Entertainment: Are the Attacks on Bruno Mars Divisive?

NiLP Guest Commentary

Are Attacks on Brumo Mars

Dividing Communities of Color?

by Howard Jordan

The NiLP Report (March 15, 2018)

Has Meshell Ndegeocello chosen to sow the seeds of divisiveness with attacks on Puerto Rican-Filipino Bruno Mars (see article below). Maybe we forgot that Hip Hop started in the South Bronx and included both African Americans and Puerto Ricans. The next thing you will be telling us that Cardi B is also appropriating music. I suggest some read the book New York Ricans from the Hip Hop Zone by Raquel Rivera that documents the often “invisibilized” contributions of Puerto Ricans to Hip Hop. Or perhaps the role that Bruno Mars boricua father, atimbalero, had in teaching him music. It is this type of divisiveness that generates heat and not light. Maybe we should also ignore the contributions of Mongo Santamaria and or Chano Pozo who worked with Dizzy Gillespie?

Food for thought: Does an artist of color who does not identify as Black like Mars does but recognizes his Puerto Rican roots engaging in cultural appropriation when he/she records R&B or honors a black genre of music? Are those who are attacking Mars engaging in Puerto Rican/Latino bashing and creating unnecessary divisions in communities of color? Does Mars, as clearly person of color, deserve different treatment that the silence of many on Eminem and Justin Timberlake because they are white? Should Mars be blamed for the exclusion of many African American artists or are we just hating the player but not the game? Familia. please share your thoughts? Let me know at howjordan@hotmail.com.

Meshell Ndegeocello Calls Bruno Mars

‘Karaoke,’ Prompting Cultural Appropriation Debate

By Jessica Bennett

Ebony (March 9, 2018)

While promoting her upcoming album Ventriloquism, an album of covers, Meshell Ndegeocello got all the way real about her thoughts on pop superstar Bruno Mars, calling his music “karaoke,” for mimicking the sounds of classic Black artists.

“What he’s doing is karaoke, basically. With ‘Finesse,’ in particular, I think he was simply copying Bell Biv DeVoe. I think he was copying Babyface. And definitely there were some elements of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis back when they worked with Human League,” the bassist told Billboard. “I feel like there’s just all these threads running through there, but not in a genuine way.”

Ndegeocello’s words inspired a debate from The Grapevine, where panelist Seren Sensai went even further.

“He is not black at all and he plays up his racial ambiguity to be able to cross genres and to go into different places.”

“What Bruno Mars does is he takes pre-existing work and he just completely word for word recreates it – he does not change it, he does not improve upon it. He does not make it better. He’s a karaoke singer.”

Social media has been debating the subject ever since, with plenty of fans supporting the “That’s What I Like,” singer while others agreed with Ndegeocello’s assessment. Check out a few reactions below.