On the subject of emceeing, easily the strongest/most popular element of hip-hop, there is a significant generational divide which seems to be widening y the minute. The original hip-hop generation (early 80s) are arguing that, despite the huge amounts of money generated by rap’s current emcees, the music is all but devoid of any creativity or originality. One could make a plausible argument that all that’s needed to succeed in a career of emceeing in today’s industry is to know the right people who have enough money to market the emcee to death. Whenever a person can make songs like “chicken noodle soup” and “supaman” that not only get top-billing on the radio but also top the charts, this is when it becomes quite apparent that skill, originality, and/or street credibility are NOT necessary to succeed. Its just not that hard to get your music over-marketed nowadays; gone are the days when radio DJs played records that were dope BECAUSE they were dope. Now, they play the songs that certain record companies pay them to play. And only 2 or 3 record companies own pretty much all the artists so we wind up hearing a continuous shuffle of the same songs on all the radio stations. Again, all that’s needed is marketing.

Back in the day, an emcee had to prove himself/herself in the streets first; they were judged based on their lyrics and their DJs. Today, emcees seem to have forgotten (or maybe never knew) what the word “lyric” means. Furthermore, today’s rappers don’t even use DJs anymore; a slap in the face to pioneer DJs and emcees who have paved the way for these newbies to rock.

Now, on the flipside, many of today’s hip-hop fans believe there is a justification for the way things are; they call it “evolution”. The argument is that all “old school” music needs to stay in the past and that critics of today’s rap are “haters”. Critics are simply envious of the height of success reached by today’s rappers. Pioneers and old-school rappers are bitter because they’re broke.

Everyone is entitled to an opinion/theory, but lets break it down! First, the term “evolution” denotes the “advancement” or “improvement” of something. I think its quite plausible to argue that, in terms of lyrics, creativity, and originality-the founding principles of rap-going from Kool G Rap to Young Jeezy is hardly evolutionary in ANY sense! As far as all the “Old School” talk; well do rock n’ roll fans say these sort of things about their pioneers? Have you ever spoken to a rock fan who didn’t know AND have the utmost respect for The Beatles? Yet, out of 25 teenagers asked about their knowledge of KRS-1, only 2 claimed to have maybe heard of him. This seems a bit unacceptable.

Critics or so-called “haters” of today’s rap seem to just be very irate a couple of specific facts: 1) pioneers are not receiving their due respect for an art form they created and 2) today’s folks feel that an abundance of money justifies the total dilution of a sacred art form. These points seem like more than reasonable motivation for real hip-hop enthusiasts, not haters, to be pissed off.