Masterpiece Essay Aryan Medam

Aryan Medam
10/30/2020
DE English 12
The sight of gay black man wearing a pink jumpsuit and blonde bob-wig screaming“I just
got a new magic wand!” clearly began to test the audience's sensibilities, as seen in their
bewildered and uncomfortable expressions. Yet, this was the climax of Tyler Okonma (Tyler, the
Creator’s) 2020 GRAMMY performance.
Okonma’s performance began on a much mellower note however, with a stripped down
version of his new album’s radio single, “EARFQUAKE”, performed by Boyz II Men and
Charlie Wilson. The singers, dressed in red and parked around a foreshadowing flaming garbage
can, deliver their consonant reharmonization of the original song. The performance quickly turns
to Tyler himself, who begins grunting out the fundamental rhythm of his more aggressive cut
“NEW MAGIC WAND” over the musical backdrop of a brooding synth lead. By the time the
dense, saturated drum track begins the set has expanded to reveal burning buildings lit by
flashing red and white strobe lights. Okonma now begins shouting the song’s lyrics, some of
which are routed through a thick layer of digital distortion. As the section of the stage he’s
standing on is elevated, several doppelgangers, sporting similar outfits and wigs, march out of
the audience and join him onstage to dance erratically. This an artistic choice that likely
represents his nearly decade long cult following in the underground, experimental, hip-hop
scene. Boyz II Men and Charlie Wilson make one last R&B interjection from a burning balcony
on the set and sing the lyrics, again loaned from “EARFQUAKE”, “Don’t leave it’s my fault.”
The doppelgangers have now dispersed and Okonma shouts the last verse of “NEW MAGIC
WAND” before ending the performance by falling backwards into a pit of CGI flames.
The lyrics in the “NEW MAGIC WAND” section range from nonsensical: “My eyes are
green, I eat my vegetables'' to edgy and startling “She’s gonna be dead, I just got a New Magic
Wand.” Lyrics that are more representative of genres like metal and subgenres like horrorcore as
opposed to traditional hip-hop or “rap music” as the GRAMMYs would pigeonhole it. The
production on “NEW MAGIC WAND” also leans into this metal motif with its drums, especially
the thumpy kick and snare, that have been buss-compressed and distorted past any reasonable
standard. Meanwhile, the performance of “EARFQUAKE” can be viewed as a R&B tinged,
mainly thanks to Boyz II Men, synthpop track with its optimistic piano lines, repitched vocal
harmonies, and buzzy synth chords. Tyler’s voice is buried by the layers of instrumentation
throughout his most recent record IGOR, containing both “NEW MAGIC WAND” and
“EARFQUAKE”, as his style evolved, over the course of his career, into a more instrumentally
driven and less abrasive one.
IGOR would go on to win a GRAMMY later that night for “Best Rap Album.” A
situation that appears particularly ironic considering that during his performance Tyler never
rapped. In fact he never raps on the album versions of the songs he performed, but chooses to
sing and shout instead. (There is however, a short eight bar section of “EARFQUAKE” where
Playboi Carti does provide a jumbled, unintelligible rap verse as a transitional element.) Overall,
there is very little rapping on IGOR as a whole and hip-hop only appears to be the main influence
on two or three songs on the 11 track album. Tyler’s choice not to perform songs where he raps
is likely a subtle jab at the recording academy, which has traditionally relegated black artists, no
matter how genre-bending their work, into the “urban contemporary1” or “rap” categories. As
Tyler, the Creator himself put it, “Why can’t we just be pop?”
By the numbers, 4 of the last 20 recipients of the GRAMMY for the “best vocal pop
album” have been black, but more alarmingly all of the recipients of the “best urban
contemporary album1” have been black. It’s an award that has been presented to the likes of
Frank Ocean, Beyoncé, The Weeknd (who has received it twice in its seven year history).
Clearly the honor attempts to share roots with the traditional R&B category that traces back to
1995 with it’s first recipient being, in a twist of poetic justice, “Boyz II Men.” Of course, R&B
has been a genre historically marketed toward black audiences since the term’s inception, but
that does nothing to explain the newer “urban contemporary” semantics. Regardless, as musical
genres continue to converge, the average listener cannot be blamed for asking “Is an artist's race
being used to categorize their art?” (An idea still particularly fresh in the minds of listeners after
the ubiquitous Lil Nas X single “Old Town Road” was controversially removed from the
Billboard Country Charts.)
While the GRAMMY’s arbitrary way of classifying music might be largely

inconsequential, it is a microcosm that of course leads to questions about how music is being
discovered by listeners on streaming platforms. For instance, the streaming revenue of songs like
“EARFQUAKE” can suffer greatly from being curated, usually by machine, into hip-hop
playlists and put up against songs that share few similarities with it. One method of more
cognizant playlist curation would be curation based on mood, color, or activity, instead of strictly
by genre. An even more extreme approach, in the methodology of genre-less curation, can be
seen in Spotify’s “Pollen” playlist that completely forgoes categorizing music by genre, and is
organized like an eclectic DJ set instead. The advent of music streaming services has
commoditized music to the point where any minute publishing error can destroy a song or
album’s viability for the artist. Nevertheless, it is unfortunate, however, that an artist's race might
turn into said publishing error.
“Grammys Drop 'Urban' from Major Award Category.” BBC News. BBC, June 10, 2020.
https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-52996675.
Leight, Elias. “Future 25: John Stein, Co-Creator of Spotify's Genre-Less Pollen Playlist,”
September 30, 2019. https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/future-25-john-stein-co-
creator-of-spotifys-genre-less-pollen-playlist-889139/.
Tyler Okonma. EARFQUAKE/NEW MAGIC WAND. January 28, 2020. Sony/ATV,

video.
“Winners & Nominees.” GRAMMY.com. Recording Academy . Accessed October 22,

2020. https://www.grammy.com/grammys/awards/winners-nominees/194.
1. This category has recently been discontinued and replaced by the “Progressive R&B” category.
1. This category has recently been discontinued and replaced by the “Progressive R&B” category.

Masterpiece Essay Aryan Medam

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Aryan Medam

While the GRAMMY’s arbitrary way of classifying music might be largely

Tyler Okonma. EARFQUAKE/NEW MAGIC WAND. January 28, 2020. Sony/ATV,

“Winners & Nominees.” GRAMMY.com. Recording Academy . Accessed October 22,

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