Friday, December 12, 2014

10. All the Fish in the World



This is exactly what you think it is - a rap tune about fish.  Off the mark, perhaps, but not by much.  I learned a valuable lesson here: it does no good to parody a genre that is already so close to self-parody as it is.  In this case, I thought I'd poke a little well-deserved fun at hip hop.  It really wasn't needed.  I mean, hip hop is impervious to parody because what are perceived as its biggest flaws are actually its greatest strengths.  Limited subject matter, violence, sexism, musical monotony, non-stop profanity, etc., all these things make it the powerhouse it is today.  The first time I heard Wiz Khalifa, I thought he was a parody act because his music was so bad.  I'm not talking beats or feel or the rapping itself (even though none of those was particularly well done); the music within the tune was atrociously bad.  But hey, that's the standard.  Back in the nineties, there was a progressive hip hop movement that was headed up by De La Soul.  It was pretty fun while it lasted, which wasn't for long.  I don't know whether such groups are still out there.  I'm aware of Shabazz Palaces, but I find their stuff vexingly unmusical.  Anyhow, even farther back in the fifties and sixties, there was always this urge in popular culture to ridicule rock 'n' roll for its youth-oriented simple-mindedness particularly by comedians of the age.  The problem was that the more outlandish the parody, the more people were drawn to it.  So basically, the whole thing was immune to all mockery, as is hip hop these days.  That's kind of what I ran into here.  Plus, people aren't totally jazzed about hearing a tune about fish.  But know this: the sarcastic fringehead is a real fish.  And it's very ugly.

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