Decoded {Book Review}
“When I started working on this book, I told my editor that I wanted it to do three important things. The first thing was to make the case that hip-hop lyrics- not just my lyrics, but those of every great MC- are poetry if you look at them closely enough. The second was I wanted the book to tell a little bit of the story of my generation, to show the context for the choices we made at a violent and chaotic crossroads in recent history. And the third piece was that I wanted the book to show how hip-hop created a way to take a very specific and powerful experience and turn it into a story that everyone in the world could feel and relate to.”- Excerpt from Decoded
Content (Strengths)
Throughout Sean Carter’s memoir Decoded, he did an exceptional job of portraying the substance within many rap lyrics both his own and other artists. stating many times that listeners unintentionally turn an ignorant ear to rap. To be honest, even I at times can be found guilty of doing so.
I found myself faced with two important questions about hip-hip while reading this book, in which I now pose to you. If you look at the content most illustrated within hip-hop: love, hatred, fear of failure/success, religion, money, drugs, partying, politics, black culture, etc., does it not first encompass similar content of other popular and well…more accepted genres of music? Secondly, does hip-hop not encompass similar content that can be found in most notable poets’ works of art (having religious implications at times like those in E.E. Cummings’ a man who had fallen among thieves, or how about rap songs with political views similar to that of Langston Hughes’ Democracy)? In case you were wondering, my answer was yes on both accounts.
The story of Sean Carter’s generation (growing up in the ‘70s and ‘80s), is one that cannot be described without including the effect drug infiltration had on ethnic communities, not just in New York, but nationally. Jay-Z does a good job of defending decisions made by a generation that was arguably the first to see the up rise of single-parent homes. While Sean doesn’t defend the actions of those who chose the streets over going to college, he does do a phenomenal job of portraying his own accounts during a similar time in his life, in which he makes the reader feel as if you’re right there with him, walking the streets of Brooklyn, visualizing crime that wasn’t uncommon where he grew up, and taking it as far as to be able to smell the repulsive mixture of piss in the stairwell & the crack on his clothes after coming home from out-of-state. Yea, that’s pretty darn dope if you ask me.
Jay-Z also did a great job of touching on certain aspects within the music industry. With me being an artist myself, Decoded almost made me feel like I wasn’t alone or wrong in my decision to pursue music, or my method in doing so: having an entrepreneurial mindset.
Weaknesses
Before reading Decoded, I went in with the mentality that I would learn a bit more about the Jay-Z never revealed to the public; and in some ways my expectations were met. On the other hand, the book left me wanting to know more about Sean Carter on a personal level that didn’t necessarily have a correlation with hip-hop.
I can count on one hand the number of times Jay mentioned having a girlfriend throughout the book, or even the mention of his relationship with his siblings (outside of any type of relation to music) without him then quickly redirecting the focus towards hip-hop again. I mean come on Jay, can I get a chapter about you and a couple of past flings? Did music add strain to your relationships? How did the women in your life cope with the long absences of you being on the road all the time? Or better yet, how did they feel about your decisions with choosing to sell drugs/rap over getting a real job? This is stuff I wanted to know, but then again, my man Duz said it best, he told me “Locke, you ain’t never gonna see that side of Jay.” And I’d have to agree. Maybe it’s best that I don’t.
Subtract 0.5 for the lack of specific personability I wanted to read in the book, as well as an additional 0.2 for the cover artwork, and you my friend get Decoded with a solid score of 9.3 out of 10. This came mostly in part of me being able to relate heavily to a lot of the content within the book; and that’s excluding the fact that I’m a young black male. Not to mention with me being an aspiring artist, while some of the music knowledge might’ve fallen on “death ears” to most readers, I soaked it all up.
You can find Decoded at your local Barnes & Noble, or online at Amazon.com.
Go cop the book if you haven’t yet.
-Locka