Has grime music impacted politics.
Proposal
My specialist study is about how grime music has impacted politics.i will explore the positives and negatives of grime music and uk rap. I will also explore how it has impacted politics and how the younger generation has taken to it. I will look at data from who’s voted and which party they voted for for each age demo-graph.
Research
The primary research I have performed was a survey I made and I got my friends to complete however, I didn’t get responses that I thought I would’ve received. In my survey I am asking if grime music is a positive on politics.
From my survey I have found out that several of my classmate do not listen to grime music or follow politics. 85% did not listen to grime music and did not provide a valid reason why. Then I went on to ask who your favorite grime artist is and I received various answers with stormzy taking the clear lead with 42%.After that I asked do you follow politics and I received 2 opposing answers because politics is a touchy subject especially after the hate they received from the pandemics. Next I asked how they feel with music and politics being mixed. I received some responses but they are different from each other and talk about different points. One of the points bought up was “Politics should be kept separate from media, especially when it is consumable by children.” which bought up my next question “Do you think rappers are a good influence on teaching your kids on politics?” where I got mostly the same answer back from each response saying it depends what the rapper is talking about. lastly I asked for one rapper\artist that has given political views to you.
Many rappers have a strong involvement in politics cause politics was the cause for them to become rappers in the first place to create music is their method of art to make noise for issues in politics. Rappers have a strong influence on the youth and can make change and shift power in politics and who gets the most voted.
PowerPoint
Grime is a genre of hip hop music that emerged in London in the early 2000s. It developed out of earlier UK dance style UK garage. Grime is generally considered to be distinct from hip hop due to its roots primarily being genres such as UK garage. • The style initially spread among pirate radio stations and underground scenes before achieving some mainstream recognition in the UK during the mid-2000s through artists such as Dizzee Rascal, Kano, Skepta, JME and Wiley. The genre has been described as the “most significant musical development within the UK for decades.” • Grime music has reached new heights over the past few years as artists like Skepta and Stormzy raise the profile and have helped the genre go global. Attendance for grime events has increased by 34% over the last three years, with Ticketmaster selling more tickets to more fans than ever before. Some of early political references was from Dizzee Rascal on Boy in da Corner: “Queen Elizabeth don’t know me so, how can she control me when, I live street and she lives neat?”. When it comes to the articulation of politics and grime, the lyric that is often quoted is Skepta Shutdown’s ‘We don’t listen to no politician. Everybody on the same mission.”
After some fans told Stormzy to shut up and stick to music instead of politics, he responded in his next track, Hear Dis: “They said I can’t tweet about the government, why can’t I be free anymore?”. “I’ll expose these racist clubs and feds who can’t move me anymore. Also On the popular grime song vossi bop that was Stormzy’s first solo single since 2017. An earlier version of the track was recorded in 2016 and the song is inspired by a viral dance. On the lyric “FUCK the Government and FUCK Boris!!” he is calling out the government and prime minster Boris Johnson. “Yo, Theresa May, where’s the money for Grenfell? What, you thought we just forgot about Grenfell? You’re criminals, and you got the cheek to call us savages You should do some jail time, you should pay some damages You should burn your house down and see if you can manage this”. This is a verse from a performance Stormzy did at the 2018 BRITs award.
In October 2017 when Dave was 19 years old he released “question time” along with his game over EP. This is a 7-minute rant aimed at the government, the Torie party, Tereasa may, Boris Johnson, Donald trump and US government along with other people and parties. Right down to the name of the song is calling out the prime minster, because question time is also the name of a politics tv show that airs on BBC 1. it could also be interpreted as asking questions that the media is scared to ask, or it could be as a interrogation from Dave to the government. Question Time criticizes the political system both in the UK and US and draws out important social events that are still awaiting justice. Even though this was written in 2017 the words that Dave is speaking are still relevant in today’s day and age and it will send shivers down your spine when you hear it. “Look. A question for the new prime minister How’d you have a heart so sinister?” This is a direct question for Theresa May whose actions and behavior was utterly heartless and cowardly, specifically referring to the Grenfell Tower Disaster. • “You brought the heart of the nation to its knees Underpaid, understaffed, overworked.” Here Dave is claiming that the British government has taken all the motivation and positivity out of the NHS (wordplay on heart as it is relating to the National Health Service) by making employees work for less money, whilst being understaffed with longer working hours. This works so well in today’s climate because Boris Johnson has taken the already stressed NHS and added more pressure and stress with no funding whatsoever. • “Privatized healthcare, guns for police, Increased uni fees, is this what they’re selling us? Well let me remind you just in case you’ve forgotten that we live in Great Britain, not in Donald Trump’s America” This is what the Conservative party proposed and wanted be implemented in law. The proposed ideas from the conservative party links in with America’s attitudes and ideas towards their services. Dave strongly emphasizes the fact that Great Britain and America are two different countries. So, they both should have different ideas and attitudes towards their services. “Speaking of America, state and the president with all due respect, I’ve got something to say to them I just find it funny you can’t give a hand to Palestine, but you can trade whole arms with Saudi Arabia” Dave is criticizing the United States for not helping Palestinians who are in the middle of a war against the Israelis. He also states that the United States has been trading loads of weapons with Saudi Arabia. This could also be a play in words as “arms” is a slang term for guns, while “giving a hand” to someone is another meaning for helping someone out. “Give a hand” to Palestine could also be taken as a reference to the ‘Free Palestine’ movement, which uses a clenched hand as it’s logo. Honestly, the whole song goes hard is full of references to politics and social events and I could be here all day explaining the whole song, so I’ve only picked out 4 lyrics that still apply to today. But if you ever get the chance please listen to the song. In addition to question time Dave also preformed his hit song “Black” at the 2020 BRITs award show. Throughout “Black,” Dave discusses themes of racial and social inequality to black people. But at the end his live performance Dave adds an extra verse In this live performance that calls out the recently elected Prime Minister Boris Johnson and points out even more political and social issues within the UK. “It is racist whether or not it feels racist The truth is our Prime Minister is a real racist” this is the first line of this extra verse and Dave has cut straight to the chase. The UK Prime Minister is Boris Johnson who has been frequently called out on racism due to making comments such as black people having ‘watermelon smiles’ this is not the first and will probably not be the last time he will be caught saying something racist if you want to look at everything, he said that racist click this link.“How the news treats Kate versus how they treated Megan” Dave refers to the treatment of Kate Middleton in comparison to Meghan Markle. However, since Meghan’s marriage into the family, the media seem to have focused greater on her actions than Kate, with her race seemingly the cause of this. An example would be Piers Morgan who was fired from ITVs good morning Britain for this exact topic.“But Grenfell victims still need accommodation” that’s self explanatory dave saying that the victims of the Grenfell Tower Disaster still do not have any accommodation.
The artist Akala talks about his early life and living in poverty, racism, the prison industrial complex, history, war and much more. He also reminds us of how stupid most people in our society act. “They used to say ‘Don’t be like me’ Yeah I got a name and dough on the street”. The Gangsters Akala grew up around discouraged him from the lifestyle, They didn’t enjoy the lifestyle of drugs and violence. No one is born to want to do these things, but they’re forced to because of unfortunate circumstances. “When the world’s this fucked up, lethargy’s a crime”. Akala is saying the world is so messed up that it is a crime to be laz y and not do anything to improve it. “As if racism just upped and vanished But has it? No its right on course You’re beaten so bad, you’re trained to ignore” Blacks living in England are oblivious to the historical system racism that their race has been through. Blacks are in such a bad situation that they have been trained to ignore the fact that they are not treated as equals in a faux post-racial society. This also ties in with the earlier line about knowing yourself and your history. “Prison in America’s a private business. They get paid fifty-k per year per inmate by the State, just wait Also legally are allowed to use their prison inmates as slaves Cheap slave labour, big corporations” States like California pay private prisons $50,000 a year for each inmate. The 13th Amendment says “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude except as a punishment for a crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted shall exist within the United States.” That means that if you’ve been convicted of a crime, you are legally allowed to be a slave.
A major report on Grime include the impact of the #Grime4Corbyn campaign. With 58% of grime fans voting for Labor during the 2017 election, one in four said that the campaign directly influenced their vote. After an election in which the youth turnout was around 72% of those aged 18-24, the impact of the youth in Labor’s surge of popularity is obvious. The role of a series of influential grime artists, who are not traditionally known for their politics yet came out in full force, working to galvanize the youth to vote and specifically supporting Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn. The general election in 2017 saw a significant rise in the youth vote, gaining the highest youth turnout in a quarter of a century. Many credit the grime movement for its influence on young people. Firstly, and perhaps the most high-profile part of this was Grime4Corbyn, which was formally associated with UK Grime. The movement hosted events with free tickets for those who had registered to vote, such events included music, debates and panels discussing both politics and music. This encouragement for young people to register to vote was supplemented by flurries of tweets from high profile artists, such as JME and Stormzy, discussing how to register to vote and when the deadline was.
“GRIME IS HERE TO STAY”. Mayor Of London Sadiq Khan has spoken up in praise of the city’s grime scene, declaring that it is ‘here to stay’.“My girls are 15 and 17 and big grime fans,” Mr Khan told NME. “Skepta’s one of their heroes, Stormzy, Wiley, it’s great. We went to Drake last week and he had Section Boyz on stage – they’re a big grime act from London.”
Controversy
On the other hand grime music can also have a negative impact through the rise of knife crime throughout out the all of uk. also there are altercations between rival gang and problems between artists that feed hatred to the fans this could cause tension between grime listeners. An example of this is the fights between London gang the NPK and OFB many viral clips haven emerged of them fighting such as stabbings. A prime example of this was in late 2020 Tion Wayne and headie one had a started a fight on a plane these resulted in arrests and kicked of the airline. This feud got many people involved like well known artist Morrison who broke up the feud as he is friends of both artists. Many people took this seriously and thought that rappers should be punished and some people mocked the situation referring it to two people fighting like children.
Stats on uk crime, in the year ending March 2021 there was around 41,000 crimes recorded involving a knife or a sharp instrument in England and Wales. This was 15% lower then the year before but 27% higher then what it was in 2010/11 and that’s when grime music started to gain traction in the UK.
Conclusion
I think that grime has a positive impact as it brings a-lot of issues in politics to light however some get too serious and heated on this topic that fans start to have clashing opinions and this results to feuds between people. For me dave has influenced my opinion positively because he talk about real issues in the uk and is unbiased, he has gone through many trials that other go though such as his mom struggling working and earning minimum wage for her family. My final thoughts are that grime music has impacted politics.
•genius.com. (2019). Stormzy – Vossi Bop. [online] Available at: https://genius.com/Stormzy-vossi-bop-lyrics. •STORMZY – VOSSI BOP. (2019). YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ClYy0MxsU0. •genius.com. (2017). Dave – Question Time. [online] Available at: https://genius.com/Dave-question-time-lyrics. •Dave – Question Time. (2017). YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ff6CjYBhoI. •genius.com. (2020). Dave – Black (Live at the BRITs 2020). [online] Available at: https://genius.com/Dave-black-live-at-the-brits-2020-lyrics. •Dave, S. (2020). Dave – Black (Live at The BRITs 2020). YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXLS2IzZSdg. •genius.com. (2011). Akala – Fire in the Booth. [online] Available at: https://genius.com/Akala-fire-in-the-booth-lyrics. •Charlie, Sloth (2011). Akala – Fire In The Booth (part 1). YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEOKgjoxoto Bienkov, A. (n.d.). Boris Johnson called gay men “tank-topped bumboys” and black people “piccaninnies” with “watermelon smiles.” [online] Business Insider. Available at: https://www.businessinsider.com/boris-johnson-record-sexist-homophobic-and-racist-comments-bumboys-piccaninnies-2019-6