I wasn't but I'm too mad not to
Rihanna's new video is out and i love it but then it's exposing a level of ignorance and fuckery, I can't even.
I am a Rihanna fan, yeah I know. I don't pay much attention to what is said about her because honestly some of it is true but between her and her people she picks catchy songs. That's not my point. When I heard she was doing the Rude Boy video and was doing it as an homage to dancehall I was excited and perturbed. When foreigners do dancehall nowadays all they do is daggering and shit like that's all there is and I didn' want her to do that esp since she's bajan. the video to me is a success, it had the colours, the dancing the fashion of dancehall even though she did the butterfly dance a bit backwards but she got the bogle dance right.
Then the fuckery started I didn't mind it as much until diplo of all fucking people tweeted about Rihanna being on Major Lazer's balls. Yeah, Major Lazer = DJs Diplo[American] & Switch[UK]. And he's talking about their Pon De Floor video:
Note that while that is the video that's a remix of the song. Now you see what's he's talking bout. I bet MIA fans are all but MIA's done that before them. I'll do you one better. Well I wanted to but it's very hard to find 90s dancehall posters on the internet. But I did find some from the 00s and they give you an idea I think but not the real picture of what. What happened was dancehall posters were done in black and white until the printeries figured out how to do colours and is like them turn frighten fridays with it. Dancehall posters exploded with colours esp the Jamaican primary colours, red, green and gold. Worse when shocking[neon] colours came out it was even worse. But I did find these:
more here [this post was made like the morning after I started looking for some]
and this one I found on flickr but I can't embed.
Apart from the colours there was the imagery of the old bike, the speakers, the lion, the patterns all of which may not have been on the posters but were on the clothes. I wish I had pictures because I cannot accurately describe dancehall fashion. There were crews of girls who always tried to best each other with clothes, hair and dancing. It wasn't about who could come closest to being naked, it was about being unique, special, eye grabbing. These women didn't have teams and consultants, they were there own designers, spending all day at dress maker designing and sewing their outfits. Google has never been this inadequate in my life. If I knew then what I know now, I'd have taken so many pictures.
I really wish I could find some of the posters so you guys can really see what I'm talking about so people who should know better don't say and perpetuate ignorance, I'm looking at you Diplo and Solange 'I jacked was isnpired by the 60s for my last album' Knowles.
I know a lot of people will write this off as me defending Rihanna but this is about more for me this is my culture. I didn't learn it from tv or the internets. I saw the posters, I wore out cassettes to get the lyrics, I spent class time and recess learning new dance moves, I envied women their courage in wearing some of the most outlandish, I lied about being at friends when I was going to dance. So when I see people who caan tell me one song on pepperseed or diwali riddim[do they even know them?], who caan do heel-an-toe or worl-a-dance to save them life acting like they OWN my culture and accusing a bajan of all people of jacking them, excuse me if I tell yuh bout yuh madda
LJ better not eat this or I'm going to murder that fucking goat and mek curry goat and manish water out of it.
I am a Rihanna fan, yeah I know. I don't pay much attention to what is said about her because honestly some of it is true but between her and her people she picks catchy songs. That's not my point. When I heard she was doing the Rude Boy video and was doing it as an homage to dancehall I was excited and perturbed. When foreigners do dancehall nowadays all they do is daggering and shit like that's all there is and I didn' want her to do that esp since she's bajan. the video to me is a success, it had the colours, the dancing the fashion of dancehall even though she did the butterfly dance a bit backwards but she got the bogle dance right.
Click to viewThen the fuckery started I didn't mind it as much until diplo of all fucking people tweeted about Rihanna being on Major Lazer's balls. Yeah, Major Lazer = DJs Diplo[American] & Switch[UK]. And he's talking about their Pon De Floor video:
Note that while that is the video that's a remix of the song. Now you see what's he's talking bout. I bet MIA fans are all but MIA's done that before them. I'll do you one better. Well I wanted to but it's very hard to find 90s dancehall posters on the internet. But I did find some from the 00s and they give you an idea I think but not the real picture of what. What happened was dancehall posters were done in black and white until the printeries figured out how to do colours and is like them turn frighten fridays with it. Dancehall posters exploded with colours esp the Jamaican primary colours, red, green and gold. Worse when shocking[neon] colours came out it was even worse. But I did find these:
more here [this post was made like the morning after I started looking for some]
and this one I found on flickr but I can't embed.
Apart from the colours there was the imagery of the old bike, the speakers, the lion, the patterns all of which may not have been on the posters but were on the clothes. I wish I had pictures because I cannot accurately describe dancehall fashion. There were crews of girls who always tried to best each other with clothes, hair and dancing. It wasn't about who could come closest to being naked, it was about being unique, special, eye grabbing. These women didn't have teams and consultants, they were there own designers, spending all day at dress maker designing and sewing their outfits. Google has never been this inadequate in my life. If I knew then what I know now, I'd have taken so many pictures.
I really wish I could find some of the posters so you guys can really see what I'm talking about so people who should know better don't say and perpetuate ignorance, I'm looking at you Diplo and Solange 'I jacked was isnpired by the 60s for my last album' Knowles.
I know a lot of people will write this off as me defending Rihanna but this is about more for me this is my culture. I didn't learn it from tv or the internets. I saw the posters, I wore out cassettes to get the lyrics, I spent class time and recess learning new dance moves, I envied women their courage in wearing some of the most outlandish, I lied about being at friends when I was going to dance. So when I see people who caan tell me one song on pepperseed or diwali riddim[do they even know them?], who caan do heel-an-toe or worl-a-dance to save them life acting like they OWN my culture and accusing a bajan of all people of jacking them, excuse me if I tell yuh bout yuh madda
LJ better not eat this or I'm going to murder that fucking goat and mek curry goat and manish water out of it.