In this essay I will look at how hip-hop has changed over the years and how emcees I have studied criticise the REEL. I will start by explaining what the REEL is.

The REEL is when people act a certain way to ‘fit in’. People act this way because certain hip-hop has portrayed the black culture as violent, mad and uncivilised. They make people feel like if you do certain things and hang around with certain people you are a ‘proper black boy’. When hip-hop portrays this image to white suburbia, they may feel like we are a threat to them, that we don’t know how to conduct ourselves.

Hip-hop came from a genre of music called Blues. This was a genre made by black individuals to express themselves about slavery. Before hip-hop was invested in, the music’s content was about things that affected the inner city communities. Such as racism, poverty and police brutality. Music companies saw that this was a good opportunity to gain money. The music companies changed the content of the lyrics because they were not gaining any profit, no one would listen to a rapper insult a police officer and his actions. They only made record deals with the rappers who didn’t mind rapping about things that weren’t socially conscious such as blacks fighting blacks, selling drugs and having sex all the time. By these rappers changing their lyrics they got a bigger audience meaning the companies would make profit. According to J.Flores (1988), music companies do this because the white suburban audience admit they enjoy the hyper-violent and hyper-masculine lyrics. Flores says that white suburbia consume 70% of hip-hop produced and at this day and age it is more economically viable to advertise hip-hop more to whites than to the black community that it originally derived from.

One emcee I have studied is an emcee named Mos Def. Mos Def is one of the emcees I have studied who criticises the REEL. We can see this in a song he made called ‘Mathematics’. He named it ‘Mathematics’ because of the relationship between numbers and the rap industry. in the song he raps ‘Like I got 16 to 32 bars to rock it/but only 15% of my profits, ever see my pockets’. Here, Mos Def shines a light on how the rap industry is exploitative of emcees. He shows this by contrasting the number of bars to the profit he makes. He suggests that his own record label takes advantage of his good work. In the second part of the bar ‘but only 15% of my profit ever see my pockets’ he uses sibilance. Sibilance is when you use the ‘s’ sound repeatedly. When you hear the sound ‘s’ you think of snakes. This links back to the idea of Mos Def getting exploited by his record label.

Bronx native YC the Cynic is another artist who criticises the REEL. He criticises the REEL by using repetition. He shows this in his hook saying i’ll ride for my negus, die for my negus. The repetition of the word ‘NEGUS‘ is important. This is because the word ‘NEGUS‘ comes from the Ethiopian language meaning royalty. Here YC the Cynic suggests that black people were kings and queens in Egypt before they were ever slaves. In comparison, the word ‘NIGGA‘ is a derogatory word used to insult or put down people of the African origin. YC the Cynic implies in this song that the word ‘NIGGA‘ is used casually. Here YC the cynic tries to make people aware of the word NIGGA. He tries to say that the word NIGGA should be used when necessary.

Akala, a rapper who criticises the REEL has an SBTV freestyle. In his SBTV freestyle he starts the rap with this opening sentence ‘Sorry kids let me apologise before I go further, Unfortunately I don’t rap about how many man I’ve murdered.’ By opening his freestyle like this he has already criticised the REEL. By letting his audience know he raps about things that are socially conscious, not things that are REEL he immediately criticises the rappers who do rap about the subjects that are in the box. We can see this where he says ‘Unfortunately I don’t rap about how many man I’ve murdered’. When he says unfortunately its as if its a disappointment to the audience. Akala also uses another quote to back up his point. ‘Apparently murdering man has become an aspiration’. Here we can see how the box has created a specific mind-set towards young people stating that murdering is not a bad thing. 

Kendrick Lamar criticises the REEL using a song he made called ‘The Blacker the Berry‘. In his song he talks about police brutality and racism. These subjects are socially conscious. By rapping about things that are happening now, things that people are aware of, Kendrick Lamar criticises the REEL. In his song ‘The Blacker the Berry’ he uses repetition. He repeats these lines ‘The Blacker the Berry, the sweeter the juice’. Here Lamar emphasise the fact that the darker you are the better you are. He tries to highlight the fact that being black is not wrong. He tries to state that instead of trying to hide your blackness you should embrace it.

To conclude this essay I will talk about why the REEL is bad and why young people like me shouldn’t follow it. The REEL is a concept made by mass media to portray a bad image of how young people should live. My evidence shows that rappers nowadays talk about things they have to rap about not what they want to rap about. Rappers such as the ones I have studied talk about things that they don’t even do. They make music that influence the young audience and make them think they have to live a certain way. People should not follow the REEL because it’s not good. It is being someone you’re not.