Blog Entry #5

Kayla Leland 

Professor Santos 

EN-003 

Blog entry #5 

 Patti Smith 

  

This week in class we have discussed Patti Smith and the women’s movement. One particular reading that stood out to me was an excerpt from “Here she comes now: women in music who have changed our lives. Ed. Jeff Gordinier and Mare Weingarten. Rare bird books; Los Angeles, 2015” called “Not a rock n roll nigger” which was written by Dael Orlandersmith. This was during the time of 1979 when racial tension was high so many blacks were targeted or seen as a traitor if they chose to listen to anything other than that. Patti Smith wasn’t afraid to speak her mind and was fighting against things that were real and current.  

 

Patti Smith was a black female rock and roll artist who many admired and looked up to for that. Patti Smith could be seen as an outsider as she chose to go against what everyone was doing and continued to sing rock n roll. Even though Patti Smith and many other blacks grew up as if they were forced to listen to black music I think it is amazing how Patti Smith detached from her community  and chose to sing what she believed in order to make a change because she wanted to. Similar to what we have previously discussed in class, who gets to judge what genre we listen to. Why should the music industry have such a say and control in what music is played. At the time blacks were forced to listen to black music and Latin music because of the racial tension as "a child of color born in a ghetto must learn fast and hard". This means that if you are black and you don’t learn to like black music at a young age you will be considered an outsider. I find it interesting to imagine how if your favorite artist was seen doing something you were against how you would react. Would you have the guts to tell them to their face what they are doing wrong or would you acknowledge them on their work like everyone else. Patti Smith was different from many other musicians as she chose to be neutral and always sang with such emotion.