Research Investigation

Does commercial Hip-Hop follow the same conventions as it did in the early years of the genre?

Hip Hop music has taken on a whole plethora of different images, ideologies and subject content, with new particular trends gaining popularity and others becoming less popular with mainstream audiences. Most music critics agree that "Rap’s rise and fall was inevitable"[1] and now rap is a vastly different form of music than it was in it's "Golden Age" [1]. At a first glance, one could assume that a lot of the conventions present in pre 2000s are still prevalent in contemporary music, but upon closer inspection it becomes clear that rap has evolved. While early hip hop music managed to keep the consistent theme of going through the struggle of living in rough areas and vividly detailing stories of violence, modern rappers are now branching out and talking about "taboo subjects like homosexuality"[1], which include Macklemore's 2012 song Same Love.[2]

My research investigation will analyse the rap genre's lyrical themes over the course of it's history, and specifically explore the themes of relationships, poverty and crime including drug usage. The two texts that I will be using to support my investigation are 'Straight Outta Compton' (1988), by former rap group N.W.A[3] and 'Long.Live.A$AP' (2013) by A$AP Rocky[4].

I will firstly analyse the lyrics of the two albums, analysing the main concept and the recurring themes within the songs and see how they compare against each other, which will give me an idea of how the content of the music has changed over the 25 years between the two bodies of music. Within this particular aim I will question if the lyrical content has changed, has it done so to simply gratify a more mainstream, mass audience. To do this I will apply Blumler ad Katz's Uses and Gratifications theory.  I will also analyse the promotional music videos that were produced for the albums, with a specific focus on the representation of women and any representation of crime. Lastly, I will analyse the music conventions themselves, including instrumentation and the post modern concept of hybridity.

Aim 1 - Lyrics

When the genre of rap was first formed, it was as a form of expression for young black men living in urban poverty stricken locations. The genre "did for poor blacks in America in the 1980s what reggae had done for the ‘sufferers’ in Jamaica a decade earlier. It got them noticed again and it helped to forge a sense of identity and pride within the local community"[5].

Since then, the music that served as an expressive medium to put out ideas that so many people had to hold in previously has "undergone changes that purists would consider degenerating to black culture"[6]. Although the late 80s and early 90s hip hop scene tended to be split geographically in terms of being located between the east and west coast of America, the lyrics tended to focus on a familiar subject matter: finding a way out of poverty. In New York, Nas' music conformed to these themes with his intellectual lyrics and rhyme schemes, for example this line in NY State of Mind: "It’s only right that I was born to use mics and the stuff that I write is even tougher than dykes, I’m taking rappers to a new plateau, through rap slow, my rhymin' is a vitamin held without a capsule"[7] and in Los Angeles, N.W.A were also doing this with their hard hitting, ruthless lyrics about police race discrimination and brutality: "You too, boy, if ya fuck with me, the police are gonna hafta come and get me, off yo ass, that's how I'm goin out"[8]. 

"You are now about to witness the strength of street knowledge"[9] served as the opening line to N.W.A's most famous record, Straight Outta Compton, and it instantly sets the tone for the entire album. It puts it bluntly that the material you're about to hear comes from years of living on the streets in a life of crime.  Compare that to a line from Long Live A$AP by Rocky: "On the road to riches, a diamond ring, designer jeans" and you can instantly see the changing reality of hip hop. Thirty years ago, hip hop lyrics expressed the desire to escape a struggle, and to a degree this is still prominent in some records today but the focus is more than often on the materialistic things that you can get if you break out of that struggle and make something of your life. With the change in the music, especially in the lyrics of the songs, it can be said that the reason that people listen to hip hop has changed over the years. Blumer and Katz's Uses and Gratification theory gives four reasons that somebody would consume a media; social integration, to get information, personal identity and escapism/entertainment. With the themes of inequality in early hip hop, it can be said that people listened to it mostly for information and social integration, with many early rappers talking about topics and issues that were generally not talked about by the masses; police brutality, racism, poverty etc. The rappers were essentially giving the underrepresented a voice, and it this gave the music purpose, with their lyrics holding strong meanings. Since the crossover of rap to pop music, a common convention that has come about is getting a singer to sing a catchy hook in the song, making it more accessible to mainstream audiences. Usually these hooks are relatively simple, for example, the most well known song on Rocky's record, 'Fuckin' Problems' has a hook repeating "I love bad bitches, that's my fucking problem" a few times. There's not much else to it, but it's a prime example of issues like degrading women, and a perfect case of song lyrics being simplified to gratify a mainstream audience.