Josh Zaborowski
The panel discussion this week was very interesting and really put a real person’s perspective on the topic of hip-hop in today’s culture. We got a chance to listen to some different, opinionated, passionate views on the subject at hand. The question that I was most drawn to over the course of the discussion was the issue of what hip-hop does for the community. For example at one point Alex addressed the issue that hip-hop is a type of genre of music that could really bring people together. Hip-hop is produced by a variety of cultures and the enjoyment people get from the music really creates a common bonding ground for many different types of people. I also found it interesting when the panel touched on the issue of commercialism within the production of hip-hop and rap. Alex had some strong views on what he thought of commercialism and how large record labels tend to dominate the radio. Also, the fact that many radio stations plays the “popular” songs of the time, which really doesn’t give other music a chance to become as popular. This action by the record labels and radio stations can be seen as a bias action towards many other types of less “popular” or “radio friendly” music.