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There is no shortage of reprehensible people making popular music. It can make listening to their music complicated. But what about murderers? What about real murder music?
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LINKS:
Charles Manson | Lie: The Love & Terror Cult | 01 Look At Your Game, Girl
• Charles Manson | Lie: ...
Carlo Gesualdo da Venosa - Tristis est anima mea
• Carlo Gesualdo da Veno...
Just Walkin' in the Rain - The Prisonaires (Sun 186)
• Just Walkin' in the Ra...
Elvis Presley - Love Me 1970 (Studio Rehearsal And Drunk Elvis)
• Video
X-raided - Incarceraided
• Video
X-Raided - Still Shootin'
• X-Raided - Still Shootin'
Reckonize
• Video
X-Raided Stabbing Caught On Prison Security Camera
• X-Raided Stabbing Caug...
Johnny Cash - Folsom Prison Blues
• Johnny Cash - Folsom P...
SYKO SAM - THE VOICES
• SYKO SAM - THE VOICES
Horrorcore Rapper Mars Interview on CBS News, About Syko Sam McCroskey
• Video
Look At Your Game Girl
• Look At Your Game Girl
Beach Boys - Never Learn Not To Love - 1968
• Video
Charles Manson | Lie: The Love & Terror Cult | 11 Cease To Exist
• Charles Manson | Lie: ...
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There is no shortage of reprehensible people making popular music. Everyone got their moment of righteousness with that last Chris Brown album, but let's not forget that John Lennon, Axl Rose, and Yanni all have histories of domestic violence. It can make listening to their music complicated.
But what about murderers? What about real murder music?
Our story begins in 1560 -- Carlo Gesualdo was the Prince of Venosa and a composer whose work influenced Stravinsky and, later, Aldous Huxley and Werner Herzog. He also murdered his wife, her lover, his father-in-law, and infant son.
Admittedly, the son and father-in-law have been the invention of an over-zealous press, but he definitely still strung up the mutilated bodies of his wife -- who was also this cousin -- and her lover in front of his palace.
The early days of the blues and R&B are littered with supposed criminals, maybe none more infamous than the Prisonaires.Formed in the Tennessee State Penitentiary, they featured two convicted murderers, recorded at Sun Records and were an early, critical influence of Elvis Presley.
The Prisonaires regularly and controversially performed at the governor's mansion. But like many black men in the American south at that time -- including artists like Buddy Moss and Son House -- it's unlikely they were guilty as charged.
X-Raided is a Sacremento rapper currently serving 31 years for first degree murder -- and the lyrics to his track "Still Shooting," where he seems to be describing the killing of a rival gang member's grandmother, played a critical role in his conviction.
X-Raided has continued to record from prison -- his 1999 album, the Unforgiven Vol. 1, reached #54 on Billboard's rap chart -- but he's resorted to smuggled DAT machines and collect phone calls to record vocals.
His notoriety has brought some unwanted attention -- like getting stabbed seven times.
But the use of X-Raided's lyrics in a courtroom was controversial, and set a dangerous precedent -- there's currently a non-lethal shooting case before the New Jersey Supreme Court where a defendant's four year-old rhymes are being used by prosecutors to suggest intent in a way no one would attempt with, say, country music.
Richard McCroskey, or Syko Sam, was an aspiring horrorcore rapper from castro Valley who murdered his girlfriend, her parents and another friend in what became known as the Farmville murders.
The vicious 2009 killings game McCroskey a new audience for his sub-ICP music -- the kind of people who become penpals with serial killers in prison. And, as always, turned the media's attention on the evil influence of music.
Artists like Syko Sam and X-Raided made violence a core part of their image -- but what about, you know, hippies?
Charles Manson is one of America's most notorious serial killers and the wirter of an album full of jangly weirdo fold called LIE: The Love and Terror Cult. A year before the Family's infamous string of murders, Dennis Wilson, brother of Brian, befriended Manson -- it's how the Beach Boys came to one of his songs.
5 мар 2014
