Macklemore Makes a Mouthy Macro-Mistake.
Macklemore Makes a Mouthy Macro-Mistake.
More Musings on the Seattle Cultural Landscape
I miss Seattle every day. She’s like a toxic ex who you lust over but know deep in your heart that going back to her would be an absolute shit show. She has a serious addiction to hard drugs and has no personal boundaries. She occasionally defecates and shoots up in front of you—sometimes at the same time, and you must be wary of her cheating on you with organized crime syndicates smuggling people and ghost guns through town. But by god she has a rocking body—those magical mountains, the giant trees, the sparkly Puget Sound…Seattle is majestic minus the other stuff.
And before you do the unthinkable, and text her to see how she's doing, you must pull yourself back and remind yourself of why you left her in the first place. Remember all those nights of people meth-ed out of their minds screaming outside your bedroom window? Or that time you accidentally walked in on an entire tent city in the middle of one of the most isolated parks in town? Or all those times you had to call emergency services on people who were overdosing from fentanyl on your walks to work? But we had so much fun together!
Luckily this weekend I didn’t need to list the 101 reasons I left the Emerald City, and that’s all due to the Seattle based “rap artist” Macklemore making international news by being a dumbass.
As I was thrift shopping so I could recreate the Seattle uniform of vintage flannel shirts and combat boots until the end of my days (I may no longer live there but I can still dress like I do), Macklemore was performing at the music festival “Palestine Will Live Forever” in South Seattle’s Seward Park. During his set, Macklemore said, “Straight up say it, I’m not gonna stop you…yeah Fuck America” and appeared to lead the crowd in some sort of chanting.
Watching the video the New York Post provided (here) doesn’t fill me with the same rage as certain hardline right-wing commentators who have jumped on the footage with the predictable righteous zealous “hatred of progressives” fervor that energizes and polarizes their audiences, but that also may be because I’ve seen this Macklemore rodeo before. Amateur Hour is a more accurate description of the activist event masked as a music festival hosted in the heart of the most Jewish neighborhood in all of Seattle. Amateur Hour is also an apt descriptor of Macklemore as a person.
In 2014 at a surprise show at the Museum of Pop Culture he wore a “disguise” to perform his hit song “Thrift Shop” that looked like a promotional skit for a Sasha Baron Cohen movie about the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Macklemore later apologized for his get up and insisted that he had no idea that a giant prosthetic nose and fake Abraham Lincoln inspired beard could be mistaken for an insensitive caricature of a religious Jew. I was really hoping he would say he was going for “the Amish man disguise” or a modern looking Rasputin–but the bowl cut wig really doesn’t fit with either of these looks (it doesn’t scream “Jew” either I might add-but the hooked nose doesn’t help his case).
Years passed, and while Macklemore has always had an oddly “Hitler Youth-esqe” haircut I could forgive him for his bland music that appealed to the frat rap demographic. And for many moon cycles and months in between, Macklemore was a name I heard occasionally, but mostly felt indifferent about, Until the year of our lord 2024, when Ben Hammond Haggerty (Macklemore’s birth name) made the Mackle-mistake of becoming a Middle East policy expert overnight.
Maybe it’s my own envy, because it’s taken me near twenty years to formulate my opinions on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and there's so much about the history of the Middle East and North Africa I still do not know. So it's jarring to see posts from Seattle artists and musicians who share screeds on social media about how “simple” this conflict is—there are good guys and bad guys, black and white, heros and villains. There is no gray. No nuance. The quintessential progressive “right side of history” musician, Benjamin Haggerty can know in an instant what is the correct moral stance to take on one of the world’s oldest geopolitical crises and then make music about it.
In the spring, right after the occupation of Columbia University’s Hammond Hall, Haggerty released the single “Hind’s Hall.” Macklemore named the song in tribute to the student protestors who renamed Columbia’s Hammond Hall after Hind Rajab, a 6-year-old Gazan girl who was killed in an Israeli airstrike.
At the concert in Seward Park last Saturday, Macklemore said he didn’t know anything about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict before October 7th, 2023. He told the crowd that he had researched everything he knows now since that day. Which is interesting, because if he was reading religiously like he claimed he was, maybe he would have had a line in his new single about the hostages, or rising antisemitism in the west, or how Hamas is a terrorist organization that uses Gazans as human shields and stocks weapons in schools and hospitals?
All the money from his performance at the festival, and a portion of the proceeds from the sale of the single Hind’s Hall are going to the UN relief agency UNRWA. UNRWA stands for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. UNRWA was established on December 8, 1949, and became operational on May 1st, 1950. This makes the refugee relief and resettlement program the oldest in the entire UN, as every other refugee resettlement organization has been a temporary one to three year post-conflict affair.
In fact, UNRWA has been around for so long it has become embedded in Palestinian society. During the raids on UNRWA schools they have found copies of Mein Kampf translated into Arabic, children’s “how-to” guides on stabbing your first Jew, weapons cachets, entrances to underground Hamas bunkers, and an entire Hamas command center directly underneath UNRWA’s Gazan headquarters. At least 19 UNRWA staff members (so far) are known to have taken part in the raping pillaging torturing and murdering that occurred on October 7th. And as of two days ago, the UN is seeking immunity for all UNRWA employees complicit in operation Al Aqsa Flood.
Clearly, UNRWA is a selfless humanitarian organization that puts the lives of Palestinian children above those of a genocidal Islamist death cult. The organization has never indoctrinated school age children into hating Israelis or brainwashed them into thinking that martyring themselves is their only lives’ purpose—a Shanda for Palestinian children and Gazan society. No, UNRWA is a completely innocent actor in this humanitarian tragedy, which is why the organization is worthy of Macklemore’s love, admiration, and donation money.
There has been some speculation that Macklemore is using the flare up in the Middle East to revive his declining musical popularity-this includes attaching his music to online driven social movements propelling progressive causes.1 I support this hypothesis, as he did release a song literally titled “White Privilege” in 2016, and a song celebrating gay marriage called “Same Love” in 2017.
I want to make it clear that I have no issues with the marriage of political causes and art. If the artistic technique is strong, and the message is pure, meaning that the artist is not creating the work to chase clout, I think great art can be made with social messaging in mind—just look at Picasso’s Guernica, Billie Holiday’s Strange Fruit, or George Orwell’s 1984.
However, I cannot say in Haggerty’s case that his art is genuine, pure or good. I think Macklemore embodies everything that is wrong with the melding of the “personal is political” in the artworld. And the city Haggerty lives in—Seattle, represents everything that can go awry with creativity in a culturally homogeneous climate.
I also have made an effort in writing this piece to listen to more of Macklemore’s discography than I ever imagined I would have to—and I have some opinions on the musical merit and creative history of Seattle’s unfortunate 21st century contribution to the hip hop canon.
Macklemore’s first album came out in 2005, and his first single was the track “Love Song.” I got about halfway through it before switching it off, it’s long monotonous and doesn’t have a hook, sorry—you can blame it on boredom. Macklemore also raps with a heavy urban accent I know he doesn’t have, in fact no one in Seattle sounds like the way Macklemore raps on tracks, even the people from the rougher parts of town. I find most of Haggerty’s songs to be a boring combination of inoffensive lyrics mixed with uninteresting musically unsophisticated beats.
There is one exception–and that’s the song “Otherside” which Haggerty made in collaboration with the producer Ryan Lewis. Lewis, it should be noted, was also responsible for the production on the song “Thrift Shop” that catapulted Macklemore to international fame.
I’ll admit “Otherside” is not to my taste (I’m a DMX and Beanie Sigel fan…I like the heavy shit) but it’s one of the only tracks where you get to peek into Haggerty’s real battle with opiate addiction. The lyrics are raw and honest, which if you're a rap fan you appreciate real life turned into a musical poem, that’s hip hop.
Unfortunately, Otherside also lays bare Macklemore’s limited lyrical abilities. I was more impressed with Ryan Lewis’s production skills, where he samples The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ single of the same name (and much better song my god) with Macklemore’s verbal flow. This musical melding inadvertently exposes Haggerty’s inability to make his raps compelling without a talented producer behind him.
Being able to hold your own with nothing but your verbal cadence and words is the mark of a real MC. I cannot say, given how I feel about listening to Haggerty on top of a beat that I would ever want to see him freestyle, which is the true test of rapping skill. I think Macklemore freestyling would probably be unremarkable. Which brings us to the real artistic casualty of Macklemore’s milquetoast musical prowess—the Seattle art scene.
I remember schmoozing a few years ago at a party in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood in a loft-turned impromptu art gallery where a very animated music journalist friend (we will call him MTK) rambled on about Macklemore’s mental health woes. If you ran in the right art circles in Seattle eventually you would bump up against people who knew Benjamin Haggerty. MTK knew everyone, and liked talking to me, so I would occasionally get an ear full about how mean the Seattle art and music community was to Macklemore.
Being a famous Seattle artist isn’t fun, and I have some sympathy for Macklemore in this regard. Seattlelites love to tear their idols down, pick them apart, dissect their politics, and then chew them up and spit them out. Macklemore being a “straight white man” in rap made him a target from the get-go. Seattle is a city that is very image conscious and very aware of it’s “whiteness.” Macklemore is their musical mirror—a reminder that while they may no longer be a backwoods logging town they are no New York City or Los Angeles California.
In addition, celebrity artists like Haggerty also draw ire from others artists—who will not hesitate to eviscerate a top performer who steps out of political line. Which can explain some of Macklemore’s public statements and song choices in the last couple of years.
And yes, before you jump down my throat, I am aware this entire essay could be misconstrued as an attack on the man. But I would like to reiterate I was never a fan nor a friend. For me, Macklemore is a vessel to be used as a sounding board for my larger problems with the city of Seattle and political movements in modern art scenes.
When it comes to artists policing other artists—I think it’s imperative that we take ownership over our worst qualities. We (the royal we) must admit that in general we can be a miserable lot. And Seattle artists at their worst are a judgmental, self-flagellating, self-censorious bunch. We can be jealous, mean, and find joy in the artistic failing and floundering of others.
In addition, there is a distinct vein of white guilt that cuts through the cultural landscape like an underground river contaminating every art and music venue where the water flows. Which is to say most Seattle artists feel a distinct need to repent for their white sins, Macklemore is no exception.
This is why performative politics masked as art has become such a cultural boon in the city–and atrophied the arts landscape in the process. City wide arts grants are tied to things like identity and making art to parrot popular social justice causes rather than making art for art’s sake.
Seattle already has issues keeping working artists in the city limits–with predatory landlords and an under-appreciation of cultural and historic landmarks. The city seems indifferent to stopping the bleeding of it’s creative class, and instead enjoys making the dwindling artist population jump through political correct hoops to fund their art practices.
Art is wielded by the city government as a form of coercive control instead of a gift of appreciation to the general population. Art as indoctrination, art as virtue signaling, and art as social platforming, takes priority over art as beauty, art as human expression, and art as the pinnacle of civilizational greatness. I wish grants were being doled out for making art because it's fun or beautiful. Art is after all the visual, auditory, and sensational things that make life in a city worth living.
When artists are judged on the culture war stances they take, the presidential candidates they support, or their immutable characteristics, is the work even art anymore?
Is Macklemore’s song “White Privilege” a solid song because of the artistic skill set on display in addition to the message behind the lyrics? Or is it simply celebrated because it's a track that parrots the overarching political dogma of our times? I would argue it’s the latter.
Macklemore is a product of his artistic environment. And while I’m angry that Macklemore, the white bread of rappers (and no it’s not just because of his complexion) has become the face of Seattle’s music and art industry, it’s not because it's undeserved. Haggerty perfectly represents the mainstream culture the city is trying to export to the rest of the world.
However, the underground Seattle art scene still exists. I cannot call it thriving–it’s fighting for its life, as more old buildings get torn down, art spaces are destroyed, and artists flee the city for the greener pastures of Tacoma, Bellingham, Spokane…or leave Washington State altogether.
But old Seattle still has a pulse. And I will not end this essay without forcefully advocating for the artists that perform at the endangered ecosystem of dive bars and art venues that encompass Seattle’s real cultural community. We may no longer be in a relationship, but I will still defend Seattle’s creative class until the end–she deserves it.
So, I would like to share a few musicians, bands, and rappers who have been definitive for me of Emerald City music culture. Because I will not allow Macklemore to be the last word on Seattle music, especially not Seattle hip hop.
Specs Wizard, birth name Michael Hall, is an old Seattle artist colleague. He’s been making music and comics with a specific Pacific Northwest flair since the 90s. Give this new single, released in January of this year a listen.
Spesh is a band that broke up during the pandemic. Rest in peace. Mikey used to bartend at the dive bar I worked at (see this comic here) so I am a bit biased. And I will admit I have bought visual art from him to boot–these pillow hands from his other project-Haus of Hands (click here), but I’m not just a fan because I was working near someone who is just so effortlessly cool, Spesh made some good music too. I recommend the single “Candy Legs” from their 2018 album “Famous World.”
Razor Clam’s 2018 EP “Vicious Sea Cows” is definitive for me of what Seattle music sounded like in the pre-pandemic late 2010’s. It was a fun mixture of twee pop camp and quirky references to the Pacific Northwest’s Riot Grrrl’s past.
Wild Powwers is probably my favorite rock band on this list. 2018 was a great year for Seattle music and I recommend their single “May I Have this Dance?” From their album “Skin.” Also check out this live KEXP set (it’s good).
Sir Mix-A-lot is so much more than the single “Baby’s Got Back.” I said once in another essay–and I’ll say it again, but “Posse on Broadway” is still the most accurate description of old Seattle neighborhoods and street culture. I still listen to it when I miss my old neighborhood, and I would like to note that Sir Mix-A-lot raps with a Seattle accent.
Jimi Hendrix…Mackle-who? Mackle-what? Yeah, bet you didn’t even know he was from Seattle.
Fantasy A is more like a cultural force than simply a musician. He’s so prolific with his poster-ing that it's gotten to the point where his self-promotion has become part of the urban landscape. His likeness is so ubiquitous that I’ve even added smaller versions of his posters to comic panels I’ve made (see below). I can’t claim that his raps are good…but they are interesting, and if you are invested in Seattle hip hop you know his name. Also he’s made a movie (click here).
Combat Mommy is the work of Seattle sound artist Chance Crafton. Chance is a friend and the only person I know who has personal beef with Macklemore. The story involves a thrift shop, a coveted necklace on layaway, and a certain Seattle celebrity who walked off with it one day while Chance was in the middle of making payments on it. So really, you owe it to Chance to at least check out her music. You know, to say you're sorry—it’s also fun to listen to.
Obviously, there is grunge, there is punk, and I know I know I didn’t mention MC Hammer (not a fan), but this is my list, so my rules. Making this list was seriously enjoyable–I used to have a music blog in the era of music listicles, I love music lists. I’m adding any tracks I can find on Spotify to this playlist (which includes any music I have mentioned in previous posts thus far).
Before I left Seattle, I had one of the worst nightmares of my entire life. It was a dream where Nazis were marching through the streets and abducting people from their homes. Given how the last year and a half has played out, it has felt more like a premonition.
Crowds of revelers wearing keffiyehs and shouting “death to America” at a Macklemore musical performance makes me very worried about the health of the Emerald City’s cultural institutions, but I can’t say I am surprised either. Seattle was always a place where the unhinged mingled with the artistically authoritarian.
But still, even with her residents going full on fascist, I cannot say I do not still miss her. And, maybe someday after the culture war is over we can still work things out–those mountains really are that magical.
I would like to add a correction—and an opposing hypothesis that Macklemore has been in a constant struggle session mode since winning a 2014 “Best Rap Album” Grammy over Kendrick Lamar. This did cause considerable outrage among rap fans. Thanks Jesse for reminding me of this event.