[1][2][3] Emerging in the late 1980s, gangsta rap's pioneers include Schoolly D of Philadelphia and Ice-T of Los Angeles, later expanding in California with artists such as N.W.A and Tupac Shakur.
Gangsta rap has been recurrently accused of promoting disorderly conduct and broad criminality, especially assault, homicide, and drug dealing, as well as misogyny, promiscuity, and materialism.
[5][6][7] Gangsta rap's defenders have variously characterized it as artistic depictions but not literal endorsements of real life in American ghettos, or suggested that some lyrics voice rage against social oppression or police brutality, and have often accused critics of hypocrisy and racial bias.
[5][8] Still, gangsta rap has been assailed even by some black public figures, including Spike Lee,[9] pastor Calvin Butts and activist C. Delores Tucker.
Schoolly D's works would heavily influence not only Ice-T, but also Eazy-E and N.W.A (most notably in the song "Boyz-n-the-Hood"), as well as the Beastie Boys on their seminal hardcore hip hop-inspired album Licensed to Ill (1986).
The seminal Long Island–based group Public Enemy featured aggressive, politically charged lyrics, which had an especially strong influence on gangsta rappers such as Ice Cube.
The hip hop group Beastie Boys also influenced the gangsta rap genre with their 1986 album Licensed to Ill, with an early reference to being a "gangster" mentioned in the song "Slow Ride".
[17] The Beastie Boys had started out as a hardcore punk band, but after introduction to producer Rick Rubin and the exit of Kate Schellenbach they became a hip hop group.
[18] According to Rolling Stone Magazine, the Beastie Boys' 1986 album Licensed to Ill is "filled with enough references to guns, drugs and empty sex (including the pornographic deployment of a Wiffleball bat in "Paul Revere") to qualify as a gangsta-rap cornerstone.
Aside from N.W.A and Ice-T, Too Short (from Oakland), Kid Frost and the South Gate–based Latino group Cypress Hill were pioneering West Coast rappers with gangsta rap songs and themes.
The single "Nuthin' but a 'G' Thang" became a crossover big hit,[26] with its humorous, House Party-influenced video becoming an MTV staple despite that network's historic orientation towards rock music.
One of the genre's biggest crossover stars was Dre's protégé Snoop Doggy Dogg (Doggystyle), whose exuberant, party-oriented themes made songs such as "Gin and Juice" club anthems and top hits nationwide.
Not long afterward, his murder brought gangsta rap into the national headlines and propelled his posthumous The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory album (released under the alias "Makaveli") to the top of the charts.
[29] Meanwhile, rappers from New York City, such as Wu-Tang Clan, Black Moon and Boot Camp Clik, Onyx, Big L, Mobb Deep, Nas, the Notorious B.I.G., DMX and the Lox, among others, pioneered a grittier sound known as hardcore hip hop.
released their debut albums Illmatic (April 19) and Ready to Die (September 13) respectively, which paved the way for New York City to take back dominance from the West Coast.
Houston first came on to the national scene in the late 1980s with the violent and disturbing stories told by the Geto Boys(hit single "Mind Playing Tricks On Me"), with member Scarface achieving major solo success in the mid-1990s.
Master P's No Limit Records label, based out of New Orleans, became quite popular in the late 1990s, though critical success was very scarce, with the exceptions of some later additions like Mystikal (Ghetto Fabulous, 1998).
Cash Money Records, also based out of New Orleans, had enormous commercial success with Juvenile, B.G., Hot Boys, beginning in the late 1990s with a similar gangsta rap style like No Limit.
However, in the mid-2000s, the group began attaining more mainstream popularity, eventually culminating in the Three 6 Mafia winning an Academy Award for the song "It's Hard out Here for a Pimp" from Hustle & Flow.
However, the rise of Bad Boy Records, propelled by the massive crossover success of Bad Boy head Sean "Puffy" Combs's 1997 ensemble album, No Way Out, on the heels of the media attention generated by the murders of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G., signaled a major stylistic change in gangsta rap (or as it is referred to on the East Coast, hardcore rap), as it morphed into a new subgenre of hip hop which would become even more commercially successful and popularly accepted.
R&B-styled hooks and samples of well-known soul and pop songs from the 1970s and 1980s were the staples of this sound, which was showcased primarily in Sean "Puffy" Combs's latter-day production work for The Notorious B.I.G.
Industry observers view the sales race between Kanye West's Graduation and 50 Cent's Curtis, both released on September 11, 2007, as a turning point for hip hop.
"[51] Jay-Z elaborated that like Kanye, he was unsatisfied with contemporary hip hop, was being inspired by indie-rockers like Grizzly Bear, and asserted his belief that the indie rock movement would play an important role in the continued evolution of hip-hop.
[55] Other Afroamerican and Chicano gangsta rappers who gained small success or big success include XXXTentacion, Kendrick Lamar, Ms Krazie,[56] Knight Owl,[57] Chino Grande, Lil Rob, Mr. Criminal,[58] Mr. Capone-E, Mr. Sancho,[59] ShooterGang Kony, Mozzy, YNW Melly, Pusha T, Nsanity,[60] Jeezy (Young Jeezy), YG, Nipsey Hussle, Migos, Freddie Gibbs, Meek Mill, A$AP Mob, Jay Rock, ScHoolboy Q, 21 Savage, Kodak Black[61] 6ix9ine,[62] Blueface, NBA Youngboy, NLE Choppa, Pop Smoke, Young Dolph and BlocBoy JB.
[75] Moreover, English scholar Ronald A.T. Judy has argued that gangsta rap reflects the experience of blackness at the end of political economy, when capital is no longer wholly produced by human labor but in a globalized system of commodities.
Tucker, who once was the highest-ranking African American woman in the Pennsylvania state government, focused on rap music in 1993, labeling it as "pornographic filth" and claiming it was offensive and demeaning to black women.
In 1994, Tucker protested when the NAACP nominated rapper Tupac Shakur for one of its image awards as Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture from his role in Poetic Justice.
[81][82][83][84] Gangsta rap has also raised questions of whether it is protected speech under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, since lyrics may express violence and may be considered true threats.
In a notable case, rapper Jamal Knox, performing as "Mayhem Mal", wrote a gangsta rap song named "F*** the Police" shortly after he was arrested for gun and drug charges in Pittsburgh.
Germany at the time, however, had few rappers active in this subgenre; allowing certain artists in the Berlin underground-hip-hop scene an opportunity to establish themselves with their lyrics representing a certain hardship acquired through the criminal lifestyle which had previously been popularized.