Why New York Rap is Dead
**Disclaimer: This article was inspired by the fact that its 2008 and NY rap hasn’t had any prominence since ‘98. **
It’s no secret New York’s hip hop scene has taken a backseat to them country boys in the South. The sad thing is it has been almost 10 long years that them boys south of the mason dixon have had a grip on the game. 10 long painful years, I might add. How did we get to this point? Isn’t New York the hip hop mecca? Didn’t we invent hip hop? Sure we had Fifty and those G-Unit guys for a minute, but Fifty was pretty much rappen with a twang when he was hot back in ‘03. And as for Jigga, he’s loved so much, because he’s all we got. The purpose of this discussion is to figure out why New York Rap is dead. Check out the 5 reasons NY Rap is dead.
5. Jay-Z
From the 80’s and 90’s there was this idea of succession in NY, in which when you were the “Man” aka “King of NY” everyone for the most part agreed. Even though there were battles, they were fought with nobility and ultimately fostered camaraderie between rappers. At the end of the day, New York rappers supported New York rappers. Jay-Z changed things in the late 90’s-early 2000 by for no apparent reason going off on New York’s hip hop legends specifically Nas and Mobb Deep. Till this day, most believe Mobb hasn’t recovered the damage Hov did to them and most of us cynics regard Nas as a bitch for signing to Jay-Z’s Def Jam.
Jay-Z also didn’t give New York rappers a chance when he was trying to build his “dynasty”. Who were the first cats he put on? Philly niggas. Beanie Sigel, Freeway, Peedi, Young Guns, State Property, hell he was even trying to sign Major Figgas and Gillie. These guys are all okay, but are you telling me there was no one in NY that was as good as these guys? Come on there’s like 30 million in the state, you could have got a dude from Buffalo who was better then any of these guys (I’m not even going to talk about Memphis Bleek here). Point here is Jigga marginalized the fans.
4. 50 Cent
Carrying on from where Hov left off, Fifty went on a rampage breaking down every single New York legend. We all know how Fifty is and his marketing strategies are no longer as effective, but by breaking down everyone from Wu-Tang to Jadakiss to Fat Joe, he made the fans take sides as if it were a war. We all know how lame it is to break others down to build yourself up, but to do this the staple artist of our rap scene only further divided the fans and give New York rap a “crab in the bucket” mentality amongst the up and coming rappers. Case in point, how many rappers had beef during this period? Everyone.
3. The Dirty South
I know saying “we invented hip hop” as an argument for saying “we should run hip hop” is just as futile as Ford saying “we invented the car, so we should make the best cars”. In many ways, the South is much like Japanese automakers in that they support one another at all levels. Toyota doesn’t want to destroy Honda but they both have a common vision to destroy GM, Ford and Chrysler. It is this shared vision of being put on the backburner for so long that has driven Southern rappers and Southern fans to unite in a common cause to take over the rap game. The south has invaded every national outlet from radio to tv to magazines. I guarantee Ozone magazine will be a bigger magazine than XXL in a few years. Contrary to what New York rappers say the South movement is not going to die. It just keeps moving from state to state (one day they got to run out of states though).
Moreover, the South is having a damn good time. It’s considered taboo for Southern rappers to diss each other and when they do they usually just fist fight and make up like brothers -far cry from the ultra gun toting NY rappers of the past. Radio hosts in the South never hate on artists or other radio stations. It’s pretty much all love. In short, southern music is fun and easy to digest and has been further elevated by the increase in interest in club and car culture across the country.
2. Record Labels, Video Channels, Radio, Internet
Simply stated, the media is not supporting the New York scene because it doesn’t generate any interest nation-wide. Since New York radio, isn’t trying to break any artist anymore, but rather just run the same playlists it’s nationally owned corporation tells them too, it doesn’t have an interest to play any independent artists. The indie NY artists are working hard and many of their management teams hit me off with audio and interviews, but the thing is even I ain’t feeling most of them, since the majority of visitors to this site come from all over the US. Would they really care about some indie NY artists who I think sucks?
1. New York Rappers
I don’t know if I’ve just become hard to impress or do NY spitters need to step their rap game up? I have no clue how some of these guys even get mentioned. Dudes like Joel Ortiz? Saigon? Tru Life? J.R. Writer? Jae Hood? Are you kidding me? These guys have maybe one thing going for them. Where is the total package? Right when Big Pun came out, I knew he was a star. Right when DMX came out, I knew he was star. Same with Fifty before he got shot. Even Nore. None of these new guys have that magical “it” quality (If you think you know someone who does, please hit me up). My point is what the hell happened to the breeding ground?
New York rappers inspired each other and the culture thrived producing superstars. Now rappers see Southern rappers get away with certain things and think “Hey I don’t have to think so hard about my lyrics I can just write the first thing that comes to mind and I’ll be successful too”. What this has done is kill New York’s style of rap, I call “witty thug rap”. It’s intelligent, fun and hard. No rapper in NY is doing this style anymore and it has opened up the door for rappers like Lil Wayne who now does a Southern variation of “witty thug rap” to appeal to the East Coast heads.
What do you think?
An interesting list! although you have forgotten what i think is the major factor here - producers. NY rappers have abandoned to ‘boom bap’ sounds and gone with big time producers such as The Neptunes, Timbo in order to have a hit single. This has therefore resulted in the NY scene suffering from an identity crisis.
Rappers are claiming to be bringing NY back but it’s being forced and people can see through that. It should be a natural return to its roots and the sooner that happens the better!
Your exactly right. Man YoRapper got the smartest readers, yall are good. BUT I’m not sure how the producer fits into the equation, I always believed the artist decide which beat is hot, not the producer. In my experience with dealing with producers, they think all of their beats are billboard bound.
Yeah man, agree 100%. Case in point - Jigga and Nas abandoning Primo on their albums :( ! Remember the days when they both had at least one Primo beat on an album ? Tracks like D’evils, NY State of Mind, So Ghetto were what kept these superstar rappers in touch with NY’s sound and now it’s a case of ‘which beatmaker can i go to so i can get a hit single?’ As you rightfully say . . what sounds hot to them is what is Billboard bound! I guess that’s whu im a big fan of Alchemist and Havoc, they’re sticking to what they’ve always done and with that comes respect - if not from anyone else, from me at least :) ! Nice one
ah man I secretly hope every Jigga album he’s going to have one primo beat, and remember Nas was supposed to do an album full of primo beats? I have no idea what these guys are thinking. Primo’s working with all these loser rappers and the good rappers are working with loser produces. Jay better have one primo beat on his real last album -his next one.
Check it: I’m a Southerner, but I’m more influenced by New York rapper. I wanted to start rapping when I heard Biggie. I’m from Florida so I like bass/booty music, but I always wished it had the same lyrical prowess as New York rap. I’ve never bought a UGK album (I did buy Bun B’s solo joint) but I’ve bought Nas, Biggie, Jay-Z, and Busta’s albums.
Anyway, Y’all can’t put it on the South, man. For years, I saw how the South got no love in New York, or hip hop in general. I remember being in countless arguments where the South would get no love, except for Outkast and maybe Scarface. Regardless, the South continued to do its thing and made it to the top of the ranks. Now we are able to give the world artists like T.I., Ludacris, Chamillionarie, and Lil Wayne a chance to show that not all Southern hiphop is all chants and no lyrics. Sure, they are no Jay-Z, but who the fuck is? There will never be another KRS-ONE or Big Daddy Kane or Rakim. Just like there will never be another Scarface, Devin the Dude , or Big Mike.
NY cats need to stop looking at the South in envy and/or hate because y’all had the game looked for a good 20-25 years and most of the time y’all was trying to shut other rappers out of the game and y’all went for self. Every now and then y’all would show love (Jay-Z showing love to UGK and Twista…wonder why he’s still on top, eh), but for the most part it was all about NY. Well, karma is a bitch and she’s playing y’all the hoe card.
My advice for NY is to just do you. Get on your grind and stop bitching about Jay-Z not promoting Joe Buddens or whoever. One of the main reasons the South is on top (of a shitpile of the game i know) is because y’all forced us to hustle. Now, NY rappers are forced to do the same. Man up and do what needs to be done. Look at Prodigy, Styles P, and Noyd. Go ahead and drop albums independent and shop them in your hoods. Y’all got 8 million people in the city. You can’t tell me you can’t sell 100 K within a year’s time. Plus, you’ll have more control over your shyt and more money. Get your grind on and stop trying to be superstars and the game will come back to you.
Wow a Southerner with a brain? Haha welcome homie. Good comment.
I think people are getting stupid. They need stupid southern rappers with simple lyrics they understand. Most southern rap fans can’t even have an intelligent conversation. Southerners… They havn’t evolved much since the 1800’s Huh.
I think that the fact NY is the mecca of hip hop is why there’s so much expectation. But the game, like fashion goes in cycles . . .NY > LA > NY > Midwest > Down South > ???
NY’s problem is that the big labels dont see artists like Papoose and Saigon as big money makers. They’d rather take their chances with a Southern artist that has a song blowing up down there.
Fair play to the down South dudes though
Hip hop is a business now and there’s a new generation of rap fands comin through. young kids dont care` for NY pioneers like Pete Rock, Diamond D and Primo . . . and why should they when they’re too busy perfecting the Soulja Boy dance ?!?
PAPOOSE!
I am from NY. And I want to work my way up, believe me. I usually freestyle, but I want to work on a mixtape and see what happens.