Hip-hop music and culture were first created over fifty years ago in New York City. Over the decades, it would become one of the world’s most prominent music genres. And in the golden age of rap music, virtually all of it was created very thoughtfully and artistically, with well-crafted and meaningful lyricism. Now, much of popular rap music seems to be the opposite – what has changed?
Contemporary mainstream rap, or “pop rap,” gets its title because it has consistently been the most popular in recent years. The music is often made simply to generate streams or money, with little meaningful or artistic aspects. Additionally, it tends to lack some creativity and rarely experiments in production or flow. Some examples of this subgenre of hip-hop include artists such as Cardi B, Lil Baby, Gunna, etc. And in our age, mainstream music of most other genres is very comparable; but often even more repetitive and boring.
Pop rap, of course, is not objectively bad music, but you will often hear critics claim that all rap is simply low-effort, low-quality music. They might say that it’s all about money and drugs, or it’s too repetitive, or they might complain that it never incorporates “real instruments.” Some will even go as far as saying that it’s not music at all. This invalid take on rap music is likely a result of the illusion of mainstream rap representing the whole genre. And while complaints about rap music are nothing new, they seem to be more common than ever right now – even among hip-hop listeners.
In mainstream rap music, the lyrics and production might be repetitive, or require little effort. But the truth is, hip-hop is an ever-expanding, incredibly versatile genre. And so, while mainstream rap might not sound very artistically impressive at first glance, it takes little further investigation for one to find that hip-hop has the richest culture, history, and artistic aspects as any other genre of music. Plenty of very high-quality rap uses real instruments, incorporates jazz, experiments, pushes boundaries, tells stories, etc.
As an example, Baby Keem, Smino, and A$AP Rocky are all rappers – yet their style of music is incredibly different from one another’s, while at the same time all displaying incredible talent, originality, and musical ability; a stark contrast from the artists mentioned earlier.
This will lead you to the phenomenon known as conscious hip-hop. Conscious hip-hop is self-explanatory; simply put, it is rapping to either tell a story or to discuss specific topics. At one point in time, in hip-hop’s “golden age,” most of hip-hop was “conscious,” with pioneers like Nas, Ice Cube, Q-Tip, Black Thought, etc. whose lyrics had lots of substance to them. But over the years this form of rap has become less and less popular with the general public, leading to the aforementioned, “mainstream” or “pop” rap.
Although its popularity has declined through the years, conscious hip-hop is still very prevalent. A great modern-day example of this is the cousin of the formerly mentioned Baby Keem – Kendrick Lamar. Kendrick’s lyrics throughout his projects have delved into various social issues in America, as well as displaying his elite storytelling ability. Take his critically acclaimed 2012 album, good kid, m.A.A.d city, an album that tells the story of life in Compton. Throughout this album, his lyrics are economically selected, delving into social and political issues in each song. On his most recent album, he discussed his difficult childhood, his family’s generational trauma, his methods of coping with grief, the pressure of fame, and his desire for self-improvement.
Another good example is Joey Bada$$, a pioneer of the early 2010s rap scene, who typically raps about the emotional struggles of living in a world with lots of corruption and violence. Or Benny the Butcher, a Buffalo boom-bap rapper, who often voices his complaints of rap critics, and about growing up surrounded by poverty and crime in his music. His label-mate, Rome Streetz, creates vivid stories about drug abuse and the poverty cycle. J. Cole, one of the world’s most popular rappers, has whole albums telling stories and rapping about racism, political corruption, growing up without a father, and the prison system. Saba, who combines jazz, R&B, and rap in his music, is a Chicago artist who often writes about topics such as racial profiling, social classes, and the loss of close friends to violence. The list of young, creative talent goes on, including artists such as JID, Denzel Curry, Kenny Mason, Larry June, and more.
These “conscious” artists all contribute in their own ways to hip-hop culture – from progressing and experimenting with their sound to bringing difficult or unsung topics to light, to calling out the at-times-corrupted industry – and this is what conscious rap is all about. Their music is very reminiscent of the golden age of rap, an era in the 1990s in which essentially all hip-hop (popular or not) was very creative, introspective, and meaningful.
With countless sub-genres and innovative concepts such as sampling, record scratching, drum machines, and the constant shifting of popular artists – there is truly something in rap music for everyone. The styles of lyrics and production vary so much from subgenre to subgenre that they create a practically infinite variety in music. This is what makes the genre so unique from others, and this is why it is loved by so many around the globe.
