| Rap rock | |
|---|---|
 Urban Dance Squad performing in 2006 | |
| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | Early to mid-1980s, United States |
| Other topics | |
Rap rock is a music genre that developed from the early to mid-1980s, whenhip hopDJs incorporatedrock records into their routines andrappers began incorporating original andsampled rock instrumentation into hip hop music. Rap rock is considered to be rock music in which lyrics are rapped, rather than sung. The genre achieved its greatest success in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
AllMusic characterized rap rock songs asrock songs in which the vocals wererapped rather thansung.[1]AllMusic also states that the rhythms of rap rock are rooted in those ofhip hop, with morefunk influences than normalhard rock.[1] Session playerEddie Martinez, who created the guitar parts for hip hop groupRun-DMC's rap rock song "Rock Box", recognized that "a rap-rock song needn't feature a new change in the chorus; rather, it's a spot where the guitarist can just solo over the same riff that drives the verses."[2]
Rap rock is often conflated withrap metal, but while the two styles may appear to have minute differences,AllMusic says that rap rock has "organic, integrated" hip hop elements, while rap metal features "big, lurching beats and heavy, heavy riffs" and has a tendency to sound "as if the riffs were merely overdubbed over scratching and beat box beats."[1]AllMusic says that old school rap rock had more in common with "hardcore punk or artsypost-punk withbreakbeats" than with metal.[3]
Early hip hopDJs utilized breaks from rock records, such asBilly Squier's "the Big Beat",the Monkees' "Mary, Mary" andSteve Miller Band's "Take the Money and Run", in order to "flaunt their vinyl guile".[5] Impressed by post-punk bandPublic Image Ltd.'s incorporation ofdub elements into their music, hip hop artistAfrika Bambaataa collaborated with the band's singerJohn Lydon on the single "World Destruction".[2] The post-punk andnew wave scenes also saw the early rap rock recordings "The Magnificent Seven" and "This Is Radio Clash" bythe Clash, influenced byGrandmaster Flash andthe Sugarhill Gang,[5][6] and the new-wave rap song "Rapture" byBlondie.[5] Althoughthe Cold Crush Brothers' "Punk Rock Rap" did not see much success andGrandmaster Flash and the Furious Five would wind up being jeered opening for the Clash, Run-DMC saw a crossover audience with their rap rock sound, helping gain rock fans' acceptance of hip hop.[5] Subsequently,Public Enemy would further unite hip hop andpunk rock audiences, "with their rough, hard-hitting boom-bap sound resonating with both black kids in the inner cities and white kids in the suburbs".[7] Public Enemy brought a punk rock attitude to hip hop;[4] frontmanChuck D cited punk band the Clash's triple albumSandinista! as a release that made him take notice of hip hop.[6] Another link between hip hop and punk rock was producerRick Rubin, who split his time between working with hip hop artists Run-DMC andBeastie Boys, and punk-influenced bands likeSlayer andthe Cult.[7]
Although hip hop music would gain popularity in the 1980s, many dismissed it as either bring a fad, or as a marginal art form which appealed only to urban African Americans.[8] However, a rap rock collaboration between Run-DMC and the rock bandAerosmith helped diminish such biases.[8] The 1986 single "Walk This Way", a remake of Aerosmith's 1975 rock song, helped bring hip hop into popularity with a mainstream white audience.[9] It was the firstBillboard top ten rap rock success played on radio.[10] Themusic video signaled "both a literal and metaphoric merging of hard rock and rap"; the recording revitalized Aerosmith's career.[8] The same year that Run-DMC released "Walk This Way", Beastie Boys released their debut album,Licensed to Ill, "a head-banging party album that enjoyed multi-platinum sales".[8] According toCNN, the album "essentially invented rap-rock",[4] as demonstrated by songs like "Rhymin' and Stealin'", which was built around samples fromBlack Sabbath,Led Zeppelin and the Clash, "(You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (To Party!)" and "No Sleep till Brooklyn", which featured guitar playing by Slayer'sKerry King.[4] Also that year, rap rock bandUrban Dance Squad formed, and according toAllMusic writer Heather Phares, the band's "mix of rock, rap, funk,ska,folk, hip-hop, andsoul signaled the trend toward genre-bending that prevailed in '90s music."[11] Public Enemy's 1988 albumIt Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back contained a song which sampled Slayer, and in 1991, the hip hop group would re-record their song "Bring the Noise" with the metal bandAnthrax,[8] a collaborationSpin deemed to be a weak retread of the "Walk This Way" collaboration.[5]
The 1990s saw rap rock achieving mainstream success.[8]Faith No More reached a large audience with their 1990 hit "Epic", in which the band's singer,Mike Patton, mixed singing and rapping.[8]Rage Against the Machine also saw success with rap rock music influenced bypolitical hip hop.[8] According to theBBC, 1990s hip hop artists likeIce Cube,DMX andOnyx displayed the punk rock sensibilities of hip hop.[7] This period also saw Beastie Boys reinventing themselves by distancing themselves from the frat boy image they portrayed on theirLicensed to Ill album; harkening back to the group's roots in hardcore punk, Beastie Boys began playing live instruments again on their 1992 albumCheck Your Head, a "groundbreaking record that captured suburban skateboard culture with a goofy melding of rap, rock, funk, and thrash"[8] and this album, along with their follow-up,Ill Communication, demonstrated that rock, hip hop andjazz could coexist on a single album.[4] However, the genre had developed a bad aesthetic reputation, owing to "a series of ill-advised, record-company driven projects"[2] which included thesoundtrack album to the filmJudgment Night (1993), which featured rock artists collaborating with rappers on every track, the results of whichSlate described as being "lumpy and uneven" in its fusion of rap withgrunge and metal;Slate wrote, "the subsequent corporate rap rock of the '90s followed the blander, more conservative examples of fusion to be found onJudgment Night."[2] In the bookIs Hip Hop Dead? The Past, Present, and Future of America's Most Wanted Music, author Mickey Hess identifiesKid Rock as connecting hip hop music to rap rock, due to the musician having started out as a hip hop artist, before shifting his style fromsample-based hip hop to guitar-drivenalternative rock that fused hip hop beats, boasting and fashion with hard rock guitar andSouthern rock attitude, influenced byclassic rock andcountry music.[12] After releasing "two albums of pure Beastie Boys worship",[13] including his first rap rock album,The Polyfuze Method (1993),[14] Kid Rock began to explore his Southern rock influences onEarly Mornin' Stoned Pimp (1996), andDevil Without a Cause (1998), the latter of which "extended the lineage of rap-rock"[13] with an album that sold over 14 million copies,[15] and helped to "ignite the rap-rock genre".[16]
The late 1990s has been cited as rap rock's "golden age".[8] Separate from rap rock, but developing popularity around the same time in the late 1990s, wasnu metal. Nu metal would ultimately be conflated with rap rock, although the two genres did not have much in common.[13] However, theWoodstock '99 festival and the bandLimp Bizkit would wind up linking, as well as shifting critical opinion of both genres from the acclaim they'd initially received to near-universal disdain.[13] The band's frontman,Fred Durst, grew up with hip hop music, and Limp Bizkit would have a stronger connection to rap rock than any previous artist in nu metal, including having formerHouse of Pain turntablistDJ Lethal as part of their line-up.[13][17] The release of Limp Bizkit's 1999 albumSignificant Other was pinpointed as a breakthrough for rap rock.[8] Selling more than more than 7 million copies, and featuring the hit single "Nookie" as well as a guest appearance byWu-Tang Clan rapperMethod Man,Significant Other demonstrated the commercial viability of rap rock by "drawing from Rage's metallic aggression and the Beastie Boys' skateboard-slacker attitude".[8] However, Limp Bizkit's performance at Woodstock '99 was linked to festival violence.[18] The festival featured performances by multiple rap rock artists, including Limp Bizkit, Kid Rock,Insane Clown Posse and Rage Against the Machine, all of which were considered the "breakout stars" of the festival.[17] However, despite these performances being well received, Limp Bizkit's performance was subject to national controversy as violence and vandalism occurred during and after the band's performance; this included fans tearing plywood from the walls during a performance of their song "Break Stuff".[19][20][21][22][23] Durst stated during the concert, "Don't let anybody get hurt. But I don't think you should mellow out. That's whatAlanis Morissette had you motherfuckers do. If someone falls, pick 'em up."[20] Durst said during a performance of the band's hit song "Nookie", "We already let all the negative energy out. Its time to reach down and bring that positive energy to this motherfucker. Its time to let yourself go right now, 'cause there are no motherfuckin' rules out there."[24] Eyewitnesses also reported a crowd-surfing woman being pulled down into the crowd and assaulted in the mosh pit during Limp Bizkit's set.[25] Widely blamed for inciting the crowd to violence, Durst later stated in an interview, "I didn't see anybody getting hurt. You don't see that. When you're looking out on a sea of people and the stage is twenty feet [6 m] in the air and you're performing, and you're feeling your music, how do they expect us to see something bad going on?"[20] Former Limp Bizkit manager Peter Katsis defended Durst in an interview for Netflix's 2022 documentary on the festival, claiming that "pointing the finger at Fred is about the last thing anybody should do. There really isn't a way to control 300,000 people. The best thing he could do is put on the best show possible, and that's what he did.".[26] Their third album,Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water, debuted at number one on theBillboard 200,[27] selling 1,054,511 copies in its first week of being released,[28][29] with 400,000 of those copies being sold in the album's first day of release[30] making it thelargest first-week sales debut for a rock album in the United States.
Crazy Town was met with more ire from metal purists than any other rap rock band due to looking more like a hip hop crew than a metal band.[31] Crazy Town's music and image reflected the band members' background in the underground hip hop scene in Los Angeles, anticipating nu metal.[32][33] Their lyrics reflected "one of the most dynamic and volatile sociocultural environments on the planet [...] where the urban squalor of the South Central district exists just minutes away from the glitz of Beverly Hills."[32] RapperKRS-One recorded a guest appearance for the band's debut albumThe Gift of Game.[32] Although Crazy Town were best known for having a rap metal sound, their biggest hit, "Butterfly", was "decidedly hip-hop".[34] "Butterfly" would be the only Hot 100 hit by a rap rock act.[35] According toVulture, the 1990s were capped off by the short-lived late-90ssitcomShasta McNasty, which encapsulated numerous 1990s trends in its depiction of a fictional rap rock band, brought the genre to primetime.[36]
The style ofcrunk developed byLil Jon was categorized as a "southern rap take on punk, which prioritised uncomfortably loud horns and repetitive screams."[7]Linkin Park debuted in 2000 with their albumHybrid Theory and would continue to be the most visible rap rock group of the 21st century, going as far as to collaborate with rapperJay-Z on the 2004 releaseCollision Course.[8] Subsequently, Kid Rock and Linkin Park's styles changed,[37] with Kid Rock having shifted to acountry rock sound.[38]Hollywood Undead was seen as a revival of the rap rock sound, although they considered themselves a rock band with hip hop influences, rather than a rap rock band.[37]HotNewHipHop said thatKid Cudi blurred the lines between genres with his albumMan on the Moon II (2010), which contained collaborations withindie rock artistsSt. Vincent andHAIM, and would deliver further into rock on his albumsWZRD (2012) andSpeedin' Bullet 2 Heaven (2015).[39] The publication suggested that the negative reception to the latter two albums, as well asLil Wayne'sRebirth (2010), were "glaring examples of the music media immediately shutting down Black artists for stepping outside of the confines of what is deemed as 'Black music.'"[39] The publication also said that Lil Wayne's use ofautotune on the album and its "raw rock attitude" would prove "to be highly influential on the next generation of rap rockstars."[39] By 2011, theMilwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that rap rock "seemed [...] dead".[37] However, that year saw the release of several acclaimed rap rock projects, includingWugazi, amashupmixtape in which raps by Wu-Tang Clan were paired with instrumentals by the bandFugazi,[2] and the rap rock mixtapeExmilitary by the bandDeath Grips, which "[coupled] contemporaryavant-rock techniques withunderground rap sonics"; while some of the mixtape's samples and influences were more mainstream, such as a sample of aDavid Bowie song, most of the mixtape's samples came from American underground bands likeBlack Flag andMinutemen.[2]Twenty One Pilots composed the rap rock songs "Stressed Out" and "Heathens", which both peaked at number two on theBillboard Hot 100 in 2016.[40][41][42][43][44]
In 2017,Pitchfork wrote, "if, at some point, you made a name for yourself through combining rap and rock, chances are you either distance yourself vigorously from such efforts now or have learned to adjust to life as a walking joke."[18] In 2018, conversely,The A.V. Club wrote that "rap-rock as we once knew it as dead",[13] whileHotNewHipHop said that the genre showed "no signs of stopping".[39] The late 2010s saw the emergence of female rap rock artists such asPrincess Nokia,Rico Nasty andBali Baby, diverging from the typically male-dominated rap rock acts of the past.[39]
In 2020,NME writer Kyann-Sian Williams reported a resurgence in rap rock, which fans dubbed "glock rock" due to the unfavorable reputation of rap rock.[45] Williams cited as representatives of glock rock,Lil Uzi Vert, a punk rock-influenced rapper who identified as a "rockstar" and citedMarilyn Manson as their all-time favorite musical artist,[45]Machine Gun Kelly, a rapper influenced byemo andpop punk,[45]City Morgue, a group that "mixedthrash metal with pulsating 808s",[45] as well asTrippie Redd,Post Malone,Clever andThe Kid LAROI.[45] Also emerging in this period wasOxymorrons, a rap rock group described as being "too rock for hip-hop [and] too hip-hop for rock";[46]Kerrang! writer Sophie K. described them as "a talented rock band who are able to properly rap with authenticity as well, seamlessly switching between clean vocals, electronics, fuzzy guitars and angsty rap vocals".[47] Rappers dominated the rock charts throughout 2020.[48]
there was such a thing as rock-rap fusion -- but it sounded very different from the rap-inflected nu metal of the late '90s. It was more like hardcore punk or artsy post-punk with breakbeats
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