Hip-Hop USED to be about trend-setting and being original… Unfortunately in 2011, from time to time, hip-hop been about trend-following . We’re not just talkin’ about the fans here, even MCs nowadays often get caught up in whatever new slang, phrase, or idea is “hot” at the time.
After listening to the radio for about ten minutes we compiled some of the most egregious trends that are either played out or should be played out.
Flip through and tell us if you’re as tired of these as we are…
Ok, ok, ok, we get it. You’re the shot-caller, the guy that people look to for leadership, the flyest, most money-gettin’est playa of ALL the playas. No one decides your destiny, you enforce your will on anyone and anything in your vicinity.
Between “The Boss”, “I’m A Boss”, and his new single featuring Nicki Minaj “You The Boss”, Officer Ricky Rozay is running this whole “Boss” thing into the ground. Ungh…
The Virgina-based rap duo The Clipse made the term “Grindin'” bigger than ever after dropping their chart-topping hustlers-anthem single. However, in the wake of this term becoming popular it became real easy for any ol’ jive a$$ turkey to sit his lazy behind on the couch and say he’s “grindin'”
The act of “grindin'” means actually getting up and doing something proactively. Some of youse ain’t “grindin'” nothin’ but your teeth. But we digress…
Steven Spielberg will not be at the strip club while you fling copious stacks of ones onto the supple cakes of a dancer named “Cinnamon”. We’ll be the first to admit that hyperbole can be fun, but c’mon son, you drinkin’ beer and some dusty lil club is NOT a “movie”.
It’s happened again, Black folks have help popularize something that we’re sure some white folks would rather us not “tan” as Steve Stoute would say. Christian Louboutin is the designer of said high-end shoes. Although he’s never made any disparaging remarks about urban culture embracing his pricey kicks (to our knowledge) if he wanted to sue Yves Saint Laurent for bitin’ his “red-bottom” style, he would sure look down upon the gaggle of geese buying fake Loub’s in an attempt to be fly.
Rappers, the shoes are for women, let women rap about them. Period.
Jim Jones took this term from the ‘hood to Hollywood with his hit “We Fly High” (Ballin’) in 2006 and 5 years later rappers are still “ballin'” in every other line. We know that you guys got mucho gwap, but let’s be a lil more creative with our terminology shall we.
There are only so many ways that you can verbalize the act of putting your convertible top back. T.I. seems to have cornered the market on that trendy saying. Nowadays if you let rappers tell it, then everyone is ridin’ around and gettin’ it without a roof.
For some reason, (particularly with East Coast rappers) when referencing how a street hustler acquires his “product” it seems to come from an unidentified Puerto Rican man known only as “Papi”. Sometimes it’s “Papi down the street” others, “Papi on the hill”, in any event “Papi” should have been indicted as many times as he has been dry-snitched on by many different MC’s.
Example: “Papi had raw, then I bought him out…”-Jadakiss
Although there has been a grumbling from hip-hop heads that we take the word “Swag” and bury it somewhere with Jimmy Hoffa. Ever one to hold on to his youth, Diddy officially donned himself “Swag” earlier this year, and if the term wasn’t dead before that was a proverbial bullet to the head. It’s one thing to HAVE swag, but when it gets to the point where we are remaning ourselves as an adjective, then it’s time to give it a rest…
We can’t put our finger on excatly when this became such a popular trend, but apparently finding women that are in relationships and having sex with them is supposed to be some type of rapper rights-of-passage. Biggie, Jay-Z, The-Dream and many others have quipped about making whoopee with someone else’s cherished companion. However, the biggest offenders of this in our eyes are Young Money MC’s Drake and Lil Wayne. Based on their raps, these two are on a mission to bang your honey-bunny as soon as they get a good look at her. So fellas, if your girl asks you if you’ll go to the Young Money show with her, you better act accordingly.
“Don’t leave ya girl round me, true playa for real, ask Puff Dad-dy”-Notorious B.I.G.
