Amika Shah: Death

Sunday, 5 August 2012

Aaliyah - Enough Said (ft. Drake)

I make no bones about the fact I am not a Drake fan, but I am a seriously fucking huge fan of 90's Timbaland , Missy Elliot and Aaliyah. When I heard that Drake would be producing a posthumous Aaliyah album with Timbaland and Missy completely uninvolved, I decided that I'd rather spend a night alone sleeping on the N29 than for this to happen. However, the first track is here, and it's actually pretty good. Drake's actual verse is kind of shit, but he references Balotelli so I can live with it. Obviously it goes without saying it'd probably be better if Timbaland circa 1999 and Missy were involved, but they aren't unfortunately.

Also, was anyone else blissfully unaware that Drake has this tattoo? That's almost as creepy as the 'R Kelly getting Aaliyah pregnant and trying to marry her when she was 15' rumours.

Anyway, R.I.P baby girl xxx

Monday, 7 May 2012

A slightly overdue tribute to Adam Yauch.

If someone had told me two years ago that the death of MCA would depress me quite as much as the death of Amy Winehouse did, I wouldn’t have believed them - I’m a girl from suburban London, just like Amy.

Yet it did. The Beasties have always had a special place in my heart though, as one of the few hip hop groups to be played in the car and all my family be happy, as the group that combined the DIY attitude that goes with their hardcore punk days with the future of hip hop by joining major labels, yet still managing to keep complete creative control.

I’d kept saying to myself for the past few years, as soon as MCA is healthy and they come to London, I’d bunk a lesson to ensure I grab those tickets at nine am release. After all, this implied I’d have the opportunity. The cancer was treatable.

The reason I held and still will hold MCA in such high esteem, was his ability to grow as a person, to admit his mistakes, and apologise for them. Hip hop still has a problem with misogyny and homophobia, and perhaps will for many years to come, but the Beasties, particularly MCA, grew as people away from this. They were the first in hip hop to apologise for the hatred they unwittingly brought with them - ‘Fight For Your Right’ was intended to satirise the attitudes of songs like ‘Smoking in the Boys Room,’ yet became an anthem for those with these party-hard attitudes. In fact, his first line in ‘Sure Shot’ was “I wanna say a little something that’s long overdue / The disrespect to women has got to be through.”

The transition Yauch made within the space of a few years, from a boy to a man, was evident from the release of ‘Sure Shot’ onwards. From here on, he went on to use his influence to do what he could to try to correct not only his own mistakes, but to use his it to help others with the organising of the Tibetan Freedom Concert. He used opportunities he had to educate people about injustice, and to make them question their own attitudes and prejudices.

R.I.P Adam. You'll be sorely missed.

Reccomended reading: Sasha Frère Jones on the passing of MCA