Taking the Rap

The role of rap as a music form and the perception of rappers as a whole has changed over the past ten years. It was a slow process for rap as a whole to be accepted as music and eventually be recognized by critics and award ceremonies. The advent of "gangster" rap brought about a new group of rappers with criminal histories and raunchy over the top lyrics. Many rappers today, like Eminem, have highly publicized criminal histories that overshadow the meaningful messages and damage the careers of otherwise model citizen rappers.

Eminem became the next hit in rap in 1999 with extremely violent and shocking lyrics that included descriptions of raping and killing his ex-wife and vicious slurs against homosexuals. I was a fan of the music simply for the shock factor like many teens of the time but I grew tired of it and moved on to more meaningful work. He followed this formula for two more albums which sold over a million copies just like his debut. He then backed up this image with drug, weapons, and assault charges in the following years. Then Eminem discovered the next "big hit" in rap when he signed 50 Cent, another convicted criminal who survived 9 bullet wounds. These are just a few cases of the media hyped crimes of a few rappers. All of these deliquent activities were used to stereotype rappers as a whole, while many other rapper's positive activities and attempts for career advancement went unnoticed or were hindered.

During the same time Eminem released his controversial albums rap acts like Outkast, Goodie Mob, Mos Def, and The Roots produced albums with positive life morals, uplifting messages, and politically charged lyrics. I was displeased to see some of the albums sell well but gain none of the notoriety of the artists constantly in the news. Only rap fans and a few music critics were aware of these positive notes, while the rest of society only got the news story of the most recent rapper's unlawful blunder. The effects were not fully realized until a large promotional deal between rapper Ludacris and Pepsi came to light.

Ludacris signed a multi-commercial ad campaign with Pepsi in 2002 when the company began to look for a "hipper" image. Ludacris uses profane language and mature situations in his lyrics but it is humorous and so over the top it is obvious it is a persona that he knew would sell. He has never been involved in any crime and even created a foundation