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miguel martinez - the crack epidemic and the advent of modern hip-hop lyrics

“if i wasn’t in the rap game. i’d probably have a key knee-deep in the crack game because the streets is a short stop. either you’re slinging crack rock or you got a wicked jump shot,” was the mentality that many young african- americans had as they strolled around the corners of places such as bed-stuy and compton. in their world there was only three places out from the toxic and decaying environment around them. for most of these young men, they would find themselves six feet under. the crack epidemic and hip hop ran parallel but in the 80s and early 90s they found themselves intertwined as hip-hop told the story of the streets and the “fiends” that roamed the streets at night. hip-hop was the rose that grew from the concrete of the urban centers that facilitated the growth of crack-cocaine. the art was an expression of their reality and for many an escape from the small rock that controlled the lives of people around them. due to factors out of their control the impoverished urban communities were a perfect mixing pot for the crack epidemic setting the mostly black community, on a destructive path. although, through the distribution of crack cocaine hip hop was able to grow and detail the struggles of the unheard
at the same time wonder mike was proclaiming “i said a hip hop the hippie the hippie
to the hip hip hop and you don’t stop” on sugar hill gang’s seminal cl-ssic rapper’s delight, afrika bambaataa was walking the “seven mile world” . a small stretch of new york city from manhattan to the bronx which would serve as the birth place of hip-hop. behind him followed the zulu nation, “bambaataa’s army- the mcs, the djs, the graffiti writers, the b-boys and b-girls, the crews they brought and the crowds they moved.” bambaataa was a member of the spade gang in new york city, who after watching the 1964 movie zulu was inspired to bring about unity and togetherness in his community. he did this by becoming a dj using his gang connections to throw m-ssive scale block parties that connected his community. while gang warfare ruled the urban kingdom and segregation of different minorities led to violence, bambaataa and many like him used music as an escape. under the influence of what he referred to as planet rock, these block parties became a melting pot for urban culture leading the way for the four elements of hip hop to be born, “b-boying, djing,mcing, and graffiti.” these elements made this youth movement out of the ordinary and stereotypical to authority figures. particularly, the art of graffiti made many young members of zulu nation and smaller groups at odds with the police. this caused the already uneasy tension with low cl-ss minorities and police to fester, but for the meantime the elements of hip-hop continued to grow with acts like run-dmc finding their way to label deals. although, the effects of hip-hop had not yet escaped the “seven mile world” something happening a few miles out of the zulu nation empire, in uptown new york would in the long term take hip-hop down a different path and put a new spin on the name planet rock
in uptown new york, cocaine was sniffed by the wealthy and high cl-ss. this drug was not new as it had represented a cure-all before being outlawed in 1913. new trafficking networks led by entrepreneurs after the vietnam war quieted the hunger of wealthy addicts after heroin networks dried up. these networks from central and south america particularly the andean mountain range, nicaragua, columbia, and bolivia created a pipeline to the wealthy that flooded the american markets with cocaine powder. “because powder cost around one hundered dollars a gram in the late 1970s when freebasing became popular, it was not a drug of choice in inner-city neighborhoods.” these wealthy recreational users would sniff the powder occasionally using it in social events or parties. this cocaine was through a process turned into powder the most impure form of it. the process starts with mashed coca leaves mixed with ether, turning into a paste, then dried with hydrochloric acid, creating powder cocaine. in the 1980s the want to get the powder into a pure form developed with the advent of “freebase”. freebase was an expensive way to reverse the hydrochloric acid, which made the cocaine impure yet, the price was too much for urban areas. it was not until lower cl-ss dealers, led by freeway ricky ross, with rich clientele found a way to simplify the purification process by using water and baking soda in heat. the result would be crack pellets that could be easily sold and packaged for cheap prices. what freeway and many street dealers like him didn’t know was how much these cheap rocks would change the streets and corners that they sold their products on. slowly, this rock would trickle down the economic ladder to the lower cl-ss urban areas and mix in with the toxicity already brewing creating what many called the “crack epidemic” of the 1980s
jay-z once said, “blame reagan for making me into a monster.” many low cl-ss urban areas had the same sentiment. for most of the country it was morning in reagan’s america, the setting of a new chapter, as he took office by a landslide in 1980. for many growing up in poverty this was not morning in their america but a continuation of a long night as life in downtrodden areas grew worse during the reagan era. while crack rock distribution continued to grow in the 1980s so did unemployment rates. when he came into office ronald reagan brought in an ideal economic plan to end the “stagflation” of the carter administration which would come to be known as “reaganomics”. the concept known as “supply side” or “trickle down” economics was the basis behind the plan. it called for tax cut induced deficits that would grant lower taxes to rich corporations while also cutting government spending (mostly domestic programs). the upper cl-ss was seemingly given less taxes while the lower cl-ss had their programs such as welfare and other aides taken away. the benefits did not in fact trickle down to the rest of the country like envisioned. “from 1981 to 1985, as inflation decreased and deficits mounted the economy went successively through a recession.” the policy did not lead to a supply-side boom and urban areas were hit the hardest. “reagan’s recession had bloated unemployment levels to the highest levels since the great depression- 30 million searching for work. the official black unemployment rate hit 22 percent.” this coupled with the growing poverty rate, 36% living below the poverty line, left many in lower cl-ss areas having to fend for themselves. for them, there was no easy way out, there was no escape. this was particularly the case for young teens as “only one in ten african americans” had a job. the urban areas from coast to coast horrible living conditions declined dramatically. the country seemingly forgot about them as many young families had to go on welfare just to survive month to month. what followed was an outcry, not from the media or organizations, not from the government, but from the streets where it was happening. the people found their way to vent their problems through hip-hop music as a way to express their living conditions in “reagan’s america”. songs such as grandmaster flash “the message” expressed the situation with verses such as, “broken gl-ss everywhere …got no money to move out, i guess i got no choice rats in the front room, roaches in the back junkies in the alley with a baseball bat i tried to get away but i couldn’t get far cause a man with a tow truck repossessed my car” these early hip-hop artists expressed their struggles through music. for many like them the pressures of unemployment with the lack of living conditions created a catalyst to find money by any means necessary, making the distribution of crack cocaine tantalizing
scarface was released in 1983, a movie about a cuban immigrant that bit by bit built a criminal empire by selling cocaine, to little fanfare. for many recently unemployed young black men and other minorities living in impoverished neighborhoods, this violent movie represented more. it was a way to the american dream and more importantly an american dream that was reachable. crack cocaine was easy to sell and gave these early dealers a weekly source of income. instead of waiting for welfare checks or waiting for “reaganomics” to work this was their way out, a way to escape the rats and the roaches of the neighborhood. these young men realized a way forward like tony montana, the world was theirs. they joined the ranks of freeway ricky ross and his “ready rock” as he became one of the first true crack kingpins. “once he figured out how to standardize production and prices, ready rock offered a potentially larger market at double or more profits of powder. anyone could afford a deuce or a nickel rock.” ricky ross and early dealers became the early “businessman” to the rock and many clientele were ready to consume their new product. as many in the “hood” found out, crack was highly addictive making the customer come back and then come back later for more. for the drug user it was an escape also, a mental escape from their plight. the dysphoria of the drug was able to make the customer want more and more. clientele used their government -ssistance checks to fund their craving, chasing their first high every time. soon whole neighborhoods fell into the product, “once an individual got hooked on it that was their only pursuit. they was robbing, stealing, jacking, everything.” these dealers like ricky ross who standardized the sale of it came to be known as the “source of the crack epidemic” as they chased the american dream many of them did not see the societal destruction as families, communities, and morality were torn apart by the ready rock
it wasn’t all mansions and radio scanners for the wannabe tony montanas that populated the urban corners. “a man with a dream with plans to make cream, which failed; i went to jail at the age of fifteen, a young buck selling drugs and such who never had much, trying to get a clutch at what i could not touch, the court played me short, now i face incarceration, pacin’ – going upstate’s my destination, handcuffed in the back of a bus, forty of us, life as a shorty shouldn’t be so rough.” many would face incarceration for their time on the block, as selling crack became a hot b-tton topic in washington bringing a slew of reform in reagan’s america and making five grams of crack equal to five years in prison. at the height of the crack epidemic washington p-ssed the anti-drug abuse act of 1986, which put into effect 4 billion for the battle against drugs. this along with other legislation continued the paradoxical disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine. the growing popularity and coverage of the crack epidemic caused the disparity to grow, crack cocaine was treated as the most dangerous threat to america and as such made the punishment even more severe. the 1988 update of the anti-drug abuse act completely made the difference on a larger scale. “the 1988 act made crack cocaine the only drug with a mandatory minimum penalty for a first offense of simple possession. the act made possession of more than five grams of a mixture or substance containing cocaine base punishable by at least five years in prison… the simple possession came to be punished one hundred times more harshly than the purer substance from which it was made.” to put that into perspective a person carrying 500 grams of powder cocaine would get the same sentence as a person carrying 5 grams of crack cocaine. despite the drugs being the same the media hype at the time created a huge difference. not only with the 100-1 disparity between the two, the new laws carried into effect what many saw as a kingpin strategy to capture higher level members of trafficking networks even though crack cocaine at its foundation was a retail system drug trade. this contradiction in law led to the explosion of prison rates with a third of them african american. while “black males’ lifetime chance of going to prison changed from 13 to 31 percent between 1979 and 1997. the number of federal and state prisoners more than doubled from 1980 to 1996, driven by a nine-fold increase in incarceration numbers for drug offenses” while prison soon filled the neighborhoods these young men left behind would be changed forever
the term “crack epidemic” first started to trickle out of the mouths of evening news anchors at this time. as the culmination of unemployment, gang territory, racial tension, and distrust of police authority that were still in the urban neighborhoods even after the zulu movement, made way for and embraced crack cocaine. crack cocaine was no longer just a new york thing in the seven mile world or just a los angeles issue, with freeway ricky ross. it was a country wide problem, day by day new victims fell under the rocks reign. tyrone brooks whose father and community were subjected to the crack rock described his neighborhood as, “once it turned night it would look like the walking dead.” the fiends as they were called by others would take over the night as they tried to stop their craving for the rock. the allure of the drug drew in more customers who heard of the user feeling “excited, energetic, and the capability of great mental and physical feats. user finds the effects are extremely pleasant and highly rewarding.” the media did not help the growing instability in the central cities as most media outlets caught wind of the urban decay that was happening, displaying to the rest of the nation the “evil” that was spewing from the lower cl-ss. as awareness grew and slogans such as “crack is wack” filled the city, the popularity and prison populations grew with it. crack cocaine did not just make a person crave the drug, but do anything to get their drug. every basic human moral system and values were thrown out as these people looked for their ne whit. this caused a permanent link with “crack to gang violence, high murder rates, urban unemployment, poverty, and family disruption.” what the evening news didn’t show was the struggle of the people in the central city just trying to survive. the families who were indirectly effected by the chaos around them, like tyrone brooks’ mother who had to work extra to support a family when crack destroyed the ideal of a nuclear family. these voices did not have an ear to hear their plight, but slowly it formed in hip-hop, the voice of the unheard, the light in the darkness
nwa’s eazy-e called hip-hop artist underground reporters, reporting on what was going on in the neighborhood on a day to day basis. hip- hop was the voice of the people, but went through a more violent avenue. gangster rap became the norm as hip-hop artists decided to voice their angst and frustration in a violent manner. “[explicit] with me cause i’m a teenager
with a little bit of gold and a pager searching my car, looking for the product thinking every [explicit] is selling narcotics. you’d rather see, me in the pen than me and lorenzo rolling in a benz-o, beat a police out of shape and when i’m finished, bring the yellow tape to tape off the scene of the slaughter.” this along with other violence themed songs centered on the ideal that they needed to stick together because everyone was out to get them. it seemed at the time that many “underground reporters” displayed the pent up rage that was in the urban centers. it was a cry for help that hadn’t been heard in a while. as the government legislation went against their survival, unemployment continued to affect them, fiends k!lling to get their product, and the ever looming threat of the police and prison hung over their heads these artists had to show what truly went behind the cameras of cnn and fox. these new gangster rap artists such as n.w.a and boogie down productions saw the violence around them mounting. “the introduction of crack caused murder rates to rise by 4.4 percent to every 100,000 population, an overall growth to 18.7 percent of before-crack murder rates” while legislation made police presence even that more substantial in urban areas using new tactics such as large number of searches and arrests, the questioning of everyone that looked suspicious, intensified foot patrols in housing projects and subways, and increased surveillance. the tension that existed between minorities and police that was already there since the days of block parties increased dramatically. it created a them versus us mentality in the lower income areas. while the drug dealers saw the police as a force trying to stop their business from reaching their customers. the police presence contributed to more violence as anyone carrying grams of crack didn’t want to fall under the hammer of the new drug laws. although, the police versus crack wasn’t the catalyst for violence in urban areas. “it was that 39% of all murders and 74% of all drug related murders were -ssociated neither with the psychopharmalogical effects of the drug nor with the economic compulsion of its addicts, but with the market based arrangments and relationships engendered by trafficking.” the violence was centered around the interaction between the dealer and his craft. whether it be the interaction between the user and the dealer or the dealer trying to protect his product from rival “businessman”, money lead to guns, guns lead to violence, violence lead to death. the cauldron of violence that was the urban areas grew the notoriety of gangster rap and in turn made it a successful music genre. artists such as n.w.a sold millions of records as the rest of the country wanted to hear at least the inner workings of “hood” politics and day to day life in the crack warzone
this new successful venture into rap seemingly intertwined with the crack industry as many crack dealers saw the pitfalls that selling crack cocaine had, seeing rap as an easier path to take. notable artists in today’s market such as 50 cent, the game, wu-tang clan, and snoop dogg started as crack dealers. they used their stories and experiences to feed the m-sses in a new way. their product was no longer a few grams of crack to a fiend in the decayed neighborhood of compton or new york, now it was “audible crack”, a cd that was given to america’s youth in every facet of american culture. these stories would satisfy the cravings of the population who were excited to hear the “hood dreams” and “hood violence” that these songs promoted. the message that started as activism with n.w.a and public enemy trying to voice the plight of the urban population for change soon turned into a glorification of the violence. the crack epidemic that was portrayed by the media was fed to the m-sses and they wanted more, in a sense hip-hop fed that appet-te. this glorification completely changed hip-hop as the advent of mafioso and kingpin hip-hop rap was born. crack culture became hip-hop culture with crack dealers either becoming artists or crack dealers investing in the growth of hip-hop acts. “despite rap’s penchant for drug-kingpin mythology and jewel encrusted swagger, the ways in which the work of crack is actually depicted lyrically, instead, reflect a very different conception.” crack was still expressed as a grind. one had to put in work to get the money to buy the gold chain, the car, and the women that hip-hop at this time expressed as postives. crack became not only glorified but a symbol of money-making and as such split hip-hop with some under the old mantra of the crack epidemic destroyed communities and others following the new holy path that crack cocaine laid out. lyrics centered around status when crack dealer was in the t-tle of your name “i move ‘caine like a cripple balance weight through the hood, kids call me mr. sniffles other hand on my nickel plated whistle,” hip-hop became “explicit, even celebratory [of] violence, h0m-phobia, and misogyny.” this new hip-hop had one solid backing, it was successful across the country, as acts like the wu-tang and the game moved millions of records across the country and the world. these rag-to-riches stories such as jay-z and 50 cent demonstrated that these young men, that used the same practices in the drug trade to distribute and rise to the top of the hip-hop charts, were street hustlers in suits. in a sense, the same young men that watched tony montana rise to power in 1983, realized the american dream that they had craved since the beginning but unlike montana were able to stay in power finding a legitimate way to stay on top
although, not all was good in urban areas as the era of the crack epidemic winded down. the epidemic slowly ended because the media no longer covered it, as the generation saw what the crack rock did to their parents, they walked away from that lifestyle. not all was cured as large percentages of children were without fathers or mothers, lost to the rock. while prison overpopulation became an extreme problem. quality of life did not return instantly and in many ways still have not been solved to this day. tyrone brooks stated, “take a walk through my neighborhood today and it’s still the same nothing has changed. there is still crack dealers selling in the same spots and the fiends still go out looking for a fix at night.” the ones who survived the crack epidemic, show that their scars have not healed over time. the effects still linger with a sense that not all was fixed and not all will be fixed
all in all, hip-hop was the rose that grew from the concrete because all inst-tutions wanted it to fail. the crack epidemic was caused because of all the social and political inst-tutions that collapsed on the urban areas, it left them exposed to the perfect storm of factors such as unemployment, violence, trafficking, and the search for money to blend with the distribution of a tiny rock. this small rock soon consumed entire regions through its addictive power and in turn caused neighbor to turn on neighbor, brother to turn on brother, father to turn on son. this small rock destroyed lives and took anyone foolhardy enough to follow the american dream with it as tyrone brooks stated,” i don’t know of any successful drug dealer to this day.” those words ring true as many of the youth seeking riches ended with the choice of freedom or jail poised to the latter. those smart enough to see an escape route through the empowerment of music saw it as a way to show the world the suffering using the practices that they used in the drug trade to sell their new product – music. in the end, the effects of the crack epidemic are everlasting to not just the urban areas that they polluted but the effects and the spreading of hip-hop culture are deeply rooted in the modern era. perhaps the words of hip-hop artist kendrick lamar ring true, “ok than we all crack babies.”

- miguel martinez lyrics

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