Hip-Hop Is Evolving. Just Ask Some of Its Big Stars.
Hip-hop has long been about superheroes, and there are few things more jarring than watching a superhero’s powers begin to fade.
The superstars of earlier hip-hop generations typically lived their post- peak careers just out of the limelight. If they were grappling with diminished influence it rarely showed or shaped their public narrative.
But then hip-hop started growing exponentially. That meant that more artists were competing for prime share, forcing those on top to learn how to navigate new territory — as still popular performers who are becoming elders. Now these post-prime stars are working out their issues in public, on record, for all to hear.
Over the past three months, four superstars have released albums that assess what a genre- dominating rapper does when the genre is beginning to move on: Kanye West’s “Ye” (as well as his collaborations with others); Drake’s “Scorpion”; J. Cole’s “KOD”; and Jay-Z’s “Everything Is Love,” which he and his wife, Beyoncé, put out as the Carters.
Their reckonings take many forms. For Mr. West, it is the acknowledgment of the frailty of his mental health. For Mr. Cole, it’s a semi-scolding of the younger generation. For Jay-Z, it’s an acceptance of his diminished public stature. And for Drake — who now feels like the youngest member of this older generation, but until recently was the oldest member of the younger upstarts — it’s navigating the tension inherent in moving from student to teacher, and realizing your teachers were no better than you.
Of these, Mr. West’s path is the most radical in terms of how it engag- es with the specter of obsolescence. On “What Would Meek Do?” from Pusha-T’s “Daytona,” Mr. West raps about how he’s viewed by skeptics: “You see, he been out of touch, he cannot relate.”
But Mr. West’s flaws are real, too, and he publicly discusses his health struggles. “Hospital band a hundred bands,” he raps on “Yikes,” referring to his hospitalization in late 2016 for exhaustion.
Here is the hero heading toward twilight. “That’s my superpower!” Mr. West barks at the end of “Yikes,” speaking about his bipolar disorder diagnosis. “Ain’t no disability!”
For Jay-Z, the acceptance of his recession from his peak began with last year’s “4:44,” a moody, raw album from an artist who had long been self- examining, but rarely made it central to his public persona. But marital strife has a way of undoing hubris, and Jay-Z’s public arc has lately been defined by a kind of defla- tion. When he has performed alongside his wife, as during her Coachella set, he has seemed small. He knows what the kids are saying about him: “Online they call me ‘dad’ kiddingly,” he raps on “Heard About Us.”
Throughout “Everything Is Love,” he is the less present force. It is charming, as ever, to hear him rap about being in awe of his wife, especially when addressing his own shortcomings: “My first time in the ocean went exactly as you’d expect/ Meanwhile you going hard, jumping off the top deck/A leap of faith, I knew I was up next.”
A decade ago, a rap superstar would have been unlikely to rap about perceived weaknesses of any kind, certainly of the sort that come with age. ( Eminem is, in this way, an outlier.) But as life has thrust him away from rap’s center, Jay-Z is provocatively reimagining the genre’s boundaries and expiration date.
Learning that your emperor has no clothes is an emotionally taxing experience, so it’s unsurprising that Drake has delved into that territory so effectively. On “Emotionless,” he raps, “Meeting all my heroes like seeing how magic works/The people I looked up to are going from bad to worse.”
By contrast, Mr. Cole focuses his gaze downward, aiming at the SoundCloud rap generation that made a sport of mocking him. On “1985 ( Intro to ‘ The Fall Off’),” he addresses them from the perspective of a big brother who has seen it all: “Congrats ’cause you made it out your mama’s house/I hope you make enough to buy your mom a house.”
Collectively these artists represent three generations of hip-hop superstardom. What truly marks this phase of their careers is the way they interact with the generations above and below them.