adminBruce Ndlovu Showbiz Correspondent
MUSIC is one of the most influential art forms in the world.
While some find beauty in masterpieces put together by painters and artisans, others find beauty while watching athletes slug it out for top honours on the sports field. Indeed, beauty can be found in any and everything if one looks close enough.
While some might not appreciate the finer aspects of art, others find the hustle and bustle of competitive sport not appealing to their tastes. It is rare, however, to find someone who harbours no love for music.
From funerals to weddings, in joy and in sadness, music is the soundtrack to the highlights and low points of people on the continent and beyond.
However, as in everything else in life, our tastes in music are not the same and they vary from ear to ear. The music gods, luckily, thus saw it fit to give music lovers a variety of genres to choose from. Under the vast wing of all the world’s genres, music lovers all find a place to nest and enjoy the tunes of their choice.
One of those genres, hip-hop, has found great favour with young people all over the globe, managing to penetrate into almost every country on the planet with its explosive mixture of raw lyrics and thumping beats. Hip-hop, founded in the late 70s by inner city youths in New York, USA, has become the biggest youth movement in the world.
In every city, evidence of the genre’s popularity can be found, whether it’s the illegal graffiti etchings that defiantly decorate the side buildings in inner cities or the fashion tastes of youths, which range from baggy jeans to kilts revamped for modern times and pioneered by Kanye West, the genre’s place at the top of the cultural food chain can’t be disputed.
Hip-hop is home of the hardcore, gangsters and the fashion savvy, all at the same time. However, one criticism that the genre has been unable to shed since its early days is the perceived air of evil and violence that purportedly surrounds it. While such criticism has been labelled at other genres before, the criticism labelled at hip-hop has been most consistent.
Worldwide, critics point to the lyrics contained in popular songs as evidence of the genre’s evilness. In the court of conservative public opinion, the genre has on numerous occasions been found guilty of altering the mind state of many a youth for the worst as most of its lyrics, in stark contrast to other genres, do not promote positivity.
Last week, the parents of University of Zimbabwe student Kranos Nyangari joined a long list of parents who have laid the blame on hip-hop for the way their children have turned out. This was after the 21-year-old, an avid hip-hop listener, made headlines nationwide when he hanged himself.
His father, Wilbert Nyangari, said his son was obsessed with the genre which led to his demise.
“I believe my son was being initiated into satanism through this hip-hop music. The day he was introduced to this type of music is when all things went wrong.
“The devil targeted my son because of his outstanding intelligence. At Ordinary level he attained eight As, at Advanced level, 19 points in Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry and Geography.
“He was a well disciplined child who loved music especially hip-hop,” Nyangari said.
Kranos’s father is not the first to complain about the influence of hip-hop. The genre’s artistes themselves have not painted it in the most flattering of lights, with their actions on and off the mic leaving much to desire.
The lyrics of some of the most popular hip-hop songs suggested Kranos’s parents might not be far off in their assessment of the genre’s negative influence. One of the most popular songs last year, Hot Nigga, by Bobby Shmurda, sees the 20-year-old detailing his list of heinous crimes which include the alleged sale of drugs in the fifth grade and a list of murders in his neighbourhood.
Shmurda wears his badge of grizzly acts with pride and one wonders what influence such songs have on listeners. Some may attribute Shmurda’s lyrics to the shallow and fake bravado of a young rapper trying to be macho, but that argument was proved false when Shmurda and his GS9 gang were arrested in December by New York City Police on allegations that he was the ringleader of GS9 which shot indiscriminately into public crowds and murdered a member of a rival gang.
He was charged with conspiracy to commit murder, weapons possession, and reckless endangerment as part of a 15-person, 69-count indictment that included his brother Javese and fellow GS9 label-mate Rowdy Rebel. With role models like those, it’s no wonder why parents think the genre is evil.
On the other side of the coin, however, is the argument that hip-hop is getting the blame for misdeeds that should not be attributed to it. While people are keen to document those who listen to the genre and fail, very few detail those that listen to it and have gone on to gain success in their lives.
It seems the genre’s perceived evil is only noticeable when something negative happens and not the opposite. If Kranos had delivered on the promise that his early life showed and gone on to lead a successful life, would his father have thanked the genre the way he had blamed it this week?
Hip-hop artiste, POY, believes the genre gets the blame for problems in society that have little to do with the music. He says although there is negativity in the genre, people ignore its positive aspects because negativity is what appeals to the youth.
“Hip-hop is rebel music but I feel like people blame it for things that have little to do with the music. The negative stuff gets pushed to the forefront because unfortunately that’s what appeals to young people,” he said.
The jury is still out on whether hip-hop is a negative influence on youths or not. With social commentary, political observation, cursing and sexual references part of the staple of hip-hop lyrics, the effects of its content will remain a headache for parents and a constant talking point for music analysts.
Online Reporter