Hip Hop – Gangster Rap

It was not too long ago that hip hop was created in the Bronx in the mid seventies. At its inception hip hop was little more then a positive way to express your feelings on a platform that would be heard throughout the country and in some cases the entire world. Hip hop despite having an aggressive stigma was not feared as it was mostly viewed as a bunch of teens having fun and expressing themselves. If it weren’t for the music and the movement known as hip hop, an entire generations feeling and beliefs would have passed by without being heard. While hip hop for the most part was positive, enlightening and self empowering on the east coast there were a bunch of youths on the west coast who also felt their struggles and views needed to be expressed.

Although the message that they were relaying on the west coast was not one that was positive at all it still fit the mold of hip hop in the sense that it was still a form of self expression. The two pioneers of hip hop in the west coast were a rapper by the name of Ice-T and a group by the name of NWA! Their version of hip hop was highly abrasive and vulgar yet they showed no remorse for it. The point they tried to prove was that hip hop much prefer all other forms of art is often a reflection of the environment that the performer lives in. They claimed that if your father wasn’t a part of your life and your mother was hooked on drugs that your reality would doubtlessly be diverse then that of a person who came from a better environment.

What has been once known as a peaceful movement had now became quite threatening to those in power. Politicians and police departments began to fight to have the music pulled off shelves and the performances of these controversial artist canceled. At this point in time in America, gang violence and police brutality were a major media concern. Hip hop artist began to produce violent music calling for the killing of cops and talked about shooting other’s who we’re not a part of their specific gang. Hip hop as we knew it had taken a drastic change and to make matters worse the music that has been so controversial on the west coast had now become the the majority popular form of hip hop. It would be titled “Gangsta Rap” due to the fact that those who performed it were either in a gang, affiliated with gangs or rapped about gangs.

Although many of us aren’t audiences of this aspect of hip hop it does not change the fact that this music is here to stay. we have to face the fact that not only was hip hop created to allow everyone to voice their opinions (no matter how crude or violent they can be ) but U.S. also created freedom of speech for this exact reason. Whether you view gangster rap as detrimental or supplemental to the hip hop movement the fact is the record sales say it all.