Celebrated, controversial & influential 30 years of hip-hop music

Ebony, June, 2005 by Kevin Chappell

In the 1990s, there was a native-tongue movement with De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, the Fugees and Queen Latifah ushering in a more eclectic, artistic and poetic period. It was also during this time that the hip-hop industry created wealthy Black CEOs like Russell Simmons. "If it weren't for Russell Simmons, I wouldn't be in the game," Bad Boy Entertainment CEO Sean (P. Diddy) Combs said in a 2001 EBONY interview. "He gave the blueprint for hip-hop ... He taught us that you can go out there, get your money and be yourself, and you don't have to put on your tap-dancing shoes."

In addition to Combs, CEOs like Master P, Jermaine Dupri and Damon Dash have followed in Simmons' footsteps. During the same time Blacks were making inroads into the business world. Artists like Queen Latifah, LL Cool J, Will Smith, Ice-T and Ice Cube transformed hip-hop beginnings into multimillion-dollar acting careers. Even kids like Lil' Bow Wow and the pre-teen duo Kris Kross got into the act.

Today, artists from cities like Chicago, Houston, Miami, St. Louis, Philadelphia and Oakland have emerged, as well as a host of artists from the South. With any type of musical beat considered fair game, hip-hop artists borrow sounds from such sources as Israeli folk music, bebop jazz records, and television news broadcasts, and take their subject matter from a wide variety of topics. "There are a lot of reports out of Iraq about soldiers rhyming outside the barracks about the war," George says. "There is a whole community of MCs who are developing out of the GIs there. In a year or two, when some of these guys come home, it will be interesting to see how many of them are going to make rhymes about the war."

Last year, hip-hop came full circle as the music once cast aside as mere noise earned the country's highest honor with the hip-hop duo Outkast garnering a Grammy for Album of the Year, the first hip-hop album to win the award.

Hip-hop advocates say the music creates self-pride, self-help, and self-improvement among Blacks, a message that is largely absent from other American institutions. Many hip-hop enthusiasts assert that the music accurately portrays life in inner-city America, serving as a voice for a community without access to the mainstream media. Critics, however, say much of the music and culture glorify violence and misogyny (hatred of women). "People have things, good and bad, to say about hip-hop," George says. "But no one could have imagined that hip-hop would dominate commercials, TV shows, movies, clothing lines, magazines and on and on and on. It has become an economic force in the Black community. It has created a lot of jobs, and created a lot of people with a lot of influence. It really is stunning. There was no concept of that at all. As a global movement, it is still incredibly powerful, and it still hasn't peaked."