I grew up on hip hop. I'm not praying for its death, but I am hoping for a reinvention. With rare exception, it's been on a steady decline since the mid 90s.

Am not an expert in Hip-hop (as all of you know), but can we say that hip-hop lost it's soul when It ended being a form of protest and social awereness tool?
[Edited 2/7/07 17:41pm]

MikeMatronik said:

You're close.

1993 will forever be remember as the year the music industry started to take only one style of hip-hop more seriously as the biggest cash cow (gangsta rap), while the other styles (especially political rap) were reject from any further chances on FM Radio.

TonyVanDam said:

What artists were rejected?

Disco never really died.They just stopped calling it "disco".They now refer to it as "dance music".There are many songs from the 80s that would have been called disco if it had been released a few years earlier.

whatsgoingon said:

Exactly.The only thing that changed was the name.It's still alive,it's just not called "disco" anymore.Artists like Madonna and Jamiroquai are making music that would have been considered disco back then.These days,it's simply called dance music.Also,eletronica/techno is basically modern-day disco.

hip hop won't die if we get more people like k-os and ka'naan , as well as salt n pepa, whodini, public enemy, social conscious people like that.

Mara said:

The fact that many people claim that the reason that all of those white kids were burning disco records back in the day was because they were all racist is just so ignorant. Do you think they all hated disco music simply because the majority of the artists were black or latino? They hated that style of music is the bottom line. They loved rock music, which incorporated many elements of the blues by the way. They felt that disco was too soft and was taking all of the grit, drive and musicianship out of much of the music that you heard on the radio during those times. You even hear classic rock artists, who were all influenced by the rock and roll of Chuck Berry to the rock style of Jimi Hendrix, stating this about disco music as well. I just feel that all of those accusations about whites being racist were and are completely unfair and unjustified.

Mara said:

All of these statements by many people that white kids hated disco music because they were all racist is just so ignorant. Do you really think that the reason all of those kids hated disco music was simply because the majority of the disco artists were black or latino? They loved rock music, which was spawned from rock and roll and had many strong elements of the blues in them as well. They felt that disco was taking out all of the grit, drive and musicianship from music during those times back then. You will even hear many classic rock artists, who were all influenced by the rock and roll of Chuck Berry to the rock style of Jimi Hendrix, also state this about disco music. I just feel that all of these accusations about white kids dislike for disco as being racist, is completely unfair and unjustified.

PurpleJam said:

The irony is that many rock artists from this period were jumping on the disco bandwagon too.Rod stewart's "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy",The Rolling Stones' "Miss You",ELO's "Shine A Little Love",Kiss' "I Was Made For Loving You" are just some of the many examples of rock artists adding disco to their music.I think rock fans resented this.In their view,disco was becoming too big and taking over everything.That's really what the backlash was all about.

Btw,Bruce Springsteen,of all people,has defended disco music,saying that racism was at least one factor that led to the backlash.

SoulAlive said:

Well, I will have to disagree with The Boss on that one. To me there was no evidence at all to support this belief about racism. I would have thought that Bruce himself would have realised this also. If there was actually any form of prejudice towards this type of music, I would say that homophobia would have been a much more likely possibility than racism ever was. And as you know, white kids are not the only group of people to be known as being homophobic, as this extends to every ethnic group, whether white,black,latino or asian.
[Edited 2/8/07 3:07am]

PurpleJam said:

I agree,homophobia played a big part in the backlash.Many rock fans still refer to disco music as "gay" When 'Saturday Night Fever' came out,these folks were calling John Travolta a fag.It was ridiculous.I've always listened to all types of music and I never understood the need to segregate any of it.In the late 70s,I was listening to Donna Summer,Chic,The Bee Gees as well as Peter Frampton,Elton John and everything else.

SoulAlive said:

You are absolutely right. People should be able to enjoy and experience all types of music and to discover as many different sounds and styles as possible in the vast spectreme of music as they wish to.

PurpleJam said:

Once again, if you read The Secret History of Disco (which, folks, REALLY is a good and rich book by the way). The Disco Demolition Night and "Discophobia" is touched on. Racial slurs and INTENSE homophobia were mouthed by many of the 50,000 attendees that night in 1979 and it is documented.

Bottomline: Disco was seen as FAG music by those 50,000 kids at Comiskey Park stadium in Chicago. You're trying to downplay it by lightly saying they didn't like it because it was "too soft." It was an intense reaction AGAINST urban America, AGAINST an artform that orginated from a largely GAY, largely BLACK dance culture.

The backlash at that Chicago baseball, as SoulAlive, also pointed out was largely fueled by HOMOPHOBIA, SUBURBAN/URBAN tension (race plays a large part in that if you know the history of big cities and living patterns in post-war America).

Racism and homophobia didn't magically disappear after the Civil Rights Act was put into effect in 1965. You STILL had schools that were segregated as LATE as the mid-70s in really big cities like Boston. And, yes, 1970s Chicago had huge racial/social, hypersegregational problems at the time that Discophobia incident occurred and it should not be downplayed by Rock revisionists/Deniers who want to act like race and homophobia weren't factors.

Disco was still very much associated with urban "blight" (i.e. black, hispanic, minority submersion) and '70s dance and disco music was WILDLY pansexual and embraced a mixing of black, white, gay, latin, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual/transgender, etc. Drag queens, crossdressers, white and black gay men singing about the "YMCA." This was THREATENING to a white American ROCK male hetero fanbase. And that cannot be downplayed or diminished as you have done.

It was ALIEN.

And, if you're American, trust me, "Alien" *comes* with a loaded set of connotations.

SoulAlive said:

Even JB and Parliament/Funkadelic flirted with disco, because it was the cash cow of the moment. I didn't hate disco music. But like all trends, it got so commercial and stale...just like today's "shit" hop (per Vainandy).

Its really impossible for any form of music to die off. Disco went into Freestyle and then on to Techno, but the form still exists. As far as Hip Hop/Rap i think what is dying off is the "mega" selling machine, people have grown tired off the "chains,girls,cars and cash" videos, that form of hip hop i can see dieing off now. Rock had the same thing, Hair metal went to Grunge and then Grunge died quickly and now we have EMO which needs to die very soon. And then theres the power rock which still exits from its days in the 70's with bands like Styx and Journey to the 80's and on with bands like Jovi, now it seems things like Hinder and Nickelback and Fall out boy are what is called Rock? R&B i am most critical off because i always felt it was the most creative, but not anymore, like the article said, there are no more Blues in RB today. Jazz is said to be dead but someone better tell Harry Connick and Branford Marsalis whose new instrumental Jazz record is better than anything ive heard in Jazz in a long time. Some say Jazz went to new Age and then New Age branched over to things like Enya,Si Se,Enigma etc.. So everything really has its roots in something its just morphing into something new. But unlike some people who believe things are just as good, i dont, some times things are just better than others. So i dont think Hip Hop is dieing, the cash cow that labels banked on is dieing or dead at this point. Im glad the article focused on the wasted $$ that the labels cause with their needless promo and media, funneling millions into a project that barely sells a million. I read the other day that Timbaland charges 250,000 for a beat on a track, now just imagine him doing 12 tracks and how much that album costs, the artist would have to sell close to 10 million to break even with production and promo costs, things are gonna start to turn.

Excellent post.

As SoulAlive stated and as I have stated myself, the biggest part of it is because they saw disco as taking over everything and forcing rock out, especially since rock artists were making disco records also.

However, as for the racism part, there was definately some of that going on to. No, not all those white kids that hated disco were racist but many of them were because I definately heard the racial slurs about disco in my area from white people. There were even those that liked disco themselves and then turned against it once it was no longer considered "cool". Like Gloria Gaynor said...."If they hated disco so much, where did they get all those disco records to burn?". But as far as someone not being racist because they own some black music, that's not true either. Someone can like black music and still be very racist. I know because I heard the remarks.

Homophobia was a large part of it also. Just look at all the signs and the choice of words they chose to use for them....."Disco Sucks". Yeah, "sucks" over the years has become a common every day slang word but the way I used to hear the word being used in the 1970s was to compare something they don't like as being the biggest insult they could think of to them....a homosexual act.
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[Edited 2/8/07 10:53am]

Once again....excellent, excellent, EXCELLENT!

vainandy said:

LOL@ Shithop

I take it your more of a classic R&B fan huh? Do you at least like classic hip hop/rap, etc.
[Edited 2/8/07 13:45pm]

Yeah, I first got into music during the disco era and switched to the closest thing at the time after disco died, which was funk.

Yeah, I love classic rap from the early 1980s especially the uptempo stuff like "Planet Rock" that was even more uptempo than funk was. It was more at a disco tempo.

When Shitney Houston came along in the mid-1980s and "adult comtemporized" R&B and others followed suit, I got into house music, which was very disco-like. In the early 1990s, when funk was completely dead, I listened to house music and fast rap, both were at disco tempo until acid, techno, trance, or whatever the hell it's called took house music's place and it was actually too fast and extremely repititive.

I guess you could say that basically everything I have ever liked my entire life has all revolved around disco in some form or another and when everything slowed down and got as far away from disco as possible, that's when I really started raising hell!

I'm not the biggest Hip-Hop fan, but there's some acts that I like. And I feel there still is some good within the majority of bad stuff. I don't think it will or should end. But I think it does need some sort of kick in the ass. There's gotta be more revolutionary artists like in the days of Boogie Down Productions and Public Enemy.

Unfortunately the mainstream seems to prefer the kind of Hip-Hop that is not empowering to Black people (and people as a whole). They'd prefer the silly, misogynistic, and ultimately nihlistic aspects of the genre.

A major change will occur once we see less Lil' Jon's and more Dead Prez's.

Oh yeah, and Disco isn't completely dead since it lives on through House Music as well as Oldies radio.

But good house music that doesn't sound all acid/techno/trance or whatever is hard to find these days and on oldies radio you just hear the same old songs over and over with nothing new.

vainandy said:

Well, whatever the case may be, Disco as a name might be dead. But the music lives on in other forms of Dance music.

And as far as Hip-Hop, well that's not going anywhere. I'd just like to see more positive and socially/politically aware Rappers conquering the mainstream, like during the genre's "golden age".

I agree that it has a totally negative image and lyrics these days and needs to change. However, that's the last of my concern when it comes to change.

The number one thing that needs to change is the tempo, the weak ass sounding drum machines, and the fact that it's stripped down to nothing. It's supposed to be music but yet they strip everything musical off of it that they possibly can.

With no music behind it, rap is nothing but some thugged out poetry over a slow weak beat. Instead of dominating radio, they need to have their asses up in one of those smokey ass nightclubs that people recite poetry, wear all black clothes, wear shades, and beat on bongos.
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[Edited 2/8/07 14:38pm]

vainandy said:

You're right. Forget Hip-Hop. New Wave should be the dominating force in music today. But one can dream can't they?