I have long loathed gangster rap for basically ruining what was art and replacing it with, as Little Brother put it, a Minstrel Show. But I have to give Ice Cube credit. He is one of the few gangster rappers out there with a fairly high degree of intelligence, and his latest song in which he talks about what an ultraviolent society we live in and how that isn’t gangster raps fault is certainly thought-provoking, whether or not you agree with the message. That, to me, is art and precisely what rap should be. But 9 times out of 10 it’s just some dope talking about many people he’s shot, a tired spiel that’s been played out since 1992.
