Defending White Rappers Against Soul-Eating Hipsters

If you are a rap blog fanatic, as I am, you may have seen "The Passion of the Weiss Hottest Rappers List". If you haven't seen it, you may have noticed I included the link. (You read the article, and when you get back, notice I made a bookmark for you - BOOKMARK). Basically, it's a parody of those types of lists, like the MTV one, or the XXL Freshmen cover. This particular list happens to feature only white rappers. Which I guess makes it funny, because white people are bad at rapping.

I'd have to say, overall, I tack a rapper being white on as a deficiency. It's just one of those things. What's that the result of? Is it years of being presented with almost strictly black rappers? Does it have something to do with seeing lots of terrible white rappers? Is it mixture of these two things? I don't really know. I just know for myself, and lots of rap fans, if a rapper is white, he better be able to make up for it. Hip-hop is a universal culture, but it is shaped and controlled by black people. That's a fact.

So with all that said, why do I take issue with the list? White rappers are definitely an easy target, and none are easier than the likes of Riff Raff, Machine Gun Kelly, Kreayshawn, and Chet Haze. To me, they are all cringe-inducing artists, definitely worthy of ridicule. So what's my issue?


I think my qualm is a three-parter. One, I don't like the shots at Hoodie Allen, specifically because they're insulting him for having grown up in the "not very affordable, yet not very cheap suburbs of Long Island" and for being college-educated. I can't be sure, but I'd guess that all members of The Passion PBR of the Weiss writing roster are college-educated, and probably enjoyed upbringings not much different than the one they ascribe to Hoodie Allen. I mean, these are some very white dudes (it seems to me), and they seem to fall in the bloggerati camp. To me, that makes them guilty of "fetishizing mediocrity". Which is to say, they love Future, who I think sucks, and hey Lil B is a genius. Maybe I should just laugh along with it, but I'm annoyed by the fact that they're picking at how white Allen is, and how he's not relateable because he comes from wealth (allegedly, which I'm only using because they included it like it was a terrible crime). Bitch please, you can relate to trap rap? You guys sling rock out of your American Apparel totebags? I'll admit I don't listen to Hoodie Allen, but my criticisms still stand.

Part two of my qualm is with their bashing of Asher Roth. I don't know when, but sometime recently I decided that Asher is pretty dope. Actually, I probably know when, it was sometime between listening to the incomparable (yes) Pabst & Jazz and reading this interview (which turned out to be one of the best interviews I've read in a long time). Their dig at Roth comes when they advertise "you want to hear dudes spit hyper lyrical lyrics about furry hats, beer bongs, bongs, water pipes, Pabst Blue Ribbon, and ping pong[?]". Firstly, I'm happy that your proud of your hipster stylings, which put you above "lyrical lyrics" and put you in the realm of fucking Autotuned rambling. Enjoy your cool points. Secondly, that statement is a weird amalgamation of hearing "I Love College", and hearing about how he raps now. Post Asleep in the Bread Aisle (which I didn't listen to), Asher's spit game isn't about furry hates or PBR. Admittedly, when he dropped, that was the image that was marketed for him. I think in the 3ish years since his debut, he's matured a great deal, and moved out of that lane. Did you hear GRIND? They further shit on him for rapping about inherently "white" things, but why? I am very pleased that he doesn't rap about bullshit he knows nothing about. Asher was the Great White Hope when he came out, partly because he was the first really high-profile white rapper after Em, and also because hey he raps about shit I actually know about. As I said before, I'm not much of a white rapper fan, but attacking somebody for not rapping about what they don't know is stupid.

Finally, the third part of why this list made me want to write out however many fucking words I'm now at, is the whole "white" blog attacking white rappers thing I alluded to earlier. PBR of the Weiss is all about hipster-cool and disaffected-chic. Honestly, I like reading a lot of the shit (the interviews, the retrospectives) but the hipster posturing makes me wrinkle my nose. But whatever, that's their lane, it works well for them, they're not concerned that one guy thinks they're a little too Pitchfork and not enough Droptops and Stacy Lattisaw Tapes. They're the bloggerati, we're Kids Wasting Time. Us and them. I just think a "white" blog taking potshots at white rappers is low, cheap and an unimaginative way to try and bolster your credibility.


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