so as the eighties progressed rapmusic became hip hop. rappin’ and this broken beat were all the rage and used wildly in a lot of pop productions (yeah, madonna used a public enemy-beat, too). as any emerging genre, soon there were countless sub-genres. early gangsta (we get to that later), conscious hip hop (i.e. “politically and socially aware” – we get to that later, too), the more pop oriented stuff and of course, after all that is where it came from, a lot of party tracks. the more, hm, vulgar ones (2livecrew), but then also the funny ones, like for example digital underground‘s doowatchyalike:
one of these party songs became a huge hit, and the longplayer it came from the first big selling hip hop record: i’m talking about beastie boys‘ you have to fight for your right (to party). an awful song, an awful record, and what made it really bad: there was no escape from it… ironically, and much commented on at the time, it was a white band having the first mega-selling hip hop record. after their initial success they started to make actually real good records – starting with the very funky paul’s boutique. here hey ladies from that record:
and while we are there, there is of course the later sabotage which is a great song and a great video – i wonder to this day if it was not only an ironic re-take of this tv-series, but also an ironic re-take of n.w.a.’s straight outta compton…?
so the beastie boys kept on doing good records and keep on doing that up to this day. if you want to have a listen how they sound now, here (link expired) a recording from the sonar festival in barcelona, spain, from this summer. for more information you can visit their website.
and what about the ladies? well, as early ones there are certainly two to mention:
first salt ‘n’ pepa – their song let’s talk about sex was a hit and at the same time sex-education – but i decided for today on push it:
and there was queen latifah – showing the early gangstas what repsect means with u.n.i.t.y.:
but there are not that many female stars in the hip hop-business. yeah, it seems that hip hop is more masculine and r’n’b being the rather female counterpart… well, i guess i would have to think about that more thoroughly. but then there is one female hip hop star i just have to mention. one that came a couple of years later but is kind of the female über-mc: missy elliott. highly successfull, making great records and having her own unique musical and visual style (musically also thanks to the collaboration with timbaland). here her first hit rain (supa dupa fly):
but let’s get back in time again. instead of mentioning more names and put even more videos up i would like to point out that to certain hip hop sub-genres that i will make separate posts. this post is just to give you an overview of what was around in general that i liked. and to give you a really good overview, i have something you can listen to. i mentioned earlier that i had a flatmate dj-ing also hip hop. after a birthday party where he was spinning all these favourite hip hop records i asked him to make me a tape with, well, all the stuff we liked at the time.
and here it is, hip-dabbi-dop-hop by alex from the summer of 1995.
more of the relaxed kind (no hard or dark stuff, musicwise), it is a great mix (musically as well as technically), including nearly all my favourites up to 1995: of course queen latifah, young mc, snoop dog, and so on – and of course jazzy jeff and the fresh prince with summertime…grin. so a highly enjoyable and easy mix.
get it here. and enjoy!
not sweating yet 