Rap not to blame for UK riots

Following on from the UK’s worst riots for three decades, the Daily Mirror's political correspondent Paul Routledge put the blame on rap saying "I blame the pernicious culture of hatred around rap music, which glorifies violence and loathing of authority (especially the police but including parents), exalts trashy materialism and raves about drugs. The important things in life are the latest smart phone, fashionable trainers and jeans and idiot computer games. No wonder stores selling them were priority looting targets. Stir into this lethal mixture, the fostering of irrational anger against the world and disrespect for others, and the end result is self-absorbed young people living at boiling point". Hmmm, strong stuff, and it drew a quick response from rapper Professor Green, who took to Twitter to say: "You had to be at East Dance at Glasto to see the damage urban music does: people of all colours and classes enjoying themselves. Terrible. Paul Routledge is an absolute moron. An absolute fucking moron. Yeah, ban rap music, silence our voices even more. Ignorant prick. Surely this isn't about shifting the blame, but accepting responsibility? Neither my music nor that of my peers is to blame for society and its faults. We didn't create the tiers".

London's Burning

The riots in London are having a profound effect on the capital and England's friendly football match against the Netherlands at Wembley on Wednesday 10th August has been called off following three nights of rioting in London. Police say they do not have spare manpower for the 70,000 capacity stadium. Carling Cup matches at Charlton, West Ham, Crystal Palace (all in London) and Bristol City have also been postponed. In the music industry, a number of HMV stores in North London have been targets of looting and a warehouse facility used by leading indie label distributor [PIAS] was burned to the ground on Monday, seriously affecting UK independent labels. The Enfield distribution centre was operated by one of Sony Corp but the impact of the centre and its stock being destroyed will be felt far beyond Sony as the warehouse was used by [PIAS] which is one of the country's leading distributors of CDs for independent labels, including the Beggars Group, Ninja Tune, Warp, Domino and around 150 others. There are also unconfirmed reports both the Brixton Academy and Electric Ballroom venues were attacked.