Something From Nothing: The Art Of Rap

• 13th Oct 2012

At the very top of this film, rapper turned actor turned documentary filmmaker, Ice-T lays out his mission statement:  he wants to find out what it takes to write rap. Ice makes it clear that Something from Nothing will not be an investigation into the darker side of rap and its association with gang culture, crime and misogyny.  Instead he’s looking at rap music as an art form, something which he feels the world at large fails to do.

In some ways the decision not to investigate raps’ darker side was a brave one. He considers rap music to be a greatly misunderstood and much maligned art and is interested in trying to get people to reconsider it as something separate from guns and violence (ironic from one of the pioneers of gangsta rap).

You have to ask though, really, would you watch this documentary if you didn’t already consider rap to be art; if you didn’t already have an affinity with this type of music?  Even during Ice’s discussions with fellow rappers, they all confirm that rap is something you have to “get” and if you don’t get it, if you don’t understand the language and the culture behind it, then all you’ll hear is noise.  Surely, then, if you do “get” rap, then you can appreciate the artistry behind the rat-tat-tat delivery of complex and complicated rhymes and would already consider it to be art….so who exactly is our director trying to convince?

Having said that, this documentary does actually have a lot to offer and if you’re not already a rap fan and you might just come away wanting to download some Grandmaster Caz.  What Ice has done is actually a real feat. He has managed to assemble interviews with some of the biggest rappers in the US (feuds notwithstanding – so no LL Cool J). Everyone you would expect and hope for is present and correct, a very stoned Snoop Dogg, a typically angry Kanye, Run and D.M.C, a fragile looking Eminem, there are even a couple of female rappers, including Salt from Salt-n-Pepa to balance out all of that testosterone.  The only notable absentee is Jay-Z, who I can only assume didn’t want to take part, which is a pity.

Ice’s interview technique is a bit patchy at times, but the conversations he has are always interesting and truly come alive when he asks his subjects to perform someone else’s rap from memory, one that means something to them. It’s brilliant to see the biggest rap stars in the world, spitting (can I use that word as a white girl?) each other’s rhymes out as naturally as they would their own.

Performance aside, the real question Ice is asking each star actually is; how do you write?  The answers he receives vary from those who focus on the hard slog of putting the time in at a desk with a pen and paper, those who see words as puzzles in their minds which need to be solved, and those who smoke a whole bunch of weed, get a couple of girls in the room with them, put on some old school classics and just write (Snoop Dogg’s answer…unsurprisingly). It’s a shame therefore that the editing of the film never seems to draw all of these answers together to reach a definitive conclusion.  But then perhaps that is the magic of art; there is no definitive answer to that question.

It’s really interesting to hear the pioneers of rap talk about its genesis coming as a reaction to US economic cutbacks taking instruments out of schools.  The suggestion is made that black culture is so saturated in music that even without instruments to play, the impulse to create and listen cannot be removed.  That economic burden which gave rise to rap, could also, Ice seems to suggest, be the reason for its oftentimes overtly political message; the desire to communicate the realities of the life for the ghettoized poor in American cities to their elected officials.  Whether that argument tracks when you listen to rap music which is more about “hoes” being “strong-armed” than the plight of the working man, is difficult to say, and this isn’t touched on which really is a missed opportunity, given how ripe a subject misogyny in rap actually is.

The film also questions the genesis of the rap battle, suggested that it took root in the “dozens”.  Before emancipation, slaves in the US who were seen as “defective” were sold by the dozen, rather than healthy slaves who were sold singularly, hence the “dozens”.  It’s suggested that the Zulu nation had a tradition of verbal warfare, which some slaves bought with them to the US, transferring that notion to verbally sparring within the “dozens”. In time this tradition was passed through the generations and formed the basis of the rap battles taking place in clubs across the US today.  Interesting theory if it’s true, adding further credence to Ice’s assertion that rap is an artistic expression of black culture.

As a director, Ice’s visual style is actually rather engaging and works well with the subject matter as his lingering shots of the L-Train and housing projects suggests the noise of the city helped give a beat to the early rappers.  There is definitely a correlation between the city and rap, as though one could not exist without the other. Indeed Ice visits the three most important centers of rap music in the U.S – New York, Detroit and L.A. all of whom have historically had large African American communities, spawning the culture behind the music. Ice goes as far as to express genuine surprise that one of the world’s biggest, and he argues lyrically complex and interesting rappers is actually white. Certainly Eminem is the only white person interviewed in the documentary, which certainly adds credence to the assertion that rap is a purely black art form.

Ultimately, this documentary is more a love letter to lyricism than anything else.  The old question: is rap actually modern poetry; is trotted out again and wonderfully turned on its head as the answer comes that no, the poets were rappers.  I would recommend this film if you want to hear artists’ talk about their craft and then demonstrate why it is they are the best at what they do, just don’t expect a treatise on the cultural implications of rap lyrics and culture.  Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to download some NWA.

Suzanne King