The purpose of this site was to promote conscious, positive culture and to resist the corporate domination of youth culture.

The big corporations have been very clever – they have taken musical forms (such as hip-hop) developed by oppressed young people and have used them to push negative, individualistic, materialistic, misogynistic ideas.

Hip-hop was a weapon for the oppressed. It promoted unity; it promoted resistance; it brought communities together. Modern commercial rap, on the other hand, is a weapon used mainly against the oppressed. Too much of it glorifies getting ‘rich off cocaine’ (even though the spread of crack has been a disaster for many black and oppressed communities in the US and Britain); too much of it glorifies senseless violence; too much of it debases women. That makes it a big win for the system – in the words of Tupac, they’re “giving crack to the kids, who the hell cares; it’s one less hungry kid on the welfare; first ship ’em dope, let them deal the brothers; give ’em guns, step back, watch ’em kill each other.”

Pac concludes: “we gotta make a change”. The big corporations and the western governments are brainwashing us with the culture that we invented but they now control. Either we submit or we fight back. This blog is a small part of the fight-back. We stand on the side of the working class and the global poor and oppressed in the ongoing cultural struggle.

We aim to spread the word about some of the best conscious music from around the world, with a particular focus on hip-hop. Expect to hear about artists such as Akala, Dead Prez, Lowkey, Ms Dynamite, Skinnyman, Immortal Technique, Public Enemy, Black the Ripper, Klasknekoff, Blackalicious, Brother Ali, Nas, Rebel Diaz, Genesis Elijah, 2Pac, Talib Kweli, Mos Def, KRS-1, Jay Electronica, Linton Kwesi Johnson, The Coup, Damian Marley and many more. We will also feature articles about various aspects of the history of progressive culture.

If you would like to contribute to the blog, or if you would like to point out material we might be interested in, please do get in contact: carlos@beatknowledge.org.