"That's it? That's all? What happened to the pimps? What happened to the guns? What happened to the curse words? That's what rap music is all about... right?" - De La Soul
The elements that define hip hop music, especially to the younger generations represent the underdog, the ascension of the maltreated from the ghettos into super stardom. While this is not constitutionally bad, it does generate a sense of unfairness and inequality, typical fuel for distressed minds. This i feel, is not the direction that hip hop impresarios that started it all initially wanted the genre to take.
A quote from Afrika Bambaataa goes as follows: "How you act, walk, look and talk is all part of Hip Hop culture. And the music is colorless. Hip Hop music is made from black, brown, yellow, red and white." These words could not have been carried out any better than through the works of the Native Tongues Posse. The posse, a collective union of creative minds from the late 1980s and early 1990s represented hip hop through ideals that are just recently being brought back. Brandishing Afrocentric lyrics in a more positive note, artists included in the Native Tongues Posse collective pioneered the use of sampling and the infusion of jazz in otherwise redundant hip hop beats.
The Jungle Brothers, De La Soul, and A Tribe Called Quest were all core members of the Native Tongues Posse, introducing to the world a music that was constructive and refreshing. Their abstract and open-minded style of writing lyrics spoke of themes ranging from spirituality to partying, from sex to consumerism and vegetarianism, themes that tagged them as progenitors of the so-called conscious hip hop movement, better known in hip hop circles as Alternative Hip Hop.
The initial success of the Jungle Brothers created an opening for De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest to infiltrate the mainstream hip hop audience. Continuing on the spirit of Afrika Bambaataa and the principles of the Zulu Nation, these innovative artists would go on to influence the hip hop world with a voice that was different, a voice that was theirs. Monie Love, Queen Latifah, Black Sheep, and Leaders of the New School (featuring Busta Rhymes) were some of the artists later influenced and linked with the Native Tongues Posse. Even later characters Common, Talib Kweli and Mos Def (independently and as Black Star), the Roots, and Da Bush Babees were considered second generation additions to the group.
Sadly, the Native Tongues Posse movement has fallen apart through the years. With the advent of Gangsta Rap, the eclectic lyricism that the movement has tried to push forward for hip hop music has fallen out of favor for hip hop of a different type. The hip hop of today is an angrier breed, lashing out at the world and each other. Pseudo-NTP groups have remained under the "cult" column, like the Okayplayers and the Spitkicker Crew (which was founded by Trugoy and Posdnuos of De La Soul) often only tickling the fancy of some, but not really able to incite a new movement. And yes, to be fair the artist-moguls of today's hip hop are talented, but something has been amiss. There is a space that a certain vibe used to occupy and is now empty.
"We also want to try and slow down all this foolishness that's going on between the East and West. We gotta understand that Hip Hop is now universal. Hip Hop is not East coast or West coast. " - Afrika Bambaataa
This article might be considered outdated by some, but most hip hop aficionados know that there is a sense of soul is lost in hip hop music today. Artists of today did have feuds, and the hatchets are buried today. Groups have reconciled their differences and beefs. The same goes for street gangs, thugs that have infested both the east and the west, as treaties for peace have deterred the further ruination of hip hop in the eyes of the world. Still, the music now is different. It is no longer about having fun, or spiritualism, or the quest for unity. Where is the funk?