Originally Posted by Martian

Jumping on the 'let's not hate hip hop' bandwagon with :

A Musical History Lesson!

Back in the early 1970's hip hop was largely developed as an underground movement. The earliest days of it were very experimental and gave rise to the phrase 'poetry with a beat'. If you need a more recent point of reference, think ska in the nineties; underground, gaining a following but still hadn't broken into the mainstream.

The holy grail of hip hop at the time was to get into the top and this was done not by one of the established and respected artists (who, incidentally, did for the most part preach tolerance and understanding; KRS One is one of the few artists remaining from those days, give his stuff a listen if you need an example) but by an upstart group known as, drumroll please, Sugarhill Gang! Their upbeat and downright fun Rapper's Delight hit number 37 on US charts in 1979.

After that, hip hop began to see much more widespread recognition in the 80's, with a much larger following and several groups, such as Run-DMC, the Beastie Boys and the previously mentioned KRS-One broke into the mainstream with several top 40s hits. When you hear someone say 'I only listen to early rap' it's not uncommon for them to be referring to this sort of music, which more or less defined hip hop and was very fun and while not exactly preaching anything certainly didn't carry any real negative connotations. The worst that I can think of off hand might be Will Smith with Parents Just Don't Understand and I haven't yet met a single person who would say Big Willie's Styles are offensive. Not to that this is when there started to be a bit of a schism in the hip hop community, as the above mentioned artists and others brought out the radio friendly fare, while the underground 'beat poets' were still (and remain to this day) quite edgy and experimental.

All of this changed in the late eighties and early nineties. Rebellion in hip hop became huge and we went from innocuous Fight For Your Right (To Party) to NWA and Fuck Tha' Police. NWA, incidentally is by many considered to be the group that anchored gangsta rap (which later became the thug rap you hear today) in the mainstream. The acronym, for those interested, stood for Niggers With Attitude and it consisted of Dr. Dre, Ice T and Eazy E. After the group broke up and Eazy E was murdered, Dre and Ice T went on to make their own rather prominent marks on the hip hop world, Dre in particular starting his own record label and bringing us artists with buddha-like natures of love and understanding, such as Snoop Dogg and the infamous Eminem.

Which is largely where we sit today. I've heard the rise of gangster rap attributed to the poorer (and primarily black, hence the strong association between black musicians and hip hop) areas of cities like Detroit and New York. It was partially romanticized in movies like Boyz N The Hood and songs such as NWA's Straight Outta Compton.

Yup. That's my quick and dirty 3:00 am summary of how the rap you hear on the radio today came to be and why when someone like Mos Def or Kanye West says something like that about hip hop they're generally recognized to be referring to the 'underground' hip hop. Note too that this particular style is also quite prominently attributed to Great Britain, where I understand it's still very popular and not nearly as hard to find as it is around my neck of the woods.

I'm Alan Cross. Or I wish I was, anyway. Thank you and goodnight.