The Lonely Island “I’m On A Boat”

(As evidenced by my Monday post) My Rap Music knowledge is pretty well stuck back in the late 80s and early 90s.

At some point I just lost touch with the scene. Or lost interest.

Or it lost interest in me, is actually what I thought. I knew that rappers were not writing their songs for white, middle class 40-somethings. So I haven’t really been qualified to assess the Rap music scene.

And for that reason, I would dismiss the dismissive comments about Rap music, that I often hear from mvyradio listeners. People on the request line, and in emails to the station, will express their strong distaste for Hip-Hop. But they aren’t supposed to be the audience for Hip-Hop, so their judgement seems too subjective.

But what to do with information that is not subjective, that supports the claim that Rap music is completely devoid of musical value? That a once-creative, urgent, necessary, dynamic art form, had devolved into a crass, commercialized parody of itself?

How else do you explain the Lonely Island Grammy Nomination? And no, not for the Comedy category.

Lonely Island is a comedy troupe from New York, who’s members famously got absorbed by Saturday Night Live. A couple of members are SNL writers, and member Andy Samberg is a part of the cast. They are the team responsible for the Digital Shorts that have appeared on the program for the last couple of years. You may remember them from such classics as “Dick In A Box,” “Lazy Sunday” and “Jizz In My Pants.”

And now you can remember them as the 3 comedians (plus T-Pain) who are nominated in the “Best Rap/Sung Collaboration” next to Beyonce, Kanye West, Keri Hilson, Ne-Yo, Jay-Z, Rihanna, T.I. and Justin Timberlake.

Is this the state of Rap music? That a song, made explicitly so they could shoot a video that mocks the stupid, crass commercialism and conspicuous consumption of Rap music videos and lyrics, is actually held up as one of the best of the year.

How could an outsider not laugh with this video, and then laugh at what the genre holds in high regard?

Of course, now you have to see the video.

And you can hear clips of all the Grammy nominees in this category. See if you can spot which one is the joke.



Buy the intentionally funny album, here