What To Make Of Iggy Azalea

Iggy Azalea tops the charts as the most controversial rapper the genre has ever seen.  Is she worth the hype?

 

Please keep in mind, this article is from 2014.

Australian- born Amethyst Amelia Kelly began her life in Mullumbimby, Australia.  She cleaned houses alongside her mum to make money. Her dad worked as an artist.  Amethyst Kelly dropped everything and moved to Miami at age 16 (hence her verse “no money no family/ Sixteen in the middle of Miami” (“Work”)).  She changed her name to Iggy Azalea using the formula for a porn star name.  She rose to record- deal status after her YouTube videos for “Pu$$y” and “Two Times” went viral. Now she’s the blonde bombshell famous for besting the Beatles by holding the #1 and #2 spots of the Billboard Hot 100.  The record- holding songs are “Fancy” and “Problem”, although in the Beatles’ defense,  “Problem” actually belongs to Ariana Grande.

 

There’s a lot of criticism against Iggy Azalea: that she’s a racist, that she’s inauthentic, that she doesn’t deserve to be the first woman on XXL Magazine’s Top 10 Freshman issue.  Azalea’s placement on the list became the subject of rapper Azealia Banks’ Twitter outrage:

 

The bad rap hasn’t hurt record sales.  Her debut album The New Classic spent six weeks in the Top 10 of American Billboard’s Hot 200 album chart.  Is Iggy a rap fixture or a huge poseur?

Here’s what I make of Miss Iggy Azalea :

1. She has a spectacular ass. Not since Kim Kardashian has the world seen a more disproportionately huge booty.  At first I thought it was fake, but there are just too many pictures.

2. For a rap star with a huge ass, she doesn’t really shake it that much.

 

3. I think her “Pu$$y” video is hilarious.

 

4.  She sounds like Ke$ha.  Her voice falls in a lower register for a girl and she has the same not- quite- ghetto accent.  Compare with Ke$ha’s “Sleazy”.

Also: Remember when the media called Ke$ha the breakthrough white girl rapper?

5. Charli XCX sings that part of “Fancy” you probably like the most.  That’s the part that goes “I’m so fancy”.

6. If I were Azealia Banks, I’d be pissed that a white girl with my name made it on that list before me. Banks’  “212” literally broke the ground.

7.I don’t think Iggy Azalea is racist, she just doesn’t understand America. Iggy Azalea is Australian. I live in Australia now and it has virtually no hip- hop culture. In Australia, whites make up 92% of the population. Most of Australia’s rappers are white.  Australia the subject of a documentary series called Dumb, Drunk and Racist.  She’s still learning America’s idea of cultural sensitivity, and the heavy limelight is not doing her any favors.

Iggy Azalea has lived in America since 2006.  She spent seven years in America pursuing fame, not living the life most black rappers rap about.  That might be why her raps sound inauthentic.

However, her ignorance does make her sound a little racist on Twitter. Maybe that’s why she based her newest vid on Clueless.

8. I don’t think Iggy Azalea deserved to be the first female rapper on the Freshman list, I think XXL should have started putting females on that list a long time ago.  Although, in XXL’s defense, the list has only been around for seven years.

9.  I think it’s amazing that a North American culture made it all the way to the furthest corner of the globe and inspired someone to ditch their family, friends and nationality to become part of a culture they adore.  Does Iggy Azalea belong in rap?  Maybe not, but she sure has fun there.