Contents
What do the letters rap stand for?
RAP Random Acts of Poetry (various locations) RAP Radio and Production RAP Recovery and Progress RAP Rhythm And Poetry (rap music) RAP Remedial Action Plan RAP Ranged Attack Power (gaming) RAP Raw Attack Power (gaming) RAP Reconciliation Action Plan (Australia) RAP Recreation and Parks (various locations) RAP Reliability Analysis Program RAP Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific RAP Research and Analysis Project (various locations) RAP Rear Area Protection RAP Research Applications Program (National Center for Atmospheric Research) RAP Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement (road material) RAP Remote Access Point (telecommunications) RAP Record and Playback (software) RAP Response Analysis Program RAP Risk Assessment Program (Microsoft) RAP Record of Arrests and Prosecutions (sheet) RAP Recycled Asphalt Pavement RAP Rhoptry-Associated Protein RAP Recurrent Abdominal Pain RAP Re-Application Program RAP Report All Poaching (various locations) RAP Random Amplified Polymorphic (DNA) RAP Reasonable Academic Progress RAP Research, Analysis and Planning (various schools) RAP Root Anchor Point (mainframe software database management) RAP Rhythmic American Poetry RAP Residents’ Assistance Program RAP Rich Ajax Platform (website application programming) RAP Route Access Protocol RAP Risk Assessment Planning RAP Restoration Advisory Board RAP Retained Accessory Power (automobiles) RAP Réseau d’Avertissements Phytosanitaires (French: Phytosanitary Network Warnings; Canada) RAP Requisition Approval Process (various businesses) RAP Résistance à l’Agression Publicitaire (French: Resistance to Aggressive Advertising) RAP Renal Arterial Pressure RAP Requirements, Analysis and Production (Canadian government) RAP Right Atrial Pressure RAP Regional Acceleratory Phenomenon (bone remodeling) RAP Rapid Assessment Protocol RAP Resettlement Action Plan RAP Rapid Assessment Program RAP Race Awareness Program (Mount Diablo Peace Center) RAP Relatives as Parents (program) RAP Rate Adaptation Protocol RAP Rule Against Perpetuities (law) RAP Rehabilitation and Preservation Program (New York State Housing Finance Agency) RAP Research Abroad Program (various schools) RAP Recruiter Assistance Program RAP Resident Assessment Protocol RAP Ready Aircrew Program RAP Rocket-Assisted Projectile RAP Right Away, Please RAP Real Action Paintball, Inc.
Why rap is called rap?
Initially the word rap meant to strike or to hit. A few centuries later a slight variation of this definition appeared which meant to speak or talk. In America around the 1960’s it began to pop up in the black community and was used as a slang word to mean that someone was talking or having a conversation.
Who said rap is rhythm and poetry?
Hip-hop is storytellin – Ajay Naidu quotes fridge magnet, Black.
Who created rap?
INTRODUCTION – The development of rock and roll music in the 1950’s and aspects of rock music in the 1960’s can be compared to the emergence and development of rap and hip-hop music in the 1980’s, certainly in relation to the black community in the United States. As we hope you will recall, rock and roll developed from rhythm and blues, which had a long tradition among African-American people.
In the 1950’s, white radio stations and record companies wanted to capitalize on and manipulate the black sound without actually having blacks perform the music. In the 1960’s, record companies including Motown, which was owned and managed by black people, tried to capitalize on the appeal that black music had to the white audience and tailored and marketed their music to a largely white group of fans.
By the time that rap and hip-hop developed, things had changed dramatically. In the 1980’s and especially the 1990’s, the rap music industry wanted to have a sound that was entirely their own – with no appropriations or limitations, and certainly no apologies.
- Rap music has been black run and black created.
- Unlike Motown, record labels like Def Jam, Bad Boy, and Death Row did not cater to a white audience at all, although the music eventually found an audience among white people and has become one of the most popular types of music in recent years.
- In fact, in 1998, rap outsold every other genre on music, including country, selling 81 million CDs and tapes.
The influence that rap has had on rock has been intense and some of the most interesting music of the early 21st century is either rap, based on rap, or influenced by rap. Although we use the terms “rap” and “hip-hop” interchangeably, strictly speaking, rap is a form of rhythmic speaking in rhyme, which in the world of music goes all the way back to the rhyming “jive talk” of the Bebop jazz musicians.
- Hip-hop, on the other hand, is the backing music for rap, which is often composed of a collage of excerpts or samples from other songs.
- Basically, hip-hop deconstructs familiar sounds and songs from earlier music, and builds those sounds into entirely new, often unpredictable songs.
- Hip-hop also refers to the culture and styles surrounding rap music.
James Brown, Sly Stone, and George Clinton of Parliament/Funkadelic are early influences on hip-hop. Rap began in 1971, in the Bronx, with Kool Herc, who was from Jamaica. At block parties, Kool Herc would play two turntables by hand and manipulate the sound to create an entirely new sound, while he rapped the lyrics from the song he was playing. The “break”, or instrumental part of the record was played repeatedly and this became his background music.
- Since he did not think that Americans would get reggae, he used the break from American funk music, like James Brown,
- He also employed dancers, who became known as break dancers or b-boys.
- Grandmaster Flash, who heard Kool Herc perform, thought he could do it better and he started stretching the break, created new sounds by scratching the records and sometimes playing them backwards.
Like John Cage and Jimi Hendrix, he pushed the sounds that a turntable, a needle and a record could make. He could not rap, so he got together a group called the Furious Five to rap to his scratching. The first rap group to have a hit record was the Sugarhill Gang,
- These early rap groups are now called “old school.” As rap developed, elements from rock music such as electric guitars and intense drumbeats were introduced by Run-D.M.C.
- Which was the first hardcore rap group, and the earlier scratching was replaced by sampling, an electronic pulling of sounds from earlier music.
Public Enemy developed a very sophisticated sampling technique, which often was based on a blend of white noise, strong beats, and unrecognizable samples. Just as importantly, or perhaps even more importantly, they introduced social and political elements from the black community into their music.
- This developed in the 1990’s into gangsta rap, which was originally introduced by NWA,
- Gangsta rap emphasized violence, crime and sex, and for that reason, has been the most controversial type of rap.
- Among the important gangsta rappers were Snoop Doggy Dog, Tupac, and the Notorious B.I.G.
- The first white group to gain acceptance in rap music was the New York based Beastie Boys,
At first called cultural pirates by some critics, they led the way for a number of white rap acts, including today’s major music center of controversy, Eminem. First the Fugees and then their lead singer Lauryn Hill, took rap in another direction, most recently blending elements of rap and hip-hop with R&B.* * developed from lecture notes written by Lisa Smith for Art Education 160, 1999.
What is rap called before rap?
“Rap music” redirects here. For the form of vocal delivery associated with hip hop music, see rapping, For the Killer Mike album, see R.A.P. Music,
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2023 in hip hop music |
Hip hop or hip-hop, also known as rap and formerly known as disco rap, is a genre of popular music that was originated in the Bronx borough of New York City in the early 1970s by African Americans, having existed for several years prior to mainstream discovery.
Hip hop originated as an anti-drug and anti-violence genre, while consisting of stylized rhythmic music (usually built around drum beats ) that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted. According to the professor Asante of African American studies at Temple University, “hip hop is something that blacks can unequivocally claim as their own”.
It was developed as part of hip hop culture, a subculture defined by four key stylistic elements: MCing /rapping, DJing/ scratching with turntables, break dancing, and graffiti art, Other elements include sampling beats or bass lines from records (or synthesized beats and sounds ), and rhythmic beatboxing,
While often used to refer solely to rapping, “hip hop” more properly denotes the practice of the entire subculture. The term hip hop music is sometimes used synonymously with the term rap music, though rapping is not a required component of hip hop music; the genre may also incorporate other elements of hip hop culture, including DJing, turntablism, scratching, beatboxing, and instrumental tracks,
Hip hop as both a musical genre and a culture was formed during the 1970s when block parties became increasingly popular in New York City, particularly among African American youth residing in the Bronx, At block parties, DJs played percussive breaks of popular songs using two turntables and a DJ mixer to be able to play breaks from two copies of the same record, alternating from one to the other and extending the “break”.
- Hip hop’s early evolution occurred as sampling technology and drum machines became widely available and affordable.
- Turntablist techniques such as scratching and beatmatching developed along with the breaks.
- Rapping developed as a vocal style in which the artist speaks or chants along rhythmically with an instrumental or synthesized beat,
Hip hop music was not officially recorded for play on radio or television until 1979, largely due to poverty during the genre’s birth and lack of acceptance outside ghetto neighborhoods. Old-school hip hop was the first mainstream wave of the genre, marked by its disco influence and party-oriented lyrics.
- The 1980s marked the diversification of hip hop as the genre developed more complex styles and spread around the world.
- New-school hip hop was the genre’s second wave, marked by its electro sound, and led into golden age hip hop, an innovative period between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s that also developed hip hop’s own album era,
The gangsta rap subgenre, focused on the violent lifestyles and impoverished conditions of inner-city African American youth, gained popularity at this time. West Coast hip hop was dominated by G-funk in the early-mid 1990s, while East Coast hip hop was dominated by jazz rap, alternative hip hop, and hardcore hip hop,
Hip hop continued to diversify at this time with other regional styles emerging, such as Southern rap and Atlanta hip hop, Hip hop became a best-selling genre in the mid-1990s and the top-selling music genre by 1999. The popularity of hip hop music continued through the late 1990s to early-2000s “bling era” with hip hop influences increasingly finding their way into other genres of popular music, such as neo soul, nu metal, and R&B,
The United States also saw the success of regional styles such as crunk, a Southern genre that emphasized the beats and music more than the lyrics, and alternative hip hop began to secure a place in the mainstream, due in part to the crossover success of its artists.
- During the late 2000s and early 2010s “blog era”, rappers were able to build up a following through online methods of music distribution, such as social media and blogs, and mainstream hip hop took on a more melodic, sensitive direction following the commercial decline of gangsta rap.
- The trap and mumble rap subgenres have become the most popular form of hip hop during the mid-late 2010s and early 2020s.
In 2017, rock music was usurped by hip hop as the most popular genre in the United States.
How did rap begin?
The Birth of Rap: A Look Back – Kurtis Blow. hide caption toggle caption
“Rapper’s Delight” by The Sugarhill Gang “The Breaks” by Kurtis Blow
World Cafe celebrates Black History Month with a special on the birth of rap, in which rapper Kurtis Blow, DJ Grand Wizard Theodore, and museum curator Jim Fricke help host David Dye explore the birth of hip-hop. Kurtis Blow was the first rapper to sign with a major label, the first to earn a certified gold single, and the first to tour internationally.
Grand Wizard Theodore was the DJ who invented scratching, utilizing turntables as an instrument to be played. Jim Fricke is the editor of Yes Yes Y’all: The Experience Music Project Oral History of Hip Hop’s First Decade, and was the curator of the “Hip-Hop Nation” exhibit at Seattle’s Experience Music Project.
Together, they tell the story of rap’s early years in the 1970s. Rap as a genre began at block parties in New York City in the early 1970s, when DJs began isolating the percussion breaks of funk, soul, and disco songs and extending them. MCs tasked with introducing the DJs and keeping the crowd energized would talk between songs, joking and generally interacting with the audience.
- Over time, it became common for the MCs (or rappers, as they soon became known) to talk and rhyme over and in sync with the music.
- Initially dismissed as a fad, rap music proved its commercial viability in 1979 with the release of The Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight,” and then again in 1980 with Kurtis Blow’s “The Breaks,” a Top 5 hit that eventually went gold.
As rapping as an art form and a technique continued to develop, so too did the DJing. DJ Grand Wizard Theodore is said to have accidentally invented the method of “scratching,” wherein the DJ pushes the record back and forth as it’s played to produce a scratching noise as it brushes against the needle.
- The scratching technique proved to be enormously influential, as it was quickly picked up by legends like Grandmaster Flash.
- Theodore is also responsible for pioneering the use of the needle drop, where instead of silently cueing up the next record to be played, the DJ drops the needle onto the exact beginning of the song.
The respective disciplines of rapping and DJing continued to evolve, leading to the mid-’80s era known as the golden age of hip-hop, in which artists like Run DMC and Rakim pushed the boundaries of the art form and helped to make rap into the ubiquitous mainstream entity that it is today.
Is rap short for anything?
Etymology and usage – The English verb rap has various meanings; these include “to strike, especially with a quick, smart, or light blow”, as well “to utter sharply or vigorously: to rap out a command”. The gives a date of 1541 for the first recorded use of the word with the meaning “to utter (esp.
- An oath) sharply, vigorously, or suddenly”.
- Wentworth and ‘s Dictionary of American Slang gives the meaning “to speak to, recognize, or acknowledge acquaintance with someone”, dated 1932, and a later meaning of “to converse, esp.
- In an open and frank manner”.
- It is these meanings from which the musical form of rapping derives, and this definition may be from a shortening of,
A rapper refers to a performer who “raps”. By the late 1960s, when Hubert G. Brown changed his name to, rap was a slang term referring to an oration or speech, such as was common among the “hip” crowd in the protest movements, but it did not come to be associated with a musical style for another decade.
Rap was used to describe talking on records as early as 1970 on ‘ album with the track name “Monologue: Ike’s Rap I”. Hayes’ “husky-voiced sexy spoken ‘raps’ became key components in his signature sound”. similarly states that rap was used to refer to talking in a stylistic manner in the early 1970s: “I was born in ’72,
back then what rapping meant, basically, was you trying to convey something—you’re trying to convince somebody. That’s what rapping is, it’s in the way you talk.” Sometimes said to be an acronym for ‘rhythm and poetry’, this is not the origin of the word.
Is rap just hip-hop?
Hip-Hop Vs. Rap – The distinction is often made that hip-hop is a broader culture and phenomenon, and rap is just one (important) part of it. But first let’s talk about the music. In the context of music and genre, the word hip-hop is often used as another way of referring to the musical genre also known as rap,
- However: all rap is hip-hop, but hip-hop is not only rap.
- Because of the prominence of rap as a musical genre that exploded in popularity in the 1980s and has only continued to rise, it is often the most visible part of hip-hop culture—hence why the two are so closely associated.
- Many artists are properly identified as both rappers and hip-hop artists, including those from every era, such as LL Cool J, Snoop Dogg, Missy Elliot, Jay-Z, Kendrick Lamar, and Nicki Minaj, among countless others.
But not all hip-hop artists are rappers. Some are DJs, while others are musical artists, such as Frank Ocean, who bend and transcend the genre. A notable example among many is Beyoncé, whose pop superstardom is inseparable from—and often viewed as a defining symbol of—hip-hop culture.
Was rap before hip-hop?
History of Rap & Hip-Hop Rap music is stylistically and lyrically diverse, representing a range of experiences and worldviews that characterize the multiple and changing voices among African American youth. Rap is original poetry recited in rhythm and rhyme over prerecorded instrumental tracks.
Rap music (also referred to as rap or hip-hop music) evolved in conjunction with the cultural movement called hip-hop. Rap emerged as a minimalist street sound against the backdrop of the heavily orchestrated and formulaic music coming from the local house parties to dance clubs in the early 1970s. Its earliest performers comprise MCs (derived from master of ceremonies but referring to the actual rapper) and DJs (who use and often manipulate pre-recorded tracks as a backdrop to the rap), break dancers and graffiti writers.
Old School Roots: early 1970s to the mid-1980s From its humble beginnings in the Bronx, NY, rap music has moved into the mainstream, redefining the soundscape and character of American popular culture and contributing to the growth of a billion-dollar entertainment industry.
- Hip-hop music culture is a product of African American, Afro-Caribbean and Latino inner-city communities plagued by poverty, the proliferation of drugs, and gang violence in the 1960s and early 1970s.
- Some MCs and DJs were members or former members of gangs who used DJing, dancing, and MCing as an alternative to gang warfare.
DJ Kool Herc gave the community its blueprints and its first brand of hip-hop music, called b-beat. Hip-hop DJs and MCs originally performed in local house parties and community centers, city parks, neighborhood block parties, and, eventually, local clubs.
- By the mid-1970s, performance venues included local clubs whose proprietors recognized the commercial potential of this artistic expression.
- Record and film producers then noticed and began to capitalize on hip-hop culture.
- Sylvia Robinson of Sugarhill Records introduced rapping into the mainstream with the release of “Rapper’s Delight” (1979) by the Sugarhill Gang.
In the 1980s several commercial hip-hop films such as Wild Style (1982), Style Wars (1983), Beat Street (1984), Krush Groove (1985) and Disorderlies (1987) flooded the market with the sound of rap. Major record companies formed partnerships with independent labels and producers specializing in rap music.
MCing evolved into the rap music industry while DJing went underground and re-established itself as turntablism (the art of manipulating music with LP records and mixers to create unique rhythms and sounds). Changes to the musical production of hip-hop, along with growing stylistic diversity and advances in technology, led to the community-imposed concept of an old and new school.
The “Old School” is associated with the period from the early 1970s to the mid-1980s. Initially, DJs were the featured attraction, juggling beats amplified through large sound speakers and shouting praises and catch-phrases to incite crowd participation.
Pioneering DJs include Kool Herc and Afrika Bambaataa, Grand Wizard Theodore, Grandmaster Flash, and Grandmixer D.ST. When their musical collages and turntable manipulations became so complex that they required their full attention, DJs included a crew of MCs to engage and interact with the crowd of dancers.
Grandmaster Flash transferred his street or live mixing style to the studio on “Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel” (1981). A year later, Afrika Bambaataa ( “Planet Rock,” 1982) advanced the studio DJing tradition through the use of synthesizers, the 808 drum machine, computers, and analog and digital recording machines and other advanced technologies influenced by Kraftwerk’s “Trans-Europe Express” (1977), and “Numbers” (1981) coupled with funk aesthetics such as Captain Sky’s “Supersperm” (1978) and the rock-style of Babe Ruth Band’s “The Mexican” (1972).
It’s Nasty” – Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five The Golden Era: Commercialization and the New School Artists (mid-1980s to the mid-1990s) “New School” rap was coined by the 2nd generation artist (1984) to distinguish the pop sensibilities of the first commercial generation of rap artists and ranged from the pop-oriented humorous style of the Fat Boys (“Jail House Rap,” 1984) and D.J.
Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince (“Parents Just Don’t Understand,” 1988) to the rock-oriented sounds of Run-D.M.C. (“Walk This Way,” 1986). Women rappers like Roxanne Shanté, Salt-n-Pepa, MC Lyte, and Queen Latifah introduced Black women’s point of view to rap fans and proved that they were as skilled and commercially successful as the men.
The chaotic sounds of Public Enemy ( It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, 1988) and N.W.A ( Straight Outta Compton, 1988) became known as hardcore; the harsh lyrical content mirrored the deteriorating conditions of the inner-cities as evidenced by abandoned factories, boarded buildings, dilapidated houses, drug addicts, the homeless, and ongoing confrontations with the police.
The hardcore sounds and lyrics of Public Enemy, Boogie Down Productions, and KRS-One became known as “conscious” rap (also known as “message” and “Afrocentric” rap); those of N.W.A, Ice-T, Ice-Cube, and Eazy-E were called “gangsta” rap. Both styles dominated the hip-hop soundscape through much of the 1990s, but gangsta took over in the 21st century, influencing the styles of Master P, 50 Cent, T.I.
and Young Jeezy. Despite this domination, an array of hip-hop styles coexisted, including hybrid productions that fused elements of R&B and/or funk with the beats of hip-hop such as those by MC Hammer, Heavy D and the Boyz, Sean “Puffy” Combs, and Kid ‘n Play. Afrocentric and conscious rappers like Lauryn Hill, De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, and Gang Starr favored soul and jazz samples in their mixes.
“Ladies First” (feat. Monie Love) – Queen Latifah Mainstreaming into the 21st Century: mid-1990s to the mid-2010s In the 2000s, hip-hop music was mainstream. Kanye West’s production and lyricism redirected attention away from gangsta rap and explored a range of topics including his middle-class upbringing, anti-Black racism, corporatism, and his faith presented in full self-aggrandizing style.
Additionally, Eminem will become a most revered lyricist, by rap artists and rap fans alike, breaking past an obstacle of white inauthenticity laid down by Vanilla Ice a decade earlier. Musically, music-making turned away from the East Coast and the West coast and found a new home in the South. Several epicenters develop influential styles: Miami (Miami bass), New Orleans (bounce), Houston (screwed), and Atlanta (crunk and trap).
By the 2010s, socially conscious rap will crossover into the mainstream as R&B and rap artists respond to tension borne from increased police and vigilante shootings of unarmed Black men, women, and children, and from advances in technology for self-production and instant sharing through social media.
- Ey artists include Kendrick Lamar, J.
- Cole, and Joey Bada$$.
- Equally important in the 2010s is the rise of female MCs as producers of critically acclaimed albums, proving once again that rap consumers will purchase their music.
- Women leading the trend include Nicky Minaj and Cardi B.
- Old school rap is associated with a party-oriented musical and lyrical style as heard in Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s “Birthday Party” (1981).
Performers of the old school (early 1970s–mid-1980s) gained their reputations from live performances. Their recordings are characterized by the use of live bands and/or Latin-influenced percussion; the incorporation of scratching and other turntable effects; call-and-response chants between MCs and crowds; and lyrics delivered in rhymed couplets (A-A-B-B).
- New school artists such as Eric B.
- And Rakim (“Eric B.
- Is President,” 1987) added a virtuoso twist to the A-A-B-B scheme by employing internal rhymes that pair words in the middle of a line rather than simply at the end.
- The “new school” substituted the aggressive sounds of the street for the party sounds of the old school.
This hard-edged aesthetic emphasized dissonance and a heavy backbeat, incorporating real sounds of inner-city life such as gunshots, sirens, street cries, and the occasional political speech. In the 1980s and ’90s, electronic and digital productions of hip-hop increasingly replaced live performances.
Synthesizers, drum machines, and computers became the primary instruments and eventually sampled materials from various sources, especially funk, provided the foundation for new songs. In the late 1990s some new school artists like the Roots and Guru began reincorporating live instruments into their recordings and during live performances, such as “Loungin’,” Guru’s collaboration with jazz great Donald Byrd on trumpet and piano.
Others, like Dr. Dre, controlled the production tightly by utilizing the basics of classic funk songs, but slowing down the tempo for riding in a car (not dancing), adding menacing, bass-driven grooves (stripping funk’s bright sounds from the brass section), highlighted by integrating high-pitched synthesizer and chopped samples as in “Nothin’ But a ‘G’ Thang” (explicit),
- In the second millennium, the southern rap styles explode.
- Although there is no one southern style, they do share in common some characteristics: rhythmically and melodically minimalistic with coarse accents on the high and low ends leaving a lot of space for vocals.
- Early foundations for southern rap emerge come from Miami bass in the mid-1980s made famous by X-rated rappers 2 Live Crew.
The sound is grounded on a deep, bass-driven groove that speaks to this cosmopolitan area dance music scene, including Latin rhythms and African-Caribbean song styles like soca, cumbia, rumba, and plena. Southern rap diversified in the 1990s, reflecting local tradition but crossing over to national and international popularity in the 21st century.
Bounce from New Orleans incorporates parade-strutting beats that guide the energetic feel of the music and rappers’ cadences to get dancers to shake their backsides or “twerk.” Examples include David Banner’s “Like a Pimp” (2003), which also includes a signature “Triggerman” sample found in many bounce songs, and Big Freedia “Boot Whop” (2012).
In Houston, DJ Screw invented the screw style but unlike other southern rap genres, he slows down the tempo so much that its hypnotic pace matches the dulling effect of the local party drink, sweetened codeine syrup. A song like UGK’s “Short Texas” after DJ Screw re-engineers the song draws out every syllable of UGK’s verses, slurred and deep, and sonically drowsy.
- By 2000, screwed music (also known as chopped and screwed) would be made more palatable for a national market with an early hit “Sippin’ on Some Syrup” (2000) by Three 6 Mafia and UGK and A$AP Rocky’s “Houston Old Head” (2011), a superstar of the style coming from New York.
- Both examples maintain the essential elements such as a tempo and groove that is recognizably the style DJ Screw gave Houston fans but with a less narcotic feel.
Atlanta and Memphis will create a new, high-energy club music crunk demarcated by grittier sounds, hoarse chants, antiphonic, repetitive refrains, and the barest-bones beats. Lil Jon’s “Get Crunk” (1997) and Ying Yang Twin’s “Halftime (Stand Up and Get Crunk!)” (2004) are definitive examples.
- The variety of southern styles will begin to wane by 2007 with the exception of a drug-trade revival style called trap, which will become the most common rap and pop trend in the 2010s.
- Most heavily produced in Atlanta, trap’s sound is an umbrella term linking various southern regional styles with older styles (like G-funk, house, and techno) and a home-spun, do-it-yourself, entrepreneurial spirit.
Trap derives its name from the place (trap house) where drug dealers produce, sell, and use narcotics. Early artists like T.I. and Pusha T of the Clipse paved the way early in the 2000s to make it mainstream. However, the crossover successes of Fetty Wap’s “Trap Queen” (2015) and Migos with Lil Uzi Vert’s “Bad and Boujee” (2017) made rap, R&B, and pop look to trap for musical inspiration.
- DJs build their sound on a laptop, midi (musical instrumental digital interface), synth pads, keyboards, software, and 808-drum machine.
- Its restrained simplicity is more complex than one might give credit—manipulating bell timbres, synthetic claps, stuttering the beat, half-time effects, among other DJing techniques.
Chicago will borrow extensively renaming it drill rap. While lyrics focus on drug-sales, the sound has been incorporated by non-trap artists like Kendrick Lamar on “Humble” (2017) or cross-over artists like Cardi B on “Bodak Yellow.” Hip-hop is rooted in the African American oral traditions of “boasting” (self-aggrandizement), “toasting” (narrative poems that sometimes bestow praise), “signifyin'” (indirect insults), and “playing the dozens” (competitive and recreational exchange of insults).
- Old school” lyrics are characterized by a recreational party style that exploited the art of boasting.
- MCs, rapping in rhyme, bragged about their verbal skills and/or the technological manipulations of DJs who “rocked the house.” Performances were competitive within and against other crews as heard in the mock MC battle “Showdown” (1981) by the Sugarhill Gang vs.
Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five. Kurtis Blow’s “Hard Times” (1980) set the stage for an East Coast style that commented on the economic woes, social ills, and deteriorating conditions of inner-cities, but it was “The Message” (1982) by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five that established this direction as “New School.” Public Enemy, Boogie Down Productions and Sister Soulja transformed these social messages into nationalist political commentary, calling for African Americans to reject the destructive forces in their communities and to embrace racial pride as a means toward empowerment.
On the West Coast, N.W.A., Ice-T, Ice Cube, 2 Pac and others sought to resist oppressive forces by arming and defending themselves with weapons. These artists use the lyrics of gangsta rap, which provide graphic descriptions of gang culture and the social ills of inner-city communities, to “murder” and “rob” their competitors through street and gang “banging” metaphors.
Combining old school boasting with “bad man” imagery, the microphone becomes an automatic weapon for an MC to “murder” his competitor. Ice-T’s “Grand Larceny” (1988) employs the metaphor of “robbing” to brag about stealing the show through his superior rapping skills.
- Such songs have been misinterpreted as being real acts of violence.
- Gangsta themes continue to overshadow other styles and artists would prove their authenticity as converted, former drug-dealers like Notorious B.I.G.
- New York) and UGK (Houston) in the 1990s, 50 Cent (New York) and T.I.
- Atlanta) in the 2000s, and Chief Keef (Chicago) and Fetty Wap (New Jersey) in the 2010s.
However, with the rise of shooting deaths of unarmed Black men, women, and children by law enforcement officers and vigilantes in the 2010s conscious rappers will re-emerge alongside the activism generated by the Black Lives Matter coalitional movement sparking protests nationwide.J.
Cole’s “Be Free” (2014), Joey Bada$$’s “Land of the Free” (2017), and even trap rappers like Pusha T’s “Sunshine” critique the justice system and the lack of accountability. Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” (2014, featuring Pharrell Williams) becomes an anthem of hope and provides a chant for the young, Black protesters: “We gon’ be alright.
We gon’ be alright.” Women rappers in the 2010s took crafting rap music out of the hands of industry moguls and released self-published songs to the delight of rap fans and rappers anxious to collaborate. Nicki Minaj’s clever rhymes and multiple voices on Kanye West’s “Monster” (2010) highlighted that the new kid among a roster of superstars like Kanye West, Jay-Z, and Rick Ross could outshine the masters.
Cardi B’s “I Like It” (2018) is an homage to the 1967 Cuban boogaloo classic “I Like it Like That” by Pete Rodriguez with a hearty, trap rap take that proudly asserts sex-positivity and self-sufficient business women making money through art while paying tribute and owning her Africana-Latina identity.
Fernando Orejuela, Ph.D. is Senior Lecturer, Folklore and Ethnomusicology, and Affiliated Professor of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Indiana University. His research focuses on the history of hip hop, social justice, and cultural traditions with special attention to musical cultural expressions (b-beat, electro-funk, gangsta rap, conscious rap), folk art and material culture (graffiti, scraper bikes, low-riders), and dance (top rocking, breaking, poppin’ and lockin’, krumping)—the topic of his book, Rap and Hip Hop Culture (2021).
He is also the co-editor with Stephanie Shonekan of Black Lives Matter Movement and Music (2018), which balances critical race theory with Black music and social movements. Dr. Orejuela offers a broad perspective on the history and development of rap and hip hop culture, nationally and globally, as well as the use of technology in the humanities.
He teaches classes on hip hop culture and youth musical subcultures and social movements, as well as seminars on Latinx hip hop, popular music and place, and sports and gaming cultures. Read more : History of Rap & Hip-Hop
Who was the first rapper?
Kool Herc and Coke La Rock – La Rock was born in, on April 24, 1955, with family roots going back to, Coke La Rock was a friend and musical partner of, who himself is generally considered to have laid down the foundation for hip-hop music starting in 1973.
- La Rock was an original member of Herc’s MC crew, the Herculoids.
- According to Herc, Coke La Rock’s MC name had various iterations, beginning as “A-1 Coke,” and then moving on to “Nasty Coke” before it was finalized as “Coke La Rock”.
- Coke La Rock joined Kool Herc for his first party, in 1973, to celebrate Herc’s sister Cindy’s birthday.
It wasn’t until about the fifth or sixth party that he took the name Coke La Rock. The name came to him in a dream. Before that time, he had no name and did his rapping out of sight from the audience, so no one knew who was doing the rapping. His original raps were usually shout-outs to friends, but gradually the poetry emerged.
He originated such phrases as “You rock and you don’t stop,” and “Hotel, motel, you don’t tell, we won’t tell” (which was immortalized on the first Sugarhill Gang single “”, although La Rock received no credit). Coke La Rock’s raps were always purely improvisational, unlike those of later 70s-era rap groups, —such as the and, who wrote down and rehearsed their rhymes and created elaborate routines.
According to La Rock, while rapping “at first I would just call out names. Then I pretended dudes had double-parked cars; that was to impress the girls. Truthfully, I wasn’t there to rap, I was just playing around.” Nonetheless, La Rock’s raps would, as with much else at Kool Herc’s parties in the mid-1970s, serve as a basic model for other hip-hop artists that would come onto the Bronx music scene by the end of the decade.
Does rap mean talk?
Definition of RAP 1 2 a : a sharp rebuke or criticism b : a negative and often undeserved reputation or charge — often used with bum or bad given a bum rap by the press 3 a : the responsibility for or adverse consequences of an action 1 : to strike with a sharp blow 2 : to utter suddenly and forcibly 3 : to cause to be or come by raps 1 : to snatch away or upward 1 :, also : a line of talk : 2 a or rap music : a type of music of African American origin in which rhythmic and usually rhyming speech is chanted to a musical accompaniment — often used before another noun b : a rap song the group mixes its usual raunch with mock news reports and anti-censorship raps — Jon Pareles 1 : to talk freely and frankly at a party rapping with a guy about music you love — Lisa Lombardi 2 + : to perform Does it feel strange to rap solo after being part of a big group like Harlem Spartans? — Kyann-Sian Williams She encouraged the crowd while her husband rapped his verse before she returned the favour and finished the song. — Jonathan Landrum Jr. Recent Examples on the Web Check out previous Ones, and listen to new rap from Tommy Richman and more on our Spotify playlist. — Alphonse Pierre, Pitchfork, 18 Sep.2023 With one final week left of summer, the heavy hitters in rap, R&B and pop have come out to play, as seen by Drake feat. — Starr Bowenbank, Billboard, 15 Sep.2023 Independent rap star Macklemore will perform in Portland on Saturday, October 7 and Sunday, October 8 at 7:30 p.m. at the Roseland Theatre. — oregonlive, 13 Sep.2023 Last night provided the multi-hyphenate a moment to reflect on all of the success she’s acquired so far in her career as a breakout female rap star. — Robyn Mowatt, Essence, 13 Sep.2023 The ever-growing television medium is keeping the legacies of two of the most important figures in rap — and overall pop culture — alive, and now the projects are competing for Emmys. — Mesfin Fekadu, The Hollywood Reporter, 13 Sep.2023 On top of Saweetie’s viral moment and bounce back, the 2023 VMAs were a big night for women in rap, — Brenton Blanchet, Peoplemag, 13 Sep.2023 The occasional glimpses of R&B and rap royalty (Keyshia Cole, Fat Joe and Ashanti, to name a few)? — Bethonie Butler, Washington Post, 13 Sep.2023 The song ends rap ‘s year-long drought without topping the Hot 100, a feat just missed by other rap superstars including Drake, 21 Savage, Lil Durk and J.
- Cole. — Ethan Millman, Rolling Stone, 11 Sep.2023 The two stars rapped their verses while showing off their best assets.
- Larisha Paul, Rolling Stone, 12 Sep.2023 In the video, which is set at the beach and an extravagant pool, Cardi and Megan don a series of flashy outfits — including matching red swimsuits at the end — to rap to the raunchy track.
— Bailey Richards, Peoplemag, 12 Sep.2023 At one point, Megan Thee Stallion leads a bunch of men around an office on leashes while rapping an original song about being a boss. — Jada Yuan, Washington Post, 8 Sep.2023 Surrounded by singers in white robes, Ja Rule raps his verses emphatically as a projector screen showcasing a sunset plays behind them.
- Carl Lamarre, Billboard, 7 Sep.2023 But Shota’s already set his head back on the desk, rapping his knuckles along with the rain.
- Bryan Washington, The New Yorker, 29 Aug.2023 His career in the entertainment world has spanned a few different industries, from rapping to wrestling to acting and writing for TV.
— Kaitlin Stevens, Peoplemag, 2 Sep.2023 The only problem is the terrifying red-eyed, midnight black horned demon crawling (and rapping ) on her ceiling, illuminated by a snowy TV screen in an homage to another freaky suburban nightmare classic, Poltergeist.
— Gil Kaufman, Billboard, 1 Sep.2023 Eminem has sent a cease and desist letter demanding the Republican presidential candidate stop rapping his music during his 2024 campaign, the Daily Mail reports. — Brendan Morrow, The Week, 29 Aug.2023 These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word ‘rap.’ Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
about these examples.
- Etymology
- Noun (1)
- Middle English rappe
- Verb (2)
- back-formation from rapt
- Noun (2)
- perhaps from
- Verb (3)
- perhaps from
- First Known Use
- Noun (1)
- 14th century, in the meaning defined at
- Verb (1)
- 14th century, in the meaning defined at
- Verb (2)
- 1599, in the meaning defined at
- Noun (2)
- 1834, in the meaning defined
- Noun (3)
- 1967, in the meaning defined at
- Verb (3)
- 1929, in the meaning defined at
Time Traveler The first known use of rap was in the 14th century Style MLA Chicago APA Merriam-Webster “Rap.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rap. Accessed 28 Sep.2023. Last Updated: 11 Sep 2023 – Definition revised : Definition of RAP
Who is the father of rap music?
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
DJ Kool Herc | |
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DJ Kool Herc in New York, 2006 | |
Background information | |
Birth name | Clive Campbell |
Also known as |
|
Born | April 16, 1955 (age 68) Kingston, Jamaica |
Origin | The Bronx, New York City, U.S. |
Genres | Hip hop |
Occupation(s) | DJ |
Years active | 1973–present |
Website | djkoolherc,com |
Clive Campbell (born April 16, 1955), better known by his stage name DJ Kool Herc, is a Jamaican American DJ who is credited for the creation of hip hop music in the Bronx, New York City, in the 1970s. Nicknamed the ” Father of Hip-Hop “, Campbell began playing hard funk records of the sort typified by James Brown,
Campbell began to isolate the instrumental portion of the record which emphasized the drum beat—the ” break “—and switch from one break to another. Using the same two-turntable set-up of disco DJs, he used two copies of the same record to elongate the break. This breakbeat DJing, using funky drum solos, formed the basis of hip hop music.
Campbell’s announcements and exhortations to dancers helped lead to the syncopated, rhythmically spoken accompaniment now known as rapping, He called the dancers “break-boys” and “break-girls”, or simply b-boys and b-girls, terms that continue to be used fifty years later in the sport of breaking,
Who is the king of rap?
E – American rapper Eminem has gone by multiple honorifics, such as “King of Hip-Hop” and “King of Rap”.
Artist | Title | Country | Source |
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Sheila E. | Queen of Percussion | United States | |
Eazy-E | Godfather of Gangsta Rap | United States | |
Missy Elliott | Queen of Hip Hop | United States | |
Queen of Rap | |||
Eminem | King of Hip-Hop | United States | |
King of Rap | |||
Gloria Estefan | Queen of Latin Pop | Cuba/United States | |
Elvy Sukaesih | Queen of Dangdut | Indonesia |
Who made rap so popular?
Hip-hop | Definition, History, Culture, & Facts While there is some debate over the number of elements of hip-hop, there are four elements that are considered to be its pillars: deejaying, or “turntabling”; rapping, also known as “MCing” (emceeing) or “rhyming”; painting, also known as “graf” or “writing”; and break dancing, or “B-boying,” which encompasses hip-hop dance, style, and attitude, along with the sort of virile body language that philosopher described as “postural semantics.” Many also cite a fifth essential component: “knowledge of self/consciousness.” Other suggested elements include street fashion and language.
- Read more below: While a number of people were influential in the creation of hip-hop, much credit is given to Kool Herc (Clive Campbell), a Jamaican immigrant who was the first major hip-hop disc jockey.
- At a party on August 11, 1973, he introduced the technique of playing the same album on two turntables and extending the drum section (which became known as the breakbeat).
Many recognize this night as the birth of hip-hop. Other pioneering hip-hop deejays include Afrika Bambaataa and, The three men are often called the “holy trinity” of early hip-hop. Although not the first hip-hop song, the Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight” (1979) was considered the first significant single of the genre.
Within weeks of its release, it became a chart-topping phenomenon and gave its name to a new genre of pop music. Part of its crossover appeal was attributed to its lighthearted lyrics, which were atypical of most rap songs at the time. hip-hop, cultural movement that attained widespread popularity in the 1980s and ’90s and also the backing music for, the musical style incorporating rhythmic and/or rhyming speech that became the movement’s most lasting and influential art form.
Although widely considered a synonym for rap music, the term hip-hop refers to a complex four elements:, or “turntabling”; rapping, also known as “MCing” or “rhyming”; painting, also known as “graf” or “writing”; and “B-boying,” which hip-hop dance, style, and attitude, along with the sort of virile body language that philosopher described as “postural semantics.” (A fifth element, “knowledge of self/consciousness,” is sometimes added to the list of hip-hop elements, particularly by socially conscious hip-hop artists and scholars.) Hip-hop originated in the predominantly economically depressed South Bronx section of in the late 1970s.
As the hip-hop movement began at society’s margins, its origins are shrouded in,, and obfuscation. Graffiti and, the aspects of the culture that first caught public attention, had the least lasting effect. Reputedly, the graffiti movement was started about 1972 by a Greek American teenager who signed, or “tagged,” Taki 183 (his name and street, 183rd Street) on walls throughout the New York City subway system.
By 1975 youths in the, Queens, and were stealing into train yards under cover of darkness to spray-paint colourful mural-size renderings of their names, imagery from underground comics and television, and even -like Campbell’s soup cans onto the sides of subway cars.
Soon, influential art dealers in the, Europe, and Japan were displaying graffiti in major galleries. New York City’s Metropolitan Transit Authority responded with dogs, barbed-wire fences, paint-removing acid baths, and undercover squads. The beginnings of the dancing, rapping, and deejaying components of hip-hop were bound together by the shared in which these art forms evolved.
The first major hip-hop deejay was DJ (Clive Campbell), an 18-year-old immigrant who introduced the huge sound systems of his native to inner-city parties. Using two turntables, he melded percussive fragments from older records with popular dance songs to create a continuous flow of music.
Kool Herc and other pioneering hip-hop deejays such as Grand Wizard Theodore, Afrika Bambaataa, and isolated and extended the break beat (the part of a dance record where all sounds but the drums drop out), stimulating improvisational dancing. Contests developed in which the best dancers created break dancing, a style with a of acrobatic and occasionally airborne moves, including gravity-defying headspins and backspins.
In the meantime, deejays developed new techniques for manipulation. Needle dropping, created by Grandmaster Flash, prolonged short drum breaks by playing two copies of a record simultaneously and moving the needle on one turntable back to the start of the break while the other played.
Sliding the record back and forth underneath the needle created the rhythmic effect called “scratching.” Kool Herc was widely credited as the father of modern rapping for his spoken interjections over records, but among the wide variety of oratorical precedents for MCing are the epic histories of West African, talking songs, jailhouse toasts (long rhyming poems recounting outlandish deeds and misdeeds), and the dozens (the ritualized word game based on exchanging insults, usually about members of the opponent’s family).
Other influences cited include the hipster-jive announcing styles of 1950s deejays such as ; the Black power poetry of, Gil Scott-Heron, and the Last Poets; rapping sections in recordings by and George Clinton; and the Jamaican style of rhythmized speech known as toasting.
Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Rap first came to national prominence in the United States with the release of the ‘s song ” ” (1979) on the independent African American-owned label, Within weeks of its release, it had become a chart-topping phenomenon and given its name to a new of,
The major pioneers of rapping were, Kurtis Blow, and the Cold Crush Brothers, whose Grandmaster Caz is controversially considered by some to be the true author of some of the strongest lyrics in “Rapper’s Delight.” These early MCs and deejays rap’s old school.
Who was the first white rapper?
White rappers. How many of us love them? To be a white rapper is a tough row to hoe in an industry with a complex overlay of cultural, social, and capitalist demands. Questions get raised: Are you real enough? Does your background matter? Is it harder or easier for you to succeed in the industry because you’re white? Did you just get signed because the record company knows that concerned white parents are way more likely to buy your stuff for their kids than the music made by some dark-skinned dude with diamond grills? Can you say the n-word? Should you? As hip-hop wrestles with its own rapidly altering identity — the kind of world where a street-verified Meek Mill can come for ex-urban Drake and see his own career nearly cave in as a result — it becomes more and more difficult to tell who has what right to be involved in what music.
Rakim, widely considered one of the greatest rappers of all time, once uttered the line, “It ain’t where you’re from, it’s where you’re at.” This is the keystone bar of a song, ” I Know You Got Soul,” that has become something of a manifesto for hip-hop culture. It’s about skills, not your background, Rakim seems to tell us.
You spit your rhymes, and that’s all that matters. If they’re wack, go back and practice until they aren’t. Where you come from, what you look like, is beside the point. (Which is precisely how it came to pass that Meek got eaten by Drake.) That some people interpreted Rakim’s words as a call to color blindness reflects the kind of idealism that characterized hip-hop in its nascent stages.
Even in 1987, when Rakim uttered that line, people were beginning to enshrine the idea of an earlier golden age when the genre — still bereft of big money deals and corporate intervention, and prior to the crack epidemic and its ensuing nihilistic carnage — was nothing more than a beautiful solution to poverty’s most pressing complications.
It was an urgent artistic expression magically created from the simplest of ingredients: turntables, microphones, spray cans, walls, cardboard. Crews were just as likely to battle one another with dance and rhyme skills as with gunplay and violence. The art form was driven by a high-integrity devotion to quality and discipline, or so the story goes.
- Who knows how accurate this idea of early hip-hop ever was? The fact remains that it’s still clung to today by academics and historians who have cemented a narrative of a music that does not see color.
- The irony for hip-hop is that its universal relatability is the very thing people use in order to deny what some others see as its spiritual center: self-determination for black and brown youth who are on the losing end of multiple oppressions.
As the genre grew from art to hustle to full-fledged industry, multinational corporations began to exert increased control over its products and direction. Protecting its cultural roots against the ensuing opportunistic influx became a martyr’s errand; so much so that Rakim himself felt it necessary to reframe his famous line, placing it in entirely different context on his 1990 single ” In the Ghetto “: “So I collect my cash, then slide / I’ve got my back, my gun’s on my side / It shouldn’t have to be like that / I guess it ain’t where you’re from, it’s where you’re at.” Rather than an open invitation for all into rap, the line is flipped into a necessary reminder of the genre’s dour beginnings.
And possibly a subtle dis at what it was already becoming. One wonders what Rakim thinks of hip-hop today. Jazz, blues, and rock were once genres invented by the black underclass that became white music over time. With the manifest popularity of contemporary rappers like G-Eazy, Macklemore, and Riff Raff, it’s not hard to imagine rap ultimately going the same route.
With that in mind, here is a condensed timeline of white rappers and their slow but steady movement into prominent positions of rap.1981 : The first-ever rap verse on MTV comes from a 36-year-old white woman who broke into the industry singing backup for a ’60s folk group called The Wind in the Willows,
- The song, “Rapture,” by new-wave outfit Blondie, also becomes the first Billboard No.1 hit to prominently feature rap.
- New York in the 1980s was home to a heady club scene in which downtown artists like Blondie earned stripes by “discovering” uptown trends like rap, break dance, and graffiti with origins in the South Bronx.
So common is this narrative that it’s the plot of hip-hop’s first movie, the 1983 indie classic Wild Style, which tells the class-anxious story of a Bronx graffiti writer whose work is made into downtown gallery art by an intrepid white journalist.1983: Rodney Dangerfield scores MTV’s second rap video with the novelty track ” Rappin Rodney,” The old man’s got hella bars and wordplay, but the main MC he murders on the mic is himself.
Highlights include “I was an ugly kid, I never had fun / They took me to a dog show and I won!” The song peaks at No.83. No one black has yet rapped on the music channel.1984: Enter Shawn Brown, who scores a minor hit with ” Rappin’ Duke,” another novelty tune based on the timeless question, “What if John Wayne were an MC?” Brown is black, but the comedic premise centers on the idea of a white man on the mic.
Years later, Biggie Smalls would shout the song out as a seminal rap moment in his own autobiographical debut single, ” Juicy,” “Rappin’ Duke” reaches No.73 on the Billboard charts, and black people gather around boomboxes, shaking their Jheri curls in laughter.
That’d be funny, we think, if white people actually rhymed,1986: White people actually rhyme. Fledgling label Def Jam signs The Beastie Boys, three refugees from a dying New York City hardcore scene. They get placed in front of a booming 808 and some sparse beats, and drop the classic Licensed to Ill, which breaks records, selling over 100,000 copies in the first week (with help from a distribution deal with Columbia) and reaching platinum status less than three months after its release.
The breakout hit is the straightforward rap-rock frat anthem ” (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Party),” but ” Paul Revere ” and ” Hold It Now, Hit It ” are accepted as bangers by New York’s black DJs. They open for Madonna, and, alongside Run-D.M.C.
on the Raising Hell tour, they elevate hip-hop’s numbers from niche to mainstream levels, conscripting entire swaths of suburban consumers into the genre’s legions of fans.1989: Queens duo MC Serch and Pete Nice debut as 3rd Bass, the first white rap act for whom whiteness is not at least in part an uproarious crossover gimmick.
Their opening studio effort, The Cactus Album, features legitimate golden-era rhyme skills and the same chunky James Brown cutups as their black contemporaries. Producers like Prince Paul (De La Soul) and The Bomb Squad (Public Enemy) sign on, lending them further bona fides.
- They later beef with the Beastie Boys on some “there can only be one” shit, and, in 2007, a post-retirement Serch hosts VH1’s The (White) Rapper Show, wherein he elevates the task of making sure white rappers proceed with proper respect into a spiritual pursuit.1990: Vanilla Ice, a.k.a.
- Robert Van Winkle, sets white people back 1,000 years by engaging in the most egregious act of perpetration since The Donation of Constantine,
The Miami “rapper” scores a huge hit with his very cool song ” Ice Ice Baby,” which he bases on an uncredited Queen–David Bowie sample mixed with a chant from Black fraternity Alpha Phi Alpha. (He would eventually pay Bowie and Queen, but not the frat.) He then takes his talents from To the Extreme to the screen, probably only narrowly missing an Oscar.
After rumors circulate that Mr. Van Winkle has liberally exaggerated his hood upbringing, he is toppled from the throne only to periodically reemerge, Lestat-like, throughout history as a better-than-decent nü-metal act, a reality-show heel, a real-estate guru, and an actual alleged burglar, (Ice reached a plea deal with Florida prosecutors, citing ” a misunderstanding,”) White people look deep into their souls and question their purpose, including Eminem, who famously stated that “Ice Ice Baby” made him want to quit rapping.
It is the first hip-hop single to reach No.1 on the Billboard charts.1991: The effervescently named Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch come through with just the kind of ” Good Vibrations ” white rappers need in their dark post-Vanilla hour. Mark Wahlberg, a.k.a.
The Shirtless Southie, steps out of his brother Donnie’s tepid New Kids On the Block shadow and invites “Black White Red and Brown” to feel the Vibration, forgetting perhaps that at least a few of those people had already felt his vibration long before he became famous. Nevertheless, the future actor and professional Face of Confusion strikes RIAA gold with this Eurodance/jock jam classic.
The song also finds its way to a Billboard No.1 spot.1992: House of Pain’s party hit ” Jump Around ” finally carves out a safe space for drunk racists to freely enjoy hip-hop. Black people use the song as an inverted North Star to determine precisely which clubs to travel in the opposite direction of.
- Professional sporting events are forever transformed.
- Later, Donald Trump plays the song at his rally and House of Pain front man Everlast jumps around in The Donald’s mentions,1993: MC Snow confuses everyone at once by being a White Jamaican Canadian rapper and dropping the wildly catchy ” Informer,” which presages both the Stop Snitching Movement and the Glasses on the End of the Nose Movement,
People laugh, but unlike a lot of MCs, Snow is about that life, serving time on an attempted murder charge while his breakout single is in postproduction. The song reaches No.1 on the Billboard charts and sells almost 2.3 million copies worldwide.1997: Limp Bizkit and Insane Clown Posse both make their major label debuts, ensuring that white kids have a form of rap that no one will try to horn in on.
Goatees gain spiritual significance. Millions of boys refuse to wash their flat-brimmed baseball caps for an entire year. Skechers and calf tattoo stocks go through the roof.1999: Marshall “Eminem” Mathers drops his first major-label single, ” My Name Is,” produced by N.W.A.’s Dr. Dre. Spitting under the alter ego of the drug-dealing, murderous, sexually violent, and downright sick Slim Shady, Eminem captures the imagination of a bunch of white boys and terrifies everyone else.
But his skills are very hard to deny. The song reaches No.36 on Billboard, and the Detroit MC would go on to record 13 top ten hits, and five No.1s (two of them with Rihanna), while also becoming the lone white representative in the greatest-rapper-of-all-time discussion.
- Early 2000s: “White Dude” supplants “Mentally Unstable Dude” as clique-based hip-hop’s hottest must-have accessory.
- The Wu-Tang Clan expands its ranks to include fellow Staten Islander Remedy, whose somber track ” Never Again ” marks both the beginning and the end of the short-lived Holocaust Memorial Rap subgenre.
Meanwhile, Three 6 Mafia lightens things up with the inclusion of the underrated Lil Wyte, who drops ” Phinally Phamous,” an impossibly dirty Dirty South anthem that would be used to test the bass on car stereo systems throughout Memphis and the surrounding areas.
- A few states over, Timbaland joins forces with future founder of country rap Bubba Sparxxx to gleefully embrace the uglier side of white rap.2004: Houston’s Paul Wall ice-grills the whole notion of a white rapper by simply being a white guy who raps.
- His debut, ” Sittin’ Sidewayz,” stalls at No.93 on the official charts but goes genuinely hard as a street classic.
He proceeds to drop a workmanlike eight studio albums, cementing himself as a mainstay of Houston rap. He also manages to avoid nearly all race-based controversy by simply being trill AF and ridin’ dirty alongside fellow Houstonites Slim Thug and Chamillionaire, nabbing three Ozone awards and a Grammy nomination in the process.2009: Asher Roth reclaims rap for people who aren’t actually part of hip-hop culture with the anodyne frat track ” I Love College,” Minivans everywhere bump this while the world struggles to solve the Inception -esque brain teaser: If you make a serious version of a Lonely Island parody, is that, too, a parody? 2011: Seattle comes hard, as Seattle is wont to do, when Macklemore & Ryan Lewis drop The Heist, a self-released album that goes on to dominate the charts on the strength of ” Thrift Shop ” and ” Same Love,” My then 8-year-old son declares Macklemore the greatest rapper to ever live.
I am disappointed to learn that an 8-year-old child is too old to abandon at the fire station. The Grammys, however, side with my kid, leading to the surreal 2014 moment when Seattle’s Illest sweeps the awards’ rap category and is thusly declared a better rap artist than everyone alive, including Kendrick Lamar.
Macklemore would privately text Lamar to say how bad he felt about robbing him, and then publicly post that private text to Instagram,2014: The Bay Area throws its five-panel hat into the white rapper ring in the form of G-Eazy, thus placating everyone who ever wondered what it would look like if an EDM DJ had bars.
Gerald Gillum’s tech-bro appearance and features on pop tracks like Aussie singer Grace’s cover of ” You Don’t Own Me ” garner him some side-eye from Guardians of the Culture, but the East Bay hustler scores a rare nod of approval from inappropriate grandpa Too Short, earning him a highly provisional hood pass.
Somewhere in Time: Riff Raff happens. No one knows what it is. No one feels OK about it. Everyone who makes eye contact with him develops a mysterious underarm itch within 24 hours. Ebro on Hot 97 famously goes for his jugular, but is widely declaimed as a hater and reverse racist for his efforts.
It’s Meek vs. Drake all over again for the first time. The only voice of reason is, ironically, Paul Wall, who a little while later goes on the show to kindly and respectfully back Ebro up, without actually dissing Riff Raff, proving once again that Paul Wall is the scientifically engineered perfect iteration of a white rapper.2016: Donald Trump emerges as the embodiment of everything wrong with white rap.
A man born into wealth and power screaming ” started from the bottom “; bragging incessantly about money, women, and dick size ; spitting battle verses at everyone who looks at him; and dropping too many terrible freestyles to count. Conclusion: White Rappers Must Be Stopped.
What is British rap called?
UK rap | |
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Stylistic origins |
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Cultural origins | Early 1980s, United Kingdom |
Derivative forms | Trip hop |
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UK rap, also known as British hip hop or UK hip hop, is a genre of music, and a culture that covers a variety of styles of hip hop music made in the United Kingdom, It is generally classified as one of a number of styles of R&B/Hip-Hop, British hip hop can also be referred to as Brit-hop, a term coined and popularised mainly by British Vogue magazine and the BBC,
British hip hop was originally influenced by the dub/toasting introduced to the United Kingdom by Jamaican migrants in the 1950s–70s, who eventually developed uniquely influenced rapping (or speed-toasting) in order to match the rhythm of the ever-increasing pace and aggression of Jamaican-influenced dub in the UK.
Toasting and soundsystem cultures were also influential in genres outside of hip hop that still included rapping – such as grime, jungle, and UK garage, In 2003, The Times described British hip hop’s broad-ranging approach:,”UK hip-hop” is a broad sonic church, encompassing anything made in Britain by musicians informed or inspired by hip-hop’s possibilities, whose music is a response to the same stimuli that gave birth to rap in New York in the mid-Seventies.
Who was the first black rapper?
Career – In 1979, at the age of twenty, Kurtis Blow became the first rapper to be signed by a major label, Mercury, which released “Christmas Rappin'”. It sold over 400,000 copies, becoming one of the first commercially successful hip hop singles. Its follow-up, ” The Breaks “, sold over 840,000 copies.
- He released ten albums over the next eleven years.
- His first album was Kurtis Blow, while his second was the top 40 pop album Deuce,
- Party Time featured a fusion of rap and go-go,
- Ego Trip included the hits: “8 Million Stories”, “AJ Scratch”, and “Basketball”.
- His 1985 album, America, garnered praise for its title track’s music video.
From this album, the song “If I Ruled the World” became a top 5 hit on Billboard ‘ s R&B chart, By 1983, he moved into production. He lived in Co-op City in the Bronx in the mid-1980s. Besides his own work, Kurtis has been responsible for hits by The Fat Boys and Run DMC,
- Run began his career billed as ‘The Son of Kurtis Blow’.
- Lovebug Starski, Full Force, Russell Simmons and Wyclef Jean all have been produced by, or collaborated with, Walker.
- Former label mates René & Angela had their R&B chart topping debut ” Save Your Love (For #1) ” was gift rapped by Kurtis.
- Walker produced, with Phillip Jones as co-producer and Dexter Scott King as executive producer, the song ” King Holiday “, celebrating the first Martin Luther King Jr.
Day, a U.S. federal holiday inaugurated in January 1986. He performed as an actor and in music coordination in several feature films including Leon Kennedy’s Knights of the City and the hip hop film Krush Groove, He was host and co-producer for Das Leben Amerikanischer Gangs (1995), an international film production focusing on the West Coast gang scene.
As host and associate producer for Miramax’s Rhyme and Reason, he gave an informative account of the status of hip hop, while he participated in the three volume record release The History of Rap for Rhino Records in 1998. Kurtis also co produced “Slippin, Ten Years with the Bloods” and won praises from Showtime for being the most viewed documentary in 2003.
Kurtis was recently a producer for the Netflix show, “The Get Down”. Kurtis has spoken out emphatically against racism. He was an active participant in the Artists United Against Apartheid record ” Sun City “. He worked with Rev. Jesse Jackson ‘s Operation Push and National Rainbow Coalition in Chicago and with Rev.
- Al Sharpton ‘s Action Network in New York City.
- In 1995, he started working on-air in radio, Power 106, the No.1 CHR radio station in Southern California,
- He hosted The Old School Show on Sunday nights, featuring hits from the past.
- He also worked for Sirius Satellite Radio on the Classic Old School Hip Hop station Backspin (Channel 46) from 2000 to 2004.
Beginning in 1996, Kurtis Blow was featured in a hip hop display at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, In the same year, rapper Nas debuted at No.53 on the Billboard Hot 100 with his version of Blow’s “If I Ruled the World”. The song went on to double platinum.
In 1998, the group Next released ” Too Close “, in which the music of “Christmas Rappin'” was sampled, ASCAP honored Kurt and Next at a gala affair on May 26, 1999 for having the number one song for 8 months. In 2002, he traveled to the Middle East to tour the Armed Forces bases performing seventeen shows for the troops.
In December 2014, Kurt was the Guest MC for the world premiere of The Hip Hop Nutcracker at New Jersey Performing Arts Center, a well received update of Tchaikovsky’s holiday classic. A national tour of the show was scheduled to launch in November 2015 with Kurtis Blow reprising his role as Guest MC opening the show.
The show has presently been up and running with 50–60 sold-out performances during the holidays. In 2016 Kurtis was unanimously elected as Chairman of the Universal Hip Hop Museum. The museum is slated to open in 2023 in the Bronx point section of NYC. In 2017, Kurtis formed “The Bboy Committee”, a group of 1st generation Bboys/Girls, who created the style of dance called Bboying, Rocking, and Break Dancing.
The members of the Bboy Committee are as follows: Trixie (Lauree Myers),RIP Wallace D, Dancing Doug (Douglas Colon), A1 Bboy Sasa, DJ Clark Kent (Tyrone Smith), the Legendary Smith Twins, the Zulu Kings and Cholly Rock (Anthony G. Horne), OG BGirl – Darlene Rivers, “Puppet” (William “Billy Bill” Waring), Darryl Solomon (The Mad Hatter), Kurtis Blow, Lil Cesar Rivas, and Shabba-Doo.
The committee is dedicated to the facilitation of the Bboy section of the Universal Hip Hop Museum. Kurtis became an ordained minister on August 16, 2009. As the founder of the Hip Hop Church in Harlem, Kurtis serves as rapper, DJ, worship leader and licensed minister. In 2016, Kurtis Blow appeared in a documentary on the evolution of hip hop, Hip-Hop Evolution,
Hosted by Canadian rapper and broadcaster Shad, the series profiled the history of hip-hop music through interviews with many of the genre’s leading cultural figures. The series was produced by Russell Peters, Scot McFadyen, Sam Dunn and Nelson George,
Does rap have to rhyme?
#2 Rap with rhythm and flow – It’s important to remember that rapping is much more than just saying a few words that rhyme, it’s just as much about the rhythm. A great way to get the feel for rhythm in hip-hop is by focusing on just the instrumental of the song.
- You’ll start to get a sense of how the words fit into the beat.
- The foundations of rhythm in rap are the syllables in your lyrics.
- Treat each syllable of a word as a beat to be synchronised with your instrumental.
- If your lyrics contain too many syllables then you won’t be able to fit it over the beat that you’re rapping over.
This can push rhymes out of place or make your flow sound forced and unnatural. With words that contain multiple syllables, some are emphasised and others that are not. When pronouncing words, we naturally emphasise a stressed syllable. It is good to identify the stressed syllables in a word as they are the most effective part of a word to use for rhyming.
Where is rap most popular?
Rap originated in 1973 from a legendary block party in South Bronx and grew to become one of the most influential styles of music in the world. Unsurprisingly, the biggest global audience for hip-hop music is found in the United States. The genre is so popular that in 2019, 52% of the top 100 most streamed songs were hip-hop.
- However, popular rap is far from exclusive to the U.S.
- Virtually every country has some kind of local variation of hip-hop with its own characteristics built from the genre’s American foundation in the early 1980s.
- This article will evaluate the key traits and top artists of hip-hop in the following five countries: Netherlands, South Korea, United Kingdom, France, and Nigeria.
Dutch Rappers The Netherlands typically isn’t the first country to come to mind when it comes to talking about hip-hop, but this genre is one of the most popular. Eight out of 10 of the most streamed artists in the Netherlands during 2018 were Dutch hip-hop artists.
Netherhop, what Dutch hip-hop is affectionately referred to as, started taking off in the mid-80s. Though before Netherhop could grow to be its style distinct from its American origins, the raps were in English, almost as if it was an imitation art. With time, Netherhop began to adapt to its new environment, which means stylistic changes.
Now, most of the lyrics are in Dutch with phrases and slang unique to the Netherlands. There are occasional lines or words in English sprinkled throughout some of the popular songs, some songs are even titled in English, but for the most part, the Dutch language dominates.
Netherhop also seems to have quite a bit of overlap with dance music and pop as evident by the high-paced beats in the background of the raps; this sound borders on electronic at times. This is due to the immense popularity of EDM and DJ culture particularly in the Netherlands which then influenced the way hip-hop in the Netherlands sounds.
Lastly, the subject matter of Dutch hip-hop often centers around pride in making money and taking care of business. Because of a focus on the prior, there is quite a bit of boisterous language and emphasis on objects the rappers have acquired with their wealth.
All in all, the themes in Netherhop aren’t much different from American hip-hop, but there is much difference in musical styling between the two. Ronnie Flex is one of the best examples of Netherhop and an excellent place to start exploring the world of dutch hip-hop. He is a seasoned rapper with a total of 9 singles that were number one on the national charts for weeks, and 18 other songs that were in the top 10 throughout his career.
Though the majority of Ronnie Flex’s popularity resides in the Netherlands, he is one of the most recognizable and appreciated Dutch rappers worldwide with fans ranging from America to Belgium. Ronnie Flex flirts less with dance music than his peers and gravitates more towards deep, slower beats.
His most popular album was Nori, but for less ambitious listeners, the songs ” Non Stop,” ” Wat is Love,” ” Drank & Drugs,” ” Plek Als Dit,” and ” Energie ” are good places to start. It may also be enriching to expand out to similarly popular Dutch artists like Lil Klein, Frenna, and Keizer, K-Hip Hop Following the same trend as other adaptations of hip-hop.
Korean hip-hop (or K-hip hop) started taking root in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Korean Americans were integral in this cultural exchange by bridging the gap between the two cultures. K-hip hop raps in English roughly half of the songs; there seems to be an even split between the two languages, more so than the rappers in other countries.
- Artists will use syllables that best fit their rhymes in both languages.
- This is partly due to the interest of younger generations, who are predisposed towards American culture.
- However, the content of K-hip hop tends to differ from its American counterpart.
- South Korea has extraordinarily strict laws against any kind of drug use, including marijuana, therefore—unlike in American hip-hop—there is no mention of drugs.
We also see the idioms and values of Confucianism as a reflection of the music’s primary audience: the Korean people. In recent years, there has been a blending of more traditional Korean instrumentals into the beats of K-hip hop. For example, the song ” EUNG freestyle,” a song that was so popular it reached mainstream America, features a traditional gong.
Orean hip-hop is also interwoven into the makeup of the extremely popular k-pop girl/boy groups. Every group has at least one member that raps on their tracks, and these groups (like BTS ) are so immensely popular that they are furthering the spread of k-hip hop inadvertently. One of the best artists to listen to when beginning your K-hip hop journey is Jay Park,
Fitting for having an album with the name Worldwide, Jay Park has global recognition with multiple albums reaching the top 10 for the Billboard’s World Albums chart. This is a significant feat when considering that the majority of music, especially hip-hop, that is recognized globally is in English.
- Beyond the global stage, he is incredibly successful in South Korea with millions of monthly streams and being a prominent judge in musical competitions like Show Me the Money 4 and Asia’s Got Talent.
- Jay Park is equally considered a hip-hop and R&B artist, and his work reflects this blend; on tracks, he will often rap at impressive speeds and sing smoothly.
However, if you are looking for the sound of K-hip hop specifically, his album Worldwide will best demonstrate these talents. Jay Park’s work reflects his upbringing in Seattle and his training with South Korean JYP Entertainment to be an idol: a solid blend of lyricism in both languages and culture.
His work has gradually shifted to reflect more and more American influence, this is largely in part of Jay Park becoming a full-time US resident where he has focused on making American projects with an American audience in mind. In fact, he has recently worked with famous American rappers like Rich the Kid, VIC MENSA, and 2 Chainz,
Jay Park continues to be known and remains distinct for his unique voice and the creative control he has over all of his music. Once he began his solo career, Jay Park intentionally remained independent from massive labels going so far as to found his own hip-hop and R&B label: AOMG ; this has given him much freedom in his creative pursuits and his style.
- Top songs that reflect Jay Park’s style and artistry are ” MOMMAE,” ” All I Wanna Do,” ” SOLO,” ” SOJU,” and ” DRIVE,” Other k-hip hop artists to explore are DPR Live, BIBI, and Sik-K,
- UK Hip-Hop Hip-hop in the United Kingdom is startlingly different from American hip-hop regardless of them both being performed entirely in English.
A clear, immediate distinction between Americans and Britons is their difference in accent. UK hip-hop consistently features a heavy British accent, which contrasts heavily with mainstream expectations of British singing (that audibly isn’t much different from American singing).
This heavy accent is a key part of the genre, so much so that a sub-genre of UK hip-hop called grime is distinguishable purely by the thickness of this accent. In tandem with the thick accent, the bass in British hip-hop is central to the music and incredibly heavy. In general, there is far less overlap between R&B and hip-hop in the UK than there is between American hip-hop and R&B.
These dark, gritty musical characteristics of British hip-hop match the weather. The majority of British artists also have particularly deep voices, while in the United States, hip-hop artists have a range of tones and voices they are known for. In this same vein, there is little variation or play with vocal tones in British rap; the focal point of this style is the rapper’s flow and lyricism.
- Content-wise, it is not much different from American hip-hop; the urban landscape of the UK, particularly London, with so many diverse groups of people makes hip-hop easily adaptable to the struggles of oppressed groups and the problems they face.
- Little Simz is a British MC to watch out for; she has put her own spin on this particular style while still staying true to the defining characteristics of UK hip-hop.
Her voice is relatively deep, a hallmark of British rap, and she has an exceptional flow. However, she not only experiments with intricate wordplay, but Little Simz also delves into sounds and influences uncommon in the world of UK rap. Her most recent album, Sometimes I Might be Introvert, had lots of old-school, black music influence from 80s R&B to gospel to jazz; it feels as if it’s an anthology of black music.
As we often see with hip-hop artists, Little Simz uses the genre to speak about her particular experience as a black woman born to African immigrants in the UK. Some of her songs, like ” Venom ” and ” Woman,” fearlessly unpack Little Simz’s experiences and feelings that can apply to women like her. This gives her music a depth that is sometimes lacking from rappers who focus on marketability instead of lyrical value.
Due to her unique sound and unapologetic raps, she has received critical acclaim in the form of praise and awards (AIM Awards: Independent Album of the Year, Ivor Novello awards: Best Album, NME awards: Best British Album, and BET Hip Hop Awards: Best International Flow).
- This last award demonstrates the extent of Little Simz’s impact which reaches far beyond the UK’s shores.
- Some songs to listen to in order to get a feel for her work without diving into an entire album are ” Venom,” ” Woman,” ” Selfish,” ” Introvert,” and ” 105 FM,” Other British rappers to watch out for are Digga D, Young T & Bugsey, and French the Kid,
French Rap France is the second-largest market for hip-hop in the world behind only the United States, so it is no surprise that French hip-hop takes a form of its own. French rappers share similar pains of growing up in impoverished, urban areas with gang culture that face racism and other forms of oppression.
- The adaptation of hip-hop to speak to struggle has been carried out by and large by the minority group that faces the most oppression in France: Muslim people.
- This makes the content of French rap incredibly similar to its American counterpart, where African Americans have used hip-hop platforms to speak out politically about their societal positioning since the genre’s inception.
Politically conscious content is often produced by artists in the South of France, particularly from the city of Marseilles. In the north rappers often directly confront themes of drugs, gangs, and poverty. In addition to speaking out about oppression as well as struggles, the easy-going, boisterous, and flaunting themes of money, sex, and status are also featured in french hip-hop.
- Additionally, French hip-hop has a noticeable amount of African influence (emphasis on bass and drums with upbeat dance music) due to their large Sub-Saharan African immigrant population.
- Because of this, African French rappers will often discuss their struggles with invisibility within french society.
Regardless of the heavy influence of American culture on French hip-hop, the lyrics are mainly in French. Often the only English in their songs are swear words or simply the song’s title. L’Algérino is an artist that embodies the style and content of southern French rap.
- As his name would suggest, L’Algérino is an Algerian, french-born artist.
- With historical context in mind, it would make sense why L’Algérino gravitated towards hip-hop to express himself.
- Algeria was colonized forcibly by France for 132 years, and during this occupation, the Algerian people suffered countless human rights violations.
L’Algerino gives voice to these struggles both to an Algerian and a broadly French audience. Namely the song “Algérie mi Amor” which discusses how tribes in the country are currently being killed and L’Algérino wishes he could save the people and country he loves.
- In representing his identity as an indigenous Algerian, he also incorporates Algerian and Chaoui (native languages to Algeria) into his songs.
- Though L’Algerino raps about other lighter topics as well like love, he is a revolutionary figure for Algerian artists by giving a voice to his people through music.
Top songs to sample his work are ” Algérie mi amor,” ” Excuse My French,” ” L’essentiel,” ” Hasni,” and ” Classi,” Other affluent French rappers to listen to are Booba, Niska, and Ninho, Nigerian Hip Hop Last but not least, Nigerian hip-hop. Hip-hop came to Nigeria as dance music with DJs in the 80s but became rap as we recognize it now in the early 90s with artists Junior and Pretty who infused local languages into their music.
- Then once hip-hop started playing on tv and radios, young people all over the country started getting into it and it began popping up in essentially every city.
- It is now such an integral part of Nigerian culture, that when searching Nigerian hip-hop there are multiple websites made by and for Nigerian hip-hop fans.
Hip-hop took root mostly in Lagos, the country’s capital, when Nigeria was under oppressive military control. The genre then became used as an outlet for these experiences. Similar to the content of hip-hop in most other countries, songs of general flexing of wealth and status persist.
However, Nigerian hip-hop is also prone to vocalizing scathing critiques of the government. This goes hand-and-hand with the origins of Nigerian rap being found in times of excessive political turmoil. Nigerian hip-hop is also known for having feuds between artists as a key feature of their hip-hop culture.
Stylistically, Nigerian hip-hop audibly sounds like it is influenced by traditional African music and instruments. Often the music has fast-paced, consistent drum beats that allow for dancing (a hallmark of African culture). And recently, Nigerian rap has begun to incorporate the native languages spoken along with English lyrics.
Every song will typically have English, Pidgin English, and another Nigerian language like Yoruba, Igbo, and Hausa. Burna Boy is an artist that unapologetically and masterfully fuses cultures in his music as one of the biggest Nigerian rappers with worldwide recognition. He was established as the Artiste of the Year at the Global Music Awards Africa.
And extending far beyond the borders of Nigeria, Burna Boy has won numerous accolades from the world’s most highly coveted award shows. His 2020 album Twice as Tall won Best Global Music Album at the 2021 Grammy Awards and he won Best International Act at the BET awards.
- Burna Boy makes an effort to address the black community globally through his music.
- In an interview with the New York Times he commented that his goal is to “build a bridge that leads every black person in the world to come together.” As you would expect from a musician with a goal to bring people together, his music is what he calls an “afro-fusion” of influences, ranging from traditional African music to R&B, and to (of course) hip-hop.
However, a hallmark characteristic of Burna Boy’s music is fast-paced drum beats. He also speaks in pidgin, English, and Yoruba; so while Burna Boy appeals to the global audience, he remains to make music that is identifiably and unapologetically Nigerian.
In speaking out to his global audience, Burna Boy tackles the many global misconceptions about Africa and African people as well as the collective black struggle against racism and exploitation. The following songs are good places to start in Burna Boy’s extensive discography: ” Ye,” ” Gbona,” ” JA ARA E,” ” Kilometre,” and ” On the Low,” Other Nigerian artists to listen to are Tekno, Kizz Daniel, and Wiz Kid,
In the same way hip hop was created as a response to the growing urban environment and lifestyle in the US, it has adapted itself to all the locations it spread to both in subject matter and style. This article featured rappers from a range of backgrounds and struggles that have appealed to their country’s audience in a variety of ways.
- While Burna Boy’s music appealed to the broader experience of Africans and black people as a whole in the world, Little Simz targeted her specific experience with sexism and racism in the UK.
- In contrast, hip-hop’s content can also be much lighter.
- Jay Park and Ronni Flex have a lot of fun with their music, and it’s clear their primary goal is to create songs people can dance to and enjoy.
Whatever the country, hip-hop can adapt to its audience to reflect their preferences and struggles seamlessly.
Who was the first female rapper?
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
MC Sha-Rock | |
---|---|
Birth name | Sharon Green |
Born | October 25, 1962 Wilmington, North Carolina, U.S.A. |
Origin | Bronx, New York, U.S.A. |
Genres | Hip hop |
Occupation(s) | Rapper |
Years active | 1977–present |
Labels | Enjoy Records Sugar Hill Records |
Website | MCShaRockOnline.com |
Sharon Green (born 1962 ), also known as MC Sha-Rock, is considered the “first female rapper” or emcee, Born in Wilmington, North Carolina, she grew up in the South Bronx, New York City during the earliest years of hip hop culture. Within the hip-hop community she has been referred to as the “Mother of the Mic” signifying her role as a prominent female figure among the early rappers.
- As a member of the first hip-hop crew to appear on national television, known as the Funky 4 + 1, her style of delivering raps on early mixtapes influenced notable rappers like MC Lyte and DMC (born Darryl McDaniels ) of Run-DMC,
- McDaniels cited Green as a significant influence on the style of rapping associated with the pioneering group.
In her lyrics, Green repeatedly referred to herself as the “Plus One More” of the Funky 4 + 1.
Why is rap so popular?
In America’s society today hip hop is one of the most listened to genres, despite it being one of the last genres to form. The music genre known as hip-hop originated in the early 1970’s, specifically beginning in the South Bronx of New York City. The hip hop genre is so popular because it is more than just a genre, it is a culture that has influenced America since the 1970’s.
The culture of hip hop has four elements involved in it. The elements are mcing, djing, break dancing, and the art of graffiti. These four elements together make up what we call hip hop. The four elements of hip hop and the aspects behind them come together to form a culture that primarily gave societies in America an outlet.
First and foremost, the hip-hop culture started in New York and had a huge influence on poor black communities. In July of 2018 Ian Lawrence gave a ted talk title “Why Hip Hop is World Culture”, Being from New York himself, Lawrence talks about how the hip-hop culture was created during a difficult time in New York.
- New York in the 1970’s was a very violent time, unemployment was high, gangs were forming, and drugs were becoming popular.
- At 8 minuets of the ted talk Lawrence explains how each element of hip-hop gave the struggling people of New York a way to survive these conditions that they were facing.
- He says that “rap songs gave stories and warnings, parties gave people outlets and murals gave people a voice.” The 1970’s of New York was a time of urban renewal, which caused a lot of troubles for the poor.
This wave of urban renewal was creating more housing but at the same time it scared off already thriving business. It started to force African American, Puerto Rican, and jewish families out of their homes. Leaving all the neighborhoods without any jobs.
People were forced to move to places like east Brooklyn and South Bronx where gang violence was very prevalent and attracting many people. In chapter 1 of Jeff Chang’s book Can’t Stop Won’t Stop he states that “If blues culture had developed under the conditions of oppressive, forced labor, hip hop culture would arise from the conditions of no work.” (13) Without any work due to the urban renewal the culture of gangs and violence began to form.
The culture that hip hop created became a way out of the gangs and struggles of the socioeconomics factors. The shortfall of the socioeconomic factors made employment for minors extremely low. Besides New York the rise of gang violence also hit Los Angeles from the 1970’s to the 1980’s.
- In the 1980’s the gang violence was growing thicker, mainly between gangs of the same ethnicity.
- As new generations of the gangs were stepping in, the law enforcement was struggling to maintain the violence.
- It was inevitable for people to join the gangs because they thought that was the only option that they had.
But hip hop gave them another option, a better alternative. The hip hop culture was growing, and people started to steer away from the gangs. Getting themselves involved in the culture of hip hop. With the four elements of hip hop there were countless activities that could occupy peoples time.
Some people stuck to one element while other explored them all. The people of the city found joy and happiness and turned the hip-hop culture into a lifestyle. It was a form of self-expression and something that they enjoyed doing. Each element of the hip-hop culture had a different effect on the people of America.
The element of graffiti had a huge impact on society. This was an uplifting thing for the underprivileged communities. In the 1970’s Graffiti was starting to become a more known and common among many people. Citizens of the city became fascinated and intrigued with the art and wanted to explore it.
The purpose of tagging was not to mark up the city’s property. It was to show the world who you were and what you represented. It was a way for people to let out their emotions and communicate how they were feeling or what they were going through. Many people who were apart of tagging didn’t realize how much it meant to the people that were doing the graffiti.
Each tag had a special meaning behind it that only the person who drew it knew about. It began to spread throughout America because of the advancement of technology. Photographers would see the graffiti on the trains and would be amazed, so they would take pictures to capture what they had just seen.
- It began to spread because tourist who are not from the area would see the graffiti, then send it to their people back where they’re from.
- This caused a ripple effect of graffiti getting the attention it deserved.
- Breakdancing also known as B-boying is an element of the hip-hop culture that targeting the kids in the city the most.
Many kids that got involved in B-boying came from poor urban communities living in the projects. The kids used b-boying has an outlet for them to express themselves. Dj Kool Herc, the Godfather of Hip Hop, was known has the best Dj. He was the best of the best at the time and brought a lot of people together with his music.
- The music he played at his parties moved people and made them want to dance.
- Dj Herc was able to use rhythm and beats to keep people engaged into the song. He knew.
- The elements of rhythm and beats makes hip hop so appealing because people can really connect to the music.
- Good artists know how to bring all these elements together like the rhythm, beat, tempo and lyrics to create music that will make people dance and bop their head.
The music and the art of b-boying correlate with each other because you can’t dance without a good sound that makes your body want to move. B-boying was a street thing and brought kids together. This was the culture of hip hop brought. It changed the lives of young kids in New York and kept them busy.
- It steered them away from the violence that was surrounding their communities.
- The element of rap has had the most influential impact on American society,
- Rapping first gained popularity in the U.S.
- In the 1970s as a kind of street art, especially among African American teenagers.
- Since the 1970’s rap music has been about storytelling.
In rap music there are many stories being told about the everyday lives of the rappers. To this day rappers tend to use their lyrics in a form of a story to tell the truths about their lives or what they are going through at the moment. A lot of rappers create poetic narratives with characters and settings, conflict, climax and resolution while also rhyming their words and making it flow to the beat of the song.
To this day rappers use a form of rap that is called political rap, This is where the lyrics are focused on what is going on in society politically. In 2017 Joyner Lucas released a single on November 28 th called “I’m Not Racist.” In this song Lucas talks about the lives about white and black people in America, and how there is a disconnect between the different cultures.
He raps from each side prospective including many stereotypes that society has formed about the two races. It raises the message of what America is like at the moment and how it is treating its people. The song is uncomfortable to listen to but needs to be talked about.
It creates a conversation that most people are too afraid to have. Joyce Lucas uses his platform as a rapper to use his skills to end the violence between whites and blacks. Joyner Lucas – I’m Not Racist – YouTube Joyner Lucas 5.68M subscribers Joyner Lucas – I’m Not Racist Joyner Lucas Search Watch later Share Copy link Info Shopping Tap to unmute If playback doesn’t begin shortly, try restarting your device.
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