Who Gives a (What) About NYC Rap?
An era that I'll always love, but NYC rap can't live on its history anymore. Hip-hop is global.
QUICK!!!! What’s the last classic rap album from an New York City rapper? Chances are, you couldn’t even name one. That’s because the last one came out in 2003. 50 Cent’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’, holds true to the formula that binds all classic rap albums. They are all snapshots of the time and locale at which they are recorded and released. Nas’ Illmatic does that for Queensbridge from 1992 to 1994, Biggie’s Ready to Die for Bed-Stuy in 1992 and Big L’s Lifestylez ov da Poor and Dangerous does that for Harlem in 1995.
Who gives a f*ck about NYC rap? That’s right... I said it. The New York City rappers who carry the torch at the moment suck. Most of them are older than 30, former gangsta rappers now flaunting their wealth while waxing philosophical about their decades-old exploits. Think about it. Biggie, Pun, Stack Bundles and Big L are dead. Jay-Z is worldwide, and could give a Memphis Bleek about Brooklyn aside from the Barclay’s Center. Fabolous? He’s on Love and Hip-Hop, not pushing work in the Brevoort Houses. The Diplomats? Jim Jones is right there with Fab, Cam’ron is somewhere trying to find another protege to screw, and Juelz can’t feel a beat, much less feel his face. 50 Cent tried becoming an actor, tried becoming Floyd Mayweather’s best friend, is supposedly a Street King, and has gone from the ‘Next Big Thing’ to a sideshow. The LOX are too busy rapping about the same thing they’ve been rapping about for the past 15 years. While something can be said for steadfastness by some of these guys, Lil Wayne’s insult to New York was spot on if you’re referring to rap. Seriously, who gives a flying shit about NYC rappers? None of those guys I mentioned are selling or making classics. Nas’ latest offering, while incredibly sound and one of the better rap albums in years, won’t be breaking Soundscan records, much less working its way into the iTunes of anyone younger than 18.
No, NYC rap is far beyond the flash and bang of yesteryear. It’s 2012. Rap has already transcended what it was originally intended to convey. Block parties have been replaced by full stadiums. Boom-bap instrumentals have given way to Fruity Loops, dubstep beats, and complex orchestral arrangements. ‘Struggle music,’ while endearing at the lower rungs of the rap game, has a hard time catching on once you’ve stopped being ‘the next big thing'. Guns, selling drugs, and the like aren’t the reality that hip-hop can display anymore, especially now that the genre extends WAY past inner-city streets. One read of Steve Stoute’s The Tanning of America was enough to know that rap’s growth makes it a much more inclusive genre, and New York City isn’t immune from that expansion.
New York is a ridiculous amalgamation of culture. That’s what makes it special. Rap was a portrait of one of those cultures, but as rap has grown, I don’t think New York’s lyricists necessarily grew at the same rate. That’s why most rap bores me nowadays. Most doesn’t veer from the tried and true, no matter how silly and repetitive it gets. I’m tired of NYC rappers who all try to harken back to the days of Biggie and evoke the spirit of Illmatic and Reasonable Doubt. It’s 2012. Those days are over. NYC rap has to evolve. It has to encompass not only the poverty that many of its denizens encounter, but also the different cultures that they experience.
Acts like Action Bronson, the A$AP Mob, Phony Ppl, the Flatbush Zombies, Das Racist, Mr. Muthafuckin exQuire, Danny Brown, Kid Daytona and Joey Bada$$, to name a few, all have the talent to break through. But it’s their handle on the ‘New’ New York that gives them a leg up as we enter this next decade of hip-hop lore. From 1979 to 1982, rap was confined to New York City, having no outside influences to draw from, no external critics to detract from its greatness, and no flag bearers other than what the city itself crowned. Through hip-hop’s global growth, NYC rap has become a genre within a genre, a microcosm of hip-hop as a whole, complete with a history and a historical sound. The city’s rap scene can’t get by on it’s history. There has to be progression, not only in the culture, but in the sound. No amount of boom-bap nostalgia can make up for ten years of inaction, and no NYC rapper can refute any of these statements, no matter how much money or ‘acclaim’ they’ve acquired.