Word: rappings
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...funk genres and served as a creative outlet for those youth who maintained a zeal for life, despite trickle-down economics that never quite trickled down to the bottom. Contrary to the elitist posturing of many “real hip-hop heads,” the first rap songs were not about the problems of ghetto life, but instead were composed of nonsensical rhyming about fun and love. When the Sugar Hill Gang released “Rapper’s Delight” in 1979, hip-hop was music by ghetto people for ghetto people, and was about...
Ironically, while commercial hip-hop enjoyed tremendous financial success, it was gangsta and socially-conscious rap that dominated the media’s attention. In the beginning, gangsta rap’s obsession with reporting the conditions of ghetto life to outsiders granted America a great service: NWA’s “F--- Tha Police” exposed police brutality, while Public Enemy brazenly dissed Ronald Reagan by exposing the other side of his policies. This tradition reached its peak in the mid-1990s, when Nas’ Illmatic, the Notorious B.I.G.’s Ready...
...shower of popcorn, beer and venom from Detroit fans. Nine fans were hurt, none seriously. But the rumble in Detroit quickly turned into another spectacularly American experience--bad sports behavior morphing into trash television. Booyah! Artest, apologetic but clueless, was soon appearing on the Today show promoting the rap album he had just produced, looking as though he had scheduled everything on his Palm Pilot: Friday, beat the poms-poms out of a fan; Monday, work on that p.r. campaign! Green, who has had three DUI arrests, may not be able to dribble in a straight line, but he found...
Combs survived a hard childhood in Mount Vernon, N.Y.; a senseless bicoastal rap war in the 1990s that probably cost the life of his best friend, top Bad Boy performer Christopher (Biggie Smalls) Wallace; and a 2001 gun-possession trial, which ended in acquittal, before acquiring his mainstream profits. And he's not finished. Bolstered by a $100 million investment from Los Angeles supermarket billionaire Ron Burkle, Combs signed a licensing deal with Este Lauder to launch a men's fragrance next fall. This summer he opened a Sean John retail store on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue. More stores...
That's the rap--and the rep--associated with caffeine, the recreational chemical of choice for nearly 60% of Americans. But what of the received wisdom is true? Is caffeine a scourge, a tonic, a little bit of both...