Sex and music not always the perfect combination
Brad York/Senior Verge Reporter
Issue date: 2/20/09 Section: The Verge
Record labels are forcing young artists to sing seductive lyrics that correlate to a sultry body image.
"If you are in music just to get signed, then you are in music for the wrong reasons," said Sean Walker, lead vocalist for The Staff Blues Band. "Certainly songs are sometimes sexual just to be sexual, and all genres have these, but writing a sexual song just to get signed is wrong. I think that a change in the style of a band should be a natural change and not something just to get a hit single."
Although all genres are facing more raw sexuality everyday, one genre has been leading the pack: rap.
Rap or hip-hop is a musical genre that was born in the streets.
The streets breed vulgar innuendos and violence, so it was only natural that this would become apparent in the music.
Does this mean the rapper makes the music or does the music make the rapper?
"I have a girlfriend and a sister, so I choose not to rap about those (vulgar and sexual) things," said Ian Winston, locally known as rapper I2K. "If I had a daughter, I wouldn't want her to be treated that way. To show your true creativity, you want to be an MC that bases your rhymes off things happening in the world. Not just sex. Sex does sell; I'd just rather listen to something a little more diverse in style."
The foundations of sex in music stem so far back that it would be near impossible to reverse the damage that sex has brought to the quality of music, but it still remains hopeful.
"Right now were in the industry's hands," Ryan said. "It is going to take a group like The Beatles (to break the mold). It won't matter what the music industry is pushing for. It will take a group that strong, that talented and with that much guts to say, 'We have a following, and let's go with it.'"
"If you are in music just to get signed, then you are in music for the wrong reasons," said Sean Walker, lead vocalist for The Staff Blues Band. "Certainly songs are sometimes sexual just to be sexual, and all genres have these, but writing a sexual song just to get signed is wrong. I think that a change in the style of a band should be a natural change and not something just to get a hit single."
Although all genres are facing more raw sexuality everyday, one genre has been leading the pack: rap.
Rap or hip-hop is a musical genre that was born in the streets.
The streets breed vulgar innuendos and violence, so it was only natural that this would become apparent in the music.
Does this mean the rapper makes the music or does the music make the rapper?
"I have a girlfriend and a sister, so I choose not to rap about those (vulgar and sexual) things," said Ian Winston, locally known as rapper I2K. "If I had a daughter, I wouldn't want her to be treated that way. To show your true creativity, you want to be an MC that bases your rhymes off things happening in the world. Not just sex. Sex does sell; I'd just rather listen to something a little more diverse in style."
The foundations of sex in music stem so far back that it would be near impossible to reverse the damage that sex has brought to the quality of music, but it still remains hopeful.
"Right now were in the industry's hands," Ryan said. "It is going to take a group like The Beatles (to break the mold). It won't matter what the music industry is pushing for. It will take a group that strong, that talented and with that much guts to say, 'We have a following, and let's go with it.'"
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