• » Name: Meka Soul
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	September 2007
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Slap-Boxing With Jesus

Lost Ones

You wanna know what absolutely fucking sucks? I just renewed my subscription for Scratch Magazine a few weeks ago, only to find out the other day that their September issue will be their last.

Aside from being pissed that I just lost $12, I’m a little sad to see that one of my favorite paper publications died. What makes this truly depressing, however, was because Scratch was one of the few (if not only) mass-produced magazines that still held a torch to one of the original foundations of hip-hop: the DJ/producer. Granted, they sometimes royally fucked up by throwing the likes of former Fugee/current faux Marley kid Wyclef Jean on the front, but that was solely to attract the masses, as its contents touched on everything, from the birthplace of the Justo Awards (you know, before Justo got ethered and the show went to shit like pretty much every other Black-oriented award shows) and the location of the original D&D Studios to the tools your favorite producer (shitbag or otherwise) and mixtape reviews. And now it’s gone, much like my paychecks are come rent- and bill-paying time.

The obvious cause of the magazine’s demise? Quite simply, the lack of support from the audience they were trying to attract, also known as the Jansport-rocking, chewstick munching, faux-“real hip-hop” heads who couldn’t tell you what hip-hop was if Brother Ali ran up on them with the burner and forced it down their collective throats. Being that I was cut from both the “jiggy” and “alternative” cloths, I’m more than well aware of the bubblehead backpackers who claim they’ll only support that “real” shit by not listening to the radio or watching MTV, yet rush to their mother’s virus-ridden computer to rapiduploadspace the latest album by, um, the cracka-ass ginger kid who runs that Definitive Jux label [1]. While it’s understandable that they were probably turned off by the mag when they see the likes of the Southern version of Chris Kanyon and his n-word spitting, fake-ass DJ Pudgee The Arabian Fat Bastard grace its cover, had they perhaps opened up the magazine they’d have seen that the magazine was much more.

On a semi-related note, it was actually a brilliant idea for BET to quietly mention that their flagship show Rap City was being moved to a different time during the hubbub that was the Curtsy/Kanye maelstrom, in hopes that nobody would notice it’d been replaced by reruns of The Wayans Bros., what with today’s music videos resembling that piece of shit show somewhat unintentionally (yeah, right) nowadays. Maybe their underwear-with-the-dickhole-wearing female CEO finally wised up to the bullshit being spewed on that show and moved to shit to the real artist’s graveyard: the late-night time slot. If you ask me though, I think that it’s inherently trying to punish hip-hop for morphing from a colorful, lush culture to a misogynistic, violent shell of its former self. If these two things aren’t proof that this culture is in dire straits, I don’t know what is.

[1] And no, I’ve not gotten his shit, because I find it much more intriguing to discover dusty soul songs by Labi Siffre than listening to some guy lament about why he's so depressed in rap form. The perfect cure for those blues? Rubbing one out.

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