Personally, I think that rap has a place - I just couldn't define it particularly well. The bottom of the Marianas Trench comes to mind, but there are logistical problems there, so I'll keep thinking about it.
BUT, wait for it, there's something worse, much worse. And that is mainstream singers who try/tried to cash in on the rap craze by either doing a rap track themselves, OR, EVEN WORSE, incorporating elements of rap into "normal" songs.
Now, I know I'm getting old because modern music often just sounds like noise to me, which is exactly the scathing sort of statement my parents used to make about The Beatles, the Kinks, yadda, yadda in the 60s and 70s. Although, I do have to say, I heard my 76-year-old pater humming along to "Money" by Pink Floyd on the radio the other day. That was a worry.
So, like B96 and others, I listen to an eclectic array of music ranging from galliards from the 16th century to Robbie Williams, who I admire as much for his genius at relatively inoffensive self-publicity as for his music. In spite of being rubbished from all sides, I listen to Jethro Tull, Steely Dan, early Deep Purple, Yes, Bowie and the whole gamut of the 70s and 80s rock music repertoire. I guess that part of it is nostalgia for my early days playing in bands, but most of it is just that I
like the stuff.
And I don't want to stop people listening to rap. I don't see it as the devil's music, I don't want to play it backwards looking for deep and evil meanings. Like Maximus Quordleplenus, I just choose not to listen to it myself.
Bear in mind, if we all liked the same kind of music, then any band craze would be like the dotcom failures - there wouldn't be room for more than one band in each genre.
So there!
