Amateur Megalomania

Have you seen the Avis commercial yet?

I have a confession to make.

I’m in that car. I’m an overweight dorky white guy in business dress, grooving to a staccato delivery of language that would mortify me in any other setting.

I have become a huge (literally) Eminem fan.

And in the interest of spreading this shame, a good friend of mine whose name I won’t mention (Chris Gidman – I had my wife type that for me), is also hooked on this stuff.

We drive around at lunch, speakers blaring, heads bobbing, absorbing the language of the ‘hood. Then we go back to our desks and work in well-paying jobs.

I can’t get enough of it. He’s a genius. Lyrics, meter, rhyme – it is amazing.

I’ve tried to branch out to other artists in this genre, so far with little success. I don’t know if that is a product of Eminem’s level of performance, or any hidden biases in my racial background. It’s a fair question, and I can’t answer honestly. All I know is that I haven’t found too much else I like as much.

We’ve been trying to decipher the world of Hip-Hop. It has its own mythology and history. It is rife with incestuous label relationships, internecine feuds, and the more than occasional murder. Wikipedia dedicates a whole page to rap feuds. As my unnamed (by me) friend said. “It looks like hard work to be a rap star, just keeping track of who you hate.”

That spawned an idea for a portal site for people like us. We suspect a large population of new rap fans who might be a bit mystified by the complex world of rap feuds. We could provide an up to date catalogue of enemies, insults and log any recent violence. I checked, and diss.com is available. I’m sure its just another business idea that won’t go anywhere.

Recently, my unnamed friend and me were out at the local mall for lunch. We loitered in the record store, and I headed to the rap aisle. Picture me – white as white, dressed for business, work ID badge hanging around my neck, PDA in my front pocket, essentially a neon sign of awkward nerdism. I sidle up to a pair of young, black men with dreds, sagging pants, and heavy jewelry. I’m flipping through the rack, checking out Tupac, 50 Cent, and others while I can feel their eyes on me. I think I was actually making them uncomfortable.

I wish I knew a little more about the genre. I would have loved to have turned to them and start talking about the specifics of Tupac’s fifth post-mortem album, or the political situation between the East and West Coast schools of rap.

Someday, I will have that conversation.

I have a dream….

Filed under: Personal