![]() During those early days, the 6’4″ Waka also served as Gucci’s muscle, which Gucci often alluded to in his music (see 2006’s “Zone 6”: “Got a tall n**** with me but he can’t really hoop/ But they call him Kobe Bryant cuz they know he gon’ shoot”). He initially got his foot in the door when he was introduced to future collaborator and label boss Gucci Mane by his mother, Debra Antney, who managed Gucci for several years beginning in the mid-2000s. Waka had only been rapping for a couple of years before his mixtape cut “O Let’s Do It” became a regional hit. For now though, let’s set aside this flimsy metaphor and actually talk about why Flockaveli was game-changing enough to incite so much backlash. Smooth was right - neither the Tea Party nor Waka maintained long-term relevancy - but their respective downfalls were self-inflicted, and they both sowed seeds that continue to impact us a decade later. Those Americans who can’t align themselves with the Tea Party might even want to try Waka Flocka Flame, as an alternative way to shout their stresses away. But for the moment it shouldn’t be hard to understand the allure of the untutored outsider that’s made Waka Flocka Flame such a big hit. Judging by his timely Tea Party comparison, though, it’s clear which side Smooth was on:Ī movement fueled only by catharsis can be hard to sustain in the long-term, and you might well question whether Waka Flocka Flame or the Tea Party will still be viable around 2012. (Also worth noting: The only other “anti-musical, anti-intellectual” rappers Smooth cites alongside Waka are his three “Shawt Bus Shawty” co-stars.) Feigning an unbiased perspective, Smooth pits Waka’s detractors and fans against each other, describing what each side sees in the bellowing Atlanta rapper. Smooth’s metaphor of choice (politics) is much classier than “Shawt Bus Shawty”‘s, but both critiques boil down to the same general point: “verbal dexterity and lyrical complexity,” to borrow Smooth’s words, are hip hop’s paramount values, and Waka represents the genre’s nadir. A few months after Flockaveli, longtime rap radio fixture Jay Smooth dubbed Waka the “leader of hip hop’s Tea Party movement” in a segment on NPR’s All Things Considered. To illustrate, let’s leave cultural criticism’s South Pole (animated YouTube parodies) and journey way up north, close to its highbrow terminus. ![]() For a wide slice of the rap-listening population, Waka Flocka’s debut album made him Public Enemy Number One. Why, on the national-holiday-worthy 10th anniversary of Waka Flocka Flame’s Flockaveli, of all days, am I bringing up a juvenile relic that deserves to stay buried under stifling layers of cultural sediment? Because needlessly derogatory as it may be, “Shawt Bus Shawty” reflects a sentiment that stretched far beyond edgelords with rudimentary understandings of Macromedia Flash. (I’d embed it below, but I don’t think anything this disrespectful to the intellectually disabled deserves more than a hyperlink.) This is “ Shawt Bus Shawty,” a parodic 2010 music video that currently sits at just under 49 million views. The one-note joke is best summed up by faux-Gucci’s couplet, “Ride the short bus to class/ I made a ‘Z’ on my report card, so I passed.” Here, we see distinctly 2000s brands of comedy and hip-hop criticism simultaneously issuing their last gasps in the first year of the new decade. Likenesses of Southern rappers Soulja Boy, OJ Da Juiceman, Gucci Mane, and Waka Flocka Flame deliver self-deprecating verses that highlight their respective shortcomings as rappers, from Soulja’s mindlessly repetitive hook to Gucci’s slurry Boomhauer-isms. ![]() ![]() It’s a crudely animated video in the tradition of eBaum’s World hits like “ End Of Ze World” and “ Sensimilla Street,” which range from cheekily irreverent to so offensive Matt Stone and Trey Parker would blush. ![]()
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