[...] Rap's highly self- and history-conscious unfamiliarity, its image of inaccessbility to established markets or truly teeming-mass appeal, is often reduced by critics to the kind of 'surly musical hostility' that, like Punk's, quickly loses its novelty for those outside, can become for Us like little more than looking at something poisonous in a tightly closed jar.

Except who exactly sealed the lid, this time? The mainstream record reviewer? He's but Market's bitchy mistress. The Market itself--Us? But everything the white rock listener pays to enjoy is black-begotten. [...]