Hip-hop today is going through it’s “emo”tional phase, just like rock did over 20 years ago. In fact the origins of what we now know as emo in rock music started in the late 80s with hardcore punk. Some of that music attempted to raise the political consciousness of listeners, which was unique for that time. By the time that emo had went mainstream, 20 years later, punk rock had reached mainstream acceptance not seen since the seventies. The only problem is that it was not the punk rock of the seventies, and had a polished, professional sound that seemed to contradict everything that punk stood for.
Today’s hip-hop artists are going through the same thing right now. Emo rap music, if you can call it that, typified by artists such as Drake, Kanye West, and at times Jay-Z and even Lil’ Wayne, not to mention numerous artists still on their ascent like Big Sean and who can forget Bobby Ray (B.o.B.) is exemplified through slick, post-modern production that is unlike anything we have heard before. It all started with the mainstream acceptance of Eminem 10 years ago; this had been alive in Detroit since the nineties but Eminem seems to be that individual to put this “sub-genre” of hip-hop onto the map. The music is atmospheric, moody, brooding, even Gothic at times. When you hear from artists like Lil’ B or Tyler the Creator the emotions and sentiments expressed are so dark you often wish they would have kept their opinions to themselves. A lot of the music is of a spiritual nature and embraces darkness, which goes against what Christianity stands for and is one of the reasons why people will never shut up about the Illuminati.
When you express your emotions, you open yourself up and you are in a vulnerable position. That tends to find itself at odds with everything we know about the Black culture; people that are cool, the tastemakers among us, dictate culture through authoritarian means and everything is diluted from the top down. Well emo artists say that their pain is more important than what it is cool; so their entire package is an expression of how they feel at that particular moment, which may or may not coincide with the popular trends in the hip-hop culture.
One good thing that has come out of the movement is a tolerance for other modes of expression. For example people are more willing to listen to you talk about your god, even if it is not their god or even if they disagree with you. In the past Muslims would talk about their religion but did so through consciousness and political activism, and Christian rap was just corny, but times have changed. Even homosexuality appears to be on the table, we may begin to see openly gay rappers within the next ten years. I was excited to see Lecrae perform in the cipher at the BET hip-hop awards show. That never would have happened during any of the “gangsta” eras in hip-hop. Right now Lecrae is the “Kirk Franklin” of Christian hip-hop.
We find ourselves in an experimental phase musically. For the last two decades in hip-hop everything was about being hard, tough, unmovable, unshakable, and indifferent to the frailty of the person standing next to you; if anything, making light of their weakness was encouraged. Now we have artists stating that they are hard precisely because they are comfortable with showing their weaknesses. Their strength is in their emotions, and they aren’t afraid or ashamed, or feel that they need to hide those feelings. Everyone is like R. Kelly when he finds religion, again; he might be talking about Jesus now but don’t leave yet, because the perversion and the hedonism is right around the corner.
The full range of human emotion is explored. But is this what we want in hip-hop. It is but one answer as to how hip-hop should be fixed. Ideas and conventional norms about lyricism are going to be pushed aside for new means of expression. Can men show who they are without being accused of contributing to what some would suggest is the feminization of hip-hop; after all, few, if any, of the women in hip-hop are as sentimental as the mainstream male artists of the genre right now. This is probably just a trend. Emo rock music didn’t last; it still exists but it is not as big as it was ten years ago. When will the same criticisms of being a hipster, or of ideas about “fashioncore” be propagated within the Black culture. They already ridicule Lil’ Wayne for wearing jeggings.