Bomb the Suburbs [Paperback]

William Upski Wimsatt (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 174 pages
• Publisher: Soft Skull Press; 3 edition (February 22, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1887128964
• ISBN-13: 978-1887128964
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #509,403 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars try it, you'll like it February 17, 2001

By Zachary L. Stauber

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

If you know nothing about hip hop, if you're white, if you don't live in the big city (like me), this is a good book to read to find out more about the other side from a point of view that is neither condescending and fearful nor filled with undue awe. It deals with the past, present, and hopeful future of hip hop culture, and also gives some really surprising insights into how blacks in the big city perceive whites. The author is courageous, honest in his own views, and extremely objective during his interviews with others. It's an amazing amount of wisdom packed into a small space, definitely something to pass on.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Easy there, fellas. November 17, 2004

By J. Garrigan

Format:Paperback

This book is very appealing upon the first read. A white author writing with authority on a black art form, how empowering for all us crackas! Slow down. Upski is a talented writer and offers an interesting perspective on a subject that receives very little attention, but whites would do well to put a lid on the corny hip hop vs. rap, Four Elements of the Temple of Hip Hop type of babble. I've met Upski several times, and he's even admitted to me that Bomb the Suburbs is essentially a white author writing what he thinks Blacks want to hear.

Read his second book, No More Prisons, for a more balanced and less "desperate to be down" narrative on the state of hip hop. He matures greatly between the two books.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Bomb your mind frame June 13, 2002

By Owen Terranceclass

Format:Paperback

This book is more than Hip Hop story's to brag to your friends about. Bomb the suburbs by William Upski Wimsatt is a book breaking boundries in the way white kids like me think about hip hop. I feel that if you have any interest in Hip Hop at all, this book is a perfect way to investigate your curiosity. Wimsatt discusses the past, present, and future of hip hop and its relation to whites, and our country as a whole. I don't know any of my friends who were dissapointed in reading this book. Wimsatt is too honest to have the book taken as a joke. I reccomend this book for all "kids" with hip hop in there headphones, and all "adults" who turn off there childrens music out of a frustration that needs to be investigated. This book looks at politics in a much less pompus way than others in it's genre. Please set down your fears, and pick up this book at your local independent bookstore if possible.