IS RAP MUSIC KILLING HIP-HOP CULTURE?
On a fairly consistent basis I am asked by people a simple yet slippery question, "what is the difference between Hip-hop and rap"?
I normally give this short answer; Hip-hop encompasses an entire culture where as rap is the act of rapping or making words rhyme in the Hip-hop form. I also go on to clarify that rap music and Hip-hop music are not necessarily the same thing. For example, a McDonald's TV commercial comes on and there are two kids with baseball caps tilted to the side rapping about french fries and chicken McNuggets, is this Hip-hop music? I would definitely say No. Is it rap? Well, yes....they're rapping. This is my short answer to the difference between Hip-hop and rap.
Going a bit deeper into the question "what is the difference between Hip-hop and rap", I find it important to define what I mean by Hip-hop. In recent years different organizations have added to and adjusted the traditional four pillars of Hip-hop, and you may find different definitions online as to what constitutes Hip-hop culture. But traditionally (and what I follow) Hip-hop is made up of four main pillars; DJing, Grafitti Art, Breakdancing and Hip-hop Music aka Rapping. When speaking about Hip-hop and its culture this is the foundation I adhere to and when speaking about Hip-hop music I am referring to the music that was born out of this culture.
Over the last decade a gray area between true Hip-hop based art and corporate America has come into play and it has become increasingly difficult to distinguish the creative growth of the culture from the appetite of corporate America and it's search for easy money off of hit song's and breakaway artist's. Corportate interest in Hip-hop has definitely aided the popularity of the culture, pushing it into living rooms across the nation and around the world, but it is also responsible for making everything on the radio sound the same and for a limited amount of major label artist to have full (exclusive) access to all mainstream media resources.
Has the infiltration of big business into Hip-hop culture wrestled control of the culture itself away from the Hip-hop community and into the hands of company CEO's? Do the decision's that these CEO's make in reference to the music that they release and push to the public non-stop through all mainstream media channels, actually control Hip-hop? Is rap music killing Hip-hop culture? Voice your opinion!
CRISTOPOLIS
Thinking Hip-hop Emcee
hiphop@cristopolis.com
www.cristopolis.com
D.C. VISIONS, INC.
posted by CRISTOPOLIS at 10:39 AM
10 Comments:
I never realized that there was a difference between hip-hop and rap until now. Thank you for the much needed insight. It is really sad how the corporate machine has managed to take the art out of artists. The factory produced garbage is spreading like a disease into all genres of music. It breaks my heart to see uncreative people turn dreams into dollars. Artists must educate themselves in order to prevail.
AAAAAAAHHHHHHH yEEEAHHH!! REAL HIP-HOP IS NOT DEAD!!!
Hip-Hop is more positive than Rap. The mainstream Rap that is coming out today, I call it Pop-Rap because it's all of these one-hit rap songs that get played out on the radio. Examples of Hip-Hop Artist are: Common, Mos Def, and The Roots. They actually rap about different topics other than being more wealthly than everyone else and killing people.
true to that brother!!!
well put, i agree with your view, then again you know we're victims of what the market had done with the culture!!!!
and still we never give up the fight!
CRUZ
CRUZ CONTROL is part of the internationally recognized Hip-hop group "Reyes Del Bajo Mundo" -- Yes champ we definitely have experienced first hand the barriers and obstacles that corporate america creates for independent artists with independent ideas - but we are also on the cutting edge of the DO IT YOURSELF movement which independent artists around the world are embracing -- big ups to RDBM for being leaders in this area!!! paz.
For more background on the difference between Hip-hop and Rap, visit the blog "Commercial Rap is not Hip-hop" on Disco Poet Easy Tee's site:
www.myspace.com/streetlegalentallstars
Ive always understood the difference between hip hop and rap but these days it is hard to find the truth. It isn't that Rap is ruining hip hop it is that corporate america, big buisness( whatever you want to call it) is ruining rap which in turn is ruining hip hop. They want to standardize it when it is supposed to be about creating your own style. In doing this it has pulled away from hip hop because some how the truth has been hidden, THey have too much control. Hip hop is and has alway been very controversial but it seems as though overall hip hop ends up with the bad rep. People need something to blame and I notice that it is always easier for people to blame an art as controversial as hiphop in all of it's forms. Corporate feeds off of making hip hop a war game in which artists tend to come at each other or talk only about their topics in a derogatory sense. It seems that all they ever talk about is women, guns, and money. whatever happened to respect and positive vibes, just being able to get your opinion out in a positive way through the art of hip hop? People have lost sight of what True hip hop is really about and there are many artists out there that have the nerve to disgrace the hip hop name? Hip hop is a voice whether it was through grafitti, b-boying,djing or music, But now it has become a voice that won't reach the people it is supposed to get because it has almost become a joke. Don't get me wrong I completely support hip hop but i support the true hip hop artists the real thing not what it has evolved in to today. Hip Hop Is an art a true expression of peoples lives, feelings, a way of life, etc. I feel that people need to start being real and stop ruining it!!!
This is a dope topic.
I definitely agree with CRISTOPOLIS 100%.
The only thing I wanted to add on to that well-thought-out statement was something I think a lot of folks overlook.
Long Version:
The muddy difference between the music called "Rap" and the Cultural Overstanding called "Hip Hop" gives us a clear overview into the psychology of our generation in a way no other form of polling or surveying or consensus taking can ever hope to understand.
Hip Hop is the first genre of music born in the Information Age. We have a world understanding that is unlike our ancestors simply because we have the Internet. Our experience will be unlike any of our predecessors have had in their lives and because of this Hip Hop and Rap, whether it be positive rap or negative rap the essence of it all houses our collective mentalities in a way that will never be duplicated.
Like the Egyptian and Mayan Pyramids and many other forms of cultural beliefs and structures which have been methodically sought out and destroyed.
Because of the historic apathy to cultures borne of our specific demographic, and the massive clamor to understand it in a way that has, in the past, been buried as soon as it was discovered, it becomes personally imperative that we preserve this culture and not allow it do be diluted in an effort to "live well", or to "live in poverty"(I quote these because I apply them to a specific economic context and not to the likely unrelated mindset). The cultural sovreignty and creative control must remain in the hands of those of us who "rap" or any other form of Hip Hop Culural Exaltation for the love of the culture and not to provide ourselves what can be provided any number of ways.
That said, personally identifying with music as a way of learning onesself is an unreplaceable human experience and will cease to exist the more we capitalize on human expression.
Short version:
Teachers should make what rappers and make cuz I'd rap for $40K a year right now.
It's so refreshing to find a forum where people express themselves with such eloquence. In this "information age" a term coined by the last poster, there can be much time spent wading through the cyberspace garbage to find these diamonds in the rough.
What a nice way to end the week :)
Hey what a great site keep up the work its excellent.
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Greets to the webmaster of this wonderful site! Keep up the good work. Thanks.
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