This week, when many people reflect on what they were doing the moment the Twin Towers fell that faithful Tuesday in '01, most won't admit that they were standing in line trying to be the first person on their block to get the new Jay Z CD but that pretty much sums up the collective attitude of Hip Hop during a 10 year period known as the "Era of Terror." It can be argued that The Blueprint had more of an impact on Hip Hop than the attack on the World Trade.
While the 9/11 attack sparked a "War on Terror" that would have a major impact on nations around the planet for decades to come, the effect on the Hip Hop Nation has been minimal, at best.
But was this a matter of apathy or fear?
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I can understand the views in this article and do believe there is a lot of truth to it. Many rappers have more so become endorsers of the "good life" than rapping about what is seen as reality. It seems as if rappers want to go with rapping about expensive cars that regular people with regular jobs will never be able to obtain and getting with different women all the time but not having to worry any type of diseases because that is what they fell is safe. Those are the songs that hit the top 10 on iTunes so they feel people want to get lost in fantasy rather than deal with life. So as long as those are the songs that make money then that's all we're going to hear while the songs with deeper meaning can continue to get lost as filler.
ReplyDeleteAn escape from reality is what attracts many to their choice of music. The events of September 11, 2001 were horrific and the devastation as a result could be construed as too dark to correlate with music of any genre. The admission that hip hop culture is more "materialistic" strays from the foundation of hip hop, but eludes to the evolving nature of the genre along with its followers.
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