This song’s got the internet going nuts, prompting Deep Discussions of race and gender and the politics of authenticity at places like The Root and NPR.com, and inspiring people to write things like this:

    Elvis Presley was not the originator of rock ‘n’ roll. That would be Chuck Berry. Vanilla Ice’s “Ice Ice Baby” is said to be the first hip-hop song to top the Billboard charts (others argue it was “Rapture” by Blondie). Justin Timberlake went from the pop sensation group ‘N Sync to the soulful singing White boy with swag. My point? America has always capitalized off of Black culture. Kreayshawn, the new White girl rapper, is only the latest byproduct

Now, maybe it’s because I’ve spent the last two years in the sometimes-wearying war zone of identity politics that is a contemporary university English department, but I just can’t get super agitated about this sort of stuff these days. Like, if I was writing about this even two years ago I’d probably be here talking about what a gross and horrible example of racist cultural appropriation this was and about how truly awful white people are, but I can no longer manage to muster up that sort of (faux-)outrage anymore, since getting salty about white people “stealing” rap in 2011 just seems kinda pointless and weirdly anachronistic. It’s like, who really cares if some white girl from Oakland is “acting black”? Like what does that even mean anymore?  And is the phenomena of privileged academic blogger-types styling themselves as the gatekeepers of Real Rap Authenticity really any less of a pose than what Kreayshawn is doing? If some 22 year old girl from East Oakland wants to make rap songs about shooting haters with a pearl-handled gun and pumping swag out of her ovaries, and happens to make a whole lot of money doing so, who are we to begrudge her?

I mean, it’s not that I think that the racial and gender dynamics at work in contemporary pop music aren’t worth examining critically (they are), or that our culture isn’t still shot through with all sorts of ugly and troubling problems relating to these issues (it is), it’s just that I find it somewhat tiresome when every discussion about these things defaults to the same set of shopworn questions and concerns. Music doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and to act as though Kreayshawn’s relationship with so-called “black music” is in any way comparable to Vanilla Ice’s or (more absurdly) Elvis Presley’s is to operate under the premise that the cultural climate of 2011 is somehow comparable to that of 1991 or 1953, which is simply ludicrous. Times change, cultural dynamics change, and, if it wants to stay relevant and important, cultural criticism needs to change along with them.

As for the song itself, and this might just be a byproduct of the complete and total deterioration of my critical faculties w/r/t new music, but I sorta really dig it. On the merits, it’s no great shakes—her flow is somewhat stilted at times, the lyrics outside of a few choice moments (eg, the aforementioned line about swag and ovaries) are unremarkable, the beat is merely serviceable, etc—but so what? It’s summertime, which means the only real criteria for judging a song are “Will this sound good coming out of car windows?” and “Will this work on a BBQ playlist?” This clears both those bars with room to spare.