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about
While rappers and rap music are consistently scapegoated as being exceptionally violent, critics of the culture conveniently overlook the reality that exceptional violence is the rule in the U.S.
The violence that takes lives, young and old, isn’t unique to rap music or to Black people in the U.S. Rather than acknowledging the broader conditions afflicting the entire country, tragedies involving rappers or people who can be described in relation to rap music are often treated as extraordinary. News and historical accounts amplify the violent spectacle of Black death and purport to valorize the dead.
A heartbreaking byproduct of this discursive violence is that some rappers only realize success after they’ve died. Deceased rappers are an unfortunately abundant commodity. The list goes on and on.
Another consequence is that the tragedies that so many people experience across the U.S. are used as pretext to criminalize and pathologize certain people and the music they enjoy, the art they create, or the neighborhoods they live in or the places they grew up.
News headlines often demonstrate this tendency toward spectacle when they describe tragedies that involve rappers. Often, the word “rapper,” as a descriptor, subtly signifies guilt or worthiness of death.
In “ANKH,” those headlines are rewritten in more honest, pointed language. The lyrics describe the ordinariness of exceptional American violence.
“ANKH,” the word that describes the Ancient Egyptian symbol that represents eternal life, doubles as an acronym to detail the casual lack of care given to these everyday tragedies: “Another Nigga Killed Here.”
[1]:
He died by the gun but they blamed the music.
They said what he said was evidence and used it.
His world was the size of the block that he grew up on.
And they found him on the streets that he threw up on.
Sickening how quick it can
turn into another mother’s nightmare there (prayers).
Papa’s on the corners asking who knows what with no luck,
increasing anger.
But we all know the deal when our fear compete with danger.
So, the family trying to hold on to hope when it’s gone
and the words to the songs in the notes in his phone.
No compassion for the life torn apart when the bullets hit him,
cause he talked about the block in his art, so he’s not a victim.
Cameraman said, “They don’t value life too much.”
He reported here before. Even twice some months.
Somewhere in his mid-twenties was his deadline (dying).
“Another Nigga Killed Here” was the headline (crying).
Hook (Nathaniel Star):
Newspaper read “A Rapper Dead.”
They said he lost his head in a game of dice (dice).
Do you remember when Nipsey said we gotta stay dangerous in the game of life (life)?
Everybody wears your R.I.P. shirt one good time when you die
(They love us when we die.),
but not a soul celebrate you while you living.
I guess it just figure. They wait for the trigger.
[2]:
Funny style arithmetic.
You can flip a coin like a numismatist
to see if life or war is what the business is.
Thoughts and prayers offered there.
Often there’s a cross to bear.
Crossing their
names off the list—
Crucifix.
It’s like the cost to bear arms mixed with Jesus
got us living sleeveless.
Tank tops and bank shots,
and it ain’t amateur hour.
It’s like the damage in our image and likeness
is all in the name of ways that we prove we like it.
Done with counting inches or centimeters the knife in our back
is plunged deep but the metaphor is a sniper.
First grade line leader giving it her last,
weighing how to dodge bullets while she sitting in the class.
Let’s hope she doesn’t write about the
feeling of the past or the future or the present while she’s scribbling her math.
Problem probably ain’t the music that she hear at bedtime (dreaming).
“Another Nigga Killed Here” is the headline (pleading).
Hook (Nathaniel Star):
Newspaper read “A Rapper Dead.”
They said he lost his head in a game of dice (dice).
Do you remember when Nipsey said we gotta stay dangerous in the game of life (life)?
Everybody wears your R.I.P. shirt one good time when you die
(They love us when we die.),
but not a soul celebrate you while you living.
I guess it just figure. They wait for the trigger.
Outro:
Yes, yes.
Writing’s on the wall.
The headline: “Another Nigga Killed Here.”
Deadline.
It’s Vintage.
Huh.
In Decatur, the success of this project is improved by the cooperation of local industrial and business concerns.
These activities after work hours are recreation not only for those who play. The program also remembers those who prefer to sit and cheer.
credits
released July 9, 2023
Beat by Vintage.
Recorded by A.D. Carson.
Mixed by Marcus “Truth” Fitzgerald.
Mastered by Mike Moxham.
A.D. CARSON is a rapper. He is an educator and artist from Decatur, Illinois whose only aspiration as a high school student was to become a professional rapper. He writes stuff, some of which he shares on his website, AydeeTheGreat.com.
