With Computers becoming more common, so is Hip Hop.
As a culture, Hip Hop has always been a product of technology. From turn-tableism to modern PC sequencers, Hip Hop’s always manifested from whatever current technologies are available. Depending on how you view it, this could be a good or bad thing. However, with the growth of technology becoming more apparent, has the accessibility turned Hip Hop into a burdened culture through it’s up rise of anyone-can-do-it rap artists and producers? Or has it helped Hip Hop in bringing it to a wider scale?
The originators of Hip Hop - or even heads who have been listening long enough - that Hip Hop started from “two turn tables and a mic”. This has been the goto quote for getting the message across that this culture started from few things, and blossomed into a multi-billion dollar industry. Even though that notion rings true, Hip Hop still started with the use of technology. What occured (if you haven’t already read here) was Bronx native, DJ Kool Herc started parties using two-turntables and a microphone; what set this apart as apposed to the normal block parties was Hercs use of “The Breaks”. What are those you ask? They were segments in a record that didn’t have the singer on them, these segments had much more percussion — they were considered the most danceable.
A classic Hip Hop track by “Black Moon”. It was released in 1993, off of their debut album “Enta da Stage”. The album is considered a “classic”, however it didn’t sell as well as expected due to being released around the time of other classic albums such as “Illmatic” and “Ready To Die”, with a slew of other big contenders.
Hip Hop has always been playing in my household, even in my youngest days I remember the classic ‘93 Till Infinity’ playing through-out my living room, or the classic ‘New York State of Mind’ track from Nas. However, I only thoroughly delved into Hip Hop (and its history) around 2004 (I’m still a youngin’). After I heard about KRS-One and the confrontation between him and Nelly I recall seeing mention of his ‘beef’ with Marley Marl and the Juice Crew; at this point I had no idea who the Juice Crew were, so I headed over to Google and searched with those tags in mind. Eventually, I came across a video in which KRS explained the ordeal and I slowly became fascinated with Hip Hop’s history. Essentially, from that point on I have been “studying” Hip Hop’s history and delving into classics that I either never heard as a child, or wanted to listen to for nostalgia sake; As it stands, I consider myself a “new-school” listener as I never grew up with the earliest Hip Hop music, but I felt that I owed it to this Art that I’ve fallen in love with, to understand it’s history. This is something that I feel a lot of new-school listeners disregard, and due to mainstreams ‘hot 100′ approach even more listeners have a lack of respect for it’s roots.
Before I get someone saying: “We don’t all have to know EVERY component to Hip Hop’s history like you do”, I want to concur. While I do not expect everyone to have a thorough knowledge base of its roots, I feel there should be some generalized regard towards them. There are several new-school listeners I know who have the mentality that “If it’s not on the billboards anymore, then it’s on my playlist’. Something I find to be completely ridiculous. I’ve also came across people who’ve had a more ‘hip-hop’ based sense of the culture, yet disregard the key figures (Tupac and Biggie only count to a degree).
