80s

• Rap as a black art form
• Rap as a popular commodity

90s

• Regionalism
• Censorship

00s

• Poptimism
• Masculinity

i’d argue he’s been doing it since Graduation, especially with the sales competition vs. 50 Cent

I wouldn't say any single artist, era, or album did it, nor would I say that hip hop is completely gentrified. But it played a role and I honestly think Yeezus is kinda corny but very well produced.

"Kanye going out of his way to call old school rap primitive/basic because the artists didn't have $2m at their disposal for production is gentrification."

He said this where?

Graduation is literally the reason TGD is on this site

Terrible takes entire thread

The Grad Divine

Are you just saying this because Eminem is a super lyrical rapper while Kanye's more of a producer-rapper?

I ask because there's no universe where Recovery, MMLP2, and Revival sound more "traditionally hip hop" than MBDTF and Watch The Throne lol.

Kanye sampled Jay on Saint Pablo too. Not many Em songs in the 2010's sounded as "traditional" as that.

Em seems to have gone in a more traditional route in the 2020's but his 2010's run was rampant with pop, rock, and top 40 radio sounds that attracted tons of non-rap fans who made those corny anti-Lil Wayne memes back in the day.

Jay Z introduced sales talk to hip hop long before graduation or Curtis

You mean the same one where he said he could say antisemitism and not get dropped ?

Why are we taking everything he said as scripture

and whose big bro is was Jay Z?

Alright fair 2010s Em was gentrifying rap. And I'll give some grace to Recovery because of how emotionally raw it was despite how corny it also is.

But he was def gentrifying rap from 2011 onward, agreed, I was wrong.

White people liked 50 more than Ye. He was close to Eminem and the whole gangster image was more attractive to them because its so far removed from what they see. Till around 2010 there were a lot of white people who were still rocking that g-unit style and could not let that era go.

I see Kanye's first success not as a sign of appeal for white audiences but he was the guy who latched unto what was going on in the underground at that time like Talib Kweli and gave it a mainstream platform. His core fanbase was always very nerdy but has also changed a lot throughout the years. Especially since Yeezus.

Jay Z gentrified hip hop more than any other rapper

Non blacks in here talking about a black man gentrifying hip hop

God kill us

Yeah because he couldn't get signed by a major and had to use crack money to get his own label off the ground and each sale was keeping the lights on at Roc-a-Fella until like 2000 when Jay became a full-on venture capitalist.

What the f*** are y'all on about

Kanye was pushing for Jay Z to do that by producing what he did for him

Jay Z was just his vessel

"I don't even listen to rap," he told DJ Semtex. "My apartment is too nice to listen to rap in. I have to be in a way more grimey environment to turn any rap music on."

Ok this reddit

Jay for sure brought commercialization into hip hop but bro never gentrified the sound. If anything Jay's label was a bulwark at one point for the hardcore roots of hip hop's sound persevering into the early-2000s.

Now THIS is bannable

Travis Scott
Playboi Carti
Asap Rocky

This is Ye’s legacy

Real artists, how many of us?

This exposes the limit to blaming artists as individuals for gentrifying a genre, because Wu Tang Clan absolutely did attract white suburban fans to hip-hop, but it had little to do with how they marketed themselves or any crossover appeal in their music. White America just liked what they heard. To continue the a***ogy of urban gentrification, it occurs in waves, the first rich people who move into a poor neighbourhood aren't coming for the organic grocery stores and improv comedy clubs, those things don't exist yet, they like the neighbourhood as it is. Only once they get settled, those buildings start popping up (in hip-hop: the indie crossovers), which in turn attracts more rich people and the second wave of gentrification begins.

Ye just be saying s***