It’s cute (for want of a better word) to realize that I too could have written the lyrics to this song, at age 15, from the time when it came out.
This is a fact I gathered while listening to the acapella version ( this one is non-melodic straight rapping) of Newcleus’s “Jam On It”.
It’s a good example of the “jibberishy” stuff that went on to live in generations of hip-hop songs. At 15, I didn’t care so much for the words as I was embracing the beats to the instrumentals.
As a little girl, I was a severe rocker; in couches, chairs and in every restaurant booth my mother ever smacked me in, to get me to “STOP IT!”.
After age 9 ish, I exchanged that habit for discreet tapping of my foot, drumming of my fingers and dancing around my room-quietly, so I wouldn’t be heard disobeying the command of keeping “your damned ass in that seat until I tell you to move! ”
Both this song and my self were released upon the world at the same time. Me into state’s custody, it onto all break dancer venues.
I loved this song and I still carry a deep appreciation for it, nearly forty years later.
As I mentioned, I loved the instrumental parts. The parts where they “hid” the good stuff that our bodies yearned to feel.
The parts that wove themselves in and out throughout our psyche. Where they could toy around with our developing libidos and bump up against other out of reach things like our self-esteem, our fears and emotions.
The art and execution of music has always been the only true magic that can be set against or serve as benefit to human beings. When discussing experiments involving bowls of rice and growing houseplants, one can say that it’s the magic which can best affect all sorts of organic matter.
Words can deliver many messages. But they can be easily detected and too easily swatted away. If one wants those words to catch on a deeper level, they have to be slipped through the eye of a fine needle. So, when the thread is knotted off, tied off and the needle removed, there’s barely a trace or memory of the thing, save for the moment of insertion.
Until the next prick comes around with a new message.
The lyrics were “nonsense” words, in this beloved jam from my youth.
It’s the echoes, slides, deep thumps and vibrations which turned me on. And kept me on. To “whatever” or for “whyever”, I haven’t a clue. I wasn’t born smart enough to be one of the talents who create such things. The point of Me was to exist as a dumb single from the vast multitude obligated to absorb it.
It’s a song which falls into a category which I’ve been struggling to put a name to, since I started studying the types and amount of propaganda in our media. While a lot of material has been ruined for myself, this particular song remains embraced to my chest, held tight in that category which I’m going to try to explain.
It’s like being a love smitten mutt who refuses to leave, after finding out truths about a cheating or abusive lover. Because of how horribly handsome he is and how amazing he makes her feel. And because thoughts of leaving him bring her far more misery than any considerations about staying.
I suppose that’s close enough of a description.
It’s also an intense and beautiful aspect of this World.
How “bad” things for some can often provide the best things for others. Things which they never would have felt otherwise.
This is the exact kind of world where a blessing of this sort was supposed to be a right for every single individual to experience. We got hung up along the way, in the wrong direction altogether. In large part because we repeatedly force others to react, act and think in the same ways that we do..whether they share the same life experience or tastes as us or not.
The most trivial examples being how we gossip and mock those who look different from us, in everyday life.
The very worst examples being when The Church and wealthy elite kill, maim and destroy majority populations of human beings for refusing to worship imaginary characters that don’t exist or have the gall to forget to address them with “Yes, I agree, your Highness” or “No, whatever you wish, Master.”
My taste for music is as varied and rich as my taste for food. To the best of my recollection, from youngest years, I never pretended to “be down” with noises I never liked and I never hid my love for the stuff that my peers never heard or simply disliked. I was and remained unique in that way. On more levels than just music.
It’s one reason why I can “see” a few things “going on” with us and don’t mind risking the embarrassment of exposing my lack of education, when I try to share writing about those things.
The point?
That by the time it gets to you finding out more than you wanted to know..
When you have the first of those “ah ha” moments, while listening to a once beloved tune or watching a favorite flick…
And you finally do see, how it was actually a rude snub at you.
Or when you are forced to realize that it was one part in a series of ongoing manipulations to force certain reactions out of you. Without your knowledge or permissions.
If you discover anything rude and disappointing at all, when you were all set to snuggle up with the memory of your tune to help remind you of “the good old days”..
Remember that you can’t unmake the love you made to it (while listening to it, as a song).
Just like you can’t swallow the laughs you shared with an old friend (while watching it, as a movie).
All of those little extras, memories and such were real and did bring you good.. even if the intentions of the artists were inclined elsewise.
Maybe a song or TV show gave you hope in thinking that you could be somebody important one day, no matter how “unacceptable” you felt or were being treated at the time..even though the artists never actually experienced the darkness that you did nor had the problems you had in your life and were just “acting like you” because it was meant to create a worst sort of “you”. Or simply meant to poke fun at you.
If you discover that your favorite media was never created to make you happy or was meant for the worst.
If you can manage to focus on the good things which actually resulted from it..
And if you can fix your eyes on a future where art will finally explode into multiple directions and to maximum potential..no longer restricted to the inspiration and obligation of our ruin..
Then you can learn to let that be all that matters..and all that should matter.
Besides, the remixes can be superb.
I tried my hand at marrying some video clips with one remix of “Jam On It”
This following remix (Brooklyn Beats) is a favorite version and not too shabby on the casino floor, if we’re talking about using the potential of music and certain sounds to affect better things ..like scoring multiple jackpots or spelling out more consistent luck on the floor, with it playing through your headphones…straight into your happy and hopeful head and onward to your hands. Maybe. ;0)
Ramsy's Joint 