Time - Man of the Year/Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso/moy/041392/0413440.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 6KB | 118 lines

                                                                                MUSIC, Page 71

Getting Down to Their Roots


The good times are beginning to roll again for a whole new
generation of black rockers

By JANICE C. SIMPSON -- With reporting by Patrick E. Cole/
Los Angeles


    According to conventional wisdom in the music business,
black musicians do rap and soul, whites do rock 'n' roll. So
what to make of a group like Follow for Now? Their dreadlocks
and fade-style haircuts seem to come straight out of a Yo! MTV
Raps video clip. So do the lyrics to songs such as White Hood,
their spirited diatribe against skinheads and other white
supremacists. But the thrashing guitars and drum licks the five
members of the band play on their eponymous debut album leave
little doubt that their musical roots reach deep into hard rock.

    Ever since Living Colour broke through the color barrier
four years ago and went on to pick up two consecutive Grammys
for Best Hard Rock Performnce, growing numbers of young
African-American musicians have begun jamming to a rock beat.
Says Living Colour lead guitarist Vernon Reid: "Rock 'n' roll
is black music, and we are its heirs."

    That legacy dates back to the early 1950s, when Chuck
Berry and Little Richard first introduced white teens to the
wildly exuberant sounds that eventually became known as rock 'n'
roll. Even after the British invasion of the 1960s, black
rockers like Jimi Hendrix, the Ohio Players, and Sly and the
Family Stone danced back and forth across the color line. That
ended with the disco era of the 1970s, whose slick,
producer-driven, synthesizer-motorized tunes created a racial
schism in pop music that has yet to mend.

    Now, however, eager for any opportunity to prop up sagging
sales, record companies are rediscovering the appeal of black
rock 'n' roll. Virgin Records has signed up neohippie Lenny
Kravitz, whose latest record, Mama Said, has sold about 2
million copies worldwide. Sony Music produces Fishbone, seven
musical renegades who have attracted a cult following with their
energetic mix of rock, punk and funk. Elektra Records is pushing
Eric Gales, 17, a wunderkind who leads a musically adventurous
three-man band. Epic recently released a debut album by Eye &
I, a genre-busting quintet propelled by the lusty vocals of
female singer DK Dyson. And pop music maestro Quincy Jones has
given his blessings to the movement: his label, Qwest Records,
gave newcomers Who's Image a $750,000 advance, an unusually high
bid for unproved talent.

    As in traditional rock, the guitar is the central
instrument for these musicians, but their riffs resonate with
blues and jazz, reggae and rap, and all the other rhythms of the
black musical experience. "We didn't watch MTV and take a little
of this and that because it was hot," says Follow for Now
guitarist David Ryan-Harris. "We grew up among a lot of various
musical influences, and we use them all." Lyrics in these songs
deal with race relations and other social issues that reflect
a consciously black sensibility. "A lot of rock is about coming
of age," says Living Colour's Reid. "And one thing that's a
definite, salient part of a black person's coming-of-age is
dealing with racism."

    But while more records are being made, black rockers say
they still have a hard time getting radio programmers -- white
and black -- to play their music. "Radio is now the stumbling
block," says Nuumi Rayfield Jarvis, founder of the Los Angeles
chapter of the Black Rock Coalition, a national network of 50
bands that organized seven years ago to promote black rock.
Because it ranges from jazz fusion to thrash metal, black rock
doesn't fit neatly into any of the traditional grooves that
determine how music is marketed. Executives who program for
traditional rock stations fret that the white teens who make up
their audiences won't identify with black rockers. Black
programmers argue that their listeners are turned off by the
heavy-metal sound. Says Mike Stradford, programming director at
KKBT-FM, a rhythm-and-blues station in Los Angeles: "We make
money by playing the music that our listeners want to hear."

    Black rock 'n' roll has found sanctuary on alternative and
college radio stations and in small rock clubs. So far, its
biggest fans have been mainly hip young whites. But the Black
Rock Coalition is working to spread the gospel, particularly
among young black music lovers. It publishes a newsletter and
organizes concerts, including a music festival in Bari, Italy,
last June and free performances in playgrounds in black
neighborhoods all through the summer. It has also produced its
first album, The History of Our Future, an eclectic sampler
distributed by Rykodisc that features 10 of the association's
bands. Says executive director Don Eversley: "We're trying to
show that some of the artificial boundaries that have been put
up shouldn't exist."

    There are signs that those walls may be falling. Columbia
Records executive Randy Jackson says 25% of the 100 or more demo
tapes he receives each month now come from black rock-'n'-roll
groups. And just last week hard-core rapper Ice-T released a
debut album with Body Count, the new heavy-metal band he has
started. Meanwhile, Little Richard, who has quit the business
several times since becoming a Seventh-day Adventist minister
35 years ago, believes the time may be ripe for another
comeback. "I've got what it takes to do it," he says. "If they
come and make me an offer, I will come and make it in a big
way." Sounds like the good times may finally be rolling again.