The state of hiphop.

Have you noticed how times change? Remember when Snoop and Death Row came to the East Coast for the source awards? Suge Knight was talking crap about Puff, (I am not a big Suge or Puff Fan by the way), and then Snoop Dogg was pulled into it too?

“Ya’ll don’t love us? The East Coast ain’t got no love for Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre, let it be known. F*ck you then”.

If you ask me, I think the instigator of all that b.s was Suge Knight. I’ve been a Snoop and Dre Fan since I first saw them and a lot of my friends are also fans from way back. My guess is that Suge started talking the crap and turned the whole crowd against Snoop and Dre. They then in turn got defensive and hostile themselves and so did the crowd. It was not a pretty scene. Boo central, Snoop was waving and pointing a cane, not pretty.

Eventually all that East Coast / West coast nonsense died out altogether, as far as I am aware. Correct me if I’m wrong please. Unfortunately we lost Biggie Smalls (part of Puff’s East Coast side) and Tupac Shakur (somehow ended up on the west coast side of the war) before things sort of died down.

Point is that hip hop is now a blending of lines. Snoop Dogg is all over, even playing video games on tv with Mike Tyson and most people forgot that whole source situation. He is no longer a “west coast rapper”, he’s featured in songs by Akon, movies and he’s all over the place, he’s even a family man. A long way from “guess who’s back in the motherf*** house with a fat d*** for your motherf*** mouth.”

Puff Daddy (I hate his name, so henceforth, Sean Combs) is doing his own thing as well. Sean had like 2 phrases in Kesha’s “tic toc” and it says featuring “P Diddy”, too funny. Marketing though. He’s also in movies.

Dre gave us Eminem, who is from Michigan and a white boy. He is one of the sickest lyricists out there today, and he’s not east or west coast, he’s just himself. Eminem in turn gave us 50 Cent.

No longer do we hear “west coast” or “east coast”, its just music. Sometimes individuals beef with one another, but its not one side of the country against the other. Plus we got the whole dirty south movement, the ATL guys who are everywhere! Look at Lil Jon, that dude had even been in love ballads with Usher!

Back in the day Big Pun (died as well) said “f*ck that east coast and west coast crap”, and I’m glad its mellowed out. I’m happy about it and its a welcomed change, but it is a shame that we had to lose 2 of the best lyricists out there before things mellowed out. By the way, Chris Brown and Drake beef, doesn’t count.

Some people say if Biggie and Tupac were still around, then Snoop, Jay-Z, Eminem, Weezy and so on would not have blossomed. Though I like Biggie and Tupac’s music, I disagree. Jay-Z was doing his thing even when Biggie was here, remember “Brooklyn’s Finest”. That was on Jay-Z’s album.  And if I recall correctly, Jay-Z was featured on a Digital Underground video, which was part of where Tupac came from. I argue these guys would have still blown up, maybe things would be different in so far as the “crown” so to speak, but they’d probably all just be sharing it. I don’t remember if Eminem came out before or after Tupac and Biggie passed, but his style is just to sick to deny, he would have blown up regardless.

Now as far as the other folks out there today, well that is up for debate, and I won’t make it my debate because I am on the fence about a lot of current artists. For instance “LMFAO”, though quite entertaining are some of the simplest lyricists I have ever heard!  I could go on and on with names and examples, but I’m sure most of you agree. Lil Wayne and Drake are doing there thing out there and I am a fan of those guys, but many are not.

In recent history, we are lucky to have Jay-Z, Eminem, Snoop and the likes of Dre in the rap game. Otherwise the genre could have died out. No one is immune to death.