Peer Comment Week 4 Entry

Hello Music History blog fans. I reviewed another one of my peer's work. As always, I have links for you to view their page. His name is Dustin Breeden and he's pretty alright. Here is the post I reviewed. And here is his entire blog.

Without further ado:


Hello Dustin,

I really enjoyed your blog about Dr. Dre. I was actually considering Dr. Dre as the topic for my blog post, but switched to Knaye West at the last minute. I liked the fact that you have a lot of dates and specific information listed about Dr. Dre. That shows that you really did your research and know your facts. Recently, I learned that Dr. Dre was the number one earner last year for the Forbes’ hip-hop charts. He earned over one hundred million dollars thanks to his lucrative venture into the Dre Beats audio company last year. That goes right along with what you were talking about with his overall net worth. They probably haven’t done all the work to make a final figure for his new net worth thanks to his highly successful business.  I’m sure it  touches many hearts that you are so immensely inspired by Dr. Dre. That type of motivation can take you far. Keep up the good work. The only thing I could find wrong was the grammar in your blog. A quick spell-check or second person looking over your post could easily fix those minor errors, though. Keep on swimming and doing such a great job!

Thanks,

Donnell.

Podcast 2: Kanye West, the innovator

Independent Research - Kanye West entry

            The road to success isn’t always a straight path. There are detours, roadblocks, and countless people that you meet along the way. Sometimes you have to take a longer path that seemingly veers way off course in order to reach your desired destination. Some of the people you meet are friends and some turn out to be foes. Some people never make it to their destination and some do. Sometimes people stop on the way because they’ve reached a much better place at only half the distance. The legendary musician Kanye West knows about this journey all too well. From being a mediocre beat-maker who people never gave a chance, to a platinum-selling hip-hop artist whose productions are desired by the best musicians on the charts.

            Kanye West grew up in Chicago and became an aspiring rapper at a very young age. People told him he wasn’t good at rapping and wouldn’t give him instrumental hip-hop music to rap to. Facing this problem, he decided he would begin making his own productions. He did everything himself. From the instrumentation to the lyrics, Kanye became a one-man band. He quickly ran into a new problem with this plan: he needed money to support his desired career. He decided he would start selling the hip-hop instrumentals that he was creating in an effort to gain some extra funds. He believed he was good enough to create instrumental productions that people would buy because, in his mind, “You can accidentally make a good beat; you can’t accidentally write a good rap.” This became a lucrative business for Kanye West. After years of producing for local acts, major artist began to notice his unique productions. He began producing for chart-topping hip-hop acts such as Mos Def, Talib Kweli, Jay-Z, Beanie Sigel, Alicia Keys, Ludacris, and Janet Jackson. Although this would be terrific news for most people, Kanye West was not satisfied because it was not benefiting his rap career, which was his true passion. He was only reluctantly given a chance after he consistently bothered one of the labels that was a frequent client for an opportunity. They decided to give him one chance because they had nothing to lose and it’d help them maintain a healthy relationship with one of their favorite producers.

            Kanye West quickly became an innovator in many ways. First, his productions were soulful and unique. They constantly sampled old songs and reinterpreted them in a creative new way. One of the most popular examples is his hit song “Through the Wire”, which sampled Chaka Khan’s “Through the Fire”. He made the song about his mouth being wired shut after a horrific car accident. He influenced the majority of hip-hop musicians to go in a more soulful direction with their productions. Kanye West constantly samples music that other people would be reluctant to even listen to. A great example of this is his song “Dark Fantasy” which contains a sample from Mike Oldfield “In High Places”, which I have a hard time even pin-pointing the genre of. Kanye West is constantly referred to as a musical genius. Further along the Kanye West spectrum, lies Kanye’s innovation upon lyrics in rap. Kanye West approached rap in a way that wasn’t popular among virtually every major artist on the billboard charts. He spoke of conscious topics such as struggling to make it through college without a career plan, people of his culture selling an enormous amount of drugs because of their struggle between morality and poverty, and wondering why life even has a struggle between morality and poverty because they are two things that are seemingly worlds away. His raps about struggles that anyone can relate to helped elevate his career to an extremely high level. Other artists rapidly began to follow suit in a great attempt to make their raps more real and relatable to a broader audience.

            As a listener, I enjoy listening to Kanye West more than the majority of other popular artists in today’s music. He is a relieving breath of fresh air that I can relate to and enjoy his clever ideas and lyrics. As a professional, I believe Kanye West is an amazing musician. People should strive to have the passion, drive, and creativity that Kanye West does. He is a true innovator of this day and age. If everybody were as passionate about his or her work as Kanye West is about his, the world would be a better place.

Peer Comment Week 3 Entry

Here is another Blog post that I reviewed. You can view the post that I reviewed HERE

And you can read Patric Flynn's entire Music History Blog HERE  (It's great!)

Without further ado, here is my review of Patric's post:

Hello Patric,

I really enjoyed reading this blog. Before reading this, I wasn’t very acquainted with Brian Eno and his work. You seem to be very influenced by him and, in this blog post, display an extensive knowledge. I would have liked for you to write a brief description of the “no way” genre that you spoke of. It sounds interesting. Other than the information, your grammar was definitely one of the highlights. The only problem is that, towards the end, your grammar started to stray away from the previous quality. I noticed a type when you typed “the se of music” and you accidentally typed the same word twice in the second to last paragraph. Also, in the last two paragraphs, there are some commas that you missed. These are all simple things that’d be noticed with an extra spell-check. They are all minor errors that aren’t easily seen, but I didn’t have any other suggestions for you because you did such a great job. Keep up the good work.

Electronic Music Innovations Entry

Run DMC is arguably one of the most successful hip-hop groups in history. Not only did they make good music, but they also broke barriers and built bridges within their genre as well as between others. The group consisted of two MC’s and a D.J. They went by the names Run, DMC, And Jam Master Jay. Although many people many not be aware of it, Run DMC actually contributed a lot to electronic music.

One of their most popular songs is Sucker MC’s. This song actually begins with a sequenced storm from the Oberheim DMX drum machine. This marked a new era in hip-hop. Hip-hop was founded upon the premise of sampling music and adding a lyrical rap to it. Run DMC was definitely going against the grain with this release. This sent an open invitation to all hip-hop artists to sequence their own drums as well as other instruments and make them sound as if they were actually being played. This is especially significant because the year Sucker MC’s was released is the same year MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) was created and available for public use. By using electronic musical devices that were also used heavily in the electronic music genre, Run DMC helped to open a door for hip-hop artists to work hand in hand with electronic music artists. From sequencing to recording, hip-hop and electronic music could be nearly synonymous in some cases. Today’s meshes between hip-hop and dub-step or any other prominent electronic sub-genre owe a lot to Run DMC and their early innovations.

As a listener, I hear Run DMC and appreciate the raw hip-hop elements that undoubtedly paved the way for modern hip-hop. The flavor that Run DMC brought to hip-hop provided a unique recipe that artists are still using today. As a professional, I better understand the impact of Run DMC on music as a whole. They were able to incorporate elements of music from every genre and create something very genuine and true to themselves.

Electronic Music - Kraftwerk Entry

Kraftwerk is an electronic music group formed in 1970 by Florian Schneider and Ralf Hutter. In the viewpoint of many people, these two were the foundation of Kraftwerk and any other musicians that became part of the group were just hired help. The album Autobahn was released in 1974 and was Kraftwerk’s first international success. The concept of this album was road travel. This changed a lot about Kraftwerk. They quickly became a group that performed in suits and released concept albums with creative subject matter. They primarily performed and recorded their music in German, which was something very few musicians in Germany were doing because it was considered inappropriate.

As previously stated, the release of Autobahn marked Kraftwerk’s first international success in 1974. This album was heavily inspired by The Beach Boys and could easily appeal to American audiences. Strangely enough, the concept of the album was road travel. This can be credited to the desire of Kraftwerk to stay true to the German culture and lifestyle. In 1975, Kraftwerk released Radio-Activity. This was another concept album with very creative ideas. This album was about nuclear activity and the radio. This album wasn’t as successful in the U.S., but went gold in France and was successful in Europe as a whole. Trans-Europe Express was the next release for Kraftwerk in 1977. This was another concept album, but this time with a theme of train travel. The percussion for the title track was actually inspired by the sound of a train travelling along a track. This album didn’t have as much of a commercial success as the previous two albums when it was released. In 1978, Kraftwerk released an album that was truly revolutionary. The album was called The Man-Machine and was the first time Kraftwerk hooked a drum machine up to a sequencer. This was truly innovative and a large influence on other musicians. After a three year hiatus, Kraftwerk released Computer World in 1981. The track “The Model” from this album is Kraftwerk’s most successful record in the UK. When Kraftwerk went on tour for this album, they packaged their whole studio up so they would be able to perform the album with all of the effects originally used in the recording. This, in itself, was a great innovation that the band spent a lot of time working to make happen.

There are many reasons that Kraftwerk has earned the position of the biggest influence on electronic music. The most obvious reason would probably be the concepts of the albums they released. Kraftwerk consistently released music with a unified theme that was extremely creative. Another reason is because of the value of Kraftwerk’s live performances. To fathom the fact that Kraftwerk actually went as far as finding a way to take their studio on tour with them is enough to leave anyone in awe. They experimented with technology and were constantly looking for innovations to take their music to the next level.

As a listener, Kraftwerk seems a little strange to me. Their music is outside the box and isn’t what I’m typically used to listening to, even today. Their creativity is impossible to overlook. As a professional, I can definitely see why Kraftwerk is such a large influence on electronic music. Their creativity, innovations, hard work, and dedication are things that every musician should inspire to be on par with and dare to exceed. 

Podcast 1: Marvin Gaye - What's Going On