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Hip Hop Music on The Whole

Early hip hop was an era of booming sound systems and American records of rap music. The history of Hip hop can be trailed back to the South Bronx where it first emerged in early 1970s. The African Americans and Latinos neighborhoods developed this culture in the early seventies as this was more than a way of life for them. The coloured people's unrest due to discrimination was vented by the way of Hip hop. With the advent of Hip hop, the gangster inspired neighborhoods and drug infested streets indulged into dance and artwork battle rather than inner-city gang's physical violence.

Not only did music battles take place but also hip hop battles and graffiti developed gradually. It was a beginning of sorts for a new Hip hop community to emerge. As hip hop music was developing, its predecessor, Rap music, had a great influence on the music style and it combined funk and R&B as well as poetry. It has complex rhythms, cadences, an intricate poetic form, and inventive wordplay. In late 70s, Kool Herc was one of the first rappers with simple rap at his parties, inspired from Jamaican tradition of toasting. Early rap music was influenced by disco but developments with sampling machines led to different music forms. Rapping also has its different styles and rhyming and delivery are also important in rapping. Mostly raps are about party rhymes and love, violence and sex and sometimes about social issues like police brutality, teenage pregnancy and racism, also materialism. Rapping is not only a male domain; even female rappers have made their mark.

With forerunners like Kool Herc and Afrika Bambaata, new styles like Toasting, Scratching and MCing evolved. This revolution of sort had its beginnings in Bronx, Brooklyn and every nearby area where the music jocks explored their creativity and ended up with a characteristically different funky music that gained fame among the clubbers. The word Hiphop was first used by all time favourite MC Love Bug Starski as a slang and a name for this culture in the 1970s. Indeed, this new cultural craze grew massively and began to be a major force in the world of music. Its catchy beats and rhythms drew such great and enthusiastic crowds each time DJ's were performing. It even got to a point when anybody who wanted a shot at stardom could crank out a Hip Hop beat and almost make it instantly. It was then that this lifestyle started to grow uncontrollably, especially with the introduction of breakdance and graffiti artists who were then the most interesting personalities of that period. The Old School Hip hop artists like Afrika Bambaataa, The Sugarhill Gang, Spoonie Gee, Treacherous Three, Funky Four Plus One, Kurtis Blow, Fab Five Freddy, Busy Bee Starski, Lovebug Starski, Doug E. Fresh, The Fat Boys, The Cold Crush Brothers and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, etc. exemplified the image, style and sound of old school hip hop. The golden age hip hop or the mid-school rap frames the 1980s while New school, with its advent around 1990s, associates with artists like Public Enemy, Boogie Down Productions, Eric B & Rakim, A Tribe Called Quest, Def Jam, Juice Crew, Busta Rhymes, Charlie Brown, Dinco D, ODB with other popular hip hop collective like the Native Tongues, Jungle Brothers, De La Soul, Wu Tang Clan, Kool G Rap, Outkast, Black Sheep and many more. The list now keeps on increasing as artists like Puff Daddy, Eminem, Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Kanye West, Linkin Park, Destinys Child, Missy Elliot and many others have joined the league.

Hip hop has not only developed as a music genre but also as a dance style, a dressing style, vocab and a culture in a holistic way. And it is not only about the Blacks; it has extended beyond East Coast and West Coast and America and has taken the world in its stride. The major spread of hip hop has been through such magazines, radios and shows which talk about hot records, fashion trends, touring schedules of various artists. It has risen from being a local culture in the streets of Bronx to an international, multi-billion dollar industry.

A part of the Hip hop culture is the Hip hop lyrics which have been the talk of the town since it was not even called hip hop but disco rap. Rap has been an integral element of hip hop and rappers would hold spontaneous rhyming battles verbally attacking their opponents, which was called freestyle and such aggressive words were spoken to a funky beat. The lyrical content evolved with time into more metaphorical and complex lyrics. Conscious rap, which is a sub-genre focusing on social issues and conflicts. Themes like religion, aversion to violence, economy, struggle of the ghettos decrying the poverty, violence, and dead-end lives of the black youth are included in conscious rap. The gangsta rap is more violent, openly confrontational, and shocking than those of established rap acts, featuring incessant profanity and resulting in controversies.

Controversies is a part and parcel of Hip hop and it is all dry and lackluster without juicy gossip and new "beef" doing rounds on the streets, specially when it is all about battles and warfare among gangs with disses and missions! It sometimes does happen that artists themselves spread wrong rumours for either their own publicity or some other hip hop artists. The artists themselves do such stuff to be in constant limelight. Nowadays, every statement made by any artists become news and based on that news, various interpretations result into new rumours. Any star seen with anybody else becomes the talk of the town and anything they wear becomes the latest trend.

Speaking of the latest trend, Hip hop fashion which is largely prevalent today is actually influenced by the Afro-American style of dressing where hip hop originated, originally in the Southern Bronx. Earlier in 1980s, disco influenced outfits were a rage but it slowly began to fade and the focus shifted to the African-inspired clothing with colourful shirts or oversized basketball jerseys, military baggy denims or cargos, Nikes and baseball caps was also a hit. The surge of designer labels and bling accessories was in late 90s which is ever-increasing with accessories for every body part.

Hip hop, with all its music, style and language, has become the most dominant music genre across the world and it is the origin of many sub-genres like country rap, conscious hip hop, alternative hip hop, avant-garde hip hop, chopped and screwed, christian hip hop, conscious hip hop, electro hop, gangsta rap, house music, mafioso rap, reggaeton etc. as a perpetual list. And not only the music or the lyrics, but even the videos of hip hop songs have become a rage. The way the films/ videos have been shot also helps the artist to shoot to fame. Most of the videos include the artists in branded clothes with chunks of funky jewellery, great cars, girls, and gang-wars with pistols and footage from their live concerts and much more. Some videos are inspired/ copied from other great videos. The all time great videos are Eminem's Not Afraid, We made you, Lil Wayne's Lollipop, Black Eyed Peas' My humps, Missy Elliot's Work It, Lose Control and many more.

EDM Artist, Nadel Paris is a triple threat; and accomplished singer, producer and writer. Her new remix album “Ooh La La La La” is now available on itunes and amazon; and features remixes by well known DJ’s including Ray Rhodes and Pascal French. To know about Nadel visit her here: http://www.nadel-paris.com/