Rolling Stone mag cover and the art of appropriation

“All cultures learn from each other. The problem is that if the Beatles tell me that they learned everything they know from Blind Willie, I want to know why Blind Willie is still running an elevator in Jackson, Mississippi?”

― Amiri Baraka, poet-playwright

Cultural appropriation, as they say, can be a little tricky to understand. It’s not always easy to negotiate the thin line between appreciation and appropriation. But what seems trickier to understand is when criticism over cultural appropriation is conveniently deflected in the name of art and its associated realities.

This is exactly how millions of Arivu fans felt following the release of Rolling Stone’s digital cover (India edition) featuring singer Dheekshitha Venkadeshan, more popular as Dhee, and Canadian artist Shan Vincent de Paul.

Both Dhee and De Paul are the lead artists of Maajja’s two biggest hits—‘Enjoy Enjaami’ and ‘Neeye Oli’ respectively. Maajja is an independent music label for South Asian musical talent launched by composer AR Rahman.

However, the one person who, critics feel, was completely sidelined was Arivu—someone who has significantly contributed to both the tracks that went on to become massive hits. While Arivu wrote the Tamil portions of ‘Neeye Oli’, sung by Paul, the rapper-lyricist also lent his voice to ‘Enjoy Enjaami’, co-sung by Dhee. The music for ‘Enjoy Enjaami’ has been arranged by Tamil music composer Santhosh Narayanan, who also happens to be Dhee’s stepfather.

What riled up Aviru fans was the fact that it was the lyrics that turned the songs into nuanced political commentaries. Yet, the lyricist was invisibilised. What’s more, the words of ‘Enjoy Enjaami’ are inspired by the stories told to Arivu by his grandmother, Valliammal, who was a landless plantation labourer.

The entire song, as the Dalit artist has been saying since its  release, is a celebration of one’s roots—an ode to the marginalised like his grandmother with a difficult past. In one of his previous interviews, Arivu said his grandmother fondly used to address him as Enjaami (en saami, meaning, ‘my lord’). It’s also a term landless labourers would use to refer to their masters.

The song—a mix of Tamil oppari (mourning song sung by women during funerals) and elements of Afro-Caribbean music—became a viral hit across demographics and cultures. Following its huge success, many considered it a watershed moment for Tamil indie music.

However, the Rolling Stone cover story focuses only on Dhee and De Paul, their future endeavours and the success of both the songs. While the cover did not have Arivu’s image, the article did cursorily quote the Chennai-based anti-caste hip-hop artist.

In the past, backed by the Casteless Collective—a musical band supported by Pa Ranjith and composer Tenma — Arivu has teamed up with OfRo to produce Therukkural  (Thirukkural, the classic Tamil couplets). Another viral hit by Arivu includes the song ‘Sanda Seivom’ (We will fight)—a sharp critique of the Citizenship Amendment Act and National Register of Citizens.

Despite all that, the young artist (he is just 27) failed to pique the interest of the Rolling Stone.

The backlash

Following the release of the cover, both the magazine and Maajja faced severe backlash. Filmmaker PA Ranjith, whose recent release Sarpatta Parambarai features Paul’s ‘Neeye Oli’, was among the first ones to call it out. “The lyricist of ‘Neeye Oli’ and singer as well as lyricist of ‘Enjoy Enjaami’ has once again been invisibilised. Is it so difficult to understand that the lyrics of both songs challenge this erasure of public acknowledgement?” he tweeted.

Many others couldn’t help pointing out the irony of invisibilising a person whose lyrics make the core of the song.

Rolling Stone India first erasing the significance of Arivu's role in Enjoy Enjaami and then, doing the bare minimum of crediting him as the lyricist of the song is the blanket South Asian representation no one needs.

— AYUSHI⁷?? (@ayushidelhi1996) August 23, 2021

However, this is not the first time something of the sort happened to Arivu. In June, when French record producer DJ Snake’s remix of ‘Enjoy Enjaami’ was released, some parts, including a few of Arivu’s verses, from the original version were missing. What’s more, a billboard put up in New York’s Times Square to promote the track—a first for a Tamil independent song—didn’t feature Arivu. It only carried the images of Dhee and DJ Snake. The original song released on YouTube, too, says ‘Dhee ft. (featuring) Arivu’. He is not credited for the lyrics.

Again when it comes to ‘Neeye Oli’, while the film version of the song solely credits Arivu for the lyrics (although he penned only the Tamil lines), Maajja has promoted the song crediting Arivu for its Tamil lines and De Paul for the English lyrics.

Narratives and counter-narratives

In his defense, De Paul came out with a statement saying, “In his righteous demand for representation for his community, he (Ranjith) irresponsibly fueled the fire of divide amongst Tamil artists.”

“In his tweet, he credited Arivu as the lyricist of ‘Neeye Oli’, leaving me and my contributions unmentioned. I wrote all of my own raps and co-directed and edited the video. Arivu contributed his talent by writing the Tamil parts (sic).”

Interestingly, after De Paul’s statement, Ranjith has deleted his tweet.

On its part, Maajja also issued a statement on the claim that Arivu had not been paid for ‘Enjoy Enjaami’.

“Maajja’s ethos is to empower artists with rights to their songs. This is to eliminate precisely this practice of artists giving up rights for a nominal fee. Artists own the rights and share the revenue earned on an ongoing basis, instead of a token payment. No artists were paid,” it tweeted.

According to the independent platform, the Rolling Stone cover is a story of how a dream called Maajja came to life.

“The cover featured just two talents on the Maajja core roster with albums scheduled to release soon–Shan Vincent De Paul’s ‘Made in Jaffna’ and Dhee, who is currently working on her debut English album. Like them, we are working in collaboration with an equally incredible and diverse group of artists like Arivu, Navz-47 (and more) to release more genre-defying, record-breaking music,” it added.

@TherukuralArivu, the lyricist of #Neeyaoli and singer as well as lyricist of #enjoyenjami has once again been invisiblised. @RollingStoneIN and @joinmaajja is it so difficult to understand that the lyrics of both songs challenges this erasure of public acknowledgement? https://t.co/jqLjfS9nwY

— pa.ranjith (@beemji) August 22, 2021

However, neither Arivu nor Dhee or Narayanan have made any comments on the issue.

Rolling Stone’s attempt at ‘rectifying’ their ‘mistake’ didn’t cut much ice as critics are still miffed even as the magazine came out with a second cover for the edition with only Arivu’s image.

According to music journalist and RJ Sarthak Kaushik, who did a stint with Rock Street Journal, independent music is still struggling to get its place in India. “So, such things [sidelining] are bound to happen. It has become a sort of cottage industry. There are no rules to be followed.”

He cited the example of a rock band and how it was sidelined while making a comeback. “In 1984, a band called ‘Rock Machine’ was formed in Mumbai. It later changed its name to ‘Indus Creed’ in 1993. In 1997, it was disbanded. But the band members wanted to make a comeback in 2012 with the album ‘Evolve’. They signed a contract with a popular label (Universal Music).”

Around the same time, Kaushik added, Bollywood actor Priyanka Chopra also came with her first single, ‘In My City’. She had signed a contract with the same label. However, the music company chose [to promote] Chopra over the band.”

“So, a big name is required for commercial considerations.”

Later, Chopra won the MTV European Music Award for her album.

“Indie music per se, didn’t get the respect it deserved. How can we expect song writers or composers to get any recognition or respect?” he asked.

Incidentally, this is not the first time that the Tamil music industry has witnessed attempts at such erasure.

A long history

Veteran Tamil lyricist film Vaali too faced similar situations when his contributions went unnoticed despite several hits penned for MG Ramachandran (MGR). Old timers from the industry say that often people would think those popular songs were written by Kannadasan, who was at the peak of his career back then.

When asked about this by a magazine, Vaali had replied: “I always see to it that I get proper remuneration for my songs. I’m not bothered about the recognition they got [for my songs].”

But do two wrongs make a right? Apparently, they do. Or so some argue as they insist that not everything can be seen from the lens of exploitation and invisibilisation of the marginalised.

If the @TherukuralArivu erasure wasn’t a deliberate & blatant move, Dhee, @Music_Santhosh & @arrahman should speak up, otherwise it will go down as a historical injustice.These are people we believe are on the right side of the good fight,I really hope they do the right thing.

— CS Amudhan (@csamudhan) August 22, 2021

According to Shaji Chen, who has worked in the music industry for years, the Rolling Stone case is a matter of “success has many fathers and failure is an orphan”.

“Between the ’70s to up until the late ’90s, people consumed music by paying for audio cassettes. In those days, only those who could afford to buy a cassette alone could hear the songs. But now, anyone can consume music without paying anyone. You upload your song on YouTube and if any advertisements come because of the popularity of the song, you start earning. All kinds of contracts, copyrights, etc. are becoming meaningless,” he says.

Music is now purely about business, he adds. “So, no one can judge whether this is right or wrong.”

Shaji goes on to say that earlier it was possible to gauge whether a song would be a hit. That’s no longer the case. He cites the example of ‘Thattiputta Thattiputta’ from the upcoming film Mamanithan.

“It’s composed by Yuvan Shankar Raja and sung by his father Ilayaraja for actor Vijay Sethupathi. All of them have their own fan following. Based on that, one would expect it to get at least 1 crore views. But even after five months of the song’s release, only 15 lakh views were recorded,” he laments.

So, what matters is how you monetise your work, he adds. “When you have a huge following on social media and if you are really talented, you can become a star. Dragging caste into all this is meaningless,” he says.

To prove a point, US-based Tamil writer Karthik Velu wrote a Facebook post, explaining how contracts are structured while promoting an album.

“The word ‘Ft’ means ‘featuring’. That is ‘Dhee ft. Arivu’ indicates that Arivu is just a participant in that song. To be precise, he contributes in a minor way to a song sung by another person, that is, Dhee. It is equal to an actor who does a cameo role in a film. If tomorrow the song gets any award, it will be awarded to the main singer, Dhee. However, the contributor’s name will be mentioned” he says.

Similarly, the symbol ‘&’ is used in some labels if a song has two singers and both the singers contributed equally.

“The letters ‘Vs’, ‘X’ are also used. The word ‘Vs’, indicates that both the singers sing a song in a competitive mood. This can be usually seen in Rap songs. The letter ‘X’ indicates the same as ‘&’, however, one will take care of lyrics, another will look after music and another partner will sing the song. Arivu’s ‘Kallamouni’ song, has used this ‘X’ letter,” says Velu.

Though these wordings are used for practical purposes, things such as who contributed what, who will take the revenues and award, etc, will be solely based on the contract they signed, he added.

This is exactly where many see a problem.

Activist Shalini Maria Lawrence pointed this out in a series of tweets following the release of the Rolling Stone cover.  “He wrote the lyrics and sang as well. The song was his idea. Nobody can deny it.” she tweeted.

Thread//

When #enjoyenjaami was released I first thought it was Arivu's independent single and it had Dhee supporting him as he was an independent artist. He wrote the lyrics ,sang .The song was his idea.Nobody can deny it. But the title said "Dhee ft Arivu".

— Shalin Maria Lawrence (@TheBluePen25) August 22, 2021

But the song’s title read ‘Dhee ft. Arivu’, “thus indirectly implying that it is Dhee’s song”.

Arivu was “systematically erased” from the picture.  “Yes caste here played a major part and they exploited Arivu and his talent and betrayed him. This has happened in the past to a lot of Dalits,” Lawrence said.

Long back, when poet Baraka, founder of the Black Arts Movement, was talking about the Beatles and a certain Blind Willie [Johnson], he meant the same.

“Cultural diffusion is a good thing, and appropriation is a part of it. We want mixture, we want expression, and we want creativity. What we don’t want is exploitation. The issue here is one of power, and more specifically, the power to exploit,” he explained in a 2007 interview.

Perhaps, Arivu, too, knew this when he wrote the song.

Nan Anju Maram Valarthean
Azhagana Thottam Vachchean
Thottam Sezhithalum
En Thonda Nanaiyalaye

(I planted five trees/
Nurtured a beautiful garden/
My garden flourished/
Yet my throat remains Dry)
—a stanza from ‘Enjoy Enjaami’