During a news conference Wednesday morning, Houston Police Chief Troy Finner had few updates on the death of rapper Takeoff the night before at a downtown bowling alley. But after confirming the identity of the rapper (Kirshnik Khari Ball) and the fact that a suspect had not been arrested, he did have something to say.
Speaking to a crowd of reporters in the room and the millions of fans that Takeoff and his group Migos had amassed, Finner warned the audience against demonizing the hip-hop community after the loss of one of the genre’s most famous names in the last decade.
“Sometimes the hip-hop community gets a bad name, and I know there are a lot of great people in our hip-hop community and I respect them,” he said.
“We all need to stand together and make sure no one brings this industry down.”
The choice to emphasize this point is tied to the perception of hip-hop and an ongoing issue that seems to perpetuate the genre: the untimely deaths of some of its most promising artists.
But as Finner also stressed, there was no indication that Takeoff himself was involved in criminal activity and was more than likely just an innocent bystander caught up in the violence swirling around him.
Alongside this has emerged a heated debate about the cost of authenticity in the hip-hop community, where artists can feel pressure to live up to the lifestyle they portray in their music. Others say gender he is unfairly scapegoated and that violent lyrics do not translate into real world violence.
Successful rap artists are not insulated from violence
Following news of Takeoff’s death on Tuesday, the music community mourned the 28-year-old artist who, as a member of the rap trio Migos, pioneered a new sound in rap and hip hop.
But while fans expressed their grief over Takeoff’s death, the level of shock is unique in the hip hop world. While the deaths of celebrities at the top of other genres, such as Drake or Taylor Swift, would be extraordinarily unexpected, seven rappers have been killed this year, giving fans a rubric for how to react when one of the biggest stars is killed. hip-hop greats.
Migos’ impact on hip hop and culture in general is impossible to ignore, and far exceeded expectations from their early days.
From left, Quavo, Takeoff and Offset of the rap group Migos perform on stage at the 2021 BET Awards at the Microsoft Theater on June 27, 2021 in Los Angeles, California. Toronto rapper Pressa described them as “the Beatles of rap”. [world].’ (Bennett Raglin/Getty Images for BET)
“They’re like the Beatles for rap [world]” Toronto rapper Pressa told CBC News, referring to how they influenced both the music industry and pop culture.
While Versace didn’t chart high when it was released in 2013 (peaking at No. 99 on Billboard’s Hot 100), it proliferated in Atlanta clubs and eventually rose to international fame when Drake added a additional verse
Throughout, frontman Quavo and Offset—one half of a power couple with fellow musician Cardi B—got most of the crowd’s attention; Meanwhile, the quieter and younger member, Takeoff, seemed to take a back seat in interviews and performances.
But it was actually him who largely drove his creative process, and the mastery of his triplet flow initially caught the attention of Kevin (Coach K) Lee and Pierre (P) Thomas, co-founders of the Migos’ label and management company. Quality control.
“Migos is their thing,” Pressa said. “You know, they had their own culture. They had their own sound. And I think a lot of people take their sound and incorporate it.”
LOOK | Takeoff death raises concerns about gun violence:
The death of the Migos rapper raises concerns about gun violence in hip hop
The shooting death of popular rapper Takeoff is just the latest in a series of violent incidents that have sparked widespread concern about the rise of gun violence in the hip-hop community. [Correction: The graphic referring to when rapper Pop Smoke died contains an incorrect date. Pop Smoke was shot during a home invasion in 2020]
That it was the more reserved Takeoff who was killed seemed to underscore the danger some hip-hop artists face, even if their lifestyle is free of violence. But the group’s perception has previously diverged from its nature: going back to the beginning of their careers, the men behind Migos were often plagued by criticism for an apparent dishonesty in their music.
As music journalist and poet Hanif Abdurraqib wrote in a 2017 piece for the National Post, some fans took issue with the three members, who grew up in a suburban area outside Atlanta, rapping about drugs and crime
That sentiment, Abdurraqib argued, pushed them to behave more in line with their music, such as when Offset was arrested in 2015, then attacked a fellow inmate.
“Like Johnny Cash in the mid-’60s, they spent time getting too close to the fire,” he wrote. “It’s hard to build such a great myth without becoming part of it.”
And in hip hop, a genre that prioritizes authenticity and self-documentation in a way that few other forms of art, they are far from the only group to be touched by violence. Since 2018, more than a dozen high-profile rap artists have been shot and killed.
Among them is Los Angeles rapper Nipsey Hussle, who was shot outside his clothing store in 2019, even though he was best known for his community building, general kindness, and poetic, heartfelt lyrics. A year later, Toronto rapper Houdini was killed while shopping; Memphis-based Young Dolph was killed while buying cookies in 2021; and PnB Rock (real name Rakim Hasheem Allen) was killed earlier this year while dining with his girlfriend at a small Los Angeles restaurant in an unprovoked robbery after a stranger apparently saw his location in a social media post social that the rapper did.
After praising Allen as a pleasure to work with, rapper Nicki Minaj implored other artists in the genre to stop making themselves so available to their community.
“They don’t love you the way you think you are,” she wrote. “You’re prey! In a world full of predators! What doesn’t click?”
The people surrounding these rappers make a lot of money. Time to start really remembering them & done!!! At least TRY to put your foot down if you care! TELL THEM!!! They don’t love you like you think!!! You are a catch!!!! In a world full of predators!!!! What doesn’t click???!!! https://t.co/wpfxtnkBU6
—@NICKIMINAJ
“It’s dangerous as an artist out there,” agreed Pressa, who said he was with Migos member Offset at a separate event the night the shooting took place. “I don’t like to convey and explain [my followers] where I go, and that’s what it is.”
“It didn’t happen overnight”
But discussions about the causes of these incidents are not simple. AR Shaw, an Atlanta-based trap music historian who wrote a book called Trap History, told CBC News that gun violence is “burning out” in communities of color, because it’s a larger issue in the rest of North America.
“I want to get this idea across that it didn’t happen overnight; that these are years of abandoned communities and abuse that has occurred in communities of color, in particular, and these are the repercussions of that,” Shaw said. .
“We’ve seen this widespread violence that’s happening [among] artists and within the hip-hop community,” Shaw added. “But it’s also indicative of what’s happening in communities across the country.”
Takeoff of Migos performs on stage during Global Citizen Live on September 25, 2021 in Los Angeles, California. Gun violence “burns out” in communities of color because it’s a broader problem in the rest of North America, said music historian AR Shaw. (Getty Images for Global Citizen)
Gun violence has generally increased in Canada and the United States. Between 2018 and 2019, the criminal use of firearms increased by 21% in this country, seconds Statistics Canada.
Shaw said the issue of gun violence began many years before rap and hip hop emerged as cultural forces. While some would see the violent messages in some subgenres of rap and hip-hop as further fueling violent behavior, Shaw said it’s often a documentation and way of working through the effects of long-standing trauma in those communities.
Rapping about crime and violence isn’t causing the problem, he said, it’s identifying it. “Hopefully we can change the narrative, but first we have to understand what the source is.”
On the other hand, some in the hip-hop world do see it differently. Kiana (Rookz) Eastmond, a Toronto music executive and former rapper, said that while rap has evolved as an outlet to deal with such trauma, as a genre it also pushes its artists to focus perennially in difficulties Other genres allow artists who talk about their lives to move on.
“We’d like to see them, you know, grow and evolve into a space where they don’t have to share their trauma or [where] they are not defined by it. We don’t ask that of rappers,” he said. “We don’t ask them to never find peace. We’re not asking them to ever continue.”
Comparing it to the NFL, which ignored the damage concussions do for years before bowing to public pressure and altering the game to protect athletes, he said the same should be true of hip hop.
Instead of demanding that rappers spend their careers exploiting the most traumatic moments of their lives, and then rewarding them for it, both the industry and fans should set a higher standard and demand music that demonstrates the gender growth.
“Artists are people. And I think just like we expect our stories to be humanized in black culture everywhere, we have to expect that from hip hop now,” he said. “We have to expect that from rap.”
Takeoff performs on stage with Migos at the 2017 HeartRadio Music Festival on September 23, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Bryan Steffy/Getty…