A pretty cool new video out yesterday from frum hip-hop powerhouse Shemspeed, featuring Y-Love and DeScribe. I saw these guys perform at the Shemspeed showcase at 92YTribeca while researching our story on Aharit Hayamim. I liked their set (though not as much as Eprhyme and Shir Yaakov‘s collaboration, a low-res version of which you can sort of hear here), but this video raises some questions.
Watch the video closely and you’ll see DeScribe holding a yellow flag with a crown on it. That’s the flag of the outspoken Lubavitch messianists, whose claims to the shul at 770 Eastern Parkway we covered in September. As Yeshiva University Jewish Studies department chair Dr. David Berger argues in the surprisingly not-boring The Rebbe, The Messiah, and the Scandal of Orthodox Indifference, and as other eminent Orthodox and non-Orthodox figures have maintained for years, continued Lubavitch insistence on the messianic status of Menachem Mendel Schneerson after his death in 1994 is bad for the Jews. I’m not equipped to make the argument myself, but check out Berger’s book or, for a brief primer, the Wikipedia page on the subject.
It’s similar to the painted tigers/clenched fists/falling bombs/grenades/rolling tanks in the background of M.I.A.’s video Galang. M.I.A. is a Tamil, and her father a member of the Tamil Tigers. Whatever you think of the Sri Lankan government’s treatment of Tamil civilians during the conflict, the Tigers have a tremendous amount of civilian blood on their hands. Innovators in the field of suicide bombing, the Tigers have committed at least 250 since 1987. M.I.A. claims to be offended by accusations that she supports the Tigers, but that’s tough to reconcile with the Galang video. So, do we walk out of a bar when Paper Planes comes on? Or do we not go to M.I.A.’s concerts? Or do we not worry about it?
This is the same kind of question I asked in the previously linked piece on Aharit Hayamim. The artists and promoters we spoke with for the Aharit Hayamim piece didn’t mind the band’s political orientation, and I gather that Ephryme, at least, feels the same way about DeScribe, given that he appears in the video. It’s instructive that no one seemed to mind, or even notice, Matisyahu’s blatant messianism.
It all leaves me feeling a bit uncomfortable. If musicians can infuse politics into their art, why can’t audiences and promoters and other musicians judge their art based on their politics?
