Nice and Smooth

>When I first listened to this song everything about it had a kind of nostalgic familiarity to it. I know the lyrics have been recycled 1000 times over, a testament to the true staying power of these old school pioneers but it was something else too. I knew the beat was something familiar and then it hit me....fast car by Tracy Chapman! Man, the way they flipped it is sooo fresh. Any true old school head reading this must thing I'm such a toy for even referencing that but note I was too young to appreciate this stuff when it first came out and so had to rediscover this era through my own volition. When I play this stuff in my car most of my friends are quick to skip the track..

The late 80's and early 90's are what I consider to be the golden era of hip-hop CULTURE, which is different from the golden era of RAP or the solely lyrical form of Hip-Hop which I think ended with the fall of the Roc's dynasty around 2002-2003. When I say culture I mean the whole movement, from the music to the fashion to graffiti and breaking and the traditional Mc + Dj pairing. Thats when this whole Hip-Hop culture thing really was at its strongest and you can hear that in the music that came out of this time. When perusing the Youtube comments I noticed one presumably by a fellow hip-hop head that resonated with me. You can hear the SOUL in this music. This is exactly what today's era of Hip-Hop is missing, at least for the main run of todays rap elite. They're lyrical prose lack soul, lack a tangible connection between musician and music, and instead we have the hollow shell of formulaic club bangers time and again flooding our air waves. Whenever I go digging through the metaphoric crates of the hip-hop archive I re-encounter again and again soul, something so far removed from today's brand of hip-hop and yet something so essential to the culture as a whole. Will we ever see another golden age? I wonder...