Quote:
Originally Posted by mjolnir
i think some of the ignorance is racism and some of it's naivete.
for example, people calling brostep and complextro and synthcore "dubstep" when it really isn't.
the copycats never knew "dub" and of course didn't realise that true dubstep came from dub reggae.
the junglists could educate people about it, but that seems to be missing lately.
and corporate america never teaches anybody anything about music history unless it's an infomercial.
sorry if i sound too cynical.
but reggae and roots music are awesome.
i posted a message about roots music on dogsonacid (DOA) and they laughed at me not even knowing what it is.
certain people flock to ska and punk but they don't connect to the sources
that seems to happen a lot in pop culture--people forget to study the true roots
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I can't really comment on dub reggae's influence on any electronic music, since I'm not really into that scene. But I have some thoughts on reggae in general.
Aside from anyone with the last name of Marley, reggae doesn't get much attention in the US nowadays. I wouldn't put it all down to racism, though that probably plays a part. Reggae is Jamacian music IMHO, no matter who
is playing it, so there are a lot of cultural influences that American audiences--especially white American audiences--don't understand and don't care to understand. Also, reggae started to gain significant notice in the US in the 70s, around the same time as rap was gaining a foothold, and rap became much more prominent. It really says something that I saw Yellowman in Cincinnati in the 80s and the audience was around 60% black, but 10 years later, I saw Toots & The Maytalls in New Orleans--unlike Cincinnati, a majority black city--and the crowd was mostly white.
Rastafarians adopted reggae music for their own ends (they didn't invent it), but for those who don't care to hear Rastafarian messages, there is a lot of secular reggae: Jimmy Cliff, Desmond Dekker, "lovers rock" singers like Dennis Brown--the list goes on and pn.