Gangsta rap is a subgenre of hip hop that reflects the violent lifestyles of some inner-city youths. Gangsta is a non-rhotic pronunciation of the word gangster. The genre was pioneered in the mid 1980s by rappers such as Schooly D and Ice T, and was popularized in the later part of the 1980s by groups like N.W.A. After the national attention that Ice-T and N.W.A created in the late 1980s and early 1990s, gangsta rap became the most commercially lucrative subgenre of hip hop.

The subject matter inherent in gangsta rap has caused a great deal of controversy. Criticism has come from both left wing and right wing commentators, and religious leaders, who have accused the genre of promoting violence, profanity, homophobia, racism, promiscuity, misogyny, rape, street gangs, drive-by shootings, vandalism, thievery, drug dealing, alcohol abuse, substance abuse and materialism.

Some commentators (for example, Spike Lee in his satirical film Bamboozled) have criticized it as analogous to black minstrel shows and blackface performance, in which performers – both black and white – were made up to look African American, and acted in a stereotypically uncultured and ignorant manner for the entertainment of audiences. Gangsta rappers often defend themselves by saying that they are describing the reality of inner-city life, and that they are only adopting a character, like an actor playing a role, which behaves in ways that they may not necessarily endorse.

Early Gangster themes

The 1973 album Hustler's Convention by Lightnin' Rod and Jaren Clark featured lyrics that deal with street life, including pimping and the hustling of drugs. The Last Poets member Jalal Mansur Nuriddin delivers rhyming vocals in the urban slang of his time, and together with the other Last Poets members, was quite influential on later hip hop groups, such as Public Enemy. Many rappers, such as Ice T and Mac Dre, have credited pimp and writer Iceberg Slim with influencing their rhymes. Rudy Ray Moore's stand-up comedy and films based on his Dolemite hustler-pimp alter ego also had an impact on gangsta rap and are still a popular source for samples. Finally, blaxploitation films of the 1970s, with their vivid depictions of black underworld figures, were a major inspiration as well. For example, the opening skit on Snoop Dogg's Doggystyle is an homage to the famous bathtub scene in the 1972 film Super Fly, while the rapper Notorious B.I.G. took his alias "Biggie Smalls" from a character in the 1975 film Let's Do It Again.

Origins: 1984-1990

Schoolly D

Philadelphia MC Schoolly D can probably be credited as the first rapper to use the word "gangster" in one of his songs. In his 1984 12" single "Gangster Boogie" he mentions it with "I shot call a with my gangster lean". He released the 12" single "P.S.K." (short for Park Side Killers) in 1985. In this song, Schoolly D makes direct references to his gang (PSK) as well as describing putting his pistol against another rapper's head. Schoolly D is often considered a pioneer in hardcore rap as well as gangsta rap. His fellow Philadelphian, Steady B, also helped pave the way for gangsta rap's popularity.

Ice-T

In 1986, Los Angeles based rapper Ice-T released "6 in the Mornin'", which is often regarded as the first gangsta rap song. Ice-T had been MCing since the early '80s. In an interview with PROPS magazine, Ice-T said:

Here's the exact chronological order of what really went down: The first record that came out along those lines was Schoolly D's "P.S.K." Then the syncopation of that rap was used by me when I made "6 in the Mornin'". The vocal delivery was the same: '...P.S.K. is makin' that green', '...six in the morning, police at my door'. When I heard that record I was like "Oh shit!" and call it a bite or what you will but I dug that record. My record didn't sound like P.S.K., but I liked the way he was flowing with it. P.S.K. was talking about Park Side Killers but it was very vague. That was the only difference, when Schoolly did it, it was "...one by one, I'm knockin' em out." All he did was represent a gang on his record. I took that and wrote a record about guns, beating people down, and all that with "6 in the Mornin'". At the same time my single came out, Boogie Down Productions hit with Criminal Minded, which was a gangster-based album. It wasn't about messages or "You Must Learn", it was about gangsterism.

Ice-T continued to release gangsta albums for the remainder of the decade: Rhyme Pays in 1987, Power in 1988 and The Iceberg/Freedom of Speech...Just Watch What You Say in 1989. Ice-T's lyrics also contained strong political commentary, and often played the line between glorifying the gangsta lifestyle and criticizing it as a no-win situation.

Boogie Down Productions

Boogie Down Productions released their first single, "Say No Brother (Crack Attack Don't Do It)", in 1986. It was followed by "South-Bronx/P is Free" and "9mm Goes Bang" in the same year. The latter is the most gangsta-themed song of the three; in it KRS-1 describes shooting rival weed-dealers after they try to kill him in his home. The album Criminal Minded followed in 1987. Shortly after the release of the album, BDP's DJ Scott LaRock was shot and killed. After this BDP's subsequent records focused on conscious lyrics instead.

N.W.A

N.W.A is the group most frequently associated with pioneering gangsta rap. Their lyrics were more violent, openly confrontational, and shocking than those of established rap acts, featuring incessant profanity and, controversially, use of the word "nigger". These lyrics were placed over rough, rock guitar-driven beats, contributing to the music's hard-edged feel. Eazy-E, an ex-drug dealer from the Los Angeles suburb of Compton, founded N.W.A. and Ruthless Records, which would become the premier gangsta rap label and an important force in promoting the new genre. Eazy-E's first single, 1987's "Eazy-Duz-It", which, like Schoolly D's "P.S.K.", dealt with gangland themes, was one of the most important early gangsta rap records, becoming an underground anthem for members of L.A.'s burgeoning gang scene, the Crips and Bloods.

The first blockbuster gangsta rap album was N.W.A's Straight Outta Compton, released in 1988. Straight Outta Compton would establish West Coast hip hop as a vital genre, and establish Los Angeles as a legitimate rival to hip hop's long-time capital, New York City. Straight Outta Compton sparked the first major controversy regarding hip hop lyrics when their song "Fuck Tha Police" earned a letter from FBI Assistant Director, Milt Ahlerich, strongly expressing law enforcement's resentment of the song. Due to the influence of Ice T and N.W.A, gangsta rap is often credited as being an originally West Coast phenomenon, despite the contributions of East Coast acts like Run DMC and Public Enemy in shaping the genre.

In the early 1990s, former N.W.A member Ice Cube would further influence gangsta rap with his hardcore, socio-political solo albums, which suggested the potential of gangsta rap as a political medium to give voice to inner-city youth. N.W.A's third album, Efil4zaggin (1991) (released after Ice Cube's departure from the group), broke ground as the first gangsta rap album to reach #1 on the Billboard pop charts.

Others

The New York rap group Run DMC is often credited with popularizing hardcore and confrontational attitudes and lyrics in hip hop culture, and were one of the first rap groups to dress in flashy, gang-like street clothing. Their stripped-down, rock-inspired beats were also important in establishing the early gangsta rap production style. The seminal Long Island-based group Public Enemy featured aggressive, politically-charged lyrics, which had an especially strong influence on gangsta rappers such as Ice Cube. East Coast rappers like Rakim, Kool G Rap, Big Daddy Kane, Slick Rick, LL Cool J, and EPMD also reflected the trend in hip-hop music in the late 1980s towards hard-hitting, aggressive, and politically-conscious lyrics, sometimes revolving around street violence, poverty, and gunplay.

Aside from N.W.A. and Ice T, early West Coast rappers include Too Short (from Oakland, California), Kid Frost (who was an important Latino MC), and the South Gate-based Latino group Cypress Hill. The L.A.-based group Above The Law, lead by Cold 187um, also played an important role in the gangsta rap movement, as their 1990 debut album Livin' Like Hustlers (released on Ruthless Records), as well as their prominent guest-raps on N.W.A's 1991 Efil4zaggin foreshadowed the gangster rap style of Dr. Dre's 1992 The Chronic.

1990-Present

Ice-T

Ice-T released one of the seminal albums of the genre, OG: Original Gangster in 1991. It also contained a song by his new thrash metal group Body Count, who released a self titled album in 1992. The group attracted a lot of media attention for the Cop Killer controversy.

His next album, Home Invasion, was postponed as a result of the controversy, and was finally released in 1993. While it contained gangsta elements, it was his most political album to date. After that, he left Warner Bros. Records. Ice-T's subsequent releases went back to straight gangsta-ism, but were never as popular as his earlier releases. He had alienated his core audience with his involvement in metal, his emphasis on politics and with his uptempo Bomb-Squad style beats during a time when G-funk was popular. He published a book "The Ice Opinion: Who Gives a Fuck?" in 1994.

G-funk and Death Row Records

In 1992, former N.W.A member Dr. Dre released The Chronic, a massive seller (eventually going triple platinum) which showed that explicit gangsta rap held more commercial appeal than pop-oriented rappers like MC Hammer. The album established the dominance of West Coast gangsta rap and Dre's new post-N.W.A label, Death Row Records (owned by Dre and his former bodyguard Marion "Suge" Knight), as Dre's album showcased a stable of promising new Death Row rappers. The album also began the subgenre of G-funk, a slow, drawled form of hip hop that dominated the rap charts for some time. Extensively sampling P-Funk bands, especially Parliament and Funkadelic, G-funk was multi-layered, yet simple and easy to dance to. The simple message of its lyrics, that life's problems could be overcome by guns, alcohol, and marijuana, endeared it to a teenage audience. The single "Nuthin' but a "G" Thang" became a crossover hit, with its humorous, House Party-influenced video becoming an MTV staple despite that network's historic orientation towards rock music. Another G-Funk success was Ice Cube's Predator album, released at about the same time as The Chronic in 1992. It sold over 5 million copies and was #1 in the charts, propelled by the hit single "It Was a Good Day", despite the fact that Ice Cube wasn't a Death Row artist. One of the genre's biggest crossover stars was Dre's protégé Snoop Doggy Dogg (Doggystyle, 1993), now known as Snoop Dogg, whose exuberant, party-oriented themes made songs such as "Gin and Juice" club anthems and top hits nationwide. In 1996, Tupac Shakur signed with Death Row and released the multi-platinum double album All Eyez on Me. Not long afterward, his shocking murder brought gangsta rap into the national headlines and propelled his posthumous The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory album (released under the alias "Makaveli") (which eerily featured an image of 2Pac being crucified on the front cover) to the top of the charts.

Mafioso rap

Mafioso rap is a hardcore hip hop sub-genre which flourished in the 1990s. It is the pseudo-Mafia extension of East Coast hardcore rap. East Coast Mafioso Rap is considered the counterpart of West Coast G-Funk rap during the 1990s. In contrast to West Coast gangsta rappers, who tended to depict realistic urban life on the ghetto streets, Mafioso rappers' subject matter included self-indulgent and luxurious fantasies of rappers as Mobsters, or Mafiosi. These stylized depictions translated to music videos that showcased rappers playing mobster roles. Kool G Rap is generally seen as the creator of the genre with his collaborator DJ Polo with Raekwon popularizing the genre with the album Only Built 4 Cuban Linx.... Other East Coast rappers, such as Nas, Notorious B.I.G. and Jay-Z began to take on the genre as well with their albums It Was Written, Life After Death and Reasonable Doubt respectively. One notable example of the genre came about in 1995 with the debut album from AZ entitled Doe or Die. Several songs ("Sugar Hill" and "Mo' Money, Mo' Murder, Mo' Homicide" especially) depicted self indulgent fantasies of living the high life and of the murder of a highly respected Mob Boss. For almost a decade, mafioso rap went out of style, but saw a resurrection when Jay-Z released his concept album American Gangster based on the film of the same name in 2007.

East coast gangsta rap and the East Coast-West Coast feud

Meanwhile, rappers from New York City, such as Kool G. Rap & DJ Polo (Live and Let Die, 1992, Black Moon (Enta Da Stage, 1993), Wu-Tang Clan (Enter the Wu-Tang , 1993), Onyx (Bacdafucup, 1993), Mobb Deep (The Infamous, 1995), Nas (Illmatic, 1994), the Notorious B.I.G. (Ready to Die, 1994), Big L (Lifestylez ov da Poor & Dangerous, 1995) and Raekwon (Only Built 4 Cuban Linx, 1995) pioneered a grittier sound known as East Coast hardcore hip hop. B.I.G. and the rest of Puff Daddy's Bad Boy Records roster paved the way for New York City to take back chart dominance from the West Coast as gangsta rap continued to explode into the mainstream. In an interview for The Independent in 1994, the Wu-Tang Clan's GZA/Genius commented on the term "gangsta rap" and its association with his group's music and hip hop at the time:

It is widely speculated that the ensuing "East Coast/West Coast" battle between Death Row Records and Bad Boy Records resulted in the deaths of Death Row's Tupac Shakur and Bad Boy's Notorious B.I.G. Even before the murders, Death Row had begun to unravel, as co-founder Dr. Dre had left earlier in 1996; in the aftermath of Tupac's death, label owner Suge Knight was sentenced to prison for a parole violation, and Death Row proceeded to sink quickly as most of its remaining artists, including Snoop Dogg, left. Dr. Dre, at the MTV Video Music Awards, claimed that "gangsta rap was dead". Although Puff Daddy's Bad Boy Entertainment fared better than its West Coast rival, it eventually began to lose popularity and support by the end of the decade, due to its pursuit of a more mainstream sound, as well as challenges from Atlanta and New Orleans-based labels, especially, Master P's No Limit stable of popular rappers.

Southern and midwestern gangsta rap

After the deaths of Biggie and Tupac and the media attention they generated, gangsta rap became an even greater commercial force. However, most of the industry's major labels were in turmoil, bankrupt, or creatively stagnant, and new labels representing the rap scenes in new locations sprang up.

Atlanta already featured established acts like Goodie Mob and OutKast, both of whom would achieve their greatest popularity in the late 1990s and early 2000s. More recently, Atlanta has produced successfully rappers like Gucci Mane, OJ da Juiceman and Young Jeezy. Jermaine Dupri, an Atlanta-born record producer and talent scout, got his break in the music industry when he discovered youthful pop rappers Kris Kross (Totally Krossed Out, 1992) performing at a mall, and would go on to establish a large roster of commercially successful acts on his So So Def label which, although mostly weighted towards pop-rap & R&B, included rap artists such as Da Brat (Funkdafied, 1994), and Dupri himself.

Master P's No Limit Records label, based out of New Orleans, also became quite popular in the late 1990s, though critical success was very scarce, with the exceptions of some later additions like Mystikal (Ghetto Fabulous, 1998). No Limit had begun its rise to national popularity with Master P's The Ghetto Is Trying to Kill Me! (1994), and had major hits with Silkk the Shocker (Charge It 2 Da Game, 1998) and C-Murder (Life or Death, 1998). Cash Money Records, also based out of New Orleans, had enormous commercial success beginning in the late 1990s with a similar musical style and quantity-over-quality business approach as No Limit.

Memphis collective Hypnotize Minds, led by Three 6 Mafia and Project Pat, have taken gangsta rap to some of its darker extremes. Led by in-house producers DJ Paul and Juicy J, the label became known for its pulsating, menacing beats and uncompromisingly thuggish lyrics. However, in the mid-2000s, the group began attaining more mainstream popularity, eventually culminating in the Three 6 Mafia winning an Academy Award for the song It's Hard Out Here For A Pimp from Hustle and Flow.

Midwest gangsta rap originated in the mid 1990's and rose to major prominence in the 2000s. Midwest Hip Hop was originally distinctive for its faster-paced flow. This is evident in the styles of the earliest Midwestern rappers to release albums, Chicago's Twista and Cleveland's Bone Thugs-n-Harmony. Bone Thugs, known for their fast, harmonizing vocals coupled with an ultra-quick rap delivery, would achieve major success with their critically-acclaimed 1995 album E 1999 Eternal, which featured a major hit in the Grammy-winning "Tha Crossroads." Detroit's Eminem broke through in the late 1990s with his well-received underground album The Slim Shady EP. In 1999, his major-label debut album, The Slim Shady LP became a major hit, and he would continue to have major success through the early 2000s, until he was apparently slowed by drug addiction. Royce da 5'9, born and raised in Detroit, is another well-known midwestern gangsta rapper.

Houston first came on to the national scene in the late 1980s with the violent and disturbing stories told by the Geto Boys, with member Scarface achieving major solo success in the mid-90s.

In the early 2000s Houston, also known as the "3rd coast", exploded into the forefront of Southern hip hop, with commercially successful acts like Mike Jones, Slim Thug, Lil Flip, Chamillionaire and Paul Wall. UGK now calls Houston home although they are originally from Port Arthur, Texas. UGK, which consists of Bun B and Pimp C (deceased), are considered Texas underground legends and have been enormously influential on southern hip hop since the 1980s.

The Chopped and Screwed genre was developed in Houston, Texas which remains the location most associated with the style. The late DJ Screw, a South Houston DJ, is credited with the creation of and early experimentation with the genre. DJ Screw began making mixtapes of the slowed-down music in the early 1990s and began the Screwed Up Click. This provided a significant outlet for MCs in the South-Houston area, and helped local rappers such as Big Moe, Lil' Flip, E.S.G., UGK, Lil' Keke and Z-Ro gain regional and sometimes national prominence.

Mainstream era

Before the late nineties, gangsta rap, while a big-selling genre, had been regarded as well outside of the pop mainstream, committed to representing the experience of the inner-city and not "selling out" to the pop charts. However, the rise of Bad Boy Records, propelled by the massive crossover success of Bad Boy head Sean "Puffy" Combs's 1997 ensemble album, No Way Out, on the heels of the media attention generated by the murders of 2Pac and The Notorious B.I.G., signaled a major stylistic change in gangsta rap (or as it is referred to on the East Coast, hardcore rap), as it morphed into a new subgenre of hip hop which would become even more commercially successful and popularly accepted. The earlier, somewhat controversial crossover success enjoyed by popular gangsta rap songs like "Gin and Juice" gave way to gangsta rap's becoming a widely-accepted staple on the pop charts in the late 1990s. For example, between the release of The Notorious B.I.G.'s debut album Ready to Die in 1994 and his follow-up, the posthumous Life After Death in 1997, his sound changed from a darker, tense production, with lyrics projecting desperation and paranoia, to a cleaner, more laid-back sound, fashioned for popular consumption (though the references to guns, drug dealing and life as a thug on the street remained).

R&B-styled hooks and instantly recognizable samples of well-known soul and pop songs from the 1970s and 1980s were the staples of this sound, which was showcased primarily in Sean "Puffy" Combs's latter-day production work for The Notorious B.I.G. ("Mo Money, Mo Problems"), Mase ("Feels So Good"), and non-Bad Boy artists such as Jay-Z ("Can I Get A...") and Nas ("Street Dreams"). Also achieving similar levels of success with a similar sound at the same time as Bad Boy was Master P and his No Limit label in New Orleans, as well as the New Orleans upstart Cash Money label.

A Cash Money artist, The B.G. and Lil Wayne, popularized a catch phrase in 1999 that captures the main focus of much mainstream hip-hop since the late 1990s: "Bling-Bling." Whereas much gangsta rap of the past had portrayed the rapper as protesting urban squalor, by the late 1990s mainstream gangsta rappers seemed focused on projecting an image of extreme affluence, materialism, and hedonism, with fancy jewelry, clothes, liquor, and women becoming frequent themes in gangsta rap lyrics and videos. Many of the artists who achieved such mainstream success, such as G-Unit and Jay-Z, originated from the gritty East Coast rap scene and were influenced by hardcore artists such as The Notorious B.I.G and Nas. Mase and Cam'ron are also typical of the more relaxed, casual flow that became the pop-gangsta norm. By contrast, gangsta rappers like Eminem and DMX enjoyed commercial success in the late 1990s by rapping about ever-more macabre tales of death and violence, maintaining commercial relevance by attempting to be controversial and subversive.

New artists have made the line between Gangsta Rap and Pop Rap much more visible, such as M.I.M.S And Soulja Boy, with lyrics that generally are meant to appeal to children, while other's such as 50 Cent and G-Unit attempt to appeal to both the pop rap and gangsta rap audiences.

See also

• List of gangsta rap artists

References

1. Gangsta Rap - What Is Gangsta Rap
2. Cam'ron on The O'Reilly Factor
3. http://www.ohhla.com/anonymous/schoolly/d/psk.scd.txt
4. Ice T Interview
5. http://www.ohhla.com/anonymous/boogiedp/cri_mind/9mm_goes.bdp.txt
6. http://jaydonscave.blogspot.com/2008/08/hot-drops.html
7. http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:u9axlfgehcqq

External links

• Keepin' It Unreal — by The Village Voice