Music Monday: Nepotism Can Sometimes Get You A Banging Track ... At Nine
Thursday, September 9, 2010 at 11:30AM
Willow Smith, 9. Has banging track. You don't. Discuss.So, little nine-year-old Willow Smith (daughter of actors Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith) has an over-produced, catchy, super-slick, Rihanna-esque club banger single out. Do you hate yourself yet? DO YOU?!
WARNING: Listen to "Whip My Hair" at your own devastation. This track will be all kinds of Langston Hughes on your ass. A soundtrack to your dreams deferred, drying up like raisins in the sun, crusting over like syrupy sweets, rotting like stinking meat, sagging like heavy loads, then exploding rhythmically to something that sounds like an old Swizz Beatz track from 1999.
You half expect DMX to pop up and scream "RUFF RIDERS!" for old times sake.
Did you listen? Do you want to hurt yourself now?
Don't do it! Put down those cyanide pills! Call the suicide hotline if you have to to make it through this frustrating moment in all your stalled, near-dead, never-got-off the ground music careers. It's not worth it! I know you're staring at your notebook, ripping out page after page of rhymes you won't ever bust on a track and looking longingly at a brochure for Phoenix University thinking a career as a medical technician might be nice right now, but just don't do it! Please? It'll be OK. I'll stroke your hair and buy you a drink and we can both complain about how unfair life is.
You really were a good singer/rapper/performer in college. You won all those talent shows too. And you moved to LA and they made you cut your hair in asymmetrical cut, signed you to a horrible deal, refused to release your album but also refused to release you from your contract, made you drop 20 lbs and now you wander La Cienega sucking on a bottle of PBR, looking for all the Camelot and Tower Records that have long since closed up and gone away with all your dreams.
Then, just when you thought it couldn't get any worse you went to a party and "Whip My Hair" came on and they had to place you in a 5150 hold.
They found you outside the Viper Room whipping your hair around, starring at your headshot screaming Cher's "If I Could Turn Back Time" at the top of your lungs wearing nothing but a pair of those ugly Lindsay Lohan ripped leggings and a Lady Gaga-esque bra made of Band-Aids, pork cutlets and duct tape.
You told the cop you just didn't know what to do anymore. They'd cut you from your understudy position in the LA production of "Avenue Q" and rent was late ... again. You remembered your dreamy, sleepy-eyed ex, that electronica DJ who married the chick from that one reality show just so he could get better gigs. You were together for six years and he just walked away mumbling something about Q ratings and free Addias. And he won't return your calls about getting those master tapes back for the independent techno-funk album you two produced together under the fake name "Ebonirotica." Even though you met Dame in the club that one time and he pretended like he might be interested in listening to it. Had his body man give you a third-party email address to "His People."
Let me hold you.
There, there. Rest your head on my shoulder. Yes, I noticed that the track opened with the transforming music from Transformers and that you did that first in your underground, never-released track "Go Go Gadget Disco." I'll buy you another Pabst.
Jokes aside, these are the moments when I truly believe the only sin my parents ever committed was the sin of not knowing anyone with connections.
My parents saw this and though "Oh cute!" not about how if they'd just sold me to the Mickey Mouse Club we'd be millionaires by now.I wrote my first novel at 13 (not worth publishing ... oh, God, it was terrible) and started illustrating and writing children's books for my baby sister when I was about 8. I started drawing cartoons and portraits with skill around 14. Continued to write short stories and novels in long-hand cursive in notebooks through high school, started drawing clothing designs at 11 and created my own comic strip that I updated monthly to share with friends from age 10 until I was in college. I even started a side business of drawing cartoon portraits of folks in the seventh grade. I wrote my first song on the piano (an R&B ballad) at 15.
My youngest sister had a flair for dance and mimicry and a quirky, interesting fashion sense. (Sasha Obama had nuttin' on Baby Snob's black n' white checkered ruffle skirt, black leggings and Janet Jackson silver and black Rhythm Nation T-shirt!) Baby Snob was also an amazingly gorgeous and funny child, mastered the entire dance to Janet Jackson's "If" video and you could never take your eyes off her when she was on stage dancing. (She jazz, tap, hip hop and modern dance, even ballet, she could do them all.)
Together, we would create our own comedy routines and perform them while washing dishes. We also recorded our own In Living Color style skits on our tape player. Yet ... all we got were polite words of encouragement and mutterings about us having this thing called "a childhood." LAME! How dare our parents think we wanted to just play and be creative and discover our talents organically! Any stage mom/dad worth their salt would have shoved tap shoes on our feet and Joe Jacksoned the shit out us. PARENT FAIL!
That said ... nice track Willow. Now get off my lawn!
Reader Comments (22)
Gawd, I hope they don't want their beautiful little sweet innocent child to follow in the footsteps of Rhianna the slutty singing bed hopper. SMDH! They need to let this chick be a child in the sense of Kimora and the Obama's little girls. She doesn't need the money or the fame, so whats the point of pushing her into this so soon? She needs to be in school and engaging in afterschool activities not be sold on the market at whatever the cost. I really expected better from Will and Jada than this. I guess looks can be decieving. Anywhoo, lil mama did a great job. Props to her and Boooo to her stage parents.
@ Tellin
Honestly? I was surprised that the Smiths were supporting their kids' launching high profile careers at such early ages too. Both Smith's know how celebrity opens yourself up to criticism and a LOT of negativity. It's bad enough to be a kid and deal with bullying or catty comments from your peers, but to be launched onto the world stage at such an impressionable age? I mean, nine is really young to put your kid out there for such scrutiny even if she is very talented.
"Joe Jacksoned the shit out us."
This is the funniest thing that I have read all stinking week! Thanks for the great post (as usual).
I'M SO UPSET... I was ready to duck walk and vogue all over that shit! And now it's stuck in my head! Damn Damn Damn!
too busy whipping my hair back and forth to post an intelligent comment. Wait, I'm working on a one-hit single and creating a stupid dance in the vein of the stanky leg so I can make some cheddar to pay my late rent - oh screw the rent..I'm looking fancy now!
Is it just my hair issues or does anyone else think that Jada should have the sugar slapped out of her for jackin' up that child's hair like that?
She's nine? They couldn't wait until the girl got 13 or something?
I listened to this yesterday and thought it was good. Somehow this track made me forget the issues I have with Will & Jada's "free to be you, free to be me" child rearing attitude. Jeez.
Thanks for smacking me back to reality Snob!
(normally I'm Neicy or NeicyRox, but we're cool now, lol)
This is too funny. Waaaay to funny.
I have to admit, I first heard this song yesterday and it's been growing on me ever since. *whips hair back and forth* :)
LOL @ DottyMac. Willow looks all types of crazy. Sorry, I just can't co-sign the hair or the song.
Awww, what a cute pic a Little Snob
I like the Willow track and where she's going. She's starting out at the same age as Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson, I don't see why she should wait til she's older *whips hair back and forth* *realizes hair won't whip*
Yes. Well. Let's check back in fifteen years, shall we?
I hate that hair do. I will be so glad when it plays out like it did years ago. It's just so ugly. It was even ugly when the Mohawk Tribe wore it in film. Oh God why is it back.
If they can afford to let their children explore their dreams, I see nothing wrong with it. they are in charge not someone who came by and asked the child to do it.
I think parents should be involved in their young child's desires as long as they are the ones in charge and know how far to let it go and the Smiths seem to have that relationship with their children. Bravo; wish my parents would have had the finances and the ability to allow me to follow mine in the early years.
This is about the Tween market.
Hanna Montana is at the end of her Tween run.
why shouldn't Willow step into that.
I wouldn't be surprised if Willow and/or Jaden got their own show on Disney or Nickelodeon within the next 18 months.
there's a WHOLE LOTTA CASH to be made.
how come there isn't a Black Jonas Brothers?
the Smiths wanna take over the world...LOL
I officially like the song, its cute. I say you gotta get in when and where you fit in. The opportunity to get into show business is not a door that is always open for you to just casually stroll into when you feel like it or something that you study for in school and go on interviews after college like being a teacher. The stars must be alligned you must know the right people, have the right look, and be at the right place at the right time.
A lot of people hate and complain but I can't knock Will and Jada for setting their kids up now while they have the clout and connections to do so because they may not be in the position to do so 10 years from now. The fact that her parents are who they are and do what they do pretty much cements the fact that this kid was never going to have a "normal" life anyway so why delay the inevitable. They will have waaay more control over her in the industry than if she was going to regular school like other kids.
@Tellin It Like It T'Iz
"Gawd, I hope they don't want their beautiful little sweet innocent child to follow in the footsteps of Rhianna the slutty singing bed hopper. SMDH! They need to let this chick be a child in the sense of Kimora and the Obama's little girls. She doesn't need the money or the fame, so whats the point of pushing her into this so soon? "
Kimora's little girls have been sold in ads and magazines and on reality television since birth. What has Rhianna done to qualify her as a "Bed-hopper" that you and countless other woman haven't? Date 2 or 3 guys by ther age of 22-23? Really? She (Willow) was born with money and fame because her parents are RICH AND FAMOUS.... Letting her work and contribute may help her NOT end up as a Papparazi street model like Angela and Vanessa Simmons, The Kardashians, And Paris Hilton. Being in the buisness is waay safer than going to one of those Hollywood schools and being influenced by the spoiled brats that go to them.
I enjoyed the Karate Kid, and Jaden was very good in both the acting, and the action. It was obvious that he had worked extremely hard. However, as hard as he worked, and as well as he did grown @ss folk were spewing some nasty, stupid comments about him all over the net. I myself did some serious WTF smack-downs on some fools on "Zhao Dre's" behalf. The thing is, he's 3 yrs older than lil' Willow, and had already done two major films, which despite all the "nepotism charges" means that he had acting experience. So, before he got this big role, they knew he could act, and in this film the scope of just how much training he's had is quite apparent, with the added benefit of the inherent discipline at the core of learning a martial art.
However, in the case of little Willow, it's just too much, too soon. She's nine, allowed to dress like a teen, and was obviously being marketed while at her brother's premiers. I don't know what Will & Jada are thinking, but this poor child is going to get slammed. It may be that her parents don't get on the internet much, and weren't told about the crazy, lying, and venomous spew that was being slung around about Jaden. At any rate her parents really should have more sense. I'm sure they've told themselves "oh she's not going to turn out like M.J., Gary Coleman, or Lindsay L." Whew, God bless her, please.
No DottyMac, it is not just your hair issues. I really don't understand why anyone adopts extreme hair styles. And I really don't understand why parents would do this to their children.
When I see phots of adults who choose to do the extreme, I ignore them for ever more, no matter what it is they may create.
Wow someone was seriously passing out glasses of HATERADE today! Since none of you know Will or Jada personally who are you to say WHAT kind of parents they are or should be and what kind of girl Willow will turn out to be. Please Miley is on her way to Whoredom,Texas and why is it NOW everybody has a problem with nepotism?! White people have been using that in Hollowood and every other industry but now it's a 'problem' sniff sniff I smell bullshit.
As long as she doesn't do porn videos, I'm cool with it. Let's pray that Willow stays on the positive vibe, like mom and dad.
Why do so many folks think that Will and Jada "did something" to her. She's 9. It's a funky hair cut that's a lot more appropriate on a pre-teen than on these grown women.
Has anyone see these little 3 and 4 year old pageant girls, hot pink lipstick and weaves on toddlers - THAT kinda stuff is crazy.
No if you'll excuse me I gotta go whip my hair back and fourth....
She's a pretty little thing..I am sure she is talented but I wish they would have her more looking her age than this look with the shaved sides of her head...She's highly intelligent though. I saw her being interviewed and she is very smart. I just hope that she will be okay five years from now...