I like a little bit of everything so this isn't a rant against rap or R&B or hip hop or whatever the hell you want to call it but dear sweet eight pound twelve ounce baby jesus . . . ascribing the word profound to any music, much less an R. Kelly song, should be done carefully.

Jimmy Hendrix was a profound musician, Janis Joplin, and Pink Floyd were all profound as well as Tammy Wynette, Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, and Billy Holiday but to praise a man who not only allegedly likes to relieve his bladder on children for the sake of sexual gratification but makes his living by further demonizing and stereotyping men with songs that stretch the human imagination no further then the penis is not what I would call profound no matter how it's done.

No matter how the trial goes any one whose seen the video can have little doubt R. Kelly is indeed the man in question and while I am tolerant of sexuality and aware it's quite literally different strokes for different folks the fact that anyone still buys this mans albums after having watched the alleged video surprises me. His music just isn't that good to begin with and coupleing that with his obvious fetish for sodomizing children what possible profundity or appeal can be left over?

Don't let your huffy little moral indignation prevent you from considering the possibility that a man might be doing something interesting. What does a man's sexual preference have to do with his intelligence? Nothing. So lay off the cheap rhetoric. It reeks of ignorance.

Wow. Stunning words, EmoBoy. I definitely wouldn't categorize someone's aversion to pedophilia as "huffy little moral indignation." And "sexual preference" is a pretty aggressive euphemism for pedophilia involving sodomy and urinating on the victim. I will admit that a man's sexual deviance and perversions do not preclude him from being intelligent, but it certainly makes me question the power and depth of his art. I think R. Kelly is a sick pig.

Well said, Emoboy there seems to have left his moral compass in bed when he got up this morning.

I was citing his "sexual prefferences" as proof that he is in fact not a profound singer/song writer but little more then a chuavanist sadistic child molester whose been given a mic and ten seconds of worn out fame for the sake of shock value. You can't actually tell me you think a twelve chapter ballad about one man's inability to keep it in his pants is something you'll look back on fondly in your sixties and say "Gee willikers weren't those the days. Ol' R. Kelly really captured the spirit of the day and what a joy to be taken back to such a mgical place in my memory. Why it seems only yesterday I was pissing on my own grand daughter."

The time is 12:30 midnight on a Thursday and I'm sitting in my office being forced once again to listen to the local rap station because it's what the majority of my co-workers prefer to listen to. I have begun a tally of the number of times I've heard the same eight songs repeated and we're on our 12th loop now. I have memorized the new Fergie song, I know at least half the words to the song with the chorus "like a cholo", and am ashamed to admit that I can't help but sing along to a song I couldn't name if I were paid but which has a synthesized voice repeating "better, harder, faster, stronger."

I began to wonder at about 11:30 where all the good music had gone and why I was being met with such resistance when attempting to change the station to one that plays oldies. The songs I've been forced to listen to at the cost of my sanity are simply crap. Bad singing, rehashed and regurgitated melodies, and lyrics the likes of which you'd be hard pressed to expound upon any further then assuming the performer was either horny, righteously indignated by the horniness of men, or sad they can't seem to find a man whose horny enough to have sex with them.

If you throw in a dozen or more refferences to pot, tacky jewelry, one's "hood" status, the truly evil police department, and the fact that their drug selling womanizing and violent ways make them a real "soldier" then you have just about every song ever written for or performed on an R&B radio station. Has no one ever figured out R&B and indeed rap is basically the same story told over and over in more bizarre and irritating ways?

The story is; Man is hood soldier, man is wonderfully magical at seducing women, man has more fake jewelry then god, everyone wants to be this man, man has best weed ever grown, man can out run or kill any cop because his hood status nay his soldier status puts him above the law, man is so manly he even cringes at his own unabashed raw pulsing manliness.

Gag me. This would be funny if it weren't so blatantly transparent.

Yes. Profound.

R. Kelly's musical genius doesn't stem from his simplified mainstream ‘Trapped in the Closet’ saga that got the development deal from IFC. Though Mr. Kelly says he has “always thought of ‘Trapped’ as an independent film” writing R&B Opera is where I feel he exhibits his strengths. STCR follows Kelly's operatic series that spans the careers of 5 musical artists and 8 years.

http://staplecrops.com/?p=349

Operatic R&B?

Again gag me.

If Trapped spans the careers of five musical artists either those artists are as trite and decadent as "Mr." Kelly himself or were grossely misrepresented by his appallingly unimaginative and salicious spoof on mainstream musicians.

I'm sorry. While he has written a few tunes with some undeniably catchy hooks (i.e. Happy People), his "Trapped" series is a narcissitic exercise in how stupid americans can be. The ideas presented aren't shocking, they are trite. The music? What music? It's the same tune over and over again sung badly with stupid lyrics. The only requirement that i have for music is that it be good. and his R&B opera crap (which i'm sorry but that's insulting to both r&b AND opera) is anything but.

On another note, i personally don't think that music should be played in the workpace unless it can be at least generallly agreed upon by everyone. I once worked at a place where the janitorial staff blasted Gospel music for an hour every day while they cleaned. And then to add insult to injury, one of the coworkers in the office would play that John Ashcroft song and some other religious patriotic drivel ( i think it was that song sung by that american idol marine?) that was just... musical slop. I understand that people like this kind of music (as uninspired as it may seem to me...) but i don't think it has a place in the workplace. Not even cause i was insulted by the "message", just because it was the musical equivalent of nails on blackboard. And it's not like headphones don't exist...

That is your opion ~in which everyone is entitled~just as I think the so-called victims are hoes looking for finacial opportunity along with others envolved~~I ahev a copy of the tape~no it's not R Kelly in the tape~but yes the girl peepee on did ASK to be paid prior to the golden shower~Now If had watched the tape bfore commenting~ you'd no exactly what I'm saying.....peace!.

Did anybody watch the tape?????????????????????That'­s what I thought.

all the entertainers name in this topic not only have severe drug problems, but Jimmi Hendrix has a sex tape,did you see it,okay``and

Hi yA ALLL

r kELLY SUKS

I understand where you people are coming from.... I think .....

but these things should be kept in perspective.

As far as a genre of music is concerned, HipHop/Rap is here to stay.

What we now have is (as my daughter calls it) "HipPop" that is poured out,spewed out, churned out, delivered to the MASSES via radio,mp3,podcast,mtv ?, mobile phone thingies.... sharp sticks , youname it !

"R Kelly is just a symptom" (u r welcom 2 us tha quot R) of the outragious? money making GrAb that is our poor/sick society.

ART is what an individual sees/hear's fsomeone elses

SORRY GOT TO GO

Pop life-

You make some great points, for a mysogynist pimp! Do you know what that is, or did your education fall short of english, relevant fact acknowledgement, and nuance? Nows I knows I is just a smart talking hoe, but if a thirteen y.o. asks you to pay her before you piss on her and plunder her backdoor, then there are a couple things you should do besides drink a Mountain Dew and pay the hoe..You and R. Kelly and all the women hating masses who believe his b.s. are what's wrong with this country.

James Joyce liked to defecate on his wife's chest. Still, we know him as an author, not a pervert.

Why?

I think R. Kelly's 12 chapter epic is in essence something an artist does halfway through his career when he realizes: Wow. I'm totally full of shit. The values I espoused are crap. My cookie-cutter was crap. The ethos I preached is crap.

So now what do I do?

This kind of reflection and self-analysis and ironic "art" requires some intelligence.

I don't condone his sex acts with minors, but I don't think that necessarily means he's a moron. That's really my only point here.

Pervert does not equal idiot.

And the "pissing on my own grand daughter" bit is hyperbole and what is known in logic circles as "a slippery slope fallacy".

Or am I wrong?