The Voice is No Longer Enough

In the era of racism and post racism, protest music reflects on issues that are contemporary. With regards to African American artists such as Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” sound track, his efforts to express his societal frustrations are clouded by the culture industry. Adorno argues that these musical forms have been commodified by the culture industry and that is an accurate observation that remains relevant throughout the consistently changing music scene. I will be using the terms protest music and political music interchangeably as they represent music that desires to reach a particular outcome that inspires a sort of change. Protest music has been a part of the music industry since the 60’s, and till this day protest music continues to formulate a portion of the culture industry. The messages, particularly for African American artists, remain the same as their predecessors. Artists such as James Brown made a huge impact by expressing his frustrations through the song “Say it Loud.” Yet in the post racial era, you find artists delivering similar messages as a result of social issues, which relate to police brutality as a sub topic of racism. For example Kendrick Lamar has attempted to address this issue particularly in the song “Alright.” 

Throughout the essay I intend to analyze 2 separate artists, the importance of their message in relation to race and the time period, as well as deconstruct the avenues in which they managed to get their message spread across their respectable channels. Music has and always will represent something beyond the face value, which is presumably to listen and enjoy, however in African American artists attempt to associate their musical prowess with political and social issues, said political and social issues seize to be addressed and the power of their voice proves to benefit consumerism rather than the greater good. It has been 59 years since the emergence of protest music, yet the message remains the same despite the fact that we are in a post-racial era. 

Due to the diversity in the delivery of messages and the consistently evolving changes in opinion on multiple social and political issues, I believe that it is important that I establish this papers main theme. Primarily, this paper will reflect on African American artists and their respective attempts to deliver messages through music. 

Protest music can be defined as an art form used in activism. Historically protest music was introduced when America was founded as a call to action. Natalie Clarkson explains that, “The earliest protest songs and the tradition of using music in this way goes right back to the founding of America. Joseph Warren’s call to action song, Free America, was possibly the first protest song to have been sung out by American soldiers.” Though considered as an art form, the delivery was still basic and was representative of the time period in which there was no electrical music recording. Shifting gears into the 1960’s with the civil rights movement coming to the forefront, artists such as Sam Cooke and James Brown released music that resonated with their beliefs in identity and equality. Sam Cooke expressed his frustration as an African American through his song ‘A Change is Gonna Come’. As described by Natalie Clarkson, “The 1960s were a significant period for artists, with the civil rights movement defining much of what was happening in the media. Out of this time comes one of the most famous protest songs – Sam Cooke’s ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’. Living as a black man in 1960s America, Cooke was no stranger to racism and after being turned away from a whites-only motel in Louisiana, he felt compelled to write about the struggles of African Americans.” Sam Cooke potentially set a platform for African American artists to begin voicing their frustrations through music and may have inspired James Brown to release ‘Say it Loud’. It is possible however that Sam Cooke may not have inspired James Brown; his work was definitely a reflection of the civil rights movement in the 60’s that included Martin Luther King Junior’s ‘I Have A Dream’ speech. The speech spoke directly to the political discourse surrounding freedom, discrimination, and equality. Martin Luther King Junior states, 

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity. But one hundred years later, the Negro is still not free.

Providing greater context to the applicability of this speech is important because one of the artists I intend to study is James Brown. Though the essence of the music between James Brown and Sam Cooke share similar values, what differed in their pronouncements was the delivery. Contrasting the conveyance of the two artists similar messages, Sam Cooke wrote a song that lends its hand to soul music where as James Brown’s Say it Loud formed a part of the Funk genre. According to Portia K. Maultsby, “This music coined “soul”, established new trends and direction for the tradition of urban black popular music.” Soul music played an important role in inspiring other genres. The message from African American artists remained the same throughout the 60’s. As Portia K. Maultsby states, “Performers of soul music, in communicating the philosophy of the Black Power Movement, promoted the black pride or self-awareness concept.” This quote underlines the change that America was going through. I believe that the introduction of funk music represented the development of African American culture and the contemporary changes and dynamics that the music industry was facing, as African American artists and their music were subject to exclusion from society at large. 

In the article ‘Funk Music as the Critical Voice of a Post – Civil Rights Movement’ Kesha M. Morant explains, “Funk music emerged out of a desire for a more confrontational approach to protest music. Brown's most noted work, "Say It Loud," was more than a cry of protest; it was also a call to action.” The approach that funk music took toward addressing societal issues seemed to be more explicit and that was expressed through the power of the artist’s voice. James Brown’s “Say it Loud” placed emphasis on the artist’s vocal prowess that was supported by a quicker tempo and instrumentals. The differences were there to see between funk and soul yet funk was heavily inspired by soul music. Whereas “Say it Loud” may have been a more direct approach, the genre as a whole was rejected by the industry. As explained by Kesha M. Morant “The explicit, unapologetic nature of funk music led to its rejection by the record industry.” The record industry during the 60’s was intent on maintaining the divide in terms of music. As a result the music that was released was forcibly made to appeal to black communities even though that may not have been the artists intention. Soul music fell victim of this divide as Portia K. Maultsby reflected on the matter by stating, “Representatives of record companies, the music industry and the mass media encouraged its exclusion by creating labels to identify black performers who they believed would appeal only to black communities. In addition, these representatives played a major role in selecting the listening audience and potential consumers of black music.” Funk music was no different and subsequently was “ghettoized” by the industry and as stated by Kesha M. Morant, “While soul and disco were embraced as palatable genres for White listeners, the industry "consciously ghettoized funk" (Brown, 1994, p. 492), banishing it to Black radio and local neighborhoods.” 

The banishing of funk music to Black radio created an issue beyond the artists expressions. By reducing the listening demographic to just the African Americans, the function of the music was not fully enabled as the people who predominantly experienced songs like “Say it Loud” were African Americans.  Kesha M. Morant identified this in her journal article by stating, “Yet while there are strengths to funk as a form of social protest, there are also weaknesses. Funk went against the grain and created music that spoke to a counterculture within an already marginalized group. It focused on speaking to the needs and desires of a small, insular community in the vernacular language most familiar to this network.” At this point, it is fair to assume that the call for action was fundamentally expressed to its fullest extent from within the marginalized African American demographic. Historically speaking, there may have not been a problem, as there is potential to believe that the music itself contained coded messages that distinctly appealed to the African American demographic. “Black music has operated as a tool to send coded messages throughout the in-group. Dating back to slavery, oral culture survived in America and was reinforced through speech patterns and musical expressions of the African people,” as explained by Kesha M. Morant. Funk music at the time did represent a call to action. African Americans may have received the message that James Brown so explicitly portrayed in his vocals, however, the song may not have been as impactful as one would hope because the genre itself was not deemed palatable for the masses by the industry. 

The release of the song “Say It Loud” was inspirational toward an entire generation. The song was released after the assassination of Martin Luther King Junior. To emphasize on the importance of the song, a law professor named Randall Kennedy recited the time when the song was released. In an article by Meghna Chakrabati and Zoë Mitchell of Radio Boston, they interviewed Randall Kennedy who witnessed “The Godfather of Soul” release the song. Studying this article offered a direct representation of what the song meant to someone who lived in that time period. Randall Kennedy himself is African American and the interview hosted by Radio Boston, discussed the songs importance in 1968. Randall Kennedy states:

It is one of the landmark cultural texts of the 1960s. The Black Liberation Movement had a variety of fronts. One front was outward facing challenging white supremacy. The other front, however, and a very important front was the inner struggle in black America to rehabilitate itself, reclaim itself. Remember, in the 1960s, the word black itself was, in many precincts, a bad word. I clearly remember people fighting, you know, ‘You called me black?' and then a punch would come. And so when James Brown came out with 'Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud,' he was issuing a challenge within the black community to the denigration of blackness that existed within the black community.

Randall Kennedy’s words resonate the words coined by Kesha M. Morant. Denigration refers to the unfair criticism that black people faced as a result of their skin color. The argument is that being black in the 60’s was seen as a curse especially for the African Americans. James Brown was attempting to create unity amongst the black community in light of Martin Luther King Junior’s assassination. To endorse my point Randall Kennedy states, “The reason why James Brown felt that he had to say this is because, for most of American history blackness has been denigrated, it has been a subject of contempt, it has been a subject of derision. So, he felt that he had to say it.” He further amplifies his point stating, “All hues are beautiful, except some hues have been systematically put down for decades, if not centuries.” The latter statement will be more relevant toward the conclusion of this paper; the former statement indicates the turmoil that African Americans were in during the 1960’s. Martin Luther King Junior rose up and appealed for change and was later assassinated, there was an increasing separation between the working class and the middle class, and there was an increase in violence and general misdemeanor. James Brown’s voice served the purpose of trying to unite within the African American community and the racial divide through the Black Power Movement. 

Funk music has impacted the music industry for decades and genres such as hip-hop have been heavily influenced by not only their sound but the stories that were once told by artists of the 60’s era.  So much so that the quote by Kesha M. Morant is still applicable to Hip-Hop music, “It is through Black popular music that the struggles, faith, and joys of a people are expressed.” The genre that, historically, is an accumulation of multiple complex cultures such as rapping, dancing and graffiti originates from New York City. Today, rap music and hip-hop music offer very little in terms of differentiation and this is a result of rap and hip-hop using cultural elements interchangeably. Artists such as Kendrick Lamar, fall into the demographic of artists who identify as rappers but find their music predominantly categorized as hip-hop music. In an article written by Alan Light and Greg Tate, they explain hip-hop music as follows, 

Although widely considered a synonym for rap music, the term hip-hop refers to a complex culture comprising four elements: deejaying, or “turntabling”; rapping, also known as “MCing” or “rhyming”; graffiti painting, also known as “graf” or “writing”; and “B-boying,” which encompasses hip-hop dance, style, and attitude, along with the sort of virile body language that philosopher Cornel West described as “postural semantics.” (Particularly socially conscious hip-hop artists and scholars sometimes add a fifth element, “knowledge of self/consciousness,” to the list of hip-hop elements.)

There were multiple elements contributing to what we now know as hip-hop reflect a time in New York during the 1970’s. The genre has developed since its emergence and Kendrick Lamar is at the forefront of that development especially considering that he is African American. Though funk music did eventually become a part of popular music, hip-hop music managed to enter the mainstream because it was different at the time and was reliant on DJ’s playing popular songs at block parties. Kesha M. Morant states, “It is undisputable that funk music and culture have infiltrated the music industry in such a way that it continues to resonate in the global world, particularly through hip-hop music.” Not only does hip-hop’s sounds resonate through cultural reflection I believe that the music still considers contemporary societal issues, of which predominantly consist of racism. 

James Brown may have been among the most influential artists of the 60’s especially in regards to creating protest music for the African American society. Today multiple African American artists rally behind similar values that call for the unity of the country, particularly among the African Americans. In the large field of musicians that had a purpose behind their music, I am going to choose Kendrick Lamar and the song titled “Alright” from his “To Pimp a Butterfly” album. Born in Compton June 1987, Kendrick Lamar Duckworth is considered to be one of the most talented rappers. According to Biography, “His parents had moved to Compton from Chicago to escape the city's gang culture, although Lamar's father had been associated with the notorious Gangster Disciples gang. As the 1980s crack trade and West Coast gang presence increased, Lamar grew up around precarious street activity, but he seemed more influenced than harmed by it.” This is one of the foundations that Kendrick Lamar built himself upon, as he made his persona around his upbringings. As stated by Biography, “Lamar remains popular for his sharp observations of street culture, often examining the psychology of the victims of crimes.” Among all the other African American artists, what Kendrick Lamar represents breathes an air of authenticity based on his personal experiences that are echoed through his music. The street activity that surrounded his childhood in the 80’s influenced his output. 

In 2015 Kendrick Lamar released the album To Pimp a Butterfly, which was subsequently given the best rap album of the year. An album that I would personally describe as a mixture between classical and contemporary, Kendrick Lamar dives deep into his conscience and manages to identify the evolving social constructs that surround rappers and sees the release of the album as an opportunity to become the voice of African Americans who are still suffering from oppression. In an article that discusses the main themes of the album, Trisha Thadani of The Daily Free Now explains, “There has not been — in the mainstream, at least — a figurehead to take on this largely open role as the voice to the people who previously had the commanding voices of Tupac and Nas when in need of guidance. If anyone, Kendrick Lamar has gotten closest to claiming this title.” The claim that, through To Pimp a Butterfly, Kendrick Lamar was attempting to become the voice of a generation it is further evidenced by his performance at the 2016 Grammy award show. “He later brought the house down with a politicized performance of "The Blacker the Berry" and "Alright" that fused spoken word, live jazz, traditional African dance and a reference to the death of teen Trayvon Martin.” For context, Trayvon Martin was fatally shot by George Zimmerman in 2012 as the trial dragged on to February 2015. In light of this Kendrick Lamar saw it as an opportunity to incorporate the case into his performance. The performance itself is worthy of discussing a new topic based on the magnitude of content that Kendrick Lamar manages to in such a short space of time. One of the opening lines of the performance is “You hate me don’t you? You hate my people; your plan is to terminate my culture. You’re fuckin’ evil I want you to recognize that I’m a proud monkey, you vandalize my perception but can’t take style from me.” The power in this text, the portrayal of African Americans in jail cells, the supporting performers who came in with their saxophones, are all representative of a time before Kendrick Lamar was born and is reminiscent of James Brown in “Say it Loud” in its direct delivery. However, the combination of jazz and hip-hop in his performance lends its hand to the contemporary form of popular music, it is the perfect example of jazz being the inspiration of hip-hop. More so the message than the sounds that accompany it. 

Kendrick Lamar’s performance challenged the standards and pushed the boundaries of societal constructs, based on the similar issues that emanated his predecessors in the music industry. His performance was reviewed on CNN and one of the key terms that sprung from their discussion was “Unapologetically Black.” The term refers to the pride that African Americans should convey about their race. Similarly to “Say it Loud,” this was an appeal to black people to be comfortable in their own skin and be unapologetic for being black. Later in the performance Kendrick Lamar, performs the song “Alright”, which is vital to the Black Lives Matter movement. At a time when African American’s were fearful for their lives, Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” lead the voices of African Americans in a time where police brutality, violence and systemic racism were under the spotlight following George Zimmermann’s acquittal for the shooting of Trayvon Martin. 

The song “Alright” is, at least from my perspective, the contemporary equivalent to “Say it Loud.” It is hip-hop in its truest form and is evidence that the music culture has evolved and artists have managed to adapt to the changes.  The music video, through its grey scale portrayal, manages to place emphasis on the current state of society. The cinematic experience showcases a depressive time, featuring black on black violence, police brutality, and gang mentality which may also be an insight into what Kendrick Lamar’s life was like growing up as a child from Chicago. The evil, as he described it, was surrounding him and through his rise to prominence he has finally found himself an outlet to lend his voice to these concerns and seek change. Kendrick Lamar from minute’s 1:30 to minute 1:47, he says, “But while my loved ones was fighting a continuous war back in the city, I was entering a new one, a war that was based on apartheid and discrimination.” The video itself indicates the awareness that Kendrick Lamar possesses of the street culture from his past and how he can incorporate that knowledge into his art now. Throwing money out of a drifting 1960’s Chevrolet Camaro while three African American children stand and dance on top of a police vehicle is a juxtaposition based on the contrast. As he repeatedly states “We gon’ be Alright,” that particular shot maintains its contemporary nature and fully embodies the concept “F#ck the police.” One of the key lyrics are, "Ni**a, and we hate po-po/Wanna kill us dead in the street fo sho'/Ni**a, I'm at the preacher's door/My knees getting' weak and my gun might blow/But we gon' be alright."

The track was dubbed the sound of black life. In an article from Ethnomusicology Review, Sayeed Joseph states, “In keeping with the Black Lives Matter movement, the album strives to combat issues plaguing the mental health of people of color, specifically Black men, regarding the cycle of gang violence and the power of self-actualization as exhibited in the rural and classic blues era.” Through the legacy of slavery, African American’s may still be subject to being haunted by their past. “Alright” stood as a symbol of hope. 

Kendrick understands the killing of Black men by the police to be another hurdle in the Black experience that can be overcome through spiritual strength to survive (the preacher’s door). At the preacher’s door we confess our struggles and expel the blues from our lives that harm our bodies (My knees gettin’ weak). The internal oppressions that our bodies absorb from the traumatic experiences of our lives (my gun might blow) give us the strength to say that “we gon’ be alright.”

The discourse about the song reiterates the argument that the song is in fact attempting to reach out to fellow African Americans that personal development can happen on the base of his past experience, while at the same time sending an external message. Sayeed Joseph claims, “As Black people, our humanity has been debased by countless historical and modern day traumas. Despite that reality, Black people (and in this case, Kendrick Lamar) have been able to survive and find a way to evolve past their personal and collective situations of struggle.” 

Ultimately the question has to be raised. It has been more than 60 years since Martin Luther King Junior gave the speech, and I only speak of him as a point of reference for change. Yet African Americans are still fighting the same struggle that their ancestors once fought. Songs like “Change Gon’ Come”, “Say it Loud” and “Alright” have all defined an era of music and their respective genres, but if the same issues are being discussed with slight variations for over 60 years, it is clear that the message is being heard, based on the success of the songs, but there is simply nothing that the forms of protest can do to change the social pattern. Simon Firth explains popular music as, “Popular not because it reflects something or authentically articulates some sort of popular taste, but because it creates our understanding of what popular is.” Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” may be both a reflective effort of contemporary society and his personal life but because Kendrick Lamar is aware of the potential behind a topic such as race, he may have done it to further amplify the culture industry. 

What I believe to be the main downfall of African American’s and their respective forms of protest music is that it has been met with commodification. The commodification of their talent and their personality has impacted the outcome of the majority of these songs. Artists have long been offering their talents to the culture industry in exchange for profit. Black Live Matter or the Black Power Movement may have stood to represent something good in their protest but because the music needs to be played consistently through radio, or streaming services today, the true value of their message diminishes. Funk was hailed as a new sound through its aggression and the homage it paid to soul, hip-hop is paying its tribute to funk music through artists such as Kendrick Lamar who echo the voice of frustration of his ancestors. However as artists continue to be identified as a commodity, the industry evidently reliant on capitalism and lack of evident societal change over the past 60 years, African American artists may continue to sing their songs of protest for the foreseeable future to no avail. The African American artists today may see this as an opportunity to contribute to their protests, but on a subconscious level, it is an opportunity to create a name. The voice of the artist is simply not enough to change more than 60 years worth of oppression.