The Golden Era of East Coast Hip-Hop
The Golden era of east coast hip-hop
This piece will demonstrate an understanding of the golden era of East coast hip-hop, from 1986 to 1993, focusing and analysing the historical roots, influences and inspirational individuals, giving reference to musical examples that shaped East coast hip-hop. Attention will also be centred on the legacy left, concentrating on the music that was influenced as well as the resulting change in fashion and political views.
Historical roots & influence
The East coast was influenced somewhat by the traditions of West African culture, the Griots dating back hundreds of years who travelled as poets and lyricists, contributed greatly to the lyricism of East coast hip-hop; the music of the Last Poets, Gil Scott-Heron and Jalal Mansur Nurriddin, had great importance to the development of east coast hip hop with their early raps and rhythm. The furthermost direct influence on East coast hip-hop was the Jamaican style of ‘Toasting’, which consisted of chanting over African American R&B records. African American sailors introduced Toasting’ in the 1960s at dances termed ‘Blues dances’, whilst in port.
The advent of Hip-hop culture can be traced back to the ever more widespread block parties of New York City (1973), where a cross cultralization of African Americans and Puerto Ricans began in the South Bronx. These block parties mostly comprised of DJs playing vernacular genres such as soul, funk and disco, DJ Kool Herc amongst them, was credited with the development of East coast hip-hop, his technique of isolating the ‘break’ from a hard hitting funk track and extending it by using two copies of the same record became very popular. He emigrated to America (1967) from Jamaica bringing with him the already popular DJ style of break-beat mixing used in Jamaican Dub music. He encouraged B-boying or break-dancing, which became part of the four elements of hip-hop culture (B-boying, rap, graffiti and Djing), he introduced a
This piece will demonstrate an understanding of the golden era of East coast hip-hop, from 1986 to 1993, focusing and analysing the historical roots, influences and inspirational individuals, giving reference to musical examples that shaped East coast hip-hop. Attention will also be centred on the legacy left, concentrating on the music that was influenced as well as the resulting change in fashion and political views.
Historical roots & influence
The East coast was influenced somewhat by the traditions of West African culture, the Griots dating back hundreds of years who travelled as poets and lyricists, contributed greatly to the lyricism of East coast hip-hop; the music of the Last Poets, Gil Scott-Heron and Jalal Mansur Nurriddin, had great importance to the development of east coast hip hop with their early raps and rhythm. The furthermost direct influence on East coast hip-hop was the Jamaican style of ‘Toasting’, which consisted of chanting over African American R&B records. African American sailors introduced Toasting’ in the 1960s at dances termed ‘Blues dances’, whilst in port.
The advent of Hip-hop culture can be traced back to the ever more widespread block parties of New York City (1973), where a cross cultralization of African Americans and Puerto Ricans began in the South Bronx. These block parties mostly comprised of DJs playing vernacular genres such as soul, funk and disco, DJ Kool Herc amongst them, was credited with the development of East coast hip-hop, his technique of isolating the ‘break’ from a hard hitting funk track and extending it by using two copies of the same record became very popular. He emigrated to America (1967) from Jamaica bringing with him the already popular DJ style of break-beat mixing used in Jamaican Dub music. He encouraged B-boying or break-dancing, which became part of the four elements of hip-hop culture (B-boying, rap, graffiti and Djing), he introduced a
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