Wayback -- putting it back in storage

As the two of you well know, I incorporated a post from May and wrote a series of drops this week reporting live from my personal favorite era in hip hop, 1990-1999...
I was discussing with The Katie last night whether or not I would continue this into the decade in which we currently live for 4ish more months here and talked myself out of it with "am I really qualified to call it 'wayback' if I am still in the decade I am discussing?" and with that, the idea was put to bed... When I got home, I finished writing the 1994 post, which completed the decade for me, as follows posted in order of POST date, not chronological year, so don't be confrused that they're out of order:

1998

1996

1997

1999

Pause for explanation

1991

1993

1990

1995

1992

and
1994

And there you have it, 10 years summing up hip hop's GOLDEN age. The 70's were infancy, and I was not born until all but 6 months of the decade were passed. The 80's were the formative years, where the successes and the fight for viability took place. I did not swing back into the 80's because I was 1 year old through 10 years old in the 80's and in such had no REAL real-life opinions tied to the music that I was aware of, but not so much in the manner that I would become in the 90's... Yeah, sure I HAVE an opinion on things that came out in the 80's, but I was not so involved as I explained in those 11 linked blogs above to have had an opinion to expound on as it took place.

What I have done here is interject my ideas and thoughts on what I feel is the best period of time for our art... It is an era that would bring along the legends of the 80's for the ride in a manner that was inclusive of and respectful to them, rather than ridicule them for being "old timers," or whatever. It draws attention to the paradigm shift in the regionality of hip hop from a New York City only thing, first to other places in the Tri State, to Virginia and further south about the same time it started making big waves in the West, then seeing the Midwest bridging the gap between the Southeast and proper West Coast... Looking at these things with a proper objective eye can sire a bit of nostalgia AND resentment, depending on how you look at it.
F'rinstance...

• One can look at how the spread of hip hop as it were made EVERYONE feel like they could rap, and very many would try to as a means of bettering their situation because rap music was the escape from their situations, since they couldn't throw/catch a football or shoot a basketball very well...
• Or, on the other hand, one can look at how the spread of hip hop as it were made EVERYONE feel like they could rap, and dammit if they didn't fucking try (and still are). This watered the industry down. More on that in a minute.

Continuing the thoughts on that second one leads to my SECOND reason for not going in on the current decade, which will last only 143 more days after today... Rap today is metaphoric to basketball of my childhood... EVERYONE thought they could play ball, they wanted to be like Mike, they were GOING to be in the league, no matter if they were 5'3" and never to be more than 5'10" or if they were a gangly 6'5" cat with NO skill other than being 8 inches taller than most others in the school. Look at it, nowadays we have people who are IN rap who will readily cop that "I'm not very articulate" in a song that GETS PLAYED ON THE FUCKING RADIO?!!? It seems that the once-standard ideas of presentation of actual skill, entertainment value -- outside of that "trainwreck" type that has your listening public wondering when you will be shot in your "beef" with another rapper -- and personal familiarity sold records. These days, the only personal familiarity these kids find in rappers are that the rappers are young, ignorant and inarticulate like they are... Whitney "I believe the children are our future" Houston is rolling in her grave right now, word to Bobby Brown.

This series of drops was likely no more for either of you than it was for me, my wanting to harken back to a time where I still "lived at home" financially and had money to spend on things like music, women and superfluous bullshit. This series has reminded me of things I had on cassette and never got around to getting on CD, as it did with things I have downloaded and would like to add to the physical collection, so my Amazon Wish List WILL be growing (if anyone is interested in helping, my email is callmephlip@gmail.com) as I read back over these.
Look, I know I didn't catch everything hip hop that was released and may have missed something that YOU personally liked or even loved... I did not go at these lists totally from memory, I did so with the advent of Google, Amazon and Wikipedia, which are not perfect either... Those concessions made, I promise to turn a deaf ear to your "Wait, you forgot..." criticisms, as I am a busy man with a life, job, The Katie and still the bit of an alcohol habit -- blame it on the brain and not the heart.

The Wayback gave me an excuse to be more productive in these pages than I have EVER been since I started blogging on MySpace (sometime in 2006, I think?)... I can't promise to generate the amount of excitement that the specific topic at hand has given me, anyone who knows me knows what I love most, so I will not promise any such a rate of work ever again anytime in the near or distant future.
No clue what the next blog will be about, or if it will be about ANYTHING anyone who has read this series will be interested -- or even when the fuck it will be.
Stay tuned if you like, I understand if you don't. The Wayback machine is going back into storage now.