[1][2] Prince Paul, producer of 3 Feet High and Rising, has described the group's intent with their skits as follows: Rap records always had some dialogue in them, like, 'Hey, man, I'm gonna smack you in the face,' or, 'Yo… let's get it!'
They were frequently employed to help establish an album's prevailing mood, or to contextualize the artist's background and lifestyle.
[3][4] Common categories of skit include violent confrontations, sexual encounters, and "answering machine vignettes".
[3] Skits have also been seen as a venue to add levity to albums, especially as the rise of gangsta rap made humor less common in the songs themselves.
The advent of the MP3 format is widely attributed as being responsible for this decline, since the move from album-based listening to shuffleable music libraries made the presence of skits less desirable.