Hip Hop culture is like the “rose that grew from concrete” that Tupac Shakur speaks about in his poem (Shakur, 2014). The music element of hip hop captures the essence of a rose almost perfectly as its sometimes explicit, offensive lyrics are like cutting thorns to listeners. Yet, the overall significance of hip hop culture as it has spread to the masses, makes it like the beautiful petals of a rose blowing in the wind. Hip Hop culture has also shown itself to grow from the concrete as it is believed to have risen out of the terrible conditions of the Bronx; some might not have imagined that birth to this culture was possible given the state of disarray in the Bronx in the 1970s (Shakur, 2014; Chang, 2005). In Jeff Chang’s book Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, he discusses the various conditions in the Bronx and Jamaica that led to the early beginnings of hip hop. However, Chang’s attempts to explain the beginnings of hip hop culture in the first and third chapters are inefficient as he leaves the readers to make inferences about the connections between the various conditions at the time and how they might have led to the creation of the culture; however, in the second and fourth chapters Chang makes it clear how the elements of the culture including rap, break dancing, DJing and graffiting came alive out of the struggle.
In Chapter 1, Chang describes the early conditions of the Bronx, only to make the connection between those conditions and hip hop culture once. First, Chang reveals the issue of racism in the Bronx in the 1960s as Jackie Robinson, the first black baseball player on the Yankees, was mistreated despite his accomplishments as a player (Chang, 2005). Next, Chang discusses the issues of displacement and poverty among Bronx residents. The displacement of residents was due to the urban development goals of builders like Robert Moses (Chang, 2005). Moses devised a plan to build the Cross-Bronx Expressway, a highway that would allow travel across the New York city boroughs to the New Jersey suburbs (Chang, 2005).
To facilitate the plan, New York residents were forced move from their homes in Manhattan to the housing developments of the South Bronx and east Brooklyn (Chang, 2005). Soon the new residents of Bronx, were impacted by the failing economy there: 600,000 jobs were lost and the average per capita income decreased to about $2,000 (Chang, 2005). Chang argues that, “If blues culture had developed under the conditions of oppressive, forced labor, hip hop culture would arise from the conditions of no work” (Chang, 2005). Here, readers receive the first and only mention that hip hop was sparked by unemployment in the Bronx. Still, the connection that Chang makes to hip hop and unemployment is inadequate for a couple reasons.
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Firstly, Chang’s connection between hip hop culture and employment is inadequate because it solely relies on his explanation of the conditions of unemployment and poor housing in the Bronx without analyzing how those conditions are tied to the creation of hip hop culture. For example, Chang explains that unemployment gave rise to the “slumlord culture” where scrupulous landlords profited by withdrawing heat and water from their tenants and by burning their properties for insurance money (Chang, 2005). Due to the lack of jobs, people sought profit by burning down apartments; the affected tenants in these destroyed buildings were left homeless (Chang, 2005). As Chang continues to talk about these conditions, the word “hip hop” completely disappears from the chapter.
This is an issue because readers only receive background information about the terrible conditions that led to hip hop but are left to answer this question for themselves: What was it about unemployment that led to the creation of hip hop culture? Readers may assume that maybe the lack of jobs provided people with more free time to explore hip hop culture. Or maybe hip hop was a response to the social conditions at the time. Also in this first chapter, readers do not receive a definition of hip hop culture. For readers to grasp that hip hop culture arose out of the unemployment situation, they should first understand the concept of hip hop culture itself.
Moreover, in the same sentence where Chang introduces hip hop culture’s relationship to employment, he also mentions the blues culture, which may add to the reader’s confusion. Chang’s inclusion of the “If-then” statement about blues and hip hop, is risky because it attempts to explain the birth of hip hop culture as a product of poor social and economic conditions by paralleling it to blues culture (Chang, 2005). While blues culture may be like hip hop culture, the similarity of these cultures should not be the basis of an argument about hip hop, especially since the background of the creation of blues culture was not previously discussed. Arguably, the history of the blues culture may not be relevant to the hip hop culture enough to include its history into a book about the beginnings of hip hop. If that is the case, it might have been unnecessary to mention it at all. To introduce a new culture to readers that is seemingly unfamiliar, to explain the birth of another culture is also problematic because it assumes that all music cultures are born out of terrible social and economic conditions. Still, readers do not get to the root of the question on how unemployment conditions led to the creation of hip hop.
The third chapter of the book provides information about the rise of gangs in the Bronx; later the reader will have to find the relevance of this information to hip hop (Chang, 2005). In the 1970s, gangs such as the Savage Skulls, the Turbans and the Ghetto Brothers took over the Bronx neighborhood (Chang, 2005). In a three-year span, over 25 gangs dominated the area with gun violence, robbery and fearful tactics (Chang, 2005). At this time, the Black Panthers, who were former gang members, used their influence to advocate for education, jobs and justice from the government (Chang, 2005). When the Black Panthers were arrested, more youth gangs were formed to protect themselves and each other from other gangs (Chang, 2005). Years later, the gangs agreed to a peace treaty which set the stage of the Ghetto Brothers to begin making music that brought the crowds together (Chang, 2005). Years later, the reader could assume that hip hop music would have the same effect (Chang, 2005).
Still, the third chapter of the book makes small connections between the information that it provides and hip hop; thus, leaving the reader to find relevance in the text (Chang, 2005). For example, when Chang discusses Black Panther Afeni Shakur’s writings in jail about oppression and mentions that she raised her son Tupac Amaru unemployed, the reader would have to assume that Tupac was important figure for hip hop; this is because Tupac’s role in hip hop is not mentioned (Chang, 2005). Given the fact that Tupac was a rapper, his profession should have been stated in this chapter. Secondly, in the discussion of the Ghetto Brothers’ music, Chang illustrates that it had a “drum-and-conga breakdown” that impressed the Bronx kids (Chang, 2005). Here, readers also must also make the inference that later hip hop music would incorporate that same style.
In contrast to the other two chapters, the second chapter successfully explains the origin of hip hop by mentioning the history of dub music in Jamaica (Chang, 2005). Before dub music, there was reggae music which was tied to the politics in Jamaica (Chang, 2005). The two parties, the Jamaican Labor Party (JLP) and People’s National Party (PNP), had opposing views on how to handle the economy, taxes and other important issues at the time (Chang, 2005). In addition, these parties were protected by gangs who forced voters to choose a side (Chang, 2005). Soon after, artists like Bob Marley and Lee “Scratch” Perry composed songs to discuss the political issues in the county and to call for revolution (Chang, 2005). As the industry grew, system operator Ruddy Redwood discovered dubplates to record multiple versions of a song (Chang, 2005). The dub version would allow the DJ could mix a song without vocals; the other side would allow the rapper to add rhymes in Patwa over the track (Chang, 2005). Here, the beginnings of hip hop culture are evident as both the DJ and rapping elements of hip hop culture came into play through the development of dubplates; these elements were better explained chapters later (Chang, 2005).
In Chapter 4, Chang efficiently examines the life of hip hop founder DJ Kool Herc and briefly mentions some elements of hip hop culture including rapping, dancing, graffiti and DJing (Chang, 2005). Once DJ Kool Herc, originally named Clive Campbell, received a sound system from his father, he practiced DJing at multiple parties to create a feeling of excitement (Chang, 2005). At first, he organized the parties in a small recreation room; later he moved the party to bigger venues (Chang, 2005). By DJing, DJ Herc learned about techniques such as looping, amplifying and cuing records (Chang, 2005). Chang also explains that rapping began with DJ Kool Herc “giving shout-outs, dropping little rhymes…[and] develop[ing] their own slang” (Chang, 2005, p.78). Then, Chang introduces the dancers who enjoyed listening to the breaks in records or the sound of drums; some of the dancers even copied some of James Brown’s moves (Chang, 2005). These dancers changed up their style and became known as “b-boys” later (Chang, 2005). At this same time, the art of graffiti became popular as kids wanted their names to be known and to rise above being invisible (Chang, 2005). The children felt invisible because the government ignored the poor living conditions of their home, the Bronx (Chang, 2005). During DJ Herc’s time, other DJs like Grandmaster Flash and Afrika Bambaataa also emerged and perfected their craft.
Overall, the first four chapters of Chang’s book provide an immense amount of background about the places and conditions where hip hop was founded. In addition, these chapters provide sufficient information about one of the founders of hip hop, DJ Kool Herc who moved to the United States from Jamaica with his family for a free education and better opportunities (Chang, 2005). Even though Chang does not explain why hip hop culture was able to bloom in these poor conditions of the Bronx, the reader can draw his/her own conclusions. From DJ Kool Herc’s story, it can be inferred that hip hop culture derived from the creativity of people who found a way to enjoy their circumstances during times of political, economic and social struggle. The struggles that occurred were numerous and included poverty, governmental corruption, capitalism, riots, racism and injustice; and would seem like harsh, seemingly concrete circumstances to stifle the beauty of the people (Chang, 2005). Yet, for the few hours that DJ Herc and his sister threw these parties, it seemed like all was forgotten; this phenomenon speaks to the impact of hip hop culture as a possible movement and source of therapeutic release.
