Progress? Noted without comment

Subject: Lyr Add: THE WAY YOU LOOK TONIGHT (Fields, Kern)
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 12:01 PM

MUSIC 1936 vs 2006

You be the judge as to how far we've progressed in 70 years:

The Oscar winning song from 1936

"The Way You Look Tonight"
from Swing Time (1936)
               Music by Jerome Kern; lyrics by Dorothy Fields

Someday when I'm awfully low
When the world is cold
I will feel a glow
Just thinking of you
And the way you look tonight

Oh, but you're lovely
With your smile so warm
And your cheek so soft
There is nothing for me
But to love you
Just the way you look tonight

With each word
Your tenderness grows
Tearing my fear apart
And that laugh
That wrinkles your nose
Touches my foolish heart

Lovely, never never change
Keep that breathless charm
Won't you please arrange it
'Cause I love you
Just the way you look tonight
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Oscar winning song of
2006

"It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp"
from Hustle and Flow (2006)

Music and Lyrics by Jordan Houston, Cedric Coleman and Paul Beauregard

You know it's hard out here for a pimp (you ain't knowin)
When he tryin to get this money for the rent (you ain't knowin)
For the Cadillacs and gas money spent (you ain't knowin)
Will have a whole lot of bitches talkin shit (you ain't knowin)

(Academy Award show version) Will have a whole lot of witches jumpin ship!

In my eyes I done seen some crazy thangs in the streets
Gotta couple hos workin on the changes for me
But I gotta keep my game tight like Kobe on game night
Like takin from a ho don't know no better, I know that ain't right

Done seen people killed, done seen people deal
Done seen people live in poverty with no meals
It's fucked up where I live, but that's just how it is
It might be new to you, but it's been like this for years

It's blood sweat and tears when it come down to this shit
I'm tryin to get rich 'fore I leave up out this bitch
I'm tryin to have thangs but it's hard fo' a pimp
But I'm prayin and I'm hopin to God I don't slip, yeah

[Chorus]

Man it seems like I'm duckin dodgin bullets everyday
Niggaz hatin on me cause I got, hos on the tray
But I gotta stay paid, gotta stay above water
Couldn't keep up with my hoes, that's when shit got harder

North Memphis where I'm from, I'm 7th Street bound
Where niggaz all the time end up lost and never found
Man these girls think we prove thangs, leave a big head
They come hopin every night, they don't end up bein dead

Wait I got a snow bunny, and a black girl too
You pay the right price and they'll both do you
That's the way the game goes, gotta keep it strictly pimpin;
Gotta have my hustle tight, makin change off these women, yeah

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 12:12 PM

I know which one I prefer!
G.
[1st one!]

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: Rapparee
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 12:56 PM

There's progress, and then there's not. Degradation of women is not progress, the acceptance and even glorification of violence is not. Glorifying the life of someone who lives off the degradation of others is simply vile.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: Peace
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 01:53 PM

Progress: We have so much of that . . . .

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: CarolC
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 02:00 PM

I don't know. I think there's probably a lot of irony and barbed social commentary in that second one.

I think if Woody Guthrie had been Black, and a contemporary of the person who wrote "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp", he could have written that song.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: Rasener
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 02:40 PM

I can only assume that Dick is on about life then and now. Its got worse.
However from a music standpoint, I happen to think there is an awful lot of good music around today, and a lot of good youngsters coming through in all forms of music.
Trouble is, that a lot of hardened folkies are rather blinkered in what they like, and refuse to change with times.
I am stunned by the quality of performers that come through the doors of Market Rasen Folk Club, many of them being singer/songwriters.
I constantly hear of folk clubs struggling to get 20 people through the doors, and thats fine, if thats the way a club wants to operate, but please don't criticise or run down performers (and there are many) who see things differently.
Tommorow night I have 70 people attending a normal folknight (concert style) in a very rural area ( and I have no idea how many will turn up on the night.
People want variety these days and performers want an opppotunity to show what they are made of.

Personnally if the comparison of the above 2 songs is about the lyrics or song, then I feel its a very unfair comparison, and really sounds like a gripe.

Thats my honest opinion and I wait for the flak, but I am at least an honest 60 year old who refuses to get drawn into thinking that the only good folk music is what was produced in the 50/60/70's.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 02:52 PM

"It's Hard Out Here for A Pimp" is not a song that I would go around whistling, but then again neither is "The Way You Look Tonight".

I agree with Carol C, Woody would have been a rap artist if he were around today. In fact, there are rap-like lyrics in the archive, adn there is a drawing of a character that he made that looks strangely like Eminem! He used music that people could relate to when he wrote his songs - if they could relate to the tune, they could relate to his words.   While many would argue that there is no "tune" to speakof in rap, it is something that many people can relate to.

Of course the song "glorified" violence and degrades women, but we would have to throw out a lot of traditional songs for the same reasons.

Samuel Clemens took a bit of flack for his use of the "N" word in Huckleberry Finn, but there is no strong evidence that he was a racist. He used words that would have been common to the time he was writing about and in his way painted a very moving portrait of a time that will last for the ages.   In 2006, it is difficult to get over the use of the word in the book, but when you finish the last chapter you will realize how it worked.

While I am not comparing the writers of this song to Mark Twain, I don't think it is fare to judge them based only on the words at face value.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 03:51 PM

The Blues were created out of black peoples experience of life and so was Rap. As a keen fan of country dance and Morris I am not inclined to knock the whole of Rap or to comment on progress

"There's progress, and then there's not. Degradation of women is not progress, the acceptance and even glorification of violence is not. Glorifying the life of someone who lives off the degradation of others is simply vile."

I agree with this comment. But not all Rap is like this and as a genre Rap is extremely powerful.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 04:31 PM

Taste is the enemy of art.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 05:48 PM

Just to point out that Woody wrote a lot of lousy songs, too.

Subject: RE: Progress? Noted without comment
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 20 Apr 06 - 08:54 PM

Apparently Dorothy Fields wrote at least one bad set of lyrics as well.