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Ex-gang members talks about rap music’s influence

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Ex-gang members talks about rap music’s influence

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I was talking to a woman who's an on-air personality for one of Chicago's most popular urban radio stations recently when she argued that rap music, even the hardcore kind, plays a negligible role in violence. I vehemently disagreed.

We went back and forth for a while until it became clear that neither of us could convince the other. I wanted to explore this topic some more, and I could have interviewed an academic or an industry professional.

But I decided to go right to the source - to former gang member Derek Brown who runs Boxing Out Negativity, an extraordinary after-school boxing program for youth in the North Lawndale neighborhood. It's been around for about six years.

Although he teaches his students the art of boxing, checks their homework and visits their schools, he also warns them about rap music and how seductive the life may seem in verse, but how destructive it is when played out in real life.

It's a subject he knows rather well.

Today, the 39-year-old is an upstanding father and citizen. But back in the day, when he was between the ages of 14 and 25 and called "Shotgun," Brown was a stone-cold gangster, the type who got tattoos to cover bullet holes and stab wounds. He also did time in several juvenile facilities and prison.

"I sold drugs, and I was making a living off of it but not knowing the hurt I caused," he told me. "When they say it's blood money, they're right. I've had money with blood on it. I've had stinky money that had been in people's socks and in their (underwear). Some of it had been stolen from their mother's purse, and the damage I did in my community was tremendous."

He said his introduction to rap music came from artists such as Poor Righteous Teachers, X Clan and Queen Latifah, who were socially conscious. But their music later got drowned out by the more exploitative, gangsta rap that N.W.A., the Geto Boys and Scarface performed.

"I remember listening to N.W.A. and they were singing '(F-word) Tha Police,' and I became somebody who believed in that kind of language, and low-grading women and calling them out of their names," Brown said. "When I shot people, the first thing I did was put on a record."

He said he listened to Scarface's "Diary of a Madman:"

Dear diary today I hit (an N-word) with the torch / Shot him on his face and watched him die on his front porch / Left his family heartbroken / Flashbacks of him laying there bleeding with his eyes open / I can't put the (stuff) behind me / I know I'm here somewhere, but I can't find me.

Brown grew up in North Lawndale during the late 1970s watching Hollywood's blaxploitation-era movies that depicted black neighborhoods as mostly filled with pimps and prostitutes.

He said he liked movies such as "Superfly" and "The Mack" and wanted to be like the pimps and players who were outside his door. He said the movies laid out a lifestyle of excess that later was glorified further in rap music. He emulated both.

Gangbanging and drug dealing appeared to offer a way out, and Brown became a gang leader. The Geto Boys' "Straight Gangstaism" was an anthem:

I was a curious child / I used to hang out by the ballroom and study the gansta style / The way they talk, the way they walk, the way they act, / the way they wore dat gansta hat, / Tilted, rim laid flat out / now that's the type a (stuff) I'm talkin' about yeah / Cigarette in one hand, drink in the other/ leanin' to one side, cooler than a (expletive).

"But even when I was making a lot of money selling drugs, I stayed in the gutter," Brown said. "I lived in a place that had roaches. My neighbors were on crack. I was a product in my environment. I didn't know how to get out. I didn't know how to move. I was someone who wasn't taught anything."

He said he began to wake up when his best friend was killed at 19 years old.

Brown said he looks around the community today and sees how the music controls the minds of many of the young men who are gangbanging. He said that in the absence of more positive role models, the singers take up the slack.

He said the music also does a good job of product placement for drugs and alcohol.

"It's not normal for a kid to want Hennessy, or to smoke a blunt with a combination of marijuana and tobacco, which is what Tupac rapped about," he said. "No African-American male from an urban community knew about Versace until Tupac started rapping about it. Now, (rapper) Future is telling our kids it's cool to pop a molly," or Ecstasy.

Brown said he considers himself blessed that he got a chance to escape the gang life, and that his community has embraced him. He said that these days he mostly listens to motivational music or gospel rap.

"The reason I am where I am is because the community knows me and the community sees a change in me and they've given me their kids because they can't do anything with them," he said. "Rap music is the driving force of the destruction of a lot of people. I don't want it to be that for these kids."

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Ex-gang member talks about rap music's influence

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I was talking to a woman who's an on-air personality for one of Chicago's most popular urban radio stations recently when she argued that rap music, even the hardcore kind, plays a negligible role in violence. I vehemently disagreed. We went back and forth for a while until it became clear that neither of us could convince the other.

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Effects of Music on the Mind You May Not Have Heard Of

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Effects of Music on the Mind You May Not Have Heard Of

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Effects of Music on the Mind You May Not Have Heard Of

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How does music influence the working of the human mind and brain? What are the effects of music on the mind? Read on to find out.

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8 Amazing Little Known Ways Music Affects The Brain

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8 Amazing Little Known Ways Music Affects The Brain

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I'm a big fan of music, and use it a lot when working, but I had no idea about how it really affects our brains and bodies. Since music is such a big part of our lives, I thought it would be interesting and useful to have a look at some of the ways we react to it without even realizing.

"Without music, life would be a mistake" - Friedrich Nietzsche

Of course, music affects many different areas of the brain, as you can see in the image below, so we're only scratching the surface with this post, but let's jump in.

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1. Happy/sad music affects how we see neutral faces:

We can usually pick if a piece of music is particularly happy or sad, but this isn't just a subjective idea that comes from how it makes us feel. In fact, our brains actually respond differently to happy and sad music.

Even short pieces of happy or sad music can affect us. One study showed that after hearing a short piece of music, participants were more likely to interpret a neutral expression as happy or sad, to match the tone of the music they heard. This also happened with other facial expressions, but was most notable for those that were close to neutral.

Something else that's really interesting about how our emotions are affected by music

is that there are two kind of emotions related to music: perceived emotions and felt emotions.

This means that sometimes we can understand the emotions of a piece of music without actually feeling them, which explains why some of us find listening to sad music enjoyable, rather than depressing.

Unlike in real life situations, we don't feel any real threat or danger when listening to music, so we can perceive the related emotions without truly feeling them-almost like vicarious emotions.

2. Ambient noise can improve creativity

We all like to pump up the tunes when we're powering through our to-do lists, right? But when it comes to creative work, loud music may not be the best option.

It turns out that a moderate noise level is the sweet spot for creativity. Even more than low noise levels, ambient noise apparently gets our creative juices flowing, and doesn't put us off the way high levels of noise do.

The way this works is that moderate noise levels increase processing difficulty which promotes abstract processing, leading to higher creativity. In other words, when we struggle (just enough) to process things as we normally would, we resort to more creative approaches.

In high noise levels, however, our creative thinking is impaired because we're overwhelmed and struggle to process information efficiently.

This is very similar to how temperature and lighting can affect our productivity, where paradoxically a slightly more crowded place can be beneficial.

3. Our music choices can predict our personality

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Take this one with a grain of salt, because it's only been tested on young adults (that I know of), but it's still really interesting.

In a study of couples who spent time getting to know each other, looking at each other's top ten favorite songs actually provided fairly reliable predictions as to the listener's personality traits.

The study used five personality traits for the test: openness to experience, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and emotional stability.

Interestingly, some traits were more accurately predicted based on the person's listening habits than others. For instance, openness to experience, extraversion and emotional stability were the easiest to guess correctly. Conscientiousness, on the other hand, wasn't obvious based on musical taste.

Here is also a break-down of how the different genres correspond to our personality, according to a study conducted at Heriot-Watt University:

To break it down, here is the connection they have found:

Blues fans have high self-esteem, are creative, outgoing, gentle and at ease

Jazz fans have high self-esteem, are creative, outgoing and at ease

Classical music fans have high self-esteem, are creative, introvert and at ease

Rap fans have high self-esteem and are outgoing

Opera fans have high self-esteem, are creative and gentle

Country and western fans are hardworking and outgoing

Reggae fans have high self-esteem, are creative, not hardworking, outgoing, gentle and at ease

Dance fans are creative and outgoing but not gentle

Indie fans have low self-esteem, are creative, not hard working, and not gentle

Bollywood fans are creative and outgoing

Rock/heavy metal fans have low self-esteem, are creative, not hard-working, not outgoing, gentle, and at ease

Chart pop fans have high self-esteem, are hardworking, outgoing and gentle, but are not creative and not at ease

Soul fans have high self-esteem, are creative, outgoing, gentle, and at ease

Of course, generalizing based on this study is very hard. However looking at the science of introverts and extroverts, there is some clear overlap.

4. Music can significantly distract us while driving (contrary to common belief)

Another study done on teenagers and young adults focused on how their driving is affected by music.

Drivers were tested while listening to their own choice of music, silence or "safe" music choices provided by the researchers. Of course, their own music was preferred, but it also proved to be more distracting: drivers made more mistakes and drove more aggressively when listening to their own choice of music.

Even more surprising: music provided by the researchers proved to be more beneficial than no music at all. It seems that unfamiliar, or uninteresting, music is best for safe driving.

5. Music training can significantly improve our motor and reasoning skills

We generally assume that learning a musical instrument can be beneficial for kids, but it's actually useful in more ways than we might expect. One study showed that children who had three years or more musical instrument training performed better than those who didn't learn an instrument in auditory discrimination abilities and fine motor skills.

They also tested better on vocabulary and nonverbal reasoning skills, which involve understanding and analyzing visual information, such as identifying relationships, similarities and differences between shapes and patterns.

These two areas in particular are quite removed from musical training as we imagine it, so it's fascinating to see how learning to play an instrument can help kids develop such a wide variety of important skills.

Similar research shows this correlation for exercise and motor skills in the same way, which is also fascinating.

6. Classical music can improve visual attention

It's not just kids that can benefit from musical training or exposure. Stroke patients in one small study showed improved visual attention while listening to classical music.

The study also tried white noise and silence to compare the results, and found that, like the driving study mentioned earlier, silence resulted in the worst scores.

Because this study was so small, the conclusions need to be explored further for validation, but I find it really interesting how music and noise can affect our other senses and abilities-in this case, vision.

7. One-sided phone calls are more distracting than normal conversations

Another study focused on noise, rather than music, showed that when it comes to being distracted by the conversations of others, phone calls where we can only hear one side of the conversation are the worst offenders.

After a survey showed that up to 82% of people find overhearing cellphone conversations annoying, Veronica Galván, a cognitive psychologist at the University of San Diego, decided to study why these are such a pain.

In the study, participants completed word puzzles while one half of them overheard one side of a mundane phone conversation in the background. The other half of the volunteers heard the entire conversation as it took place between two people in the room.

Those who heard the one-sided phone conversation found it more distracting than those who heard both people speaking. They also remembered more of the conversation, showing that it had grabbed their attention more than those who heard both sides and didn't remember as much of the discussion.

The unpredictability of a one-sided conversation seems to be the cause of it grabbing our attention more. Hearing both sides of a conversation, on the other hand, gives us more context which makes it easier to tune out the distraction.

Then again, as we've explored before, getting distracted is often not such a bad things for various reasons.

8. Music helps us exercise

Back to music again, and we can see that just like silence doesn't help us to be more creative or better drivers, it's not much use when we're exercising, either.

Research on the effects of music during exercise has been done for years. In 1911, an American researcher, Leonard Ayres, found that cyclists pedaled faster while listening to music than they did in silence.

This happens because listening to music can drown out our brain's cries of fatigue. As our body realizes we're tired and wants to stop exercising, it sends signals to the brain to stop for a break. Listening to music competes for our brain's attention, and can help us to override those signals of fatigue, though this is mostly beneficial for low- and moderate-intensity exercise. During high-intensity exercise, music isn't as powerful at pulling our brain's attention away from the pain of the workout.

Not only can we push through the pain to exercise longer and harder when we listen to music, but it can actually help us to use our energy more efficiently. A 2012 study showed that cyclists who listened to music required 7% less oxygen to do the same work as those who cycled in silence.

Some recent research has shown that there's a ceiling effect on music at around 145 bpm, where anything higher doesn't seem to add much motivation, so keep that in mind when choosing your workout playlist. Here is how this breaks down for different genres:

Now if we team up these different "tempos" with the actual work-out we're doing, we can be in much better sync and find the right beat for our exercise. If you match up the above with the graphic below it should be super easy to get into a good groove:

So in the same way that exercising makes us happier, it's not surprising that music adds significantly to our work-out success.

What have you noticed about how music affects you? Let us know in the comments.

Image credits: Suites Culturelles, Nature Reviews Neuroscience, Ali eminov, PaceDJ

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8 Amazing, Little-Known Ways Music Affects the Brain

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I'm a big fan of music, and use it a lot when working, but I had no idea about how it really affects our brains and bodies. Since music is such a big part of our lives, I thought it would be interesting and useful to have a look at some of the ways we react to it without even realizing.

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Complex: 20 Rappers that are influencing music right now

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Complex: 20 Rappers that are influencing music right now

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No idea's original. Hip-hop is a 39-year-old musical genre, and at this globalized stage of its evolution, we can trace the appeal of so many contemporary rappers back to a few, crucial wellsprings of inspiration. With hi-speed Internet having demolished regional boundaries and stylistic distinctions, at least within the U.S., influences migrate with the quickness. Atlanta trap star Gucci Mane is a patron saint of Chicago's drill scene. Drake is Lil Wayne's protégé and a huge UGK stan. Nicki Minaj, despite her abundance of unique quirk, occasionally channels the Notorious B.I.G. ("Four Door Aventador") and KRS-One ("Monster"). Danny Brown, from Detroit, cites UK grime godfather Dizzee Rascal as his definitive role model.

Even the very best contemporary rappers are, for the most part, elevating the style and ideas of generations that preceded them. Here we take a look at 20 rappers who are influencing the rest of contemporary hip-hop.

After LL Cool J's crossover insurgency in 1990, Snoop Dogg was the second-ever solo rap megastar. As a suave but initially awkward Long Beach Crip, Snoop provided a crucial fusion of chart-topping party anthems ("Gin and Juice," "Who Am I?") and severe, streetwise realism ("Little Ghetto Boy," "Murder Was the Case") that first foreshadowed the rise of 2Pac, E-40, and Jay Z, and then eventually influenced everyone from Mac Miller and Wiz Khalifa to Vince Staples and Meek Mill. Since 1992, Snoop has flirted with a variety of styles and regional influences-remember No Limit Snoop?-with the result being that hip-hop now globally reflects Snoop, the mirror, himself. Smokers, killers, pimps, dealers, and even the wavy white girls: Damn near every successful rapper of this century is indebted to Snoop Dogg's ambidextrous pop precedent. - Justin Charity

It's a rare occasion when a protégé breaks away from a mentor and becomes his or her own force in hip-hop. Under the guidance of Gucci Mane, Waka Flocka Flame took what made Gucci a star (his innovative delivery, his song concepts, and his ability to create signature ad-libs) and pushed the boundaries by taking his music to the extreme. While Waka isn't the most lyrically dexterous MC, he's taken elements of ATL crunk and infused aggression to establish his sound as boisterous, rowdy, and fun. Thanks to Virginia producer Lex Luger, Waka's bombastic and ominous direction, as demonstrated in heady anthems "Bustin' at 'Em" and "Hard in da Paint," opened doors for Ca$h Out, Peewee Longway, T-Wayne, and Rico Richie to impact younger listeners with their inescapable singles. To this day, Waka is still breaking down walls, where he's going full-on EDM on side projects and working with newer talents like Keith Ape to help bring together rap's melting pot of tastes. Plus, not any rapper can announce they're running for president in 2016 and get the response he's gotten from his fans. Squad! - Eric Diep

We are living in the era of the Boss Don Biggavel. Future, Fetty Wap, Drake? All of this rapper-slash-singer shit that's been poppin' off lately is due to the man known as Charley Wingate. Max B wasn't the first to do it by any means; the list of rappers who also sang on their tracks before him is long. However, one can argue he ushered in the popularization of the act. The Silver Surfer provided the ultimate wave for French Montana and his sworn enemy Jim Jones. Both artists benefited from collaborating with Max. Montana got his deal because of the work he did alongside his former partner, and Jimmy's marginal hit "Ballin" and his best album, Harlem: Diary of a Summer, happened with the help of Max's pen. To quote Roc Marciano: "The fans can have Drake, but the streets have Max." - Angel Diaz

You're a producer that's a rapper? Or a rapper that's a producer? Doom did that. The underground legend is still selling old beats from the instrumental tapes he dropped in the early '00s. Doom's metal fingerprints are all over this game. Kanye got the idea of keeping his best for himself from Madlib, J. Dilla, and MF Doom, a.k.a. the holy trinity of producer/rappers. And Doom's quirky rhyme style can be heard in the raps of Earl Sweatshirt and Mac Miller. Action Bronson raps about food? Well, Doom has an entire album dedicated to the practice, complete with cooking show skits. He is easily one of the most creative artists of our time. I would say Madlib, Doom, and Havoc are three producers who have the capability of flipping known samples in ways other beatsmiths can't. It's uncanny. Kanye is the best rapping producer? Ha! Go home, listen to Doom, fast for three days, and reflect. - AD

The late DJ Screw of Houston rightfully receives so much explicit credit for the popularity of screwed vocals, purpled doors of perception, and whatnot. But O.G. Memphis clique Three 6 Mafia (plus Juicy J's younger brother, Project Pat) pioneered the cultish chants and vaguely satanic fight songs that preceded and clearly inspired rappers like Rocky (e.g., "M's") and Future (e.g., "Trap Niggas") and producers like Mike WiLL Made-It ("23"), Chief Keef ("Faneto"), and Young Chop ("Feds Listenin"). Sometimes leisurely, sometimes rough-and-tumble, but always dark, Three 6 Mafia (and Memphis, generally speaking) were Houston's crucial co-conspirators in the promotion of haziness and promethazine zen as hip-hop's prevailing aesthetic. And as for hip-hop's libido: Grace Jones recently accused Nicki Minaj (among others) of biting her zany '80s modeling style, but I think both Nicki and Lil Wayne, as songwriters, are more so (respectfully) indebted to O.G. hip-hop dominatrix Gangsta Boo, who made Akinyele sound like Bow Wow. - JC

It's hard to overstate the impact of Lauryn Hill's 1998 hip-hop classic The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. The album blended soul, jazz, hip-hop, and pop elements into a beautifully coherent sound, laced it with catchy hooks and verses of deep personal confessions, and still managed to be accessible to the casual music consumer. It netted Lauryn Hill millions in album sales and even snagged hip-hop its first ever Album of the Year Grammy. There's probably no one who has done more for multidimensional women in hip-hop that Ms. Hill, a fact that everyone from Nicki Minaj to Azealia Banks should be thanking her for. The former Fugees frontwoman's solo debut certainly set a new standard for rap women, and even for rap in general, but its influence extends far beyond the genre walls of hip-hop. It's hard to imagine the rise of conscious artists like Lupe Fiasco or Kendrick Lamar without her, but it's equally as hard to picture widespread success for minimalist, soulful singers like Adele, Amy Winehouse, and even FKA twigs without Lauryn paving the way. Even Kanye West credits his success in part to Miseducation. With one album, Lauryn changed the game. - CM

Your boy took Kanye's big one-off emo moment, ran with it, and nothing was the same. Rappers rhyming, and sometimes even crooning, about their feelings has always been a thing, but not on such an appealingly narcissistic and consistent level the way they have in this post- So Far Gone world. But purists can't even really use his singing as a crutch, not when he's out here bodying lyrically. With each album comes at least one new phrase that's instantly added to the contemporary pop culture lexicon before being used to death. One feature from Drake has a 95 percent guaranteed success rate of boosting your song and/or album, in some cases your career-these days it's turned into a fun guessing game deciding which bubbling banger from an up-and-comer will get the Drake stimulus package. Sometimes all that's needed is tangible evidence of Drake's interest: see Dej Loaf and "Try Me." And the rap community literally watched his beef with Meek Mill play out with bated breath, resulting in a diss song that's become borderline inescapable in the club. A ghostwriting scandal has only made his next moves even more highly anticipated, while together with his cohorts Oliver and 40, he and his OVO artists craft a distinctive sound that's slowly monopolizing rap production. The reign is only just beginning. Take care. - Frazier Tharpe

The Notorious B.I.G. wasn't playing when he called himself a rap phenomenon. When Christopher Wallace hit the scene in 1993, there were very few people who could keep up with the Bed-Stuy wunderkind. He managed to at once embody the eternal struggle of those overlooked by a system made to protect them and the flashiness of someone who zipped right out as soon as they could. He did this by never leaving the harshness of the world behind. It's difficult to do this, as you can imagine. Biggie's not considered the best for no reason. His deft ability to effortlessly weave stories while coining new phrases that made an imprint on your mind like a Rhino on a memory foam mattress is enviable. It's a talent many have sought to replicate. Take a look through Rap Genius and you'll find more than a handful of rappers past and present who have lifted B.I.G.'s words to fit their narrative. And it's not just Jay Z. Here are 30 rappers who have stolen lines from "Juicy." And that's just one song! In addition to the lyrics, Biggie implanted a sense of self-affirmation that is still alive and well today (remember: sky is the limit), and he made songs that speak to the ladies and to the streets in equal measure. Oh, and then there's the flow. Forceful, nimble, and smooth as fuck. It's the part of Biggie's game that's been copied nearly more than his actual bars. The thing about phenomenons is that they usually change the course of history. That's exactly what Biggie did. - Damien Scott

Jay Z might have tried to snatch the King of New York crown with The Blueprint, but the blueprint for The Blueprint will always be Nas' seminal classic Illmatic. Credited with nearly singlehandedly reviving the New York rap scene, Illmatic is still regarded as one of the best rap albums ever made. It ushered in the era of multi-producer albums and the resurgence of East Coast gangsta rap, and raised the bar of lyricism for everyone in the game. Those most directly influenced were the big NYC rappers who would emerge in Illmatic's wake, artists like the Notorious B.I.G., Puff Daddy, and Jay Z, as well as hardcore acts like Mobb Deep. But the soundscape and subject matter that Nas put forth is still the gold standard that influences New York hip-hop today. From Joey Bada$$ to Action Bronson to Troy Ave, New Yorkers are still looking to Mr. Jones for inspiration. Beyond Illmatic, Nas' career has had some ups and downs, but one has to look no further than Stillmatic's "Ether" and the great Nas/Jay Z feud of the early 2000s to see what a good hip-hop beef really looks like. Drake and Meek Mill should take some notes. - CM

"Can we get much higher?" That's the question posed on the intro to My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, the album we here at Complex believe to be Kanye's magnum opus. It's a work as twisted as it is beautiful and purposeful-three descriptors that could describe Ye's entire catalog. But to answer the question: *Kanye shrug.* It's yet to be seen if rap can ascend past the musical and cultural peaks reached by Kanye West. This is the guy who worked his way from Common and No ID's annoying lil man to ghostproducing for Puffy's Hitmen to one of Roc-A-Fella's secret weapons to the guy who, for a moment, bridged mainstream and underground, to the most influential person rapping (or singing) verses into Pro Tools. The guy Chris Rock called "the most interesting guy that ever picked up a mic." The guy who refers to himself as a god. If you look at rap in 2015 and don't see Kanye embedded in the beats, rhymes, and life, you must be looking at a completely different genre, because Kanye Omari West is the most influential rap artist of all time.

It's true.

When talking about rap influence, it used to be that you fell into two camps: You were either a clever rhyme spitter who could weave meaningful anecdotes with ease, much like Nas and Biggie, or you wore your heart and aggression on your sleeve and made music that hit like a blunt instrument, like 2Pac. West embodies both ideals. He's not the most gifted MC of all time, but he's rapped a bunch of lines that have become modern parlance. When he felt rapping couldn't properly convey the emotions broiling inside of him, he released an album of him mostly singing. Without Kanye, we would have no Drake, no J. Cole, no Chance the Rapper, rappers who have internalized the outsider ethos to make music everyone jams to. You want to know why a lot of rap today bears little resemblance to what Rakim practiced? Or why a guy like Fetty Wap can rule the Hot 100 but is for some reason still considered hip-hop? It's because of Kanye West. Not only did he bridge the mainstream and underground by putting Jay Z on a song with Talib Kweli, he bridged genres by showing that artists could do whatever the fuck they felt like doing as long as they felt the groove.

And that's just music.

Let's not even get into fashion. Look at what rappers were wearing before Kanye West came along, and look at what passes for acceptable fashion now. You can thank Kanye and his pink Polos, tight jeans, and "ultra Travolta" style for allowing rappers to feel as if whatever they felt was cool, was, well, actually cool. Drake once rapped, probably as a subtle jab to Ye, "And I'm the only one who's still known for the music." Sure, a case could be made for that. But when you're truly influential, truly a monumental force, everything you do is analyzed and examined for possible repurposing: every rhyme you say, every step you take, every word you utter, every garment you wear, every face you make, every shoulder you shrug. Does it get much higher? Nah. - DS

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20 Rappers Who Are Influencing Rap Right Now

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No idea's original. Hip-hop is a 39-year-old musical genre, and at this globalized stage of its evolution, we can trace the appeal of so many contemporary rappers back to a few, crucial wellsprings of inspiration. With hi-speed Internet having demolished regional boundaries and stylistic distinctions, at least within the U.S., influences migrate with the quickness.