“Gold all on my chain, gold all in my rang,” the relatively exclusive use of precious metals and gemstones to describe living life hip-hop style, sits in perfect juxtaposition to the lyrical content of contemporary artists who haven’t reached their respective stations in life. Trey Songz’s mixtape Trigga, represents what is 100. The fact is that the use of suggestive musical lyrics will constantly be debated in terms of how it relates to what time it is for the black community.
What is freedom of speech and does it protect literary nonsense and empty rhetoric? Of course it does. That being said, since an artist is free to express himself with any lyrics he or she chooses, there is definite beauty in being an independent artist with free-flowing lyrics that don’t have to adhere to label requirements or even make sense. But the images that we see conjured up over and over again in video and in life are those of people draped in gold and diamonds like some strange new form of recreation and the adulteration of a culture.
