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"Thus, we need to produce a large volume just to survive even though we are not always proud of our songs. We compromise quality for quantity because the pirates are destroying our market." With no music copyrights and a musicians union that has been co-opted by government sympathizers and no longer represents the interests of the artists, musicians are powerless to air their grievances and claim their fair share of the profits. Fight the Power For now, Burma’s Rap and Hip-Hop scene is confined primarily to the younger generation of privileged urbanites. Art does not exist in a vacuum, however, but arises from social limitations and the desire for new forms of expression that challenge accepted cultural norms. In a country where communication is highly controlled and regulated, it is no surprise that the lyrics are not politically charged. But by the very iconoclastic nature of the music, Rap and Hip-Hop becomes a tacitly subversive expression of socio-cultural discontent. The introduction of new rhythms, themes and ideas—and defiantly casual fashions—serves as a direct response to the alienation between government authorities and social realities while providing an artistic escape from imposed ideology, discipline and social identity. "The military tries to define what is ‘good art’ and says this is a bad influence from the West, but many of these youths are progressive-minded and talented, and they don’t like what is established," says the Rangoon-based writer in his sixties. It remains to be seen how boldly Burma’s dozen or so Rap and Hip-Hop artists will challenge the country’s social and political limitations, just as it is uncertain where the authorities will finally draw the line. In the 1980s, Eastern Bloc countries like Hungary cautiously loosened policy restrictions on rock music to reclaim the confidence of the increasingly alienated youth as a "safety valve", allowing the discontented to vent their frustrations musically rather than politically. But because Rap and Hip-Hop, like rock music, deals in the currency of symbols such as clothing and personal appearance, it is always ambiguous, and thus can expand the boundaries of social and political debate indirectly making it difficult to control by the authorities. And in Burma, ambiguity is the safest approach when addressing desires for change. "Everybody’s scared stiff," adds the writer. "These artists dare not speak what’s really on their minds." Rap and Hip-Hop can function as a mirror that reflects societal frictions, or can serve as an entertaining opiate that forgets such conflicts. In Burma, this new artistic trend is neither a sonic weapon aimed at established power structures, nor a tool to politicize the audience but an expression of the desire for new sounds and new tastes and it has struck a responsive chord in the country. And while the music and its associated fashions are still largely limited to the fringes of society, there is no denying that Rap and Hip-Hop music in Burma is "in the house".