Old School Hip Hop Making a Comeback?
So, I’m watching the Hornets-Warriors game last night when I heard Heavy D’s (featuring Aaron Hall) 1991 hit Now That We Have Love playing inside the New Orleans Arena.
I thought it was kind of interesting. You don’t normally hear old school New Jack Swing in NBA arenas. Then I saw this Nike commercial featuring KRS-One (and Lupe Fiasco as Rudolph).
Then I remembered the NBA 2K10 commercial featuring Rakim’s 1992 single Don’t Sweat the Technique
A few years back I would have automatically thought: “Is this selling out?” But if you watch the commercials you’ll notice they’re not sell-out moves at all. Both KRS (who’s worked with Nike in the past to create commercials) and Rakim (who teamed with KRS, Nas, Kanye and Prim for this ad) maintain their authenticity. Neither has to water down their content in order to be palatable for mainstream consumption. It’s the product that wants to be associated with them and what they stand for: classic, enduring, respected, authentic.
Here’s what KRS had to say in an interview a year or so ago (hat tip grandgood):
Today, artists like myself or Chuck D or Talib Kweli hold a degree of credibility that’s attracting companies like Red Bull, Cadillac, or Nike. Executives at these companies are our fans. And they are really sick of the state of music. So what they’ve done is spend $250,000 of their own money, in the case of Nike, to create a song with Kanye West, Nas, Rakim, and KRS ONE. We don’t rap about the shoes because they don’t want us talking about that. They just want us to create a song they can play on their website. Authenticity is the new business model and these companies need a product that’s not destroyed by an artist’s shady image.
Could it be that classic hip hop is making a comeback in 2010. If so, that’s what’s up.
