Two Modes of Lollypop

Kalup Linzy and Shaun Leonardo lip sync to the Hunter and Jenkins tune, which was banned from the radio in the 1930s. Even though completed in 2006, it appears, in the present context, as a premature reply to Lil Wayne's 2008 "Lollipop," which despite its catchy track and at times interesting visual effects, largely invests in gratuitous hip-hop video cliches (shots of a huge limo filled with eager ladies, and opening shots in an incredibly expensive hotel) and uses too much vocal vocoder.*



The predominance of voice distorting technologies along with the rise of explicitly 1990s house beats on hip-hop makes me pause at the increasing techno-ification of billboard hip-hop in general. Is this the sign of its imminent death as per the NAS's most recent album? or the increasing emphasis on hook driven singles as opposed to talented lyricism?


*Then again, I have "Lollipop" on my iTunes queue.