Tag Archives: Hip hop music

by | August 6, 2026 · 6:00 am

Afrobeat, hip hop, and Nigerian activism

Nigerian music genres, particularly Afrobeat, have historically sparked social consciousness, with Fela Anikulapo Kuti as a prominent figure. His energetic performances aimed to confront oppressive regimes in Nigeria and beyond, addressing neocolonial influences from Western powers. Despite facing assaults and imprisonment, Fela remained dedicated to his enduring belief that an artist’s role extends beyond entertainment; it includes provoking public thought and raising awareness about social issues. His commitment to these ideals has left a lasting impact on the cultural and political landscape of Nigeria.

Fela remained a steadfast opponent of Nigerian military rulers until his death in 1997. While some musicians have attempted to carry the torch of his activist legacy, few have been able to mobilize a significant following or resonate with the public as he did. Other genres, like Nigerian hip hop, have often faced criticism for promoting misogyny, materialism, and hedonism. In contrast, Fela’s counterculture has evolved into a broader global movement, gaining traction alongside the rising international popularity of Nigerian hip hop, now widely recognized as “Afrobeats.”

Cover art for the 1976 album Zombie, which was a scathing critique of the Nigerian government and military. Listen to the title track Zombie here.

One musician who has taken up this challenge is Falz (Folarin Falana), a dynamic Nigerian artist who combines humor with bold social commentary in his music. Like Fela, he uses his art to spotlight societal issues and foster awareness aimed at inspiring positive change. The son of renowned human rights lawyer Femi Falana and his wife, Funmi Falana, a lawyer and advocate in her own right, Falz initially trained as a lawyer before pursuing music, reminiscent of Fela’s own journey. Gaining fame through humorous social media skits that critique everyday Nigerian life, Falz’s music has evolved to address pressing social problems, urging ordinary Nigerians to recognize their role in perpetuating state repression and to advocate for change.

The Nigerian rapper Falz.

Falz initially garnered attention as a humorist on social media, creating skits that satirize everyday Nigerian life. As his music career progressed, his performances became more impactful, drawing inspiration from Fela both musically and politically. In his songs, Falz tackles pressing social issues in Nigeria and encourages listeners to actively resist and advocate for change. Notably, Falz emphasizes the collective responsibility of ordinary Nigerians, highlighting how the broader populace contributes to the state repression faced by citizens.

This according to “Re-imagining Afrobeat(s): Juxtaposing Fela and Falz’s social commentary and lyrical activism”, by Paul Ayodele Onanuga (African identities 23/3 [2025] 584–603; RILM Abstracts of Music Literature, 2025-1229).

Below are two Falz music videos.

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by | May 21, 2025 · 6:00 pm

Répertoire International de Littérature Musicale (RILM) introduces its latest product at the special event Sites + Sounds + Scenes

Just a reminder that on May 27, 2025, at 4:30 pm, at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York City, Répertoire International de Littérature Musicale (RILM) will unveil its latest product, the RILM Archive of Popular Music Magazines (RAPMM), at a special launch event titled Sites + Sounds + Scenes.

The RILM Archive of Popular Music Magazines (RAPMM) is a continuously expanding digital collection that currently includes over 125 independently published popular music magazines and fanzines from the late 1960s to the present. This internationally scoped archive covers a diverse range of popular music genres, from punk and rock to indie, hip hop, and country, serving as a multilingual and interdisciplinary resource for music research. By preserving rare and historically significant publications, RAPMM safeguards essential elements of cultural heritage.

In line with RILM’s global mission the content of RAPMM spans multiple languages and countries–currently from Australia, Canada, China, Colombia, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The zines in RAPMM cover a wide range of popular music genres, including punk, rock, indie music, post-punk, grunge, hip hop, women’s music, world music, psychedelia, noise, alternative music, jazz, and country music. There are articles on the history of musical movements and their relation to politics, society and social movements, underground and subcultures, stylistic shifts, and feminism; interviews with widely recognized and unknown artists at different stages of their careers; band profiles; and album reviews and history of record labels.

Watch the RAPMM trailer above.

Accessible through RILM’s Egret platform, RAPMM offers advanced browsing, searching, and translation features across desktop, mobile, and tablet devices. Additionally, the platform provides a networked research experience, linking directly to other scholarly resources such as RILM Abstracts of Music Literature and external services like the Virtual International Authority File (VIAF). RAPMM underscores RILM’s broader mission as an NGO accredited to provide advisory service to UNESCO’s Committee of Intangible Cultural Heritage. Speaking on the project’s significance, RILM Executive Director, Dr. Tina Frühauf, states:

“In alignment with UNESCO’s initiatives to protect cultural diversity, RAPMM represents a vital node in an international effort to safeguard and preserve information about the sonic history of our times. It fosters community-centered archiving practices that foreground the lived experiences and material traces of popular music magazines. By bridging the analog and the digital, the local and the global, RAPMM not only preserves endangered media artifacts but also reimagines archives as dynamic spaces of cultural memory, equity, and engagement.”

The launch event, hosted by The Barry S. Brook Center for Music Research and Documentation and RILM, is cosponsored by the American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning. In addition to unveiling RAPMM, the event will also celebrate the release of two groundbreaking publications: Inside the Studio Spaces of Electronic Music Production: Berlin/Cairo by Dr. Matthias Pasdzierny and Gero Cacciatore, and Gear: Cultures of Audio and Music Technologies by Dr. Eliot Bates and Dr. Samantha Bennett.

Held in the William P. Kelly Skylight Room on the 9th floor of the CUNY Graduate Center, the event will feature discussions with key contributors, moderated by Finn Cohen (The Sun). A reception will follow.

Admission is free. Please RSVP to cmrd@gc.cuny.edu. The event will be live-streamed by the CUNY Graduate Center–RSVP to receive the link.

For more information, please visit https://brookcenter.gc.cuny.edu/event/sites-sounds-scenes/.

Contact:
Michael Lupo (he/him/his), Marketing & Media
RILM International Center
365 Fifth Avenue, Suite 3108  •  New York, NY 10016-4309
Michael Lupo  •  Phone 1 212 817 8601  •  www.rilm.org

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by | January 16, 2024 · 6:00 am

All hail the queens: Women in rap (1984-97)

Roxanne Shante on the mic.

Women have been part of hip hop expression from its early days, primarily as part of MC crews such as the Funky Four Plus One and Sugar Hill’s female group, Sequence. For most of hip hop’s recorded history, however, women MCs were mostly seen as novelty acts, with a few exceptions. In the mid-1980s, some female artists were popularized momentarily through answer songs, which ridiculed popular songs by male acts. These answer songs included Roxanne Shante’s Roxanne’s revenge (responding to UTFO’s 1984 song Roxanne, Roxanne) and Pebblee Poo’s Fly guy (responding to the Boogie Boys’ 1985 song A fly girl).

MC Lyte strikes a pose.
The early rap group, Sequence.

Some of the most enduring female hip hop acts released premiere albums in 1986. Salt-N-Pepa was the most commercially successful hip hop group with its first album, Hot, cool and vicious. Queen Latifah emphasized strong social messages and women’s empowerment on her first album, All hail the queen. MC Lyte recorded her first album, Lyte as a feather, at this time. Many women artists who appeared or recorded during the early 1990s adopted the extant masculine-oriented hip hop images prevalent in hardcore rap music. MC Lyte, for example, recorded a hardcore album in 1993 entitled Ain’t no other–the album’s first hit single, Ruffneck, was MC Lyte’s first gold-selling single. After the decline of gangsta rap music in the mid- to late 1990s, women remained on the periphery of mainstream hip hop, apart from the occasional pop hit, such as the platinum-selling Atlanta-based artist Da Brat’s Funkdafied (1994).

Cover art for Lil’ Kim’s Hardcore and Foxy Brown’s Ill na na.
“Supa dupa fly” Missy Elliot.

By the late 1990s, artists such as Lil’ Kim and Foxy Brown publicly celebrated or exploited female sexuality through explicit lyrics and widespread publicity campaigns that presented these scantily clad artists as sex symbols. For the most part, however, women artists failed to receive respect within the hip hop community as competent MCs and recording artists, although achieving mainstream success. Many of the writers and producers for the female groups were men, particularly through the late 1990s. The year 1998, however, was pivotal for women in hip hop, especially as rapper-producer-songwriter Missy Elliot began gaining notoriety with her debut album, Supa dupa fly (1997).

Learn more in The Garland encyclopedia of world music. The United States and Canada (2013). Find it in RILM Music Encyclopedias.

Below are some videos from this early period of hip featuring women rappers. First up is the music video for Queen Latifah’s Ladies first, followed by Roxanne Shante performing Roxanne’s revenge (on VHS tape from around 1984!), and a 1985 recording of Pebblee Poo’s Fly guy.

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by | August 25, 2011 · 1:00 am

Traditional Ghanaian sampling

The Ewe of Ghana have a long history of incorporating musical elements from other cultures into their traditions.

Recent developments among the Tagborlo family in the master drumming for agbadza funeral dancing (above), influenced to some extent by contacts with Western popular music, involve humor (including graphic sexual jokes), taunts, and quotations from popular songs in a manner resembling sampling procedures in rap music. These innovations are entirely within the tradition—the basic rhythmic structure, cultural context, and instrumentation remain the same.

This according to “’My mother has a television, does yours?’ Transformation and secularization in an Ewe funeral drum tradition” by James Burns (Oral tradition XX/2 [October 2005] pp. 300–319). Below, agbadza drumming and dancing at a funeral in Atsiekpui, Ghana; the master drummer on the far left conveys verbal messages through references to speech rhythms and tones.

Related post: Dagomba dance-drumming

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