A Cultural Shift in Mainstream Music
Jacob Banks is an African American singer/songwriter who has reinvented the idea of what soul means in regards to music. I have not heard this kind of soul in music since The Temptations. His song, Diddy Bop was in the movie 50 Shades Freed and is now one of the most popular in regards to mainstream music. His voice is so distinctive and bold, it is a breath of fresh air from the mainstream EDM style. Bank’s voice is just as if we were to go back to the 1950s and listen to someone sing in New Orleans or other southern-culture states. He is reinventing what it means to have soul again. It is surprising that the rest of mainstream society is also loving him, he should be considered the one in a million when it comes to reshaping what current society’s idea of music is.
In regards to the song, Diddy Bop, Banks is telling a story. In the third line of the first stanza in the first verse of the song, Banks explains that, “Two empty souls won’t fill the vacancy,” he continues to the fourth line, “I know it’s heavy on your mind.” This song is describing the club life. People go home with new people every night. The norm of society is to go to a bar on Saturday night and then end up sleeping with someone at the end of the night. The story that Banks is telling in this song is that you don’t need to do that. Banks is saying that we don’t have to conform to the norms of society. The vacancy he is referring to is the vacancy of one’s own self, he is not referring to a hotel in this instance. Banks is saying that you don’t need someone to take you home in order to fill your own vacancy inside of yourself. Sleeping with someone new every night will not fill that empty void.
Banks goes on in the second stanza of the first verse saying, “Sugar and smoke won’t make you feel at home/ Yesterdays are made for letting go/ Silver won’t ever feel like gold/ But chasing shadows will leave you in the cold.” Banks is saying that current culture is always settling for something or someone that we don’t actually want. Silver isn’t gold; Banks is right! Lowering one’s standards just to feel important and wanted is not the way to live a happy life. Banks is not trying to single anyone out in this song. He is simply addressing a pattern that has commonality in young societal culture. He asks his audience in the last line referred to above, what are you chasing? Banks is addressing his audience; he is saying that you are chasing an emptiness that will never be filled because all you are chasing is shadows.
In the chorus of the song, we understand who exactly Banks is talking to. I think at this point he is addressing himself. Banks says, “Oh, you should dance some, boy/ Don’t need nobody to take you on/ Grab a drink or four/ Don’t need nobody to take you on/ Now the floor is yours/ Don’t need nobody to call your fault/ You better dance some, boy/ Don’t need nobody to take you on.” The particular line, “Don’t need nobody to call your fault,” really hits the entire point that Banks is making in this song. He is saying that he doesn’t need judgements from those who are different then him. He can just simply be; Banks is saying here that it is okay to have fun, it is okay to dance and enjoy life, and it is okay to do so without having to worry about the judgements being passed by other people.
Diddy Bop should be number one on all of the music charts. This song is iconic. It speaks to cultural society unlike any other song has for quite some time. I am so glad this song is on the radio; hopefully it will surpass all the mainstream music that has made me practically go deaf. This song should be the first of many that we are hearing from Jacob Banks; his unique, soulful voice and the messages he conveys in this lyrics is exactly what we, as a societal whole, need to be listening to.
