First off, apologies. It has been hard to stay on a weekly cadence. But I do hope to get out one more, maybe much shorter, piece before next Tuesday. In the meantime, here’s the next issue of Tunegrape, on rap music and the regional specificity that comes with the places we call home.
Before we begin, one quick note: This is not an exhaustive list of regional rap artists. It’s not even an exhaustive list of my favorite regional rap artists. I could write 10,000 words and still leave out some of my favorites.
Some artists that aren’t mentioned below, or at least aren’t given enough attention, are the Wu-Tang Clan, Isaiah Rashad, Young Thug, Doechii, Cardi B, Missy Elliot, Tierra Whack, Vince Staples, Tyler, the Creator, JPEGMAFIA, Busta Rhymes, A Tribe Called Quest, RATKING, Freddie Gibbs, the Fugees, Earl Sweatshirt, Del the Funky Homosapien, Mach-Hommy, and many, many more.
Drake is very purposefully not on this list and will not be mentioned again in Tunegrape.
What it is is a stroll through some of the most prominent regional scenes in the genre, my personal experience with them, and how the music is shaped by the places it comes from.
The Shit is Real - DJ Premier Remix by Fat Joe
Courtesy of Tyler, my brother, from Texas.
The first official post in this blog series spoke to storytelling and music, and made specific mention of rap as a storytelling genre. And to reiterate, it truly does represent the storytelling music ideal. The genre’s looping breakbeats open up plenty of space for dense verses packed with poetic reminiscences.
In that same blog, I spoke to the stories we tell being borne of the places we live and the cultural rituals that shape us. Other than being bald, if there’s one thing my brother and I share in common with Fat Joe, it’s that all three of us grew up in the great state of New York. Of course, my brother and I were raised in a very different New York than the New York Fat Joe called home in his early years. We grew up on Long Island, while the Terror Squad originator is from the Bronx. But as children, we were never far from New York City, and that greatest city in the world shaped us as much as anything.
It was hard to escape rap music growing up in the 1990s and early 2000s. But I think being from NY took the genre’s influence to another level, especially for my brother. And 50 Cent’s “Get Rich or Die Tryin’” was a turning point for our neighborhood. While “In Da Club” was his biggest hit, the Fiddy song I most closely associate with those years is “Many Men (Wish Death).”
I have clear memories of listening to it with my brother and our friend, the three of us fascinated by a New York that was physically close to us, but in all other aspects felt worlds away. The same New York that Fat Joe raps about in “The Shit is Real.” In it, he tells the story of growing up in the South Bronx and how being there quickly led him to a life of violence and crime. And he does so with impeccable writing:
Keep the shit in check, in order And my main man Tone was fuckin everybody else's daughter See everybody knew in town That Joe and Tone had shit locked down
As I mentioned earlier, dense. Packed with various rhymes and assonance, like the 'ee' sound in keep, see, and everybody, these verses exemplify the sort of writing I gravitate toward in rap. But what stands out even more than the story or the rhyming is DJ Premier’s beat on the remix. It is Premier who takes what was an okay Fat Joe song and turns it into something great.
The Trifecta: Reshaping my views on rap and writing
It wasn’t long after 50 Cent skyrocketed to fame that I declared what I called The Trifecta. This, for me, was the Holy Trinity of rap music. There was the Notorious B.I.G., the most naturally gifted rapper to ever do it. There was Jay-Z, the greatest businessman in rap. And there was Nas, the best writer in rap music.
Biggie was also one of the great storytellers in rap music, well known for being able to step up to the mic and freestyle into existence a detailed plot like that of “I Got a Story to Tell,” about the time he had sex with the girlfriend of a NY Knicks player and then robbed him.
Meanwhile, while the ethics of Jay-Z’s ever-growing fortune are increasingly questionable, the fact is he built his wealth from nothing. A massive pile of dead presidents. While my earliest experiences with Jay-Z were my brother’s copy of “The Black Album,” my favorite record by him remains “Reasonable Doubt.”
And finally, the rapper I can most relate to because he is clearly a writer at heart: Nas. As I’ve hinted at, the more alliteration, rhymes, and assonance a rapper can pack into a verse, the better. And few could do that like Nas. I’ve long considered my own writing style to be inspired by rap in the same way Jack Kerouac’s style was inspired by jazz. And it’s writers like Nas and MF DOOM who lit the way for me.
When it comes to NY rap, recently I’ve been dipping my toes back into the scene. Particularly, I’ve been delving into NY sample drill again. This genre sprung up in the early 2020s as a regional offshoot to Chicago drill that relied heavily on recognizable samples, which rappers rode to viral fame. I have trouble with a lot of NY sample drill because it feels like everyone has the exact same flow. But Kenzo B branches out. And when she does lean back toward the ever-present sample drill flow, she elevates it into a densely packed, spitfire art.
NYC is a grind, where Timberlands trudge through snow and bodies sweat together in unbearable heat. Where blue-collar workers from a thousand different cultures rub shoulders with the world’s wealthiest people—either ripe for a robbery or for climbing over as you climb over them and up the ladder.
Rap and the places that shape us
In rap music in the early 2000s, a giant emerged from Jay-Z’s circle and walked among us. Although he was 5’8” on a good day, this man reshaped rap and music in general. His descent into mental illness and Nazism has been sad. And honestly, he was never a great writer (in this case, thank God for ghostwriters). But as a producer, he was untouchable.
While rap was all around me when I was growing up, it was Kanye’s music that showed me all the genre could be. While “Jesus Walks” and “Through the Wire” were unavoidable, it was actually “Heard ‘Em Say” that made me think “what is this and where do I get more of it.” My love for the genre was born in the gritty boom bap of New York rap, but it matured in the Chicago scene.
Chicago
Rap, maybe more than any American music, is regional. Just as it is emblematic of storytelling in music, it is also emblematic of regionality in music. While it later became the home of drill, when I discovered Chicago rap, it was defined by Kanye West’s “chipmunk soul” and the various artists adjacent to West, such as Twista, Consequence, Lupe Fiasco and, later on, Kid Cudi. My love for that specific scene ended with Chance the Rapper, as the Chicago drill of the 2010s never really appealed to me. At lest, not like NY sample drill does.
One of my favorite albums of all time, one that I think deserves an entire chapter in the book of rap, is “Lupe Fiasco’s Food & Liquor.” Packed with a tangled thicket of pop culture references and socially conscious musings, it includes four all-time classics in “Kick, Push,” “Daydream,” “Sunshine,” and my personal favorite, the Neptunes-produced “I Gotcha.” But this album, which features contributions from West, is all killer, no filler. It starts with a poem read by Fiasco’s sister, Ayesha Jaco, before he introduces the album.
West also shared a close connection with maybe the most beloved rapper out of the Midwest, Kid Cudi. While not a Chicago rapper per se, he’s from nearby Cleveland and closely tied to the scene through West. As I mentioned in my previous post on sonic texture and atmosphere, my favorite Kid Cudi song is “Cleveland is the Reason.” But at first I wasn’t all that impressed with the rapper and his breakout hit, “Day ‘n Nite.” It was only when I heard “Soundtrack 2 My Life” that I understood the power of the Solo Dolo himself. While not of the socially conscious ilk of rappers like Fiasco or West in his early discography, Cudi separated himself from the pack with a unique degree of introspection that first shone through in his work on the perpetually forgotten and underrated “808s and Heartbreak.”
While Chicago took a turn toward drill in the 2010s, the socially conscious vintage of the scene lives on through the impeccable work of Noname. Maybe just as important as her music is her work through Noname’s Book Club. Founded in 2019, the project elevates POC voices and encourages members to buy through local, independent bookstores. And it raises money to send book picks to prisons, something I absolutely love. Plenty of people are staying woke. How many are actively sending books to prisoners? It’s vital work, and I’m glad she’s doing it. It was Noname who inspired a years-long personal project of my own to alternate between books by people of color and women, in order to break out of my white male bubble.
Chicago rap is socially conscious because it has to be. While not the war zone conservatives portray it as, violence comes with the territory in places where neighborhoods are historically segregated and resources kept away from those who need them most. And the work of rappers like Fiasco, Noname, and Chance the Rapper reflects the pleas of a community desperate for peace.
Atlanta
Socially conscious rap isn’t limited to the Loop, though. And while Run the Jewels is great, the best Run the Jewels album wasn’t even released under the RTJ name.
Southern rap, with its country-fried lyrcism delivered in syrupy drawls like maple syrup drizzled over chicken and waffles, isn’t confined to Atlanta. And it’s probably worth an entire blog post on its own. But my favorite Southern rap just about always comes from the Peach State. Of course, no discussion of Atlanta rap, or Southern rap in general, is complete without mentioning the greatest rap duo to ever do it.
In Outkast’s work, you can find what would become hallmarks of the scene over the coming years, similar to Kanye’s production defining much of the Chicago scene. Hailing straight from the Black capital of America, there’s an unmistakable note of Black joy in the music. But it’s always contrasted against the reality of Black struggle. Strip clubs, parties, and Cadillacs slot in beside generational trauma dripping with a racist atmosphere as heavy as the humidity.
The city is considered the center of Black culture in America. But it sits in a region that operated as a white supremacist authoritarian society while many of the politicians and wealthy men who still run this country were teenagers. The legacy of white supremacy may feel distant to some who aren’t forced to deal with it daily, but it’s really still very recent. That this city could be so indisputably Black while also being situated in the seat of American white supremacy informs much of the music that came from it. That includes the music of Outkast and their longtime associate Killer Mike. There’s perhaps no better example of this contrast than “SpottieOttieDopaliscious.”
It starts off as a tale of Atlanta nightlife before evolving into a warning against allowing the dangers of said nightlife to overcome you. At least not if you’re not ready to take up the responsibilities that might just come with it. It’s a celebration. It’s a warning. It’s a lesson. Sex and drinking are fun. But sex and drinking may leave you with an unplanned child. And you better be ready to raise that kid. It never judges, though. In fact, the narrator hints that he may have partaken in the scene before. He’s not looking down on those participating. He’s just telling them to look out for what comes with it.
Their portraits of Southern life would become more suffused with political themes and lyrics without ever becoming overt screeds. Dynamic and unapologetically Southern, Outkast pioneered the rap of a region that would come to dominate the charts in subsequent years with Young Jeezy, T.I., and Lil Wayne, among others (the first two also from Atlanta).
You can trace their influence directly to the Atlanta rap scene of the last ten years. From Big Boi’s technically precise flows to André 3000’s hippie-coded, left-of-field taste, Atlanta rap still owes much to Outkast. I remember the first time I heard “God’s Whisper” from Raury, I thought I was listening to the second coming of André 3000.
But I think the best example of the duo’s legacy living on is Spillage Village. Comprising EarthGang, JID, and others, this loose collective combines impeccable flows, colorful portraits of Southern life, and back-to-earth hippie hymns in much the same way Outkast did throughout their discography. A friend introduced me to Spillage Village through EarthGang’s 2015 album “Torba.”
I was obsessed. It was wonderfully weird, lyrically complex, and backed by head-bopping beats. And the more I dug, the more I found a rich catalog of music. In my late teens I grew to despise much of what the genre had to offer. The mainstream success of Southern rap subgenres like crunk, pop rap, and snap left me despondent.
By 2015, several scenes had already brought me back from the brink, including the new wave of NY rap that emerged around A$AP Rocky, Flatbush Zombies, the Underachievers, and many others, as well as another region we’ll discuss soon. But the brand of creative and unique rap music coming from the South, the same region that gave us Lil Jon and Soulja Boy, was a full circle journey from pain to joy, each born of the same city.
My favorite rapper from the mid-2010s Atlanta scene was JID, though. Being an EarthGang and Spillage Village fan already, I was on top of his debut album as soon as it was released.
Now, I’ll admit I was wrong about that. But not because I misjudged JID’s immense talent. What I was wrong about was whether that talent would translate into mainstream success. But who could blame me? In 2015, I was still riding the high of accurately calling a different rapper’s trajectory to stardom.
Los Angeles
It was 2010, and I was as down as I would ever be on American rap music. I had turned to UK grime and Dizzee Rascal to escape the depressing rock bottom that was mainstream American rap, milked of all originality by record execs bent on making a buck off of hip-hop culture. A friend of mine from high school sent me a song I absolutely had to listen to by this kid out of L.A. Four minutes and 34 seconds later, I knew rap music had found its savior.
My faith in the gospel of K. Dot only deepened upon listening to the “Overly Dedicated” mixtape. In particular, “Cut You Off (To Grow Closer).”
He brought together a combination of impeccable beat selection, technical superiority, and writing chops that I hadn’t heard since I was a child. We knew then and there that this was something special. And wouldn’t you know, he actually made it. For as cynical as I’ve long been about the potential for real talent to travel to the top, Kendrick Lamar is the prime example of it actually happening in my adult lifetime. A truly great rapper. One of the greatest of all time. And he emerged through the muck that was mainstream music’s grotesque facsimile of a once vibrant genre.
Not only that, but he was surrounded by a group of rappers with similar generational talent. Sure, Ab-Soul only had one truly great song. But ScHoolboy Q and Jay Rock are all-time talents in their own right. And their record label, Top Dawg Entertainment, also gave us SZA and SiR (I know, she’s from New Jersey. But she was discovered and developed by Top Dawg).
It is hard to overstate just how talented and just how important the scene that emerged around Kendrick Lamar and Anthony "Top Dawg" Tiffith was. As far as regional rap goes, it might be the most important scene of the last 15 years. And it all started with a vision of Tupac.
As I mentioned at the top, Tupac was never really my thing. West Coast rap in general wasn’t. Although, outside of TDE, I have a particular soft spot for E-40. Especially his album “In a Major Way.”
But to deny the importance of the rap music coming out of Southern California in the late 80s and early 90s is to profess your ignorance. The Los Angeles that raised Kendrick Lamar was the Los Angeles of Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, and NWA. It was the Los Angeles of Snoop Dogg. It was the Los Angeles of Nate Dogg and Warren G.
As the title of this article makes clear, in music we hear home. And in the work of rappers like Tupac, Kendrick Lamar heard Los Angeles. And he iterated on that to push the entire rap genre forward. I may be from New York. And I may not fuck with most West Coast rap. But my all-time favorite rapper was raised by Los Angeles music.
Music Starts at Home, But it Makes its Home Everywhere
Rap is a distinctly American genre. But like many distinctly American genres before it, it has gone worldwide. My wife grew up on Bollywood music that had, by the time of her childhood, borrowed heavily from hip-hop breakbeats. And when I play the music of a certain Sri Lankan rapper, she recognizes so much of the music she heard growing up in India.
While rap boils down to poetry laid over a beat, it carries with it all the places we call home. It is a genre we live in because it is shaped by the places the artists lived in. When we listen to Nas, we walk the streets of the Queensbridge projects in the early 1990s. And when we listen to Kendrick Lamar, we find ourselves in the middle of the Compton gang wars. When we hear M.I.A., we’re traversing the jungles of Sri Lanka with the Tamil Tigers.
I can’t relate my own childhood to any of these experiences. But I can better understand them and sympathize with them by hearing the music. For a few minutes, I can make their home my home. And I walk away knowing something about a place and time I never experienced. The words and the music communicate something I’ll never know firsthand. Because artists like Kendrick Lamar or Nas took the time to welcome me into their experience through the power of their music.
The places we grow up in shape the music we create, and the music we create opens the doors and welcomes the world into our homes. Few genres capture the regional specificity of this powerful experience like rap.
What’s your favorite song from your local scene? Tell us below for a chance at a future feature:
See you next week with a song suggested by another human.
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