Down Guitarist Pepper Keenan Criticizes Kanye West
Steve Newton of Straight.com reports: Just before Hurricane Katrina cut a horrifying swath across the U.S. Gulf Coast in August of 2005, the members of metal quintet DOWN had gathered in their hometown of New Orleans to work on new material for their third CD, "Over the Under". Guitarist Pepper Keenan made the smart move of leaving the area before the storm hit, and apart from losing power for a month, his house was all right. But he didn't walk away from the experience unscathed, and neither did his Big Easy bandmates. "It was somethin' we all went through and are still dealing with on a daily basis," he relates, on the line from Reno, Nevada, before the first stop on a 29-date North American tour. "I mean, it was devastating, man. People lost their houses, I lost family members. Half the city was destroyed."
The fortitude of Louisiana natives in the face of Katrina's destruction is cited on "Over the Under" tracks like "On March the Saints," but as Keenan explains, the city is still terribly wounded more than two years after the disaster. And it hasn't gotten much help with reconstruction from the Bush administration. "If they did as much in New Orleans as they're doin' in fuckin' Iraq we'd be fine," blusters Keenan, before decrying Kanye West's assertion that Dubya's disregard for Katrina victims stems from his indifference toward blacks. "I don't care about Kanye West," he counters. "I mean, everybody was damaged in the storm. For Kanye West to make it a black thing was retarded."
Source: Blabbermouth
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34 Comments on "Down Guitarist Criticizes Kanye West"
Senior News Correspondent
Senior News Correspondent
5. writes:
50 Cent wouldn't be anywhere without Eminem anyways. All the kids just went "Ooo, Shady says this guy's good so he must be right!" Though in all fairness I bet Eminem made his money from him.
Now Dr. Dre, Cypress Hill and the Beastie Boys, THERE'S some decent rap!
6. writes:
beastie boys were ok before they got all political and annoying. cypress hill is sh**. thats what 16 year old white kids listen to when they first smoke pot. i cant deal with that f***ing whiney voice. dre was good when he was in nwa. and kanye's got better rhymes then 50 could ever hope to match with his slurred voice and irritating choruses about birthdays.
7. writes:
Bush is a war monger just like his father, I agree that if the bush administration put at least half of the funds towards the areas hit by katrina that they are putting into war efforts everything would be ok... I mean just yesterday I read about how bush vetoed a health care bill for poor children...what a piece of sh**.
Senior News Correspondent
9. writes:
In all fairness to the Beasties political side, it's not drilled into every single song and they don't go onstage shouting "Yo f*** Bush" after every song like some bands I could mention. Whilst I don't like Kanye West at all I'll agree that he's better than Fiddy. 50 Cent is just f***ing awful. Cypress Hill was what a friend of mine was listening to when he first started weed... when he was ten! But they do have some good stuff, as do House Of Pain. All the regular visitors to the site know that I'm a Necro and Ill Bill fan aswell but they're not for everybody. Snoop's old stuff was good but lately... it's just boring (though I did like that song Vato). And if you wanna get into chicano, then Kid Frost is too good to leave out when it comes to great rap!
11. writes:
"George Bush hates niggas"... I wish I could punch West in the face, just once before I die. George Bush hates the middle class. He swore to raise welfare to win a couple states and now is still shafting middle class college kids. I have been trying to get back into school for about 2 years now and Bush keeps making it harder and harder. The interest I owe on my federal loans (Which I had to fight on the phone for a month for) was raised 150% so we could go play in the sand with our f***in' tanks.
12. writes:
But you can't bring up rap without mentioning Run-DMC (before all this rev run B.S.)!!!!
anyway the ball was really dropped on the whole relief efforts, but Kanye (who is an OK rapper at best) always seems to take the oportunity to try and get as much publicity and as much of the spotlight as possible to get people talking about him rather than the issue at hand which is that people in our own country are suffering.
Senior News Correspondent
16. writes:
FUK ANY RAPPER!!!!.....FUK EM ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!....JUST ANOTHER BLACK RACIST MAKING RACIST STATEMENTS ABOUT WHITE PEOPLE...ANY1 WHO SUPPORTS THESE BLACK RACIST SHOULD BE HUNG ALONG WITH THE BLACK TRASH THAT SPOUTS RACIST REMARKS BECAUSE THEY ARE RACIST THEMSELVES!!
Supporter
Supporter
18. writes:
Shut your pie hole brandedcdfh420! You have no idea what your talking about. You're white trash I take it. Besides that ignorant stuff--I agree with Pepper's comments and Kanye is once again, ADD. Just trying to get attention. He's a performer. What do you expect. I did think it was funny when he said "Bush hates black people" Priceless.
Senior News Correspondent
28. writes:
First of all bring up the Race Card, everybody f***ing knows that their is still a huge race problem in this country, u could obviously tell that from the retards who posted before me. But i think it will always be like that in this country and through out the world with dumb f***ing bigots like branded p***y, and douche bag russ. And i love Down and C.o.C but Keenen really shoudlnt say sh** about black people since he has no idea what black people have gone thru in the south. I mean the reason peole didnt get help down in La was because of poor management by FeMA and the State of Louisianna concerning the leeves and emergency evacuation procedures.
Member
29. writes:
Kanye west although crazy, was right. The majority of those who couldnt evacuate were those who are in poverty and those in poverty are mostly black people, so when president bush toke is time in helping out victims he in turn was saying f*** the black people they dont matter as much. and how you guys are reacting is sick, whats wrong with al sharpton, you guys are the reason why we have f***ing racist problems and part of the reason why our country has so many problems in all aspects.
30. writes:
i agree with the above posts about the stupid racist comments. its ridiculous, people bring up the race card thing and all that. but the majority of the people who do bring up the point that black people use the race card usually have something ignorant or racist to say. and "whats wrong with al shapton". a lot. he blows a lot of things out of proportion and makes issues out of a lot of non issues for the sake of publicity. hes done a lot of good things for the african american community, but he also has caused a lot of turmoil and tension with his sensationalism of race issues.
Member
32. writes:
George Bush doesn't care about orange cats.
If I used some of the BS logic I see here then Dubbya is the greatest president ever. Under him I graduated and make more money now that I ever have in my life. Of course I would have done that under any president but I'm just using the logic everyone else seems to be using. I know a retard who once said, "I don't like Bush because he deports Mexicans." Funny, I thought illegal immigration was around LONG before Bush was president. And he didn't veto a bill for healthcare for sick kids. Learn a little about politics, bills have all kinds of riders attached to them like, "Money to go to phedefiles over the age of 15." That type of crap should be vetoed. Blame Bush sure, he does a LOT of stupid things, but go ahead and blame every other incumbant politician that only cares about themselves too. The mess in NO happened because no politician was directly affected. Just do a LITTLE reading on how Congress works: Bush can't snap his fingers and make sh it happen, not even the war. That took a majority of votes form others, including Hillary Clinton and John Kerry. *Whew*
And one more thing (sorry I just can't stop), there has been no good rap since NWA broke up. Now days it's all, "yo yo yo I got the bling bling bling look at me and my bling yo yo yo watch me tell you about myself while 30 niggas dance behind me." Pathetic.
33. writes:
And one more thing (again, sorry), as long as black people let hanging nooses get them all worked up, it will continue to happen. I wouldn't know the work "n*****" if I didn't hear black people say it and I'll bet it wouldn't be used in contemporary speech at all. Why do you think "honky" and "cracker" faded out of language? Because white people don't care! It doesn't bother us! Just let it go! It's all style over substance with these people (gangsta rappas not all black people).
Ok, I'm DONE!
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1. Feckineejit writes:
Ridiculous assertation by Kanye - but not surpising. He is self-absorbed and blinded by his own inability to consider that people other than black people were affected by Katrina. Didn't affect him much though, he is still a happy millionaire.