Is it really all that damn serious?
Words: Mario “2Tyme” Hankton

I am watching a tube video of R. Kelly mildly expressing irritation at some of today’s artist’s lack of respect and integrity. It made news about a week or so ago, but the content therein had been brewing for some time. Ironic how history repeats itself… Seems like just the other day Kells was unseating Aaron Hall as the new R&B King…

The irony of his personal troubles and his professional opinion are too something to marvel, but the reality is, he’s made some tracks (pun intended) during his reign. Then I immediately think about the age old first person musical argument. “YALL aint nothin! without David Ruffin!”

Artists, or their supporters, have been exclaiming themselves as the savior of music in one way or the other since the inception of the art form. It was a method of marketing one’s ability or sales potential and in other ways it’s just that good old ID (see Sigmund Freud).

Rappers are notorious, or should I say N.O.T.O.R.I.O.U.S, for committing first person acts of “big timing.” Don’t even think for a millisecond that this is unique to Hip Hop and R & B, or that fighting through sound just started. I won’t even take you all the way back to Africa for that.

READ MORE

It’s been months since Trey Songz dropped attempted to ether R. Kelly with his own rendition of “D.O.A.” and as he prepares to make his own push, for his own album, Kellz is finally responding.

He doesn’t go so far as to actually say dude’s name, but he does reference the new generation of R&B thugs.

“You cannot give your opinion and talk about someone who’s done what they’ve done in this industry; which is change the industry and brought a new genre of music and ideas to the industry and still doin’ it,” he says. “You don’t do that. It’s like tryna throw a rock on top of the SEARS Tower.”

He suggests toward the end of this exclusive with DJ Skee that he would never question the artisitc choices of any of his predecessors -Stevie Wonder, Donnie Hathaway and others among them. In essence, any artist attempting to go at him is more or less disrespecting the process that has taken years to materialize as it is today.

“Fortunately I am smart enough and I am wise enough that I don’t need to retaliate to sell my album, to be a better man a bigger man, or a tougher guy,” Kellz says before ending his spill. “I don’t need to retaliate to do any of that. And besides, elephants don’t swat flies.”

VIDEO INSIDE

After a lengthy introduction that includes personal Michael Jackson footage where the fallen pop legend is dancing to “Ignition” in the back seat of a car, R. Kelly debuts a song he did in MJs honor. During his address, which is apparently aimed at a sellout crowd that came to see him perform, Kellz insists that he will not let Michael die.

First there was the “N” word and now this… Last night during the Midwest Music Network multi-platinum producer R. Kelly took the stage, but he did so outside of his traditional element. Instead, he used his time to discuss the notion of burying the word “hate.”

He encouraged the Chitown audience to let go of the negativity and offered, “The depth of your struggle will determine the height of your success.”

A moving spill from a man who readily admits he doesn’t read. In fact, Kelly discloses how he his cousins and others teased him when he was younger because he was in fact illiterate. Then he just went on to become one of the most talented writers of all time.

Go figure. He may be one tortured soul, but you can’t knock his desire to succeed. Can one of the most hated men in America effectively kill the “H” word?

VIDEO INSIDE

R. Kelly finally decided to respond to Trey Songz’s diss record in which he called for the “Death Of Kellz” (D.O.K.) days after rapper Jay Z released “Death of Auto Tune” (D.O.A.) and it wasn’t much of a reaction.

“If you’re a true king, you don’t get into challenges,” he said. “You get to a status in life where you don’t ever have to throw another punch. What is an elephant supposed to do when an ant or a fly lands on you? Those guys have some growing up to do…I would have answered [that diss] 20 years ago…but not now.

To think of how he abruptly ended Aaron Hall’s career by basically raping dude’s entire image, it’s about time the tables were turned, but his choice to ignore Songz altogether and then dismiss him in the aforementioned statement, is classic! Meanwhile, TS is still yearning for his first platinum album?

Good luck buddy!!