[2] Key producers include DJ Premier, Pete Rock, Buckwild and Diamond D.[3][4] Prominent hip hop artists who incorporated "boom bap" in their music include Gang Starr,[5] KRS-One, A Tribe Called Quest,[6] Wu-Tang Clan, MF DOOM, Mobb Deep, Craig Mack, R.A. the Rugged Man, Big L, Boot Camp Clik, Griselda, Jay-Z, Common, Yasiin Bey, Nas, and The Notorious B.I.G.
[7] The term boom bap originated in 1984 when it was used by T La Rock to describe the beat of the kick drum and the snare in the song "It's Yours".
[8] T La Rock spoke in an off-script fashion, using the words "boom bap" to mimic the sound of the rhythm.
[14] The original artist recognised by the hip hop industry as the first to experiment with these samples in boom bap was DJ Marley Marl.
[9] DJ Premier and Pete Rock gained notable fame as producers for their work within the boom bap industry.
[16] KRS-One when describing the beat common to the subgenre states "The vibe of boom bap is to use the least amount of instruments to create the most rhythmic sound".
The process in which a disc jockey or hip hop producer will forcefully move the vinyl record back and forth underneath the needle.
[26] This can be heard in LL Cool J's "Around the Way Girl", a song and artist that utilizes boom bap features to create the hip hop beat.
[28] The music sample can be stretched or condensed, and in some cases the beats are manipulated directly to achieve a perfect synchronisation.
[30] The addition of touch pads allowed the artist to add improvements in "not just timing, but also accents and velocity variations".
[19] The lyrical content in boom bap has been variously characterized as introspective and conversational,[32] raw and direct,[13] or macho and dominant.
[37] The boom bap movement after hitting its peak in the early 1990s made its way across the Atlantic and infiltrated some of the European music scenes.
[38] Boom bap can often be found as a foundation for many modern day English rappers, which exhibit similar on-off beat.
[39] Boom bap is commonly recognized as delivering some of the founding elements of modern hip hop and rap music.
[18] Due to much tighter copyright laws in the United States and around the world in recent years, the accessibility for sampling and regenerating sounds based on other's work has become increasingly difficult.
[42] Phillip Mlynar states that in the modern world "the notion of tagging something as boom bap has become more of a backhanded compliment.
The phrase is frequently applied to East Coast hip hop to suggest that its architects are dated and trading on former glories".
[9] In the London music scene boom bap is well known for its "hard bass drum" and "snapping snare", but it is commonly associated with "old school" tracks.
However, critics were not entirely happy with the album, referring to its weak textual life, although commendable attempts at reviving the forgotten style.
[45] With influence of platforms such as Verzuz,[46] multiple artists have released singles or full length projects with a boom bap aesthetic: J. Cole, Griselda, Redman, DJ Kay Slay, Lloyd Banks, the HRSMN, and Rosenberg among others.