I think hardcore rap music became hip after I'd reached my prime as a music listener. And I'm not convinced rap's had all that positive a social influence, frankly. That said, I'm listening to it more today than ever, since my boys like hip hop.
See the Los Angeles Times, "Rhythm of the Street: Gangsta Rap Was a Ready-Made Soundtrack, and Its Words Grew Stronger Afterward":
The L.A. riots of 1992 arrived with its soundtrack in place. Sanctioned police brutality, a grim job market, gang life, a decimated school system, the toll of crack on poor neighborhoods and racial tensions were all being documented by West Coast rappers long before Rodney King's beating by Los Angeles Police Department officers was documented on tape. Inner-city kids were infusing hip-hop — a genre that arose out of the Bronx in the last '70s — with hard-core, L.A.-centric rhymes about gangs and the crack-addled neighborhoods around them.
"Even before the riots … voices in L.A. hip-hop were foretelling what was to come," said director John Singleton, whose 1991 film "Boyz n the Hood" was one of the first empathetic looks at South L.A. life for many Americans. "So many people who didn't grow up black and poor couldn't understand why it happened. You can live in a different part of L.A. and never understand that frustration. But if you listen to 'F— tha Police,' you hear where they're coming from."
The riots gave marginalized music from the hood a global stage and sudden mainstream legitimacy. The music born of the very conditions that precipitated the riots now transcended South L.A., and major labels began signing and promoting West Coast artists like Snoop Dogg and Tupac Shakur. For better or for worse, the Southland style that became known as gangsta rap changed the trajectory of pop music by becoming the '90s definition of cool.
For suburban fans who'd been consuming N.W.A's music as a race-music expression of white teenage angst, the televised revolution in L.A. made it clear that the lyrics weren't just outlandish fiction set to hard beats. They were rooted in bitter truths, a hard reality that L.A. was a two-tier city with gross inequities in both wealth and possibility.
One, two, three and to the fo'
Snoop Doggy Dogg and Dr. Dre are at the do'
Ready to make an entrance, so back on up
(Cause you know we 'bout had to rip shit up)
Gimme the microphone first, so I can bust like a bubble
Compton and Long Beach together, now you know you in trouble
Ain't nothin' but a G thang, baaaaabay!
Two loc'ed out G's so we're craaaaazay!
Death Row is the label that paaaaays me!
Unfadable, so please don't try to fade this (Hell yeah)
But, uh, back to the lecture at hand
Perfection is perfected, so I'm 'a let 'em understand
From a young G's perspective
And before me dig out a bitch I have ta' find a contraceptive
You never know she could be earnin' her man,
And learnin' her man, and at the same time burnin' her man
Now you know I ain't wit that shit, Lieutenant
Ain't no pussy good enough to get burnt while I'm up in it
(yeah) Now that's realer than real-deal Holyfield
And now all you hookas and ho's know how I feel
Well if it's good enough to get broke off a proper chunk
I'll take a small piece of some of that funky stuff
[Hook: Snoop Doggy Dogg]
It's like this and like that and like this and uh
It's like that and like this and like that and uh
It's like this and like that and like this and uh
Dre, creep to the mic like a phantom...
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