Hip Hop Essay Topics

Thus, with every passing year, the contemporary popular music of the Seventies strayed away from the “counterculture” themes folk and early rock n roll endorsed. In part, geopolitical issues weren’t as pressing, but the tragedy at the Altamont Free Concert combined with Charles Manson’s murder spree largely brought an end to “hippie culture”. Disco, Funk, Country, and the early stirrings of Hip Hop took became the new music, and tended to focus attention on domestic politics and race. The war themed songs that did come out of the Cold War Era however, were songs that attempted to humanize and empathize with people living under Communist regimes. David Bowie, famously recorded his album “Low” in West Berlin, where he unleashed a string of …show more content…
Instead, Punk Rock and Heavy Metal filled the niche that folk protest music previously occupied, and embraced the disillusionment and hopelessness that revolved around the nuclear uncertainty of the decade. Sonically, the speed of punk rock and the intensity of heavy metal combined perfectly with the confrontational lyrics of the former and the pessimism of the ladder to create the perfect backdrop to the Cold War (Hartigan). In particular, Heavy Metal dramatized themes of nuclear annihilation and embraced doomsday prophecies (Hartigan). Metallica, a punk influenced metal band released a slew of atomic themes songs in their debut album Kill Em’ All. Metallica’s opening song of the album, Fight Fire With Fire, warns that “Time is like a fuse, short and burning fast/Armageddon is here, like said in the past”. The lyrics prophesize a nuclear doomsday based on the “blank check proliferation” policies both practiced by the Soviet Union and the United States (Hartigan). The staccato delivery and fast paced tempo underscore the message of impending doom based on unstable nuclear edifices. The paradigm shift in foreign and nuclear policy created an entire genre that explored and internalized the fears of the intensification of the Cold