Music as a Form of Activism
As a type of contemporary activism, music is increasingly being used to express the concerns that various societal groups may have. The social issues that the oppressed segment of the society is facing can be brought to light through music by the artists. Due to its greater significance and dependence on millennial relationships, music is an effective tool. Concerns of the contemporary society have been addressed in large part by the activism aimed at combating police brutality and the modest measures taken by the authorities to address societal issues. The killing of the blacks and the black rights has been some of the issues that are facing the black community (Cochran 47).
The Role of Hip-Hop in Supporting the Black Community
Hip Hop music has often sided with the black community owing to the ghetto nature of such music and the location in which it produced. Since 1993, Wu-Tang has been prominent personalities in hip-hop music who are making advances into bringing about respect for the black race in the modern societies. This paper analyzed the content of the A Better Tomorrow music by Wu-Tang and enabling that the audience may draw from the composition.
The Influence of Black Lives Matter Movement in Music
The black lives matter debate has been one important form of the activist voices that is concerned with the highlighting of the police boas against the black rise. The depiction of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. is intended, not to entertain, but to enlighten the audience on the success that has been undertaken by the previous human rights crusaders. The inclusion of the prompt by former President Obama on the need of equality and the right to air treat meet irrespective of the races is the anchor to which the core message of the activist voices has been premised.
Amplifying Activist Voices Through Hip-Hop Music
Amplifying the voice of the activists through the use of hip-hop music genre is objective owing to the background of the hip-hop music. Hip-hop is a genre of music that is majorly identifiable with the black race. The blacks have often been victims of oppression by the state authorities, especially, the police, thus, the objectivity is its choice to highlight the black killings I the lyrics. "Black lives matter…..now stay strong" is an objective statement that is passed by the clip to draw the attention of the audience into calling for equality in the American continent (WuTangClanVevo 1:19).
Empowering the Black Community Through Music
In the music, the phrase, wake up, is repeated severally with the background voices chanting, "I am free" is an affirmation of the progress that ought to be done to enlighten the blacks in need to proclaim their freedom. "The politicians have to listen to our position" is a musical note that comes out sharply from the poem, what the phrase depicts is the high level of enlightenment of the politicians being at their disposal and their employees. Therefore, the sentence is a call to action for the lawmakers who tend to have laxity in the various tasks that they are conducting for the population. Accordingly, the clip is a powerful tool that is used to describe the official positions that the citizen are taking to ensure that there is equality within the United States of America.
Addressing the Issues Faced by the Black Race
Wu Tang's music is manifest of the problems that the black race has to face in their routine lives within the United States. For example, in the first stanza of the music, the artist asserts "in the housing, thousands seen early graces, victims of worldly ways, memories stay engraved." The lyric shows the bitterness that the artists have with the regime that is wiping off the black culture. The recognition that the blacks are being aimlessly killed and the description of the new world order slaughtering the children, women, and men are manifest of the inability of the current regimes to address the issues that are facing the black race succinctly.
Striving for a Better Tomorrow
The title of the music being a better tomorrow is the objective of the role that ought to be played by the modern society in being progressive about the issues that are facing the current population. As such, the level of segregation that is advanced against the blacks ought to be addressed with the sole intent of bringing about equality in the American society.
Giving Hope to the Oppressed
The backbone of the music is on the hardships that are currently being faced by the oppressed in the society. The need by the oppressed to look into the mechanism through which they may improve on their livelihoods is one important wakeup call that is being advanced by the artist. Therefore, the music is composed with the intention of relating with and highlighting the issues that are faced by the average citizen in their quest to have justice and to live in a society that is cognizant of their needs and sensitive to their tribulations. Therefore, the music is meant to give hope to the oppressed, especially the blacks, who are losing faith on their existent status as equal members of the American society.
Positive Message and Social Awareness
On closer analysis, the music churns out positivity on the side of the artists. The positivity of things becoming better through the involvement of the people who feel that they are deprived of some of their rights and the sensitization of the authorities concerned on the need to have a level playing field for all the citizens (Alexander 7). Therefore, the artists are successful in their mission of informing the public of the social ills that are perpetrated against the minority.
Organic Structure and Powerful Visuals
The organization of the entire song seems to be organic in its structure and composition. The band recognizes that they are emcees and command a huge following and having the music released naturally, in a manner that is relational to their target audience would make the music sell and be liked by the majority. The instruments are not well pronounced in the music with the emcee taking the dominant role of the fats rap to bring forth the core message that is being passed across. In the video clip, the description of the various scenes of crime, such as Ferguson and the organization of burials of the victims of police brutality are set to emphasize the suffering of the blacks within the American soil.
The Responsibility of the Black Community
Furthermore, the music is a message to the black population on the ills that are advanced by them and their capability of sorting out their messes. The blacks are often known for their quest of being rich quick and being street smart, even if it is through the illegal means (Pough 45). While crime, violence, and blacks may be misconstrued and dealt with differently by the law enforcement agencies, the wrong move by the blacks is responsible for their suffering and a cause of their early death. In the music, the flag is given a different meaning based on each color. The color black is representative of the dominant white color is a representation of the cops, red color being is representative of the bloodshed while blue representing chips. Therefore, there is no honor that the blacks can give to the flags since it is summarized the untold suffering that the blacks have to go through routinely.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the music by Wu-Tang is both coherent and points on the causes of the black suffering and the quotas of the society that is to blame. The quotas include the blacks themselves and the law enforcing agencies especially the cops. The blacks are more concerned about the need to get rich in any way, through which they can be regarded as being street smart. Additionally, the blacks are targets of the state owing to the violence that is meted against them by the police, which is responsible for maiming them and compromising on their right to live like the other Americans. Wu-Tang's style of music is a pointer to the original street hip-hop that was majorly produced in the black quotas and had the intention of promoting the ghetto culture and bringing out the suffering of the black race. Therefore, Wu Tang's work is an eye opener on how music could still fit within a given genre, in this case, hip-hop, and always intellectually present an emerging issue.
Works Cited
Alexander, Michelle. "The New Jim Crow." Ohio St. J. Crim. L. 9 (2011): 7.
Cochran, Shannon M. "Hip-Hop commercialism and the destructive exploitation of young Black males: In search of Joseph." Spectrum: A Journal on Black Men 3.2 (2015): 45-70.
Pough, Gwendolyn D. Check it while I wreck it: Black womanhood, hip-hop culture, and the public sphere. Northeastern University Press, 2015.
WuTangClanVevo. “Wu-Tang-Da Mystery of Chessboxin.” Youtube. 2013. Web.
