Biggie Smalls and Lil Wayne
Yesterday was a sad day for many hip-hop fans. It was the 13th anniversary of the death of Christopher Wallace aka Biggie Smalls. It was also the first day of rapper Lil Wayne’s one-year prison sentence for attempted gun possession.
Both men represent the huge success of commercial hip-hop over the last 15 years. The Hip-hop of MTV and BET has a very different façade than it did 20 or even 40 years ago coming up out of urban Black communities. Today, hip-hop makes billions for the major record labels and influences nearly all popular music in ways Biggie Smalls probably never imagined.
Who else would we turn to but MTV for a little context in these emotional times. The Network has called both men “arguably one of the greatest MC’s of our time”. A recent MTV article about Lil Wayne quotes rappers Young Jeezy and Diddy saying that the “hip-hop community is under attack” and rappers need to “watch themselves”. But it’s not the hip-hop community that’s under attack; it’s the entire black community. Read more
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Authors
- Amy Mehta
- Amy Spicer
- Ana Turck
- Axel Fuentes
- Carlos Rich
- Charlotte Williams
- Chris Bober
- Cloee Cooper
- Eric Ward
- Garat Ibrahim
- George Garza
- Glenn Hutchinson
- Guest Blogger
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- James E. Johnson
- Jessica Acee
- Jill Garvey
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- Katie Bezrouch
- Ken Brown
- MJ Olahafa
- Noah Chandler
- Rebecca Poswolsky
- Rev. David L. Ostendorf
- Sarah Viets
- Stephen Piggott
- Amy Mehta