Melange Lavonne – The Movement

by Lynn Casper

Melange Lavonne
The Movement
Official MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/melangelavonne

Purchase The Movement:  http://cdbaby.com/cd/melangelavonne

Melange Lavonne is an African American, female rapper. She is also an openly out lesbian. She describes her music on her MySpace page as “Christian Rap” and also identifies herself as a Christian. The songs on her album, The Movement, touch on real issues that are often not talked about. The album opens with “Gay Bash” in which she outright calls Christians who hate on homosexuals hypocrites. This song brought a smile to my face because everything she said were things that I wish more people would stand up and say.

This is an important album for our society to hear right now because it speaks so many truths on many different topics from gay parenting to global warming. The issues are real not only to Lavonne, who raps from a very personal standpoint about her life and the obstacles she has faced from being openly gay, but to every single person who has questioned their sexuality or been judge, discriminated or hated because of it.

Lavonne had a rough time coming out which included losing her College Basketball Scholarship and going through suicidal depression after not being fully accepted by her parents. She was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Disease and has been battling the cancer for years. She has also been a victim in an abusive lesbian relationship which she talks about in Domestic Violence.

Although the topics Lavonne covers in her songs are often hard to be heard in mainstream music because they are so honest, it is such a relief that someone is standing up and creating visibility with their music, especially in the hip hop / rap scene which is polluted with so many misogynist and sexist content. Her song, “The Game” addresses issues of stereotypical sexism, racism and the sensationalized glamour of thug life in hip hop culture. Lavonne blames the ignorant lyrics of today’s rap songs on the record executives, saying: “he’s the one that allowed the ignorant shit to flow through.”

It’s rare to find a good rap song with meaningful lyrics these days. You can tell that Lavonne puts a lot of thought into every word she chooses in her songs. In an article on AfterEllen, Lavonne states “There’s never a song where I write and have the facts screwed up. I love hip-hop because I can articulate in about four minutes what I can in a conversation.”

The first time I listened to The Movement, I started nodding my head, and not because of the beat; I was nodding in agreement of everything Lavonne said.

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