But some people simply think that as long as rhymes in songs existed, rap has existed. Some people say centuries before the 1900s, some people say in the 1920s and some people say in the 1960s. No one has really confirmed when rap started. However, these meaning were quickly forgotten by the media, as rapping is almost always associated with rhymes. Four centuries passed and the meaning was changed to "to strike, especially with a quick, smart, or light blow". Rap is a word that is speculated to be first used in 1541 simply as the meaning, "to utter sharply", in short. At first, rap didn't mean what it means today. Finally, if anyone is thinking that commercial radio is going to provide any hope here, then perhaps supporting your local university radio station is the best bet and the Internet can be of great help.Rap is one of the main genres of music. While it is true that despair is often a theme in punk, it can be avenue for social change as with Clash. I think that some people might want to live the tough guy life of a gangsta just as people used to want to live vicariously through another person’s existence. It wasn’t until I heard Michael Franti’s the Beatnigs which opened for Billy Bragg in Ottawa in 1988 that I begun to change my views on rap a bit. Some say I am a an elitist, but I think it is because much of the rap music I was exposed to was pretty boring or uninteresting. Rap and hip hop took a long for me to warm up too. I think white suburban kids like rap and hip hop because it feels like a different form of music and experience that it outside of their experience. I’m willing to bet that my fellow white hip-hop fans would agree.
I mostly find current rock depressing, but hip-hop makes me feel energized. For every one Biggie Smalls song like “ Suicidal Thoughts” there are ten like “ Juicy” or “ Unbelievable.” I wouldn’t say gangsta rap is happy, exactly, but it is very often triumphant, confident, and swaggering. Most gangsta narratives are about struggling against life in the ghetto, and very often winning out. Darker hip-hop sometimes deals in those emotions, but more often it’s about overcoming adversity. Punk, metal, alternative and indie rock are about anxiety, despair, depression, angst, alienation and self-loathing. Their respective fan bases overlap somewhat, but the emotional experiences are very different. I’ve thought a lot about the difference between gangsta rap and darker, angstier forms of rock.
#Gangsta rap made me do it meme movie#
The movie Office Space nailed this entire idea in just a few seconds of Michael Bolton rapping in his car. If you live in polite society, constrained by the rules of schools and offices, gangsta rap offers an imaginative release for your antisocial impulses, the same way rock used to back when it was dangerous. It’s the same vicarious pleasure as watching Tony Soprano or Don Draper. Gangsta rap is a fantasy of (mostly) masculine power: fighting danger, drinking and smoking pot at will, getting laid effortlessly, defying authority, getting rich without being chained to a desk. But listen I do, because why would I want to deprive myself of the music? I myself have been known to climb mountains and play the electric guitar, and the fact that GZA is directing his ire specifically at me makes listening to the Wu a complex experience. If you’re a teenager wanting to annoy your parents, there’s no better method than to blast the Wu-Tang Clan, especially if your dad is a mountain climber who plays the electric guitar. It’s also dramatically more offensive, but that’s part of the allure.
It has grittier beats, denser and more ambitious rhymes, more pointed political and social commentary, and darker humor. So why is gangsta rap cooler than Will Smith or Drake? The big thing is that gangsta rap tends to be musically stronger and more creative. It boils down to the fact that the suburbs are lame, and hip-hop is cool. So I think I have some pretty good insight into why white kids in the suburbs like hip-hop, especially of the gangsta variety. As an adult, I’m more centered and confident, and have resumed loving it. As a teenager, I succumbed to rockism, probably due to social pressure from our racist society, and pretended not to like hip-hop anymore.
My social circle included very suburban white kids and very urban nonwhite kids. I attended a very fancy school, but traveled there by public bus and/or subway through other tough neighborhoods. I lived in a posh little corner of an otherwise pretty tough neighborhood. My experience growing up was an odd blend of the city and the suburbs. I’m not from the suburbs, I’m from New York City.
A followup post to White People And Hip-Hopįirst, a little on my background.
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