The Live Music Scene
Live Music - Our Ethos - Why we do, what we do...
At Pure::Social before we accredit any other strings to our bow, we are musicians and we realised that we wanted to do something a little different on the Live Music Scene...
Going out to live music events is more than just following a band, artist or genre. Live music is more about the skill, the talent & how it makes you feel when you hear it.
Too often music is restricted to a single style where the events only cater to one type of audience. We understand that there is a need to bring together people like us who love listening to live music & don't care so much about the genre.
Neo-soul Music - The soul of today's day...
Neo-soul (also known as nu soul) is an ultra chic & cool musical genre which fuses contemporary R&B, 70s soul, hip hop and jazz. The third major generation of fusion music from R& B Neo-soul sits nicely after its predecessors New Jack Swing & Hip-Hop Soul, Neo-soul came along with the likes of Tony Toni Tone & exploded with the timeless contributions from of D'angelo & Erykah Badu.
Neo-soul still has an undoubted resoundingly cosmic, pull for the masses. Young savvy music lovers in the US & UK alike love nothing more than the contemporary sounds of seductive neo-soul. Although many young artists have refused the term neo-soul from being thier own musical descriptive, for the sub-genre itself, it is an important relief of existance to anyone who is anyone.
Many of the UK artists that are currently on the underground music scene tend to steer in the direction of creating the textured neo-soul sound. To truley capture the rhythm of neo-soul with the life story lyrics whilst still having a crowd grooving to your beat, is simply musical poetics and an artform in itself which many unfortunately fail to acheive.
Neo-soul in its essence tends to work best when an artist is lyrically skilled to deliver a message – such as Jill Scott/India.Arie or when the neo-soul artist can consistantly hold and sit on a guitar groove marrying their vocal contribution - like say D'angelo/Lynden David Hall or when the neo-soul artist can bring some cosmic energy – such as Erykah Badu's earlier works or lastly when the neo-soul artist has their own sparkle to add - Goapele/Terri Walker
Hip-Hop Music - Our ethos - And the story so far...
PURE::Hip-hop is a live stage, a lifestyle, a concious movement of music hosting live hip-hop music events for major and independent artists in London, UK and beyond.
Our stage has seen some richly talented artists/MCs who have helped to remove some of the much undesired 'bling & butt' out of hip-hop music. Every artist on our stage has paid a tribute to hip-hop in some way shape or form with their gift of lyrical flowisim and creativity.
We just wanted to take away a little bit of the negative imagery that is often associated with the hip-hop genre and show how good content and tight beats could still be left intact. In recent times there have been so many 'artists' claiming to be real MCs that the hip-hop market is over saturated with sub-standard music. When real wack MCs used to be stopped early in the playgrounds and b-ball courts from destroying the hip-hop genre they are now openly encouraged to get in the studios and record weak rhymes, loose beats and jagged flows with a VIP pass to mass distribution deals for the public to follow.
Throughout the world there is so much live music talent but the UK has many many undiscovered gems within its own mist. PURE::Live and PURE::Hip-hop is here to uncover the veiled artists and bring them into the limelight where they can and do certainly deserve to shine.
We have our own favourites, but it's not our choice, it is yours as to whether or not you will also choose to contribute and support real HIP-HOP MUSIC, not from ‘bubble rapping’ stars who mime and enjoy a booty dance whilst they look into the eye of the camera, but from Artists of a Stature and Standard!
Some words from one of the hosts of the PURE::Hip-Hop shows
Hip-hop is the way I live, it's who I am and where I'll always wanna be. So if I'm straight up to the point when I speak about the 'game', you'll either love me or hate me but accept me, respect me and know that I am true to what I say. What comes from my mouth comes from my love for the art and it's real.
Truth about MCs was so plainly and accurately put by Rakim in the 18th Letter "… what I'm giving them back man, is what they've been waiting for..skills."
The 'rap game' as we know it and accept it today is deprived, straight up. To find some real skool hip-hop in the 'just released' cd section is rare. Stop your trip to the store and save your time because what you are looking for… is simply not there. If a time machine existed we could go back to when the doors were Our Price and it was 30p for bus fare.
The kind of skilled hip-hop I'm talking about needs some good old crate diggin' cos most of the stuff you hear nowadays worldwide, is flat out rubbish.
If I was asked, do I like grime? ..honestly no. As its own specialist art form, I can appreciate in some way the content flow and the lyrical styles. But I refuse to accept material from talent-less MC's as any timeless contribution to good hip-hop music.
When I say names like Big L, Mad Skills, Masta Ace, CL Smooth, Phonte (I could go on forever) immediately you will and do reminisce, thinking back on the good days of old when there were SKILLS!!!!!!!!!!!
When I say names like 50 Cent, Nelly, Diddy, Rick Ross (again I could go on forever) what are you to think of other than how much money they made or what their volume sales were by the mass market?
In the UK and outside, hugely over-popular and wack DJs are running the airwaves with fake accents and jelly vinyl in their sleeves purporting to be REAL HEADS! All I say is, these are definitely the wrong heads and we all know who they are to hold them accountable for contributing to the mass dilution of the hip-hop scene. (Clue: if you want to hear some of the wackest US MC's on radio just tune into your '1' every Saturday evening).
Whilst you read, I'm on my 19th prayer of the day for the return of real MC's to come back with force to remind one and all what REAL hip-hop music actually sounds like.
::On a brighter note rather than wait for a weekly dose of brainwash food on a Saturday 9pm-12am you could always just pick up KRS1's new album.
Regards
6th Skillacist (Underground MC) and host of PURE::Hip-hop
