Ahhhh, white rap: you either love it, or you hate it. If you want my personal opinion, hate is too strong a word, but despite the fact that I myself am a white guy, I have never been a huge fan. Don’t get me wrong, its not that I don’t recognize the incredible talents of Eminem, Slug, or The Beastie Boys, it’s just that a lot of white rap falls into one of two stereotypes. On the one hand you have the gimmicks: Vanilla Ice and Asher Roth, who want you to know that they may be white but they’re still cool and can pick up all the fly honeys yo. Then on the other hand you have Slug, Aesop Rock, and even Eminem who are depressed, hate themselves, and vulnerable, and thus somehow we are supposed to love them deeply. It’s not that I don’t think that there is plenty of room for both of these types of rap; if you are a fan of either, by no means should you ever feel embarrassed, be proud. Music speaks to everyone differently. Yet for me personally, I hate trends and gimmicks, and if you don’t love yourself, it’s pretty hard for me to come up with a reason why I should love you instead, especially if I have never met you. To take it one step further, it’s even harder to imagine why I should spend money on you, especially for a show where you are gonna stand stiff as a brick while you play depressing songs that if I actually pay attention, will make me hate life and want to drive my car at full speed into a brick wall. The image of Cage screaming “Teen Age Death!!!!!!!” to start his show at the first Paid Dues festival, will forever go down as one of the stupidest concert moments I have experienced. At the same time, to show you that I am not a complete hater, I must admit, that around the time that I discovered that blunts, cars, and loud music was an absolutely incredible combination, one of the homey’s had stumbled across Atmosphere’s, God Loves Ugly. Although I haven’t listened to it in at least half a decade, it definitely got consistent spins for about a year. Just hearing “Shrapnel” takes me back in time, to where I can almost smell the Bud Lights and Swisher Sweets in the back of the homey’s Ford Focus. Oh yeah Grouch and Eligh are the business as well.
Anyways, to get to the real subject of this article, Hazardous Wastes is an MC out of Boston, which over time seems to be ZIF’s favorite underdog city. Until this weekend, I had never heard a song of his, a feature, or even his name, but Jake told me that he liked the album and wanted me to review it. Being that Jake’s ear for music is almost always reliable, and listening to brand new albums completely ignorant of what I am about to get myself into is without a doubt one of my favorite past times, giving Hazardous Wastes a shot was a no brainer.
for the whole review please visit: Zebraisfood.com and tell them your opinion on it! Id like to thank matt for the review
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