Is Hip Hop Dead?

Evan Endicott's "Under The Radar" talks about hip hop being dead and the emergence of a new underground scene that is trying to resurrect a dying art by using "vintage vinyl, digital software and live instruments to
create new classics."

Everywhere you turn, the secret is being whispered. In the aisles of independent record stores, where groove lovers congregate among dust-covered slabs of vinyl; in the neighborhoods of New York and Los Angeles, where hip hop has shaped two generations of youth; on college radio and in cyberspace, the words are heard and seen.

'Hip hop is dead.'

How can this be? After all, hip hop, a 'fad' born in
the Bronx two decades ago, has weathered the media's
ceaseless attacks to become the dominant form of pop
music. Rap's mainstream acceptance, enabled by multi-
platinum pretenders MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice, created
a cottage industry that comprises not only albums, but
stadium tours, film franchises and fashion imprints.

Yet the secret persists, winding its way through smoky
nightclubs and streetcorner ciphers. Hip hop remains
alive in name only-a brand like any other. As a voice
of dissent against 'Amerikkkan' culture, it has ceased
to function. These days, P. Diddy proclaims, 'Don't
worry if I write rhymes / I write checks,' and
listeners nod their heads in agreement.

I'll admit to loving that line in "Bad Boy for Life" but it does speak volumes about where so-called hip hop heads are these days. Are we so wrapped up in the bling bling lifestyle that we've lost the sense of what hip hop truly is and what it can do?

The article goes on to say:

But for every action, there is an equal and opposite
reaction. Hip hop's underground, much maligned after
years of in-fighting and self-obsession, is showing
signs of renewed vitality. The first element of this
renaissance is musical. While Eminem recycles Aerosmith
tunes and Jay-Z squeezes the last drops of soul out of
Bobby Bland, innovative 'undie' producers are employing
vintage vinyl, digital software and live instruments to
create new classics.

Am I the only one tired of hearing the same samples over and over again? I am in the mood for some new music. Something I've never heard before. Something that is going to thrill me.

Although I do like some of the bling bling raps, I don't like that they are in such heavy rotation. I'm missing hip hop with a message and hip hop with a conscience. I'm looking for people with something to say. I'm as materialistic as the next person but I don't need my head filled with that 24/7. Address some issues. Use your position to lift the heads of those around you, those that might not get the message otherwise because they are too busy bling blinging, on the grind and playing PS2 all day long.

Apparently the voices are out there, but they aren't going to get any mainstream radio play.

Many underground MCs focus on fixing hip hop because they lack the vision to address the bigger picture. Fortunately, J-Live's eyes are wide open. Above is a State of the Union Address, delivered with more candor and heart than any president could muster. On 'Satisfied,' J-Live rhymes: 'The poor get worked / The rich get richer / The world gets worse / Do you get the picture?' Addressing America's recent adoption of patriotism as fashion statement, he observes, 'Now it's all about NYPD caps and Pentagon bumper stickers / But yo, you still a nigger.'

A coast away, Blackalicious draw similar conclusions on
their major label debut Blazing Arrow. From the
blackest streets to the Whitest House in the land, MC
Gift of Gab captures the fall of the American Empire in
chilling detail: 'Liquor stores upon every corner and
younger people done accepted defeat / In the melting
pot the lava's seeping and the hood is all the mind can
conceive / … The cops is the Klan and the planet's run
by a government of genocidal thieves.'

Fortunately, Blackalicious and J-Live buttress these
dark treatises with bouncy, sun-soaked songs that
celebrate life's pleasures-friends, family and hip hop
itself. Less optimistic, but no less funky, is
Oakland's The Coup, a pair of Marxist revolutionaries
who drop communist theory over rump-shaking
instrumentals.

On '5 Million Ways to Kill a CEO,' (from the LP Party
Music) MC Boots Riley sums up America's captains of
industry in three brilliant lines: 'They own sweats
shops, pet cops and fields of cola / Murder babies with
they molars on the areola / Control the Pope, Dalai
Lama, Holy Rollers and the Ayatollah.'

That's what I'm talking about man.