RE: URB cd and Van Helden

From: Manire, Aaron D (amanire@indiana.edu)
Date: Sun Jul 02 2000 - 20:14:01 MET DST

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    cliché is a good word for his latest album. admittedly, i was intrigued by
    the cover art, mistakenly thinking that van helden might have something to
    say about the situation with too many african youths (the upheavals in
    zimbabwe??? where is that photo lifted from? no credits). but it's just
    an image to grab the viewer. might as well be a benetton add. even the
    fonts are cliché. you need a cereal box decoder to read the tracklist.
    retch.

    especially irritating is that van helden fronts like he's trying to take
    house to a higher ground by focusing on his hiphop credentials, dissing
    capitalism/escapism and worshipping individualism? like he had some kind of
    epiphany about "bringing man to a higher level"??! stringing together a
    series of non-sequitors that sound thoughtful but are really just the same
    old tired shit. van helden's been taking lessons from volkswagon
    commercials, the x-files, and trendy fruitopia drinks.

    "before there was even any thought of being capitalist, you know what i'm
    saying. it's like you going to back, to like, the jungles in the amazon and
    you find a tribe alive right now and they don't know nothing about what's
    out there today. they just know that they live and they happy and they have
    their existence. that's the type of shit i'm talking about right there,
    like the fullness of, that whole spiritualness of what they are as that
    tribe and how they live and and survive through that whole pure essence of
    spirituality. you know what i'm saying?"

    yeah, i know what he's saying. he's saying that he doesn't know shit about
    the world except how to exploit a mythical fantasy and exoticize his vanity
    in the process. the amazonian tribes are getting fucked over left and
    right, by eachother, by mineral and oil speculators, by government sponsored
    settlers and by cocaine traffickers. they don't eat pure essence of
    spirituality, they eat food. they want pots and pans. they want
    electronics. they want money (dollars, reals, pesos, you name it). in
    other words, they're extremely aware of the global capitalist system.

    and to think urb is doing it's job by sucking up to this ignorant hypocrite?
    a real journalist brings critical intelligence to bear on the situation.
    van helden, more than anyone else, deserves some rhetorical leveling but urb
    just rolls over and passes the primmed hype along like a standard industry
    ho.

    and btw, the music is wack too. what's the big deal about looping numan's
    cars? pete rock and cl smooth already did it 15 years ago.

    paz,
    adario

    -----Original Message-----
    From: markeg [mailto:markeg@virginconnect.com]
    Sent: Friday, June 30, 2000 1:51 AM
    To: acid-jazz@ucsd.edu
    Subject: URB cd

      dear aj list:What is on the current cd given away with subscriber copies
    of URb this month? Btw : Armand van helden goes on about how he loves
    hip hop more than house. well why dont he makes some aside from AV8 records?
    im tired of people linking themselves to hip hop to seem authentic.
    Its as much a cliche as the black diva who reslly wants to do r and b but
    is doing house. dance music is its own thing Love it s itself. stop
    apologizing for it!.



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