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Like it or not, rappers wear labels – and not just Louis Vuitton and True Religion. From crunk to gangster to conscious, MCs have been categorized since the beginning of rap times. But they haven’t always been quick to accept the stamps they’ve been given.
Blacksmith CEO and rapper Talib Kweli might be considered the reigning King of the “Conscious Movement.” Yet he shunned the title with the quickness during a recent AllHipHop.com interview when asked to name his Top 5 Conscious MCs.
“You know what? I don’t even know if I want to answer that question, because I feel like that’s part of the issue – we keep separating us, and it makes it hard on me as an artist,” said Talib. “It’s makes it like ‘conscious’ is the alternative to MCing. We come from a generation where, if you were going to be dope and considered in the Top 5, you had to have a degree of consciousness.”
According to Talib, things changed after Biggie: “Biggie was the first MC who was considered in the Top 5 who there wasn’t a degree of consciousness in his debut. But you started to hear it creep in in the second album…there was a little of that gangster consciousness.”
Pharoahe Monch, whose longtime career has dabbled heavily in consciousness, took a more diplomatic stance about his pal Talib’s unwillingness to be labeled. In this exclusive AllHipHop.com video clip, he shares his thoughts on what the moniker really means for him, Talib, and others:
In recent news, so-called “conscious” rapper Common was called “vile” by conservative media pundits on the eve of his invitation to The White House to read poetry for President and First Lady Obama. To most of the Hip-Hop world, Common and the word ‘vile’ don’t even exist in the same universe. His thought-infused, woman-honoring, lesson-teaching lyrics have ruled rap consciousness for over a decade and bear little resemblance to gangster.
Yet, in today’s rap climate, even Common might turn his back on the “good guy rap” label. This past week, he neither confirmed nor denied his uncanny ability to make audiences think and/or embrace often rap-absent concepts like peace and love. After all, he rides for people like escaped, convicted New Jersey cop killer Assata Shakur, and he even made a pilgrimage to communist Cuba despite his home country’s longtime stances against Assata and former president Fidel Castro.
The irony and double consciousness of the Black man has never been more persistent.
“…it’s like when you think about KRS-One and Kool G Rap and Rakim and Chuck D, and then think about their influence over Ice Cube and Q-Tip and Nas, that sort of rounds out my Top 10 list,” said Talib. “For me in 2011 to list my Top 5 Conscious MCs, I feel like that kind of does a disservice to them, because they should be listed in with everybody else. Like I think Rakim should be in the same category as Lil Wayne,” he added.
Hmmm. Maybe? Maybe not.
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