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Editor’s note: To conclude DP dot com’s first evah guest blogger week I return to my new old friend, TONY’s KANSAS CITY. His insightful and pointed wit is why I enjoy reading the news on his blogsite, even if it’s about Kansas City. A town that didn’t even get any money in the go-go BILL CLINTON era. So even though Kansas City is a one horse town, and that one horse is blind with a screw in it’s ankle, TONY captures the truth of his city’s disenfranchisement as it is a microcosm for any mega-urban centre. TONY studies the details, and those are the techniques that make for the best economists, painters and writers. Sit back and enjoy a little bit of TKC truth aptly titled…

MOST RAPPERS SIMPLY DIE TRYIN’
While it’s true that cRap music has made Russell Simmons rich so that he can send alimony checks to that bitch ass Kimora, I think Janet Jackson and her publicly flaunted right titty said it best when they asked the following: “What have you done for me lately?”

Put simply, if you aren’t already a rap music mogul but you’ve listened to Hip-Hop your whole life then odds are you’ve given what amounts to thousands of dollars to make sure that P. Diddy can eat oysters with Condoleeza Rice and Kevin Federline with only the benefit of a handful of decent singles and a few recycled riffs from the 70’s as your compensation.

What’s more, we all know that there is very little room at the top of the rap game and public acclaim for today’s top selling artist could change faster than a failing U.S. military strategy in Iraq.

To make this situation even more depressing than old photos of Biggie at a salad bar, you must realize that all across the country there are people known as “local rappers” (ugh) who never learned that almost everything on TV is fake. These poor kids have Hip-Hop dreams and most of them are doomed to fail… While that doesn’t make them any different than most of the population and their failed dreams; cRap music has a whole different level of disappointment that it brings to the table to crush the spirit of those who want to make a living increasing the profit margins of multi-national media corporations and thereby supporting Summer Redstone’s lazy ass kids.

To wit, let’s take a quick look at those people who never sold enough records to be has beens. Yep, it’s hard to believe that the “never-was” category in terms of Hip-Hop contains so many violent deaths. It’s almost interesting in comparison to failed professional athletes who generally leave nothing more than bastard babies in their wake and usually land on their feet with a coaching job at some po’dunk high school.

The first minor league rapper in recent memory whose greatest hit was the one contracted on him was almost certainly Mac Dre. Poor guy had a decent following until he was repeatedly capped in Kansas City over dumbass gang violence that rap fans aren’t allowed to snitch on or hear about in any other place but Hip-Hop message boards, hints in cRap magazine articles and new mixtapes. I only listen to yacht rock so most of this garbage doesn’t concern me but I find it a far cry from country music hopefuls (I’m from Kansas City) who primarily destroy their own livers if fame doesn’t whisk them away to fantastic heights. Additionally, I think the whole rap feud phenomenon deserves a closer look because obviously in-fighting and cattiness exists in almost every field of expression but only the corrupt and stereotypical culture of present day Hip-Hop celebrates it with such enthusiasm especially when it goes nuclear. There’s got to be a reason other than simply blaming Black people… Even though I guess that’s probably good enough. But I digress.

KC Rapper Fat Tone was killed in Vegas last year in what many people suspected was retribution for Mac Dre’s death even though Tone was never implicated in the shooting.

Also, let’s not forget Proof getting peeled off the streets of Detroit far away from anywhere someone would consider an epicenter of cRap music distribution. I know, I know there is a thriving Hip-Hop community of cRappers in Detroit, most of whom have a better shot at playing for the Pistons.

And that’s basically my point: There is a significant number of people in this country who are literally dying to be a part of the rap game but instead end up as tragic footnotes. I wonder if someday, someone will find a way to memorialize them. I suggest something along the lines of baseball cards only instead of gum you get a voucher toward a bullet proof vest.

Finally, to further illustrate the ridiculous levels of violence in the Hip-Hop community I’d like to point you toward the recent case of a rapper in Lawrence, Kansas (that’s right) who was recently killed. Lawrence is a college town and other than the occasional date rape there isn’t much excitement in the sleepy hideaway for privileged white kids. But reality always has a scary way of creeping into the most elaborate of fantasy worlds. Word to 9-11. And now a great many Lawrence rap fans (that phrase makes me want to laugh too) have been confronted with the scary notion that the larger Hip-Hop community is familiar with as well: There are legions of Rappers who are literally dying to entertain the masses. And in the end, while it ain’t exactly Halliburton and KBR… I have to think that any moderately educated Hip-Hop fan might see this situation as eerily similar to the “culture of death” that was noted by Pope John Paul II who, as you probably know, was a huge fan of breakdancing.