Music evolves like any other sector, but it seems hard for the majority to embrace the changes that is likely to happen more often than expected. Hip Hop being one of the music genres on the planet, which, by the way, is culture that involves a lot more than just rapping and rhyming, that might be younger than other genres because it turned 50 years this year as it basically came to life in 1973 in Bronx, New York, spread by black community as a part of edutainment that later on became a business and created music moguls like Jay Z to date.
It became a world-wide genre which means Rwandan adopted it around early 2000s and rappers started expressing their emotions and thoughts in the booth, microphones became their best friends, and book of rhymes never left their hands since then. Mahoniboni was one of the first rapper to ever touch the mic in Rwanda, citizens were in awe to see a Rwandan rapping in their mother tongue as they were so used to American rappers like Eminem and 50 Cent that were in their prime time at the time.
It didn’t take long for Riderman and Tuff Gang to join the movement. They carried on with the genre for more than 15 years and are still giving their best. In the meantime, fans who rarely pay attention to the differences in rap music are more nostalgic and stuck reminiscing the old days when Tuff Gang came for the first time, and fail to lend their ear to the new generation which came around 2018 precisely.
This happens not only to fans but also to fellow rappers who really think they can’t corporate with new tunes brought by the new generation. Nobody says people should love the same thing as long as taste subjectivity is concerned, but why hate? It’s not advisable to hate on the new generation as seen mostly in the audience and social media most of the time.
Talking of the new generation, we are referring to trappers (rappers who do trap music) and drillers (rappers who do drill) that emerged around 2018 by Kinyatrap movement for the very first time which drove the whole nation shaky and vibrant. It was like a whirlwind because Drill took over sooner than expected. That’s where Ish Kevin gets his flowers because he blew this sub-genre up and influenced some other youngins like Bruce The 1st, obviously.
We shall have special time to talk about the whole evolvement of Hip Hop, but let’s talk about how embracing the change is hard for the audience. It’s better to be a student of Hip Hop than a judge, and if you don’t really like the new genre evolving as it happens a lot in this culture, at least don’t call for hate.
The backlash against new generation rappers has been surfacing on Rwandan Twitter that holds a lot of rap fiends nowadays. Most of them stating that new generation don’t do hip hop and are not considered rappers, which in fact, is false. Fans are stuck with past, it has to be a balance, and if not, hate is never an option. If one does not like new music going on, it doesn’t mean downgrading and trolling new artists.
Pro Zed witnessed this the hard way the day he was trolled just for being a new generation rapper and producer at the same time, this happened after his picture with Kendrick Lamar went viral where he was with other fellow new rappers like Kenny K-Shot and Kivumbi King, amongst others. This time fans complained it should’ve been the other way around for Kendrick Lamar to meet with older rappers, it was chaotic on social media at the time.
This is not only found in fans, but there are some ‘old generation’ rappers who really think and show they can’t work with new generation which stunts the rap industry.
Fans should grasp the change and support their own rappers if they want to help, sticking to the past won’t help. Old rappers need new energy to keep moving and know that rap music fans generation has changed too, they need to swallow the pride and move to work with rappers. Bulldogg is a very good example if honesty is involved.
The transition from lyrical-flow based rap songs to melodic rap showed the big differences in a way that lyricism changed too. It takes one’s mindfulness to notice and respect the changes occurring in order to finally get the beauty of differences, having both sides cheerful.
The writer is a communication graduate from University of Rwanda.