Jay Z – ‘On To The Next One’
A prediction: This, while being a perfect description of how Jay-Z does that thing he does, and yet another example of why he is the best at doing it, will not linger around the upper reaches of the Top 40 in the same way that certain other songs from his ridiculously successful last album have.
It’s nothing to do with the quality of the music: ‘On To The Next One’ manages to be both brash and eerie at the same time, and Jay is officially so obviously Good With The Words that mentioning it only makes ME look foolish. By rights, this should have a similar chart life to ‘Empire State Of Mind (Part I)’, but there’s a problem. Some 30-odd years since it was first invented, some people still can’t quite handle hip hop.
(No video. Sweary.)
Don’t believe me? Well, try this for a test. Keep an ear out for ‘On A Mission’ by Gabriella Cilmi song on your local radio station. Y’know the bit where she does an Avril Lavigne cheerleader/rap breakdown? Well, some stations have cut that out.
And the rap section in ‘She Said’ by Plan B? The bit where he deviates from the relative safety of the soul rehash to remind listeners that he started out as a rapper, and by so doing proves that hip hop and soul are part of the same musical spectrum? Again, gone.
It happened to Estelle’s ‘American Boy’ too. The parts featuring Kanye West suddenly disappeared, including his astonishing go at the word “rubbish”. I’ve mentioned it before, but it’s starting to look worryingly like a trend.
Heck, even the astonishing success of ‘Empire State Of Mind’, has been eclipsed by its rap-less ‘sequel’ by Alicia Keys. These things all point towards a general disquiet towards MCs by…
…well, here’s where I’m not sure what to say. It’s either record companies wanting to maximise a song’s potential, or radio producers wanting to play a song without losing listeners, but either way, they’re only doing this because they believe there is a large audience of people who can’t handle hip hop. And they are so scared of those people flicking the dial or refusing to buy the product, they’re prepared to cut it to bits.
The question is, are they right? Is the idea of a person talking over a beat still so scary that we have to pretend it’s not there, in case it prompts rioting on the streets? It’s fine to cut out the swear-words, but to lose whole sections of songs just in case they’re not universally popular is bonkers, isn’t it?
And it just makes you wonder, how many Glastonbury headline slots, No.1s, sellout tours, radio plays and guest appearances by Chipmunk is it going to take before this nonsense settles down? As I said, Hip hop has been around for THIRTY YEARS. That’s about the same age as Star Wars, and you don’t see anyone editing Chewbacca out, because he can’t speak proper English, do you?
Download: Out now
CD Released: April 12th
www.jay-z.com
BBC Music page
(Fraser McAlpine)
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