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Is Hip-Hop Dying?: The Cyclical Nature of Music

© Steve Juon

Lately the word on the streets from the people who love hip-hop is that the music is dying; and some true heads may be genuinely convinced. Among the arguments that true hip-hop is dead:

1. Puff Daddy has become our number one representative in pop culture. Everybody wants anything Puffy touched, and while they all bounce to simple beats rehashed with Bad Boy MC's, heads get madder that creative production and clever lyrics are being totally ignored.

2. A variety of New York's highly anticipated albums such as A Tribe Called Quest, Boot Camp Clik, and Funkmaster Flex were somewhat dissapointing by all accounts. A variety of Los Angeles' highly anticipated albums such as Makaveli and Westside Connection produced much the same feeling despite commercial love.

3. The general trend of hip-hop artists doing R&B remix cameos and/or putting R&B flavored songs on their albums suggests to some that strong pure hip-hop alone can't survive in the marketplace.

Of course, what people fail to notice is that this has all happened before. In fact, it seems to me that every two years for the last 7, all the naysayers and ne'er-do-wells have gathered to proclaim hip-hop to be creatively and artistically dead -- which was followed by a sudden splash of good albums from old favorites or unexpectedly good new jack artists.

I admit to being disheartened by the oversaturation of the market in terms of hip-hop albums; I believe it confuses the consumer and lowers the quality of the content as a whole. Do we really need twenty different artists with their own albums on Suave Records, No Limit Productions, etc.? I'm not saying that overproductive = wack but there is certainly something to be said for quality versus quantity in a lot of cases when none of the new artists make a name for themselves or any kind of noise on a national level.

Time will reveal though. The seeds are already being planted by pioneering artists like DJ Shadow, Latyrx, The Last Emperor, and other new artists -- while veterans like De La Soul, Redman, and KRS-One have all released quality albums in the past nine months. What I suggest to those who really believe hip-hop is dead is that they should wait for what the cycle to come around again.

Peace, Flash

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