Thursday, June 19, 2014

A Brief History Of Hip Hop

By Todd S. Braun


Hip Hop is a cultural, musical and artistic movement that emerged in South Bronx, New York, around the early 1970s. Originally, it was popular in black and Latino ghettos of New York, but later spread quickly throughout the country and the world to the point of becoming a major urban culture. Hip Hop culture spans several disciplines: rap (or MCing), DJing, breakdancing (or b-boying), graffiti, beatboxing. These disciplines, appeared before Hip Hop and were integrated at the birth of the movement.



Two years earlier, a young MC named Schooly D launched his career. Although it was rather unspectacular, he earned a reputation with his innovative lyrics. At the same time, Gangsta Rap was accused of glorifying violence, rather than constructively tackling it. The group defended themselves mostly with the argument that they only simulated the conditions in ghettos.

Afrika Bambaataa was one of the DJs that were inspired by DJ Kool Herc. In 1976 he organized his first party, accompanied by a crew of breakers he called the Zulu Kings and Zulu Queens, and later the Zulu nation emerged from these crews. From 1976, Grandmaster Flash developed other important DJ techniques such as Cutting, back spinning and phasing (where the disk is spun backwards to repeat a specific section). This action resulted in a slight speed reduction generated by the velocity of two turntables, known as the phase effect.

Also worth mentioning is British Hip Hop, which produced its own brand of Britcore, as well as Brazilian Hip Hop, it introduced its own style, influenced by the Bass Music Rio Funk. In Africa, a diverse scene developed in the meantime, often in its search for American role models but also produces independent varieties of African Hip Hop. Hip Hop music can indeed take many forms: either limited to beats of DJs, in which case the term rap is not appropriate. The term rap, let alone Hip Hop, cannot be applied to slam.

Around the 1990s, artists such as Nas Illmatic, The Infamous Mobb Deep and the Wu-Tang Clan reached milestones for rap music and thus defined the East Coast sound. The Gangsta Rap had now taken the lead and the following years were marked by the feud between east and west coast (where the assignment was not always strictly geographical). The commercial rise of Hip Hop around the 1990s was still bullish.

The genre fits both continuity and rupture with black American music. It continuous manifestation as a distant descendant of complaints about the living conditions of African Americans in the Bronx, the tradition of improvisation appeared with ragtime and jazz, and musical dialogues (call and response).

Musically, it was in the second half of the 1990s that major innovations really happened. The beats became more complex, you could hear the influence of styles such as reggae and dancehall (raggamuffin Hip Hop), but also the old-school hip-hop and electro funk from the 80s. In addition, the style of Hip Hop continued to grow along with soul and R & B right through to the early 2000s, the influence again reached the normal pop music. Significant albums include Wyclef Jean (The Carnival, 1997) and Lauryn Hill (The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, 1998).

Although officially, neither the west or east coast had triumphed. The Hip Hop market was dominated by the presence of gangsta rappers of the West Coast, and their successors. Since the turn of the millennium, however, the dominance of West Coast rappers has fallen. In recent years, however, Detroit has drawn attention to itself. For the most part, the most famous representative is Eminem, the careers of other artists such as D12, G Unit, Obie Trice, Stat Quo, or 50 cents also enjoyed the limelight. Eminem was discovered by Dr. Dre, who now operates a branch in New York with Aftermath Records. Although this music in now mainstream, it took a series of underground Hip Hop producers to innovate and bring this music to popular prominence.




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