I have to disagree about the statement you made about R&B, as I am an avid listener of this genre of music and I can clearly point out songs and examples of negative images that kids shouldn't emulate. I'm not saying it is all bad, but some R&B songs and get very raunchy and derogatory. Depending on who your listening to, you will also hear violence, and cursing. There are plenty of R&B albums that I would not play around my little sister. To us adults, you hear these songs and thing nothing of it, but when you hear a child singing it and not even realizing what they're singing about, that can be disturbing. I will say that Rap does tend to be more upfront and personal with the choice of words they use, but R&B can and does create negative images in a more subtle way.

 

^^^ Hey Chillaxin206, I, by my own admission, listen to very little of the stuff, so I accept that I could very well be wrong there too.
Too bad. I don't think music has to be like listening to Howard Stern...

Scott

 

Why do people think that "real" hip hop has to be all political and positive? Originally it was all about partying and having fun; calling out the crowd and getting a response.....it wasn't all that different than what Lil Jon does. Then KRS rapped about his 9mm going bang. NWA and the Geto boys took it to a whole new level, there is no way you can say that they're not "real hiphop". The “old school” isn’t all that different from today really. And just because Jay Z, Nas, Pac etc blew up and found mainstream success, does nothing to diminish the fact that they are some of the greatest of all time. Throw out their sales and their celebrity and judge their records for what they are.

 

I do agree thought, there is no music like "old skool", Its what my family listened to when I grew up so I know alot of that stuff. I, unlike alot of my peers knows that old skool is when music had a message and a meaning. Since then it has progressively gone downhill overall. Its sad to see how people sacrifice their artistic talents for the love of money. Rap is a great example of that (trying to stick to the subject). By no means do I mean all rappers, because I also listen to christian rap which has a message and a meaning behind it. It lacks all the drama of commercial rap. To me a good album is one that I would be able to play around someone as young as 5 to someone as old as 85 and not offend either or corrupt the minds of the youth. But with the current trend in rap music that would be something hard to do.

 

Well, you can have music with a "negative" vibe and not be foul-mouthed and XXX rated. Having lyrics based on cold-hard reality is great - some of the best music of all time is negative in some ways, but like was said above, I like music that's playable with any audience. F-bombing and using the "N" word are lazy to me. Having real talent to tell a story - positive or negative is what impresses me.
Even comedy has gone that way. Everyone now falls back on foul-mouthed "humor" which is often not funny or creative.
Time will tell. Good music of any genre and time will still be around decades from now.

Scott

 

For the folks that think music can "corrupt minds," I'd have to disagree. Minds are shaped by parents, family, friends, and community. I listened to everything from 2 Live Crew to NWA, and I turned out fine...lol Conversely, I don't beleive Christian rap will do anything to enlighten minds either.

Back to the topic....

Not all old school had a message and meaning, not all was conscious hippie rap, not all old school even meant rapping (what about electro?). Either some people have a glorified vision of old school hip-hop, or just don't have an idea.

Whatever you're definition of Old School hip-hop is, I think we can all agree that it is gone forever.. You know it's dead when people had to start talking about "keeping it real" or bringing back the Adidas track suits, etc...

Personally, I think hip-hop died once people started talking about the "4 Elements" (prob, around mid 90s) Once you try to define a movement or trend, it's over.

It's just like punk music. There are no true punk bands anymore, just people trying to recreate/mimic/ or charicature the punk style, but the attitude or state-of-mind is non-existent.

All new hip-hop is just rehash of what has been already done or said before wether it be mainstream or independant, it's just variations of style. Crunk, Hyphy, etc.. is just an updated Miami Bass - either sped up or slowed down. Every ganster/hustler rapper ranging from Biggie to Jay-Z to 2Pac owe it all to Kool G Rap. Etc., etc., etc....

Hope I'm making sense, I'm kinda going off the top of my head......

 

That's truth right there. Anything that starts talking about the "elements" is just corny.

I can't disagree on this either. A lot of rappers out there use vulgarity for the sake of being vulgar. It kind of sad, but it's accepted and probably won't change anytime soon.

The last truly original thing to happen to hip hop was DJ Screw.

Dude above me also motivated me to put on "Roots of Evil". That is a great album.

If your in to good music you should check out www.cookinsoul.com and download their remix albums. Those guys have some real nice production.

 

Just ran across this link: http://poplicks.com/2006/02/flashback.html

It's funny, people have been complaining about the commercialization of Hip-Hop since 1991..lol

 

For the folks that think minds are shaped by parents, family, friends, and community...I'd have to disagree. My mind has been shaped by many things, yes, but to limit it to those, or to even say some of those are not always the case. When I talk about music corrupting minds, you have to realize that #1 everyone who listens to muisc is not always intelligent enough to understand that alot of it is fake, and creates images of life that are untrue. I would say that this is more or less directed toward people in their youth. I've seen, worked with etc. many young people who get caughtup in the fame of the music biz and what these rappers are saying. Now, some of them shouldn't even be listening to it, but its not their fault it's their parents. Many of these young people see these rappers, and what they promote, which usually is violence, sex, drugs, etc., and aspire to be that or like that. There are people, believe it or not, who can be and are corrupted by things of this nature, because they develop a false sense of what it means to be successful, and that material things should be your desires in this world. This can be seen in alot of communities where you have people rollin' escalades on dubs, but can't even afford a decent place to live. The funny thing is that Rap these days only relates to its audience on a certain level, because all this bling bling, fancy cars, expensive trips that they so often talk about, their audience is not in a position to experience the same. I'm not saying everyone that listens to this genre of music is caught up into it, but there are those who are. It is not the only factor that goes into corrupting a mind, many things do, but it doesn't help break the cycle either.

I never used Christian Rap as an example of enlightening minds, I simply stated that it avoids much of the drama that other rap so often uses and promotes. Guarantee I will throw on any christian rap cd before I would a 50 cent, lil john, jay-z..etc. etc. etc. around my lil sis or my grandma. That to me says something.[/quote]

 

I think we are on the same page; we just have different ways of seeing it. I think we both agree that mental development is a result of many environmental factors. I am no psych/sociology major, but I just feel that for popular hip-hop imagery to affect a person so drastically, the mind must have already been "corrupted" or not had proper grounding in reality.