Was The Source in its prime any different from Pitchfork?
- Thread starter Mike Otherz
- Start date
I remember pitchfork being nothing but metal fegs and maybe def jux was as hip hop as they got.
krackdagawd
Inspire.
tempted to neg.
krackdagawd
Inspire.
the op
Done
Art Barr
INVADING SOHH CHAMPION
the source was not the real source in the era when you read in 96-04.
the real source stopped back during the westside connection review and ice cube selling out.
before that the source was the holy grail.
till, they disenfranchised the writers.
art barr
Art Barr
INVADING SOHH CHAMPION
Breh... the Source was damn near at one point the only hip-hop mag with real content. There were lots of mags with posters and little shytty interviews, the Source really went in with their features and always had the best articles. And sure there were 'cacs', but most of the main writers were actually Black and Latino- Reginald Dennis, James Bernard, Kierna Mayo, dream hampton, Carlito Rodriguez, Selwyn Hinds, etc... and the 'cacs' weren't hipsters tryin' to prove they were hip-hop- they knew their shyt.
you forgot scoop and upski
art barr
Homeboy Runny-Ray
From Around The Way
im not gonna compare it to pitchfork, complex & them, but i agree with the OP's premise. ive been saying this for close to 2 decades now.
i mean, it was still a great magazine nonetheless; but when it came to the mic ratings, awards & rankings, that chit was always scust. i already looked at that chit as suspect before i even hit puberty. then when i started peeping the editorial pics they used to do every once in a while, everything i already thought was confirmed.
and yea, alot of people on here grew up swearing by that stuff. smh.
man f*ck all that.
i enjoyed the source more when benzino took more control in the late '90s.
shoutout to dave 'money-makin' mayes too.
lol.
dave mayes looks & talks like he grew up playing pickup ball in the hood & his occupation deals with at-risk youths.
he gives it away with his stiffness tho. so yea, im not surprised. he still the homie tho.
i mean, it was still a great magazine nonetheless; but when it came to the mic ratings, awards & rankings, that chit was always scust. i already looked at that chit as suspect before i even hit puberty. then when i started peeping the editorial pics they used to do every once in a while, everything i already thought was confirmed.
and yea, alot of people on here grew up swearing by that stuff. smh.
man f*ck all that.
i enjoyed the source more when benzino took more control in the late '90s.
shoutout to dave 'money-makin' mayes too.
lol.
dave mayes looks & talks like he grew up playing pickup ball in the hood & his occupation deals with at-risk youths.
he gives it away with his stiffness tho. so yea, im not surprised. he still the homie tho.
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Burger King
Beefin
the source used to be good in its prime... pitchfork has always been shyt 
Hiphop was hipsteriish, that's where it developed among college kids; smart brothers with big glasses and tight jeans in the northern universities. Whether it was Puff throwing parties at Howard or superfeminist Dream Hampton doing documentaries about Biggie for her NYU homework or Rick Rubin making beats in his dorm room or Mays creating a newspaper in his dorm room. The clubs for the big rappers were in shady areas like Hells Kitchen and Soho in NY with cats like Basquiat, Madonna and Andy Warhol and on.
The Source is not like Pitchfork, cause hiphop was more of a face-to-face culture back then. Today the culture is digital, so you don't have to dedicate anything but internet hours to be fully involved. Artists are invited to the same festivals as pop and rock artists, same channel (youtube), same radio (Spotify), same awards and on. Which is also why people can be fully integrated in mad different genres today by dedicating less time and money.
So it's hard to be the same, when times are different but the fact is still that it's often privileged hipsters (black and white), from small towns (with the occasional smart brother from the hood) that moved to "shady parts" of NY like Brooklyn that wrote for magazines back then and today.
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I have a hard time believing the 'hipster' part because hipsters by nature are mainstream. I get what you're saying that there was a 'smart class' that built hip hop into what it became. Which I agree with.
The White folk that got involved in hip hop 'early' were not mainstream. They just weren't. If anything, they were outsiders/opportunists who for some reason gravitated to this new music. And since they were in the minority, they had to approach the culture with respect (mostly) or they were getting kicked out.
Early adopters DO NOT have the same personalities as the late majority. Hipsters of today are late majority. And we're talking about Pitchfork specifically. They started in 1995, and I never heard of them till 2008-ish because I went back to university and the young kids were talking about Arcade Fire. So you're telling me they were just like The Source even though nobody knew they reviewed hip hop till the mid-late 2000s?
Cmon breh.
Our definition of hipster differs, P4K is not hipster anymore imo or better yet it's like you say it's mainstream now mostly due to the internet. People from a ranch in Montana can get the same clothes, Yeezy's, same music and everything at the same time as someone who lives in Brooklyn. Hipsters are hating on P4K now cause it's a famous magazine, giving extra weight to famous rappers and on. Back in the day the most famous rapper they would dikkride was Ghostface or Madlib/MF Doom and they are one of the main reasons to why hipsters love Ghostface. Arcade Fire were hot among hipsters around 04-07ish, then they became "mainstream" with their third album. They still have their favorites that the mainstream can't digest like Animal Collective, Ariel Pink and Swans but their favorites include mainstream cats now too.
People knew that they reviewed hiphop, "hipsters" or people that nearly exclusively listened to underground/indie music. Just like The Source in the beginning, it was just the hiphop heads that new of it. After a few years it was widespread, casual hiphop listeners, non-hiphop listeners etc everyone knew of it just like p4k.