Hip Hop 101 for Baby Boomers

Introducing MC Cris-P

Meet my friend Chris. He'll be doing some visual aids and old school rap demos. The kid's like a lyric encyclopedia. I think I've seen him do all of the Beastie Boys' seminal double album, Paul's Boutique, front to back acapella including skits and samples. Here he is busting a few bars of vintage Scarface off the dome. Scarface both as a solo artist and as part of the the Geto Boys is probably the most famous and influential rapper out of Houston, Texas. The Geto Boys (featuring Face, Willie-D, and a sociopathic suicidal midget named Bushwick Bill) were probably the most notorious gangster rappers of their era. They came out with some of the hardest, most unrepentantly violent and mysoginistic lyrics during the hey-day of Congressional hearings on scary rap records. I'm sure in the C-Span archives there's some footage of Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) reading Geto Boys lyrics with a senatorial mix of gravity and utter disdain. I like Chris's version better:



When Chris was in junior high he used to transcribe the lyrics to Geto Boys and Ice Cube songs in his notebook. One day his mom found his notebook and read what she assumed was her sons poetry about "icing niggaz" and doing terrible things with 9mm pistols and AK-47's. She was understandably upset and confused and had a long talk with Chris about the importance of civil rights and how if he ever felt angry inside he should talk it out instead of resorting to violence. When she found out that Chris actually didn't write the raps she'd found but that he was just a huge fan of hardcore gangster rap, Chris's mom was relieved; but only just a little bit.