Why Hip Hop REALLY is Dead, and Why That’s Not Necessarily a Bad Thing

 

Hip Hop Progression 1990 – 2010 Note the blingage-per-person increases dramatically through the years

 

In 2007 when Nas declared that Hip Hop Was Dead, was he right? Its a debate that has split hip-hop-heads into those who agree hip hop today has sold out and lost all artistic credibility, and those who argue we’re just experiencing a new phase of the evolution of hip hop and everything is OK.

There’s also a third faux know-it-all group who often comment on a Lil Wayne YouTube video saying ‘hip hop isn’t dead bro, its underground!’ And then cite Binary Star – Masters of The Universe, an album which was released over a decade ago (It is, in fact, a really really good album, just a completely inappropriate example). There is an innate problem with this argument anyway, because if the only place we can find ‘real’ hip hop today is underground, that means that the mainstream, public image of hip hop today is all fake. It’s true, there is some good hip hop out there right now, as was there was some really bad hip hop in the good ol’ days, but it is the holistic, driving force of the genre that defines its position in music.

To state that hip hop is actually dead, we need to start by accurately defining hip hop as it was when it ruled airwaves and headphones during the 90s and early 2000s:

DISCLAIMER: I understand that this post completely contradicts the  whole theme of my blog, but 1) this topic is too pertinent to be ignored and 2) like I said, there still is some good hip hop out there today which I plan to continue covering. For example, Talib Kweli’s new album Gutter Rainbows, which I am listening to now and should have an album review up by this weekend.

Defining ‘Hip Hop’

From the late 80′s to about 2005, hip hop was defined by three  factors that helped to popularize it to a worldwide level and respected musical medium (I know, I know, hip hop started way back in the 70′s, but I’m just a youngin’ and find anything pre- Straight Outta Compton (1989) too choppy and gritty to listen to. Sorry, Eric B. and Rakim):

1). True hip hop artists rapped about their actual lives and experiences

2.) Hip hop was collaborative and constructive, not destructive

3.) How you rhymed and what you said mattered and production accompanied and emphasized lyrics instead of usurping them.

For example:

Freestyling is hip hop as its most basic level; artists feeding off the energy of the cypher (crowd) to deliver the most powerful and innovative lyrics they can think of over a simple break-beat, and it doesn’t get much better than this video of Biggie freestyle battling in his home neighborhood of Bedstuy Brooklyn. The most defining status of hip hop in its ‘Golden Age’ was how real‘ they were (Nas actually was dirt poor growing up in Queensbridge, Jay-Z and Biggie actually dealt drugs, Big L actually got killed over his brothers unpaid debt) and this shows through lyrics which serve as portals into their life experiences and struggles. Reality makes for great drama in any artistic medium, and when you mix in the extremely steep competition and limited chances of succes for rappers (Datpiff wasn’t around yet for EVERYONE to drop mixtapes on, back in the day you had to get signed or make a lot of underground noise to get hype), you create the fundamental brilliance that ushered hip hop into its explosion in popularity in the 90′s.

Hip hop during its ‘Golden Age’ operated as kind of a cult, due to the exclusive membership and up-and-coming success of the genre, and rappers formed a collaborative and constructive community in response. Wait, collaborative? What about Tupac and Biggie??? Aside from the twisted and exaggerated Tupac vs. Biggie battle (which I’m sure I’ll write about later), the majority of hip hop artists and music represents a collaborative and positive message. If you don’t believe me listen to some De La Soul.

The Brethren of Wu – Can you name all 9?

Probably the best example of this constructive theme is in the number of hip hop groups; Tribe, Wu Tang, Hieroglyphics, Pharcyde, duos; Outkast, People Under The Stairs, Dead Prez, Binary Star, and rapper-DJ combinations; Gangstarr, Atmosphere, Zion I etc. that were at the forefront in the 90′s and early 2000′s.

The most important point of all of what I’ve described as real hip hop is that it was what you bought at the CD stores (lol), saw winning Grammy’s, and heard on the radio.

So, What Killed Hip Hop?

As you can probably gather by now, today’s popular hip hop is somewhat an antithesis to the three factors which formed hip hop in the 90s. Instead:

1.) Today’s artists rap about what they think people will like and listen to.

2.) Hip Hop today is selfish and monetarily-based

3.) How you rhyme and what you say now is negligible, you’re usually singing anyway and the beat is too overcoming to hear you anyway

So, if real hip hop was so good, how did America let this happen? Aside from the natural evolution of music, which is affected by cultural changes and artists breaking through with catchy new styles of sound, I can think of a couple unnatural causes (ah I feel like Al Gore with global warming) which threw hip hop far off-course.

The Jay-Z Effect:

Vol. 1 In My Lifetime

Jay-Z has caught a lot of flak at about every stage of his career, from when he went mainstream after Reasonable Doubt, to biting styles and rhymes without remorse (Empire State of Mind is too eerily close to Nas’s NY State of Mind to be a coincidence), all the way to falling off after the Black Album. However, its his credit for practically defining the mainstream rap genre since 1998, and creating a persona which has been unsuccessfully copied for the last decade.

Think about it. While Jay-Z did not give birth to the braggadocio, mafioso rap style (Biggie did, and Hova always gets shit for biting it – again, it seems like nobody likes him), he perfected the ‘Money, Cash, Hoes’ mantra and basically invented swagger in his flow. He also highly popularized the solo hip hop artist and his rags to riches story is unmatched in rap, making him extremely marketable, and thus a perfect template for record labels to copy.

The problem is, there’s only one Hova, and the countless artists out there (really, almost everybody… Lil Wayne included) focus more on the image of being Jay-Z when they don’t have the same story, and neglect the lyrical style which was what made him so iconic. This is also why you don’t see many hip hop groups anymore (Young Money does not count, btw), its all about the limelight of the individual. Even on collabo songs today its 4 different guys rapping for themselves, no passing the mic around or building off each others lyrics.

Just to vent more about Lil Wayne.. Yeah, he’s very talented, but calling yourself the best out there and then spitting the final verse in ‘Milli’ (calling it a verse is giving him a lot of credit) is perpetuating the demise of legitimate lyricism.

The Internet

In the early 2000′s, the internet came in and basically mindfucked everybody and changed how we do anything, music included. Does the name ‘Tower Records’ ring a bell? What about the letters CD? Oh, the olden days…

Seriously though, the internet and Napster made music so free people get pissed off now if they have to buy it. Furthermore, it changed the way hip hop (and all music) was made, through the advent of mixtapes and YouTube. Mixtapes were the response for some already established artists to the disappearance of any revenue artists make from making an album, but for newcomers it represented an easy way into the game.

For better or worse, guess which one, mixtapes took less time to make, were released faster, and thus had to be catchy and immediately gratifying. This is instead of older hip hop from albums which was made through countless hours of precision to leave a lasting impression (I swear, I still hear something new everytime I listen to Illmatic). Literally, quality was thrown out for the newest, hottest song out. Hot, like a flash in a pan, these rappers on mixtapes had to have an infectious loud beat and a cool voice spitting swagger lyrics. The epitome, Drake, was an actor before he started rapping. An actor… the whole idea behind acting is that you artificially pretend your somebody else. Talib put it so perfectly on his last album when he said “lyrics been replaced with swagger”.

There are some other reasons for hip hop’s demise over the recent years, but this has become a super long post and this is the internet.. So I’ll let the Cunninlynguists and Masta Ace summarize basically everything I just said in their awesome song ‘Seasons’:

Why The Death of Hip Hop is Not Necessarily a Bad Thing

So after my long rant about how hip hop is dead and rap today sucks blah blah blah, now I’m telling you “not to worry its not that bad”. WHAT?? Well, like I mentioned earlier, music naturally evolves along with the times. While this ensures that great eras of music, like rock in the 70s or hip hop in the 90s don’t last forever, it also makes sure that bad eras of music (the 80s, anyone?) die the death they deserve too.

There’s definitely some good music out there right now, but its not found in hip hop. And I’m not saying I want the golden age of hip hop is going to come back, or that it should, but there are some good artists out there right now who have the opportunity to bring back some respect to the genre:

Kid Cudi                               Jay Electronica                             Wiz Khalifa                       MURS

Were counting on you…

 

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