Rap Blog
This is my 80’s blog. I had a choice of five genres to write about, which were:
- Rap
- Glam Metal
- 80’s Pop (an over view of pop music from the 80’s)
- New Romantics
- Two Tone
I have chosen to write about Rap. I will give an overview of Rap, from the origins, significant artists, musical and lyrical style, and where it went onto.
Origins
Rap originated in the east side of America in the state Pennsylvania, the roots go back specificly to the city of Philadelphia.
The scene would become a reaction against popular music at the time. The music industry was dominated by what could be described as ‘white peoples music’, specificly Rock music.
The black people at the time felt alienated, there was no music to call their own. By that time Soul music and the general Motown scene was dying out.
The Rap Scene Develops
The beginnings of the Rap scene started with parties that were generally known as ‘block parties’. These parties were held on public concrete slabs. A group would gather, bringing a generator and a P.A. system, seeing as these parties were not authorized, they were often shut down by police.
(an example of a modern block party, uploaded by ‘openbarmusic’)
Bands would play at these parties, but that quickly evolved into DJ’s bringing a set of decks, playing songs for people to dance along to. DJ’s would have a mic with them to introduce the songs, and to get the crowd going. However, with the evolution of decks, and the ability to switch almost instantly to another song, the role of getting the crowd going was passed over to a second person, known as an MC.
DJ’s started mixing parts of songs together, giving the MC a backing to rap over, this was how the art of rapping first started.
Commonly mistaken is that block parties only happened in Philadelphia, they in fact happened at various locations in America. It is also mistakenly believed that the only people who were rapping came from Philadelphia. In fact, a small number of groups were doing it in Britain as well. However, at the time, it was very underated.
Lyrical Style
The Lyrics in Rap can be defined as being confrontational, as is the vocal style. A trait that may have been inspired by the Punk scene of Britain in the 70’s.
Lyrics would commonly be of a social or political commentary nature.
An example of the confrontational aspects of Rap is the artist ‘N.W.A’, (it is known that the enitials stand for ‘Niggers With Attitude’). Their debut album ‘Straight Outta Compton’ caused a lot of controversy, due to the violent lyrical content of the album.
(‘Straight Outta Compton’, the lead single from the album of the same name by ‘N.W.A’. Uploaded by ‘Sohail7654321’.)
Some of the contempories of the scene include:
· Public Enemy
· Grandmaster Flash (know for their very political lyrics)
· Run DMC
MTV Controversy
When MTV started in 1981, it started off by only playing music by white people, which upset many black artists.
It was a couple of years before music by a black artist would feature on the channel.
The first black artist to feature on MTV was Michael Jackson with ‘Billie Jean’. This opened the door for many other black artists to appear on the channel.
('Billie Jean' by Michael Jackson, uploaded by 'HDOwnage')
Popularity Rise
As Rap started to hit the mainstream, white artists started to jump on the bandwagon. One of the most famous early all white Rap groups is the ‘Beastie Boys’.
The fact that the Beastie Boys were white didn’t change the lyrical content. The lyrics of the Beastie Boys were equally a social commentary as their black contempories.
Music videos would equally be a social commentary, an example would be the music video of ‘No Sleep Till Brooklyn’ by the Beastie Boys, which was a sly dig at the music industries tendancy of only playing Glam Metal, particularly MTV with music videos.
(‘No Sleep Till Brooklyn’ by the Beastie Boys, uploaded by ‘TheBeastieBoysVEVO’)
Despite videos being quite often a commentary of some kind, some artists had a tendancy to make videos humerous as well.
Rap Of Today
Although starting in the 80’s, Rap still has a big part in society today, with more and more artists appearing as the years go by (of both black and white ethnicity).
Some of the artists of today include:
· Eminem
· 50 Cent
· Timbaland
· Jay-Z
