Rap Music And Culture

Rap music has become one of the most distinctive and controversial music genres of the past few decades. A major part of hip hop culture, rap, discusses the experiences and standards of living of people in different situations ranging from racial stereotyping to struggle for survival in poor, violent conditions. Rap music is a vocal protest for the people oppressed by these things. Most people know that rap is not only music to dance and party to, but a significant form of expression. It is a source of information that describes the rage of people facing growing oppression, declining opportunities for advancement, changing moods on the streets, and everyday survival. Its distinct sound, images, and attitude are notorious to people of all

Rap music has experienced a radical increase in popularity in the last five years. In the year 2000, rap became the second-best-selling genre in music, capturing 12.9 percent of the year's $14.3 billion in total record sales ("Rap/Hip Hop" Sc 1). Though rap is no stranger to criticism, that criticism has increased in both quantity and vociferousness at about the same rate as the number of rap albums climbing the charts. And the growing evidence that, apparently, in order to achieve commercial success, each rap album must be more negative and offensive than the last does not help to address these criticisms.

Every day many kids of all ages are listening to a variety of music from rap like Migos to Oldies like Billy Joel. However, most teens predominantly listen to rap artist. Today there are a lot of terms or lingo that come from rap, therefore it also has a major input to how millennials are speaking today. Music today is the fastest growing art form in the world today and has been influencing people in different ways since the beginning of music. Kids today are listening to a lot of rap music and the artist has a big impact on how they see things. Even though some might disagree, rap music and artist are influencing this generation more than you think. While parents are worried that this music is making their kids more violent and rebellious,

Analysis of Hip-Hop and Youth Culture Throughout the last twenty-five years, a new form of expression has continued to evolve. Hip-Hop, once limited to urban music and dance has become a widespread form of communication exhibited and enjoyed by young people throughout the world. Hip-Hop is no longer limited to rap music and break dancing; today it represents a multi-billion dollar industry that influences everything from fashion to prime- time television programming, professional sports, mass media marketing and advertising. Today Hip-Hop is becoming a way of life, a culture that is intricately woven into every aspect of young people's daily lives.

In an industry, mainly controlled by high society white men, African-American musical artists are frequently regarded as commodities, not as artists. They must adjust a requirement for artistic control and "keeping" it real" with the impediments and weights from record organizations inspired by producing deals and massive appeal. Often the message and artistic integrity of rappers can be lost amidst national marketing campaigns and concern for approval by important commercial allies. Musicians have struggled to maintain rap's potency as a form of resistance and empowerment. It is doubly injuring for dark ladies who are now plagued by assaults from outside their groups to feel the push of musical knifes to their respect from inside. Apart

Hip-hop as a whole, consists of DJs, who make the beats and scratch records, rappers who rhyme lyrics to the beat, graffiti artist who use spray paint to make art on building walls, and breakdancing to the music. Shortly it advanced, serving as a platform for urban youth to discuss things they faced on a daily bases from their crime ridden neighborhoods to struggling for a meal. Hip-hop consists of many different styles and flows like bands like Public Enemy used militant style lyrics to uplift the black community and send political messages while artists like LL Cool J sang smooth love ballads boasted about his talent. Later came gangster rhymes that glorified murder, misogyny, and other topics of the sort. Groups like A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul use their own style on hip-hop with mellow flows over sophisticated jazz beats while rapping about culturally and politically conscious topics.

Music and society have always been closely related. For years now music has been apart of people’s everyday lives all around the world. Having so many different genres out there, it makes it easy to be appealing to so many different ethnic backgrounds. However, one type of genre in particular has seemed to grab the attention of a younger generation. Rap music has undoubtedly had its utmost impact on African American youth, since many of the performers themselves are African American. An overtly masculine culture dominates rap music and creates gender stereotypes that become abundantly popular to the youthful audience. Three constant themes that are found within the rap culture are encouragement of violence, the misogynistic representation of women, an extreme hatred of homophobia. Each theme plays a detrimental role in the process of defining black masculinity as well as shaping the values, morals, and beliefs that its younger audience adopts after tuning into this “gangster lifestyle”.

Today, many view this as just rap, but to fully embrace the variance between the two is to understand the difference. “Rap” is the musical sound produced by the art form of chanting rhythmically over a track of music. Contrarily, Hip-hop is not just music, it is a cultural movement that influenced America in positive ways. These positive influences are represented in the traditions, fashion,

The most popular and influential form of African-American pop music of the 1980's and 1990's, rap is also one of the most controversial styles of the rock era. And not just among the guardians of cultural taste and purity that have always been counted among rock 'n' roll's chief enemies--Black, White, rock and soul audiences continue to fiercely debate the musical and social merits of rap, whose most radical innovations subverted many of the musical and cultural tenets upon which rock was built. Antecedents of rap are easy to find in rock with other kinds of music. Music is often used to tell a story, often with spoken rhymes over instruments and rhythms. Talking blues, spoken passages of sanctified prose in gospel,

The rap genre originated from some of the most underprivileged areas of New York in the 1970’s. What was once DJ’s talking over a beat they were playing to encourage more activity on the dance floor, turned in to a new genre of music called rap. The majority of earlier rap songs were fun inducing tracks, but in the 1980’s, Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five introduced social consciousness to the genre. They sparked a long lasting impact on rap as it started to evolve rapidly as time went on. The 90’s was home to “gangsta rap,” followed by a softer side of song writing pioneered by the likes of Outkast and Kanye West in the 2000’s. Today, rap music is very diverse and more accepting of different styles than it was before. However, throughout the entire history of rap music, the one thing that has stayed

You’re standing in a crowd amongst thousands of fans at an Eminem concert, people from all over, shoulder to shoulder in a massive stadium, singing along every word of their favorite song for hours. People from all over are connected to each other through the power of music. When it comes to music, the life experiences, inspiration, and current events play a tremendously significant role. Hip hop is a form of art which can be expressed through rap songs, break-dancing, and graffiti art. The culture has become so popular that it has entered today’s fashion and modern language. Hip hop music is an extremely large part of today’s generation and a global genre, which influences the generation all over the world.

The impact music has on the life of people is very powerful. It can easily revamp the way people act and take control of people’s emotions. Rap music is a very common and popular type of music within the world today. Rap music has existed since the mid 1970s, nowadays it is practically everywhere. It is easily a central focus of many young people’s lives. Rap music was essentially intended to create a voicing of one’s frustrations and disappointment with society, it has recently taken a turn and is creating a negative impact on the youth. It is the root that influences and encourages degrading women, violence, and is filled with sexual content.

For many years, the youth have been known for singing along to their favorite song and taking that song as whole and using it as their motto for life. It may seem that sometimes these kids do not know what is being said in the music but this shows that they do know what the lyrics are saying. According to Franklin B. Krohn and Frances L. Suazo in their article “Contemporary Urban Music: Controversial Messages in Hip-Hop and Rap Lyrics,” many teenagers and minority groups view rappers as their spokesmen because of their ability to speak in street language and bluntly express their frustration (Krohn, 1995). Unfortunately, hip hop lyrics usually tend to talk about drugs, sex and violence leading kids to think that everything they hear is okay and that is how they have to live their life. Yet, there are artists out there who take their lyricist skills to give positive lyrics and messages in their music, but these songs are not often played in the mainstream.

Rap is a genre of music that has great history, songs, instruments, and rappers. The most used instruments in rap are drums and mix/sound boards. Rap music started when slaves would work in the fields and sing “call to answer” songs, where one person would sing part of the song and everyone else would answer in the next line. Nowadays, famous songs for rapping are “Lose Yourself” by Eminem and “Remember The Name” by Fort Minor. Famous rappers include Chris Brown, Wiz Khalifa, and Macklemore. Rap has an interesting history and popular songs.

First, the uniqueness behind rap music cannot be found in any other music. Because rap is lyric driven music, the speed and the pronunciation a rapper uses affects the outcome of the sound greatly. Also rap contains a lot of wordplay and figurative language that makes it complex and meaningful. The difficulty behind making a rap adds a competitive nature that most other genres do not