For the Sake of Nostalgia . . . Could We Bring Back The Box?

*shout out to Rhashadd Shadzilla for the inspiration for this post.

Hip Hop (video) has become too serious. The randomness associated with the music (videos) has been lost. The refreshing feeling of huh? is gone. Old School Hip Hop videos were full of random, nonsensical, out of place occurences that usually had very little to do with the music itself. It contributed to the lightness of the music. It added to the euphoric feelings of fun that permitted you to escape from the deplorable social and economic conditions from which the music was borne.

There was something pleasant about seeing a bikini clad light skinned (light skinned was hotter than the sun at that point), long haired girl standing on the beach with the sun shining on her face, ocean flowing over her feet while playing a saxophone as in Wreckx-n-Effect's Rump Shaker video (0:05 seconds in). At first sight, you have to laugh and think, "WTF is she doing on the beach with a saxophone . . . A SAXOPHONE!". Or maybe you didn't think about it at all. The videos were a complement to the music at that time. The music itself was so much of the focus that having a BIG ASS RED (0:42 seconds in) telephone prominently displayed while watching the 2 Live Crew - Me So Horny video was unnoticeable. You didn't have to focus on Beyonce's every dance move and compare it to the countless number of YouTube remakes done by random dorm room dancer dude (don't act like I was the only one to watch this and say, "damn, this dude can dance").

And what happened to the aimless placement of children in videos. Have videos gone too high budget and produced to have unnecessary shots of kids dancing erratically as in Poor Righteous Teacher's (1:45 in) Rock This Funky Joint? Yes these videos were recorded with Hi-8 cameras on roof tops without permits or safety harnesses . . . so what? We were broke too and could relate. Now our videos are recorded in HD, played on BluRays and DVR's (vs. having to call in to The Box, dial the 1-900 Number to play "Tootsie Roll" and subsequently take a beating for running up your momma phone bill).

Hip Hop has gone too serious, too flashy, too unreal for any of us to relate. I don't own a Maybach, never had a private flight, wouldn't think about pouring Ace of Spades on anyone for fear of wasting it and couldn't understand what would drive a man to make it rain. Things done changed.