Comments on: Interesting “Interview” with Theo Parrish

By: noleian

noleian — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 07:29:00 +0000

yup, excellent.

By: jordan detroit

jordan detroit — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 21:25:47 +0000

edit: plus half of theo’s top 8 on myspace is like, WHITE people. haha!!

By: jordan detroit

jordan detroit — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 21:21:30 +0000

you know what happens when ur living in detroit? you get salty and pissed off at the rest of world basically. worst economy in the nation, corrupt cops, corrupt mayor, “most dangerous” in the nation. all that shit. u know what i’m saying. so you just sometimes talk some shit tounge in cheek.

half of the illest detroit records wouldn’t have been pressed it it weren’t for ron murphy, a white dude. think about that.

plus half of theo’s top 8 on myspace is like, people. haha!!

he’s just talking to wackness out there… the people doing shit wrong.. and the white people unappropriating and disrespecting original roots. anyone who understands and respects music, should be able to catch that on the dime.

don’t forget about this part of the interview “There are a few non black underground dance artists that simply have gravitated to the form because its as free a musical form as you can get. They don’t even care who their music sounds like, they are just trying to express themselves honestly and truthfully. I’m not talking about them. They are rare and appreciated. They are original. Whatever success they garner is deserved.”

By: nightlight

nightlight — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:56:17 +0000

Man, EVERYBODY is thinks that ‘black’ music is ‘better’ than ‘white’ music. And if it’s not put in actual words (it’s not pc) it’s there between the lines. It’s true for most of us, regardless of where each one of us lives, especially during the last five decades. I do it too. I don’t read into it more than what I already mentioned.
Miles Davis was a demigod incarnate. If HE didn’t get love and money, we’d have to cut off our ears and hands. Still, SO many demigods died poor or were never even heard by anyone, regardless of ‘race’, so we should consider the above lucky.
As for the Cocoon team you named, these are hardly your typical european DJs as they are THE most hyped guys around, all Ibiza, marketing and art crap flooding over their undeniable yet overstressed talent. They are not the underground. They are not the everyday people. And if you use them as an example you don’t know Europe well man, sorry. Do you think Ewan Pearson and A Guy Called Gerald in Berlin have different opportunities? Guys from Detroit move here cause there’s (’mostly’) better quality of life and they get the respect they deserve, of which they ‘re obviously depraved in the US. And yes, they get paid better. They make enough money to live and travel around the world because they DO get gigs. Which very few europeans can claim to have succeeded without compromising their work/ having beforehand a shitload of money to invest on their artistic ‘career’/ attaching themselves to a group as parasites/ sucking genitalia/ etc, etc.
I guess you don’t see it that way and I don’t blame you, you’d have to live here to know that. As I know I don’t understand racial discrimination problems in the States (or France, for example) in their fullness, cause I’m not there. But same shit IS everywhere. Focusing on bitterness is easy. Overcoming problems is the hard part.
It’s not my thing to judge someone from a line he spoke or wrote, I don’t quote and analyze words and stuff. I think TP bitched about a bit, but I don’t really care about it. Opinions like yours and mine and of all the others expressed here are more important.

By: cul

cul — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 02:59:02 +0000

I agree with a lot of what theo says. I even assumed when he said ‘white folks at a party they didnt belong at’ he was being metaphorical rather than literal.

But to suggest (all) music is of a black origin is patently stupid. Im not sure if theo said that or someone here.

Firstly the ‘we all from africa’ comment is daft. So white people just forgot all they learnt about music in africa once the pigment faded a bit?

Theo doesnt live in africa surrounded by other black people. He lives in the USA. He watches American TV. He buys American food. He uses japanese synths and ‘white’ recording technology.

We exist in a shared consciouness. Theo may have more black experience than some because he lives in detroit but a lot of his experiences are still filtered through ‘white folk’. Would he be making the same music if his ancestors hadnt been brought/moved to a land consisting of 80%+ white people? Maybe he’d be happier - but the music wouldnt be as interesting? maybe, maybe not, who knows.

would robert johnson have been able to play the blues without white folk? No, becuase white folk nicked the guitar idea from some people they met in the middle east while they were both fucking around in boats in the mediteranean 5000 years ago.

I have no problem with what theo says but im taking up some serious objections to people’s interpretations of it.

By: von

von — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 10:23:14 +0000

Does teddy not realise without his ‘white folks’ audience he has nothing , black america wants hip hop not smelly old disco re edits … many of the samples from white musicans.

By: stable boy

stable boy — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 22:14:58 +0000

Theo is acting like a right tit.

By: Jacob

Jacob — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 08:16:41 +0000

Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Miles Davis, etc all were able to make money, push boundaries musically and socially, and all got paid

It’s not like for like to compare those guys to TP. A much fairer comparison would be Timbaland, Outkast, Lil Wayne. Who are, lets face it, making bank.

By: pipecock

pipecock — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 20:59:04 +0000

“For your education”

hey thanks, i didn’t know how to use the internet and i have never read any philosophy. thank god for that link, otherwise i might not know anything.

let me be a little more specific in what i was trying to get across: knowing your history is important, understanding the flow of musical styles is great. what i dislike is making music discussion too academic, that is where the disdain for “-ist”s comes from.

and you *are* nitpicking that point. you are complaining about one small statement in a larger whole which even if it was totally incorrect (i am still not 100% in agreement on that) doesn’t change the main crux of his argument. you could leave that fragment of a sentence off his entire post and it would not change the meaning.

By: trouc

trouc — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 20:36:44 +0000

For your education,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essentialism

I’m not nitpicking anybody’s points. He says some good things, makes some excellent arguments, and then he claims that techno, like all music (and he gives rock, the blues and jazz as other examples), was originated by black people. He may be right about techno, but that point itself gives the lie to what you’re claiming, i.e. he is talking about specific musics, not music as a whole. Rock music, the blues, jazz, etc, he’s right with all of these too, but there’s plenty of music besides those. The claim is irresonspible, and that’s that man. If you want to contextualize it as others have, go ahead, but don’t pretend he didn’t say what he explicitly did.