Let the Rhythms Flow Into Our Veins

When I first heard about the rap group MIMS, which is an acronym for Music Is My Saviour, I thought it was a joke. Probably I grew jaded together with the rest of the Singaporean society, that rap stars were just singing about how much money they were rolling, the cars they were pimping, and the women they were getting.  But this is what draws most of the Singaporean teenagers to listen to their songs. They just want a song they can get a beat to dance to, watch videos with cool cars, singers wearing million dollar blings, and wishing they can lead that kind of life they cannot get here in Singapore.

I'm not saying that these artists do not use such commercial marketing concept to try to sell their songs. Just look at Justin Timberlake for example, he can basically sing about anything and his record sales can soar up to over a few million within a few months. But is it true that these celebrities have nothing worthy for us to listen to and be inspired by? Time and truth will tell, if you actually sit down and go through album by album, there are certainly some tracks that anyone can relate to, regardless or what age group you are.

Of course, not everyone has the time to take the down time to go through every album that comes up on stores. There are millions of singers, whichever genre they are in. But if sometimes you find that you come across a song and you tend to hum along to the lyrics, and sometimes you are in the shower, you sing along the lyrics though you never even bothered to read their lyrics but they just get stuck into your head, it means that those words mean something to you, someway or another. These singers, no matter what genre of songs they fall into, do write songs that they wish to share with people about their personal experience, their emotions, and how they hope people to go through and understand the same pain they have gone through.

There is a strong argument that we, as Asians, cannot relate to what the African Americans are singing, or rather rapping about. We live in a sheltered life, we never had to sell our blood just to put food on the table, 90 percent of our population has never even seen someone die right in front of our eyes. But these singers have, and that’s why they pen down what they have gone through. True, the language they use in their music may not be desirable by most Asians, or parents in that matter because they feel that they do not want to expose their children to the experiences of such violence. I cannot, and will not argue with their parental concern. Of course, MTV has always been dismissed as a channel not worthy to be viewed, as as compared to the Discovery Channel or BBC. But there is so much more to MTV than just the music videos alone. There are a couple of reasons for this statement which I have made.

Firstly, music videos relate the songs sung by the artists. The concepts that they have to come up with, is immaculately and ceaselessly planned for many many months, and even years. There are so many teenagers with problems growing up with adolescent pains nowadays, and sometimes by watching videos that they can relate their lives to, sometimes help them get through their pain, their frustrations, and their pent up emotions they feel that they cannot get through to their parents.

Secondly, MTV is not just about music videos. The Americans are instilling so many new kinds of reality shows like “True Life”, certain scripted reality serials like “The Hills” , “Run’s House” and especially “Laguna Beach”, which they hope to inspire people to follow their dreams no matter how old they are. These shows also serve to show how other young teenagers live their lives, make their mistakes, and grow up from it. Of course, the MTV organization want ratings to soar, and sometimes they might resolve to certain tactics to make sure that people watch, by creating relationships drama, life in the party scene, but if the person discerning enough to watch knows how to perceive what is right and wrong, what is real and what is not, it’s really up to the individual.

The final concluding statement given is, before you restrict or condemn any kind of pop music, rap music which have and always going to be a huge condiment in the music industry, take some time to think about how music can affect you, your children. Afterall, Singapore has MDA for a reason, they do a good job in the department of censorship.