Despite starting as part of the local culture of New York City, Hip-Hop has become a globally recognized genre over the past half a century. It has been instrumental in the growth of so many other genres and has been an outlet for many communities who otherwise wouldn’t be heard. We’re all now used to hearing it on the radio and TV, but it also turns up in some places you wouldn’t expect. Here’s some unexpected places to find Hip-Hop.
Casino Games
With a history almost as long as hip-hop itself at this point, online casino games have covered virtually every theme and topic you could imagine. While certain themes like Ancient Egypt tend to be more famously linked to it, hip-hop does have a significant presence. When people log in to casino sites to play slot games with prizes of cash or bigger things as part of competitions, hip-hop-inspired slots are often part of the libraries.
Some notable examples include the graffiti aesthetic and record-scratching soundtrack behind Chaos Crew and its sequel, both evoking the golden era of hip-hop in the 90s. The famous and extensive Nitropolis series of slots has also delved into the music for a backdrop, and San Quentin from the same developers has a distinct hip-hop tone behind it.
Theatre and Musicals
When we think of musical theatre, there are two genres that most commonly come to mind. You have the pop-style productions of Hairspray or Grease, and then there’s the rock opera style of musical that includes things like We Will Rock You or The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Hip-hop hasn’t been the most prominent subgenre of musical theatre although it has a more storied history than many realize.
Elements of hip-hop in musicals have been around for decades in a small way, although only recently has it made a really big impact. For the past decade, the production of Hamilton, a retelling of the revolutionary fathers through the lens of modern music and language, has been dominating Broadway, the West End, and every other major musical hub. Previously, In The Heights had similar success, before it was turned into a film.
Art
The relationship between hip-hop and art is unbreakable and has been that way from the beginning. The music has always been closely tied to urban art and the graffiti style, and over the years both have evolved together. We’ve now reached the point where hip-hop is being celebrated as part of the art itself, and there are more and more art exhibitions that include hip-hop music as part of the context for viewing modern urban art.
Of course, things like the musicals we mentioned above and the movies we mentioned in our introduction are also considered art forms. With that said, actual exhibitions are more unexpected to most, as if you had said to someone 30 years ago that prestigious art museums would one day be piping hip-hop through the speakers to create atmosphere, you would have gotten some strange looks.
While the forms it takes now may look very different from the 80s and 90s, hip-hop still runs through our cultural veins and reaches every aspect of our art and culture. We’d expect to see plenty more creations like the ones above on the horizon!
Main Image Credit: Hin Bong Yeung on Unsplash