So I'm in class and we watched a clip on Louis Armstrong, and they are talking about how he was the driving force that clarified the direction of jazz and was the one who made Jazz relevent. This got me thinking about Hip-Hop, who would you decide is equivelent to louis armstrong?
The biggest and best comparison to Louis Armstrong in the hip hop world would be Kanye West. I hate to say it but with his release of 808's and Heartbreaks, he has really set a new direction for Hip-Hop. One of the largest factors of Armstrong was the fact that he pierced the novelty of Jazz just as Kanye West has done with his tracks "Heartless" and "Love Lockdown"
I am curious to find out what you readers have to say about it!!
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I think that hip-hop will keep evolving and not settle in one particular area.
ReplyDeleteBut to strengthen your argument for Kanye, he also was one of the first ones, and definitely the most influential, to out in sped up samples in his tracks. People are still doing that today, and that can basically be traced back to him.
I also think that Ice Cube/NWA defined an era before Kanye. Before them hip-hop was a lot more about making party music and having fun. They were the first to really make "gangster rap".
Then I think there is the Tupac era. One where he set the precident for telling stories through songs about real life events and truly delivering a message. I think some of the fallout from him is Eminem to certain extent (Toy Soliders, Stan, etc...) and even someone like Mos Def.
So as you can see, it seems that there have been pioneer's, but I dont think anyone has "Defined" hip-hop long enough to say that they are the face of it, a la Louis Armstrong.
Yeah i found it difficult to narrow it down to a single person. But if you want to go off the basis of storyteling, it would have to be someone like KRS-One or even a more popular MC like Run-DMC.
ReplyDeleteBut i do like the statement of Tupac, because he did create such a huge following off of his Thug Life mentality.
I think that the most important factor for comparing an artist to Louis Armstrong is the ability to inject creativity into a mainstream setting. Louis Armstrong really changed the face off jazz from a shallow and trival music style into something used to express emotion.
As im typing this i think that i have to change my vote for kanye to GrandMaster Flash and the Furrious Five.
This might seem like a silly choice but they were the first to really bring the struggles of the inner city/impoverished. Although he lacks the huge career of jay-z or tupac or biggie... they were the original to put out a track that was serious.