep "Speed Stick!" (Thanks, Tricia.) 

*

Stay in school, bone up on your opera, and someday you might be able to come up with goofy shit like this:

(A clearer version is here.)

I bet "Master of the Unusual" Michel Lauziere's rims are pretty nifty.  He should hook up with Lord of the Yum Yum for an all-Bizet performance art piece.

(*)  Watch this version, where they viddy'd the clip for a live audience at a New York comic convention.  They're in hysterics.  Which is okay, right?  Everybody's got a laughing place.

(**)  There's always the possibility "Read a Book" could be intended as a parody of pedantic, message-point insultry.  The Clockwork-colored struggle (and, again, the complicated history of Beethoven's champions) could suggest this.  And... "Blacker" people don't like "hooks?"  But these shadings are swept away by the overwhelming positivity of its rules - anyone want to argue with the wisdom of "raise your kids?" - and the vigorous simplicity of its chants.

tags: dmite  bomani armah  michel lauziere  bet  

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