Iggy Azalea – Check Your Black-cent @ The Door

It was about a month ago when a random flipping of the dial led me to the Today Show on WNBC in NYC and it was there, during the Toyota Concert Series, that Hip-Hop heaved one of its most pathetic “last gasps” in what has been a continual death knell.

What I was about to see was not only a further bastardization of street culture, but the latest insult in a seemingly endless barrage of insults. I was about to soak in the performance of one Iggy Azalea.

Evidently the hottest MC in these vapid days of Hip-Hop, the young, blonde, Izalea was about to put her mark on the most recent affront to the art form by twisting it further away from its roots than some Pacific Northwest dandies like Macklemore & Ryan Lewis.

No, Iggy is evidently “still in the murda bizness,” – so she was about to literally kill it.

And who delivered news of this death blow to urban culture, none other than a descendant of the reaper that killed Rock N Roll, Mr.” Video Killed the Radio Star” himself, former MTV Vee Jay Carson Daly.

Enthusiastically chirping of the “awesome Aussie’s” accolades, Daly said Azalea spent more time at number on the charts in 2014 than any other female “rapper” in history and had her first two singles to top the charts paralleling only The Beatles.

Fresh off my morning Joe, I was terrified; I was stupefied; I was horrified – I was in the middle of the latest installment of Boom Bap Radio’s “When Hip-Hop (doesn’t) Happen.”

Izalea performed her Billboard Magazine “Song of the Summer” mega hit – “Fancy” in a two piece yellow and pink body suit, replete with what appeared to be a padded up bottom that could not be seen months earlier in the video version.

Right from the top, she let you know, despite a glaring set of hips and booty that have magically sprouted on the former Miss Six O’Clock , that she is a real MC, one that should be honored right up there with all the greats.

The opening line to the song says it all:

First thing first, I’m the real-est

Seriously?

As real as Kool Herc a pioneering DJ from the Bronx or Afrika Bam, a former leader for the Black Spades street gang?

How about Public Enemy or the Wu-Tang Clan?

Think again.

Another lyric describes how she’s:

“rooftop like she’s bringing ‘88 back.”

A difficult task, if, like 24-year-old Amethyst Amelia Kelly, you were born in 1990 in Australia, not exactly home to break beats, urban blight or The Message.

What the hell is going on here?

What the F is an Iggy Azaelea?

Does Vanilla Ice have an Australian cousin?

Did they just remake “Great White Hype?”

Who Dat? Who Dat?

Twenty-four year old Amethyst Amelia Kelly traded in her Wiggles card and went all gangsta in 2006 when the Aussie left her native Mullumbimby home in New South Wales to become an American rapper.

“The I-G-G-Y” phase of Hip-Hop began, when the songtress decided to drop her government for a formulaic “stripper name” built from her dog: “Iggy” and the street on which she grew up in Australia: “Azalea.”

The then 16-year-old bounced to Florida before ending up in the Dirty South between Houston and Atlanta. It was there she was taken under the wing of T.I.

She released her aptly named debut mixtape “Ignorant Art,” and later signed to T.I.’s Grand Hustle label. By 2012 she had released an EP entitle “Glory” and the rest is whack-assed history.

The blonde and evidently new face of Hip-Hop, began modeling for the Wilhelmina agency and was also announced as the new face of Levi’s. She became the first female and first non-American to be featured in XXL’s Top 10 Freshmen (rappers) edition.

Azalea’s simple, country-assed, dumbed down version of emceeing, somehow became the gold standard among the kids. Commercial based radio stations began buying what it was she was selling and next thing you know the chick is everywhere.

 

 

Now I would never hate on success in as fickle a business as music, however, after taking in this Aussie’s “body of work,” it became abundantly clear that this heifer was mocking our culture. In fact to call this Aussie’s act anything other than mockery of Black street culture, replete with the illusion of a twerkable sistah booty, is not only

Don’t believe me?

Check her out in any interview, where the country black-cent she raps in gives away to a distinctive Austrialian accent.

Do they talk like Black rappers in Mullumbimby?

If not, what is this black-cent and why the act?

I really thought she was the “real-est.”

Look At Her Butt…

 

Ironically, the boomin’ booty was not present in her trademark “Fancy” video, which appropriately is a homage to the all-time most notorious movie about vapid, shallow behavior – “Clueless.”

Now, to be fair, Iggy has been hanging with the brothers and was last seen taking selfies in the bedroom of NBA swingman Nick Young. Maybe “all that ass,” as Nick says, comes from lots of collard greens, monkey bread and some good old fashioned “elbow grease.”

In fact, Iggy’s caboose has become its separate part of her act.

She flaunts it at every turn and even recently signed on with the biggest, most famous ass in the industry – Jennifer Lopez – for a remix of Mommy from the Block’s single – “Booty.” Azalea replaces Pitbull, who was the rapper featured in the original mix.

They call the promotional cover “Double Bubble” – aargh! 

Again, I’m not angry at her success, but as has become the way in the 21^st Century, legitimate artists play along with the industry reindeer games and next thing you know Macklemore, Iggy Azalea and other parodies become the culture.

Nicki’s Anaconda

News of a new queen, seemed to at least piss off the reigning and returning champion Nicki Minaj, who seemed to point veiled disses at Azalea during the BET Awards.

Fresh off winning Best Female Hip Hop Artist, the Anaconda charmer gave a speech that applauded winning her 5^th award and assured her fans that she writes all of her own rhymes, something young Iggy has been accused not being capable of accomplishing.

Minaj said there is no hate between the two and even congratulated Azalea on her nomination at the recent MTV Awards.

I guess you have to go along to get along.

Ironically, it wasn’t too long ago that our Aussie heroine was ignorantly believing native people in her own country were tearing down government built PJ’s because they are nomadic and love living outdoors. She probably missed that the housing was dangerous and substandard, so maybe that really isn’t an Aboriginal little person tied to her backside, afterall.

In the end, Iggy is only playing the role the big record labels want her to play and the Hip-Hop she is butchering is collateral damage in a career we hope will only remain in the genre for a short time.

At the end of the day, her faux black-cent and lack of rhyming prowess, is not Hip-Hop at all, but another Pop music freak show aimed at harvesting more American dollars from the pockets of you and your kids, like MC Hammer, Vanilla Ice and that friggin Cowboy Troy.

So, next time you’re bopping to “Fancy” in the club, remember you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. And that young white girl from Australia isn’t really hip, but the latest edition of When Hip-Hop (doesn’t) Happen.

Ms. Kelly, you should at least big up the real female emcees you mockingly emulate and in the words of Naughty: “If you ain’t from the hood, stay the hell out of the hood – you wouldn’t understand it.”