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Ahh, the N-word. We would like to think that common sense would suggest to many people that the dreaded word conjures up an intense hate -- and, depending on the situation in which it is expressed, a desire to inflict physical harm to someone because of the color of her skin. However, black artists -- musicians, writers, poets -- adopted the word as a way to bare "truths." By incorporating the word back through their artistic endeavors, it is used in an ironic sense, to regain power over something that is so psychologically crippling in our society.
When rapper Nas decided to name an album Ni&#er (he later removed the title), I can safely assume that while many were offended, they understood his point: It wasn't that he felt the way that African-Americans who lived and died before him were made to feel by their slavemasters, by store owners, educators and people in the street. He wanted to create a work of art that was political and confrontational, revealing the ugly truth about life that many never want to openly discuss.
And yes, controversy is also a great way to sell records.
But what happens when a white artist says it? For the sister/duo CocoRosie, their use of the N-word has caused some ire, though perhaps not as much as they deserve, and drawn a lot of attention. The problem is, where does that attention come from? A good place, as in "omigod these hipster chicks are so ironic?" Or a bad place, as in "what the hell were they thinking? Are they really that ignorant?" On "Jesus Loves Me" off their new album, Grey Oceans, the ladies sing:
"Jesus loves me /But not my wife
Not my nigger friends/Or their nigger lives."
For me, the above lyrics, which as the newspaper The Stranger points out, is sung in a faux-bluesy voice with a "lazy back-porch, blues-guitar plucking an antique grotesquerie in keeping with the band's frequently deployed old-timely affectations," is pretty bad -- but could be, yes, construed as "ironic."
Image by odreiuqzide via Wikimedia Commons
If CocoRosie is trying to prove a point via shock value, perhaps the lyrics aren't so bad. But if you believe what is alluded to in the above-linked article, that these two women, who have become indie darlings, are really spoiled, self-indulgent brats who use their father's supposed half-Native American roots to bolster their street cred, then, yes, there is a problem.
To be fair, other folk/rock/punk white artists have also appropriated the N-word. The most famous is John Lennon and Yoko Ono's "Women is the Nigger of the World" where they attempt to ... umm, compare the plight of women to black people? And if they tried to do that, are they saying that white (or non-black, anyway) women deserve more respect than black men and black women whom the word is commonly directed toward? I have always been a bit confused over that.
And then there is Patti Smith's "Rock n' Roll Nigger:"
Jimi Hendrix was a nigger.
Jesus Christ and Grandma, too.
Jackson Pollock was a nigger.
Nigger, nigger, nigger, nigger,
nigger, nigger, nigger.
Which to me is a bit more offensive. Whether Smith and co-writer, comedian Lenny Kaye, were trying to be "radical," calling Hendrix a "Ni#$er" -- Hendrix, an iconic figure who in a sense broke racial barriers in the world of hard rock music -- was not the way to go.
Both songs angered many, but are also seen as some , if not the only important, relevant musical offerings of their generations.
On the other hand, there is also the band Eyehategod's contemporary-era "White Nigger," which is positioned from the perspective of the plight of poor white folks living in a predominately black city (the band is from New Orleans) who reject the conformity of modern-day society. Is it more centered on feeling like an outcast because of societal/economic class differences than racial differences? As you can see below, the writer, Mike Williams, did not feel that he needed to continously use the N-word to get his message across:
We are the leaders of tomorrow.
We are the ones to have the fun.
We want control. We want the power.
Not gonna stop until it comes.
(chorus)
We are not Jesus Christ.
We are not fascist pigs.
We are not capitalist industrialists.
We are not communists. We are the one.
We will build a better tomorrow.
The youth of today will be the tool.
American
