Mass communication: Hip-hop
Interlopers in hip-hop and rap bring out diversification and authenticity in these genres of music. Henry Chalfant is an American photographer and videographer who worked on graffiti, breakdance, and hip-hop. His graffiti photographs are known to have appeared in New York galleries.
White flight in New York City in the 70s led to the neglect of the area by landlords, and decay followed in the streets, which caused an increase in gang activities. The urban renewal plan to construct the Cross Bronx Expressway led to the displacement of people of color further to the south areas of Brooklyn and Queens. Vacant spots as a result of this displacement served as perfect places to hold block parties from where the culture of hip-hop came about.
According to Jeff Chang, neglect and leniency from the New York Police Department enabled writers to paint the walls in the streets of south New York. There were graffiti writers in the many gangs in the south of New York. The writers would mark their clubhouses with writings as a form of marking their territories. There were also other graffiti writers’ crews who moved separately from the gangs and could slip in between the territorial restrictions. Eventually, the gang structures died, and a new era of graffiti writers was born.
Jazz is said to have provided a precedent for hip-hop music, which was initially associated with graffiti. The music instruments used in jazz music, such as the trumpet, saxophone, and bass, inspired the graffiti artists.
Charlie Ahearn is an American creative cultural artist who significantly contributed to hip-hop by filming local graffiti murals, and kids break dancing. He helped youth in New York make martial arts films, which helped introduce some artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Jeff Chang explains that when graffiti was viewed as street art, graffiti writers used their names to brand their work, and the quality and quantity of the writings determined their market share. Grafitti was no longer viewed as street art when the New York Times wrote an article on one of the graffiti writers, Taki 183, in 1971, and this resulted in competition and rapid style change. Tracy 168 is another graffiti writer whose graffiti words were used in a hip-hop movie leading to the transformation of graffiti from street art to high art.
Blondie’s Rapture was the first rap song to ever top charts for weeks in the United States of America. The song was vital as it combined elements of disco, punk, and hip-hop. Topping the charts rendered the new musical genre available to a new audience. The song was, therefore, instrumental in facilitating the transition to the mainstream.
Malcolm McLaren was an English musician, performer, and clothes designer who initially focused on hip-hop and world music, but later diversified to punk and disco. He used popular culture to market his music. Alan Lomax, on the other hand, was an American ethnomusicologist best known for his recordings in folk music.
The world music genre is considered a misnomer because it combines different styles of music from across the globe, some of which westerners find as ethnic, indigenous, and folk music. The composition of the different styles, therefore, presents the genre as misplaced.
Fab Five Freddy was a member of a Brooklyn based graffiti group in the 1970s. Therefore, when Fab Five Freddy was mentioned in the Blondie’s Rapture lyrics, the ideas of hip-hop is brought forward because graffiti was associated with hip hop and vice versa.
References
Chang, J. (2005). Can’t stop won’t stop: A history of hip-hop generation. New York: St. Martin’s Press