Art Oasis

Visiting Art Prize in Grand Rapids was pretty awesome. There was some talk about the competition being weaker than past years. However, the fact that the whole city had been transformed into an art museum was pretty incredible. And I thought that the art was impressive too. An entire city was dedicating itself to art, local restaurants were full of tourists and everyone seemed happy to just be wandering around.

I've never thought of Grand Rapids as an oasis for art. And that got me thinking about hip-hop (pretty much everything makes me start thinking about hip-hop). And in particular, I was reminded about Minnesota hip-hop. Like Grand Rapids and art, Minnesota and rap music are not two things seem to match up. But there are a good bunch of talented rappers from the Twin Cities. Three MC's in particular jump to mind, I posted three videos below so you can get an idea of what Minnesota's hip-hop oasis consists of.

Slug (of the duo Atomosphere): Modern Man's Hustle


Brother Ali: Take Me Home


Eyedea: amazing freestyle with Slug

Who are the ten most prominent women in music right now?

Before I start this post, I know there are plenty of great female indie musicians. Karen O, Victoria Legrand, Sarah Martin, Régine Chassagne, Lana Del Rey, and the Dum Dum Girls are all immensely talented and I feel that they are much more musically significant than most of the artists I'm listing below. However in the book, "Where the Girls Are" by Susan J. Douglas which I'm reading for my Media Theory class discusses the cultural impact of girl groups like The Supremes and The Ronettes, groups who were very much in the spotlight, who the public was very much aware of. This two groups pushed cultural boundaries and beyond that, they were immensely talented. Looking at the ten most prominent women in music today, based mostly on billboard chart numbers, the group seems to be lacking in terms of subject matter and in terms of the quality of the music:

Rihanna
Adele
Katy Perry
Britney Spears
Lady Gaga