Why You All Need To Listen To The Mighty Vinnie. This Is A Rapper!!! This is A Minstrel

I had previously published this under the title, “I NEED DRUGS – NOT!!!”

I am a connoisseur of real music. I am 61 years old and many are surprised at the genre of music I listen to. I do listen to all era’s of music, but my everyday is who I speak of in this ‘Walk With Dann’.

By ‘real’, I mean music in which there is lyrics that actually convey a message or story. 

Do not see much of that nowadays in this ‘so-called’ hip hop/rap genre. 

 A song is meant to convey a message or enlighten one’s  inner soul. Musician’s were and are “minstrels”. 

Minstrel defined by the dictionary as, “singer who performed songs whose lyrics told stories of different places or of existing or imaginary events. Although minstrels told their own tales, often they would memorize and embellish the works of others“.

 Who are the top few I consider minstrels? 

 Here are a few that I have mad respect for what they are speaking to the youth of today.

Ill Bill and his brother Necro

Vinnie Paz

Yelawolf

Eminem

Mr. Green

Pacewon

Rittz

SPM

Rasheed

Tom Green (YES! That ‘Tom Green’ – check the O.R., udunno what I say)

So, let me show you a few examples of what I am saying ………

First video you should watch (courtesy of YouTube) is:

 Uncle Howie hears “My Uncle” for the first time  – courtesy of youtube

Here you will witness the power of the love only family can give to their own. 

As is very visible, Howie is definitely healthy and happy here. The result of his nephews love, caring and guidance. 

The lyrics speak mountains – definitely written from the heart and most definitely truthful. 

 A testimony to the realities of drug abuse and society’s darker side. A confession of the pain these nephews felt watching their Uncle suffer.

Here is the younger nephew, Necro:

His video that shows the “BEFORE” Howie:

 NECRO _ I Need Drugs     – courtesy of youtube

Recently I posted this video to my FaceBook page with this as the intro: 

 “Brings tears to thine eyes – R.I.P. Uncle Howie. Dudes and Dudettes, compare Uncle Howie in this video to the one in Necro’s older brother, Ill Bill’s “My Uncle”. May the creators BLESS these lads for bringing their beloved uncle back to Earth. What a heavy load on my heart to overstand the pain they must have had to endure with the loss of such a knowledged Street Warrior to cancer after years of dancing with the dragon’s from Hell. 

Mad respect for the message’s Ill Bill and Necro and all their homies convey. 

Wish all these other so-called hip hop artist would follow their path and speak of REALNESS.”

Personally, I shed a tear everytime I listen to “Uncle Howie” for Howie, for Necro and for Ill Bill and for all of Howie’s family.

My soul becomes wrapped in the guilt of my SINS – knowing that in years long gone by, (and some close at hand), I have laid this burden upon those who loved me as much as these men love their Uncle.

What a statement to the realities of modern life in the tenements our youth are growing up in.

Ill Bill began his quest twenty-four long years ago in 1992. 

TO THIS DAY HE STILL SINGS FROM HIS HEART AND TO THIS VERY DAY HE STILL CONVEYS THE MESSAGE. 

RESPECT AND BLESSINGS TO THIS WELL SEASONED STREET WARRIOR.

No words I may type can tell you what your eyes will overstand when you have viewed this. 

‘Nuff said. 

I cannot say who is my favorite, but right up there with Ill Bill & Necro, is Vinnie Paz & his Jedi Mind Tricks. 

Here lies another minstrel who has been spitting the truth from 1993 till this very day. 

Twenty-three years and still sending out the message!!! 

Vinnie’s messages are so deeply written in the blood of his truths. 

Listen deeply to the lyrics in such tunes as “Uncommon Valor” and – my personal favorite “I, Who Have Nothing”. I play it every morning along with Ill Bill’s “My Uncle” to remind me of the life I have and am living.

Listen to what this song conveys, “I, who have nothing, but the comfort of my sins.”  DEEP!!!!! 

I, Who Have Nothing  – courtesy of youtube

To keep this blog from becoming a complex full length documentary, I will not break down and example all the above listed true artists.

This ‘Walk With Dann’ is only to say that I wish all musicians would get back to being MINSTRELS. 

For, if they could, then maybe, just maybe, one other soul would not have to sing about their Uncle, their life in the swamps of the Southern States, their lives in the swamps of Detroit or New York or Texas or Toronto. 

Overstand me now?

Bring the minstrel back to the music. 

Bring the stories back to the public. 

Drop all this bullshit about “Money, Weed & Hoes”. 

“Imagine” a world where “all the people could live as one’ – where “you may say I am a dreamer, but I’m not the only one”

“I hope someday you will join us and the world will live as one” 

(Thank you John Lennon for embedding this within the confines of my mind)

I leave you now with a quote from a beautiful  Yelawolf/Ed Sheeran collaboration:

“I’ll be coming up when the Sun goes down. Rolling like a rock till I hit the ground. Running from the Lord cause I can’t be found. Only MY God can track me down”

SAVE OUR YOUTH. PEACE OUT!!!