Hip Hop

Hip hop music is dominating the online and offline music charts. Hip hop music fans experience an “it’s about time” moment every time they turn on MTV, VH1 or any local radio station that doesn’t specialize in country music. Even urban channels that used to play only mid tempo rock music have diversified their rotations to include more hip hop music.

Why is hip hop suddenly everywhere?

Suburban Kids! They latched on the beats, nouveau riche lifestyle full of machismo and bling, and they latched on to the party. Hip hop might have started out as a companion to rap music, but today, the two musical genres are a world apart. Hip hop is funky, full of energy, dynamic, catchy, male, female, American, European, Asian and Indian all at the same time.

Modern hip hop is so dance friendly that frankly no cares about the lyrics anymore. I can name a bunch of up and comers in the field including Lloyd Banks, Ciara (or anyone else out of the Missy/Timbaland factory) and Chingy. Then, let’s not forget the 3 million people that make up G-Unit and D12. That’s pretty cool.

Now, can I name one verse of any song, by any of these artists? Of course not! These people are selling hip hop music for the club. If I hear even three seconds of a song from any one of them, I’m on the dance floor. Still, I can’t come up with two solid lines to any of their songs. Why?

Hip Hop Music Masters

Rap music was artist driven. Hip Hop music is producer driven. Producers are the ones who put together all the ingredients to get you the final product, a hit song. Since the rise of the producers starting with Missy and Timbaland in the mid 90’s hip hop music has gone mainstream.

The lyrics don’t matter much anymore because the meat of the music-- is in the music. Literally, the complicated arrangements, samples on top of samples, guest stars, wanna-be stars and more, all culminate into MTV ready hit songs.

It’s not that hip hop is not deep, or socially conscious. It’s just that it has a different lineage. Rap masters were the lyricists. Hip Hop Masters are non verbal communicators. This is the blessing and curse of hip hop music.

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That is why hip hop music is so present on radio, cable TV, and now, in the online world. If you think that modern hip hop is a bit much, perhaps you should try one of the streaming radio stations where you can select hip hop music from the 80’s and 90’s when rappers were still in charge. Get in touch with De La Soul and some of the other early hip hop pioneers.