By: Lucas Fink By: Lucas Fink | August 5, 2022 | People, Culture, Music, Celebrity, Community,
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Tupac Shakur and E-40 in 1996.
Hip hop, maybe more so than other genres, is often discussed in terms of its regional specificity - of the sounds, styles, and vibes peculiar to a given scene in a given city. Chicago is associated with the synth and sample-heavy approach of artists like Kanye West and Chance the Rapper; Atlanta came to be known as the quintessential incubator of the trap sound, producing artists like Future and 21 Savage; the Los Angeles sound is defined by the hard-hitting lyricism and innovative production of Kendrick Lamar and Madlib.
As we are already familiar with in regards to the punk scene, Northern California is a markedly fertile bastion of cultural production, and must - like Atlana, Chicago, and LA - tout a specific suite of hip hop sensibilities all its own. What, then, is the Bay Area’s hip hop sound?
As of the mid 2000s, NorCal’s distinctive rap signature was beginning to cement itself, and soon was bestowed the nickname hyphy (not to be confused with whyphy, the fictional narcotic around which the plot of 22 Jump Street revolves). What’s hyphy? What does it sound like? Why is it called that? In what ways is its influence still felt in the world of Bay Area hip hop? Fret not, dear reader; all those secrets and more will be revealed in the following crash course on Bay Area hip hop.
See also: Oakland's Inaugural Poet Laureate, Ayodele Nzinga, On Blackness, Existence, And The Creative Process
Why Hyphy?
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In 2005, San Jose producer Traxamillion produced a song called “Super Hyphy” for Oakland rapper Keak da Sneak. Prior to the single’s release, hyphy was slang term used to refer to the rambunctious, frenzied energy one might experience at clubs, Oakland, raves, sideshows, drag races in between stop lights down East Bay boulevards, or similar underground subcultures. Traxamillion’s hugely significant contribution here was to transmute hyphy as a cultural affect, as a vibe/mood, into a distinct sonic subgenre. Though it would evolve in ways Traxamillion didn’t foresee, the core foundational elements of hyphy he inaugurated - thrumming, easily danceable beats ripe for club settings, uptempo production, and high-spirited, braggadocious lyricism - continue to contour Bay Area hip hop.
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Similarly influential is the legacy of the legendary Mac Dre, a Vallejo-born rapper whose tragically abrupt death in 2004 prompted a greater appreciation for his contributions to the subgenre. Dre coined the dances/turns of phrase “thizz” and “going dumb” - cementing hyphy as a signifier for rowdy boisterousness - and founded the local label Thizz Entertainment which platformed the likes of E-40 and Andre Nickatina, who would go on to further develop the subgenre.
E-40, Tupac, and More
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In 2006, Hyphy exploded beyond the boundaries of the Bay Area when E-40 - one of the Bay’s defining rappers out of Vallejo - released the seminal project My Ghetto Report Card. The album quickly broke into the mainstream, largely thanks to its hit single “Tell Me When to Go” featuring none other than Keak da Sneak. E-40 would go on to become one of the faces of the NorCal rap scene and can be found courtside at basically every Warriors game sporting Golden State swag.
Where does Tupac Shakur - commonly regarded to be one of the most influential and gifted rappers in the history of the genre - fit into this constellation, you might wonder (especially since Tupac is technically a New York city native)? In his late teens, Tupac moved from the East Coast to Oakland, where he joined the exalted NorCal alternative hip hop collective Digital Underground as a dancer and roadie before becoming an official member in 1991. Digital Underground is, at bottom, responsible for Tupac’s meteoric ascension, for they both discovered the young rapper’s prowess and helped him garner his first record deal.
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Crucially for our focus here, the rationale Digital Underground and Tupac ushered in - one predicated on sampling basslines from 1970s funk groups - paved the way for hyphy’s preoccupation with groovy, upbeat rhythms and dance-conducive production.
To offer a brief timeline/summary: Digital Underground and Tupac => Mac Dre => Keak da Sneak => E-40.
The Present (DJ Mustard, SOB X RBE)
Though we are now well over a decade past hyphy’s heyday, its influence is still easily discerned in contemporary hip hop as well as genres beyond rap. DJ Mustard took the mid-2010s by storm with his unique brand of melodic, buoyant production geared towards club environments; Mustard has since worked with Tyga, Y.G., Big Sean, and myriad other major players.
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Hyphy’s emphasis on pronounced backbeats and thrumming bass is readily apparent in the work of four-piece Vallejo group SOB X RBE, whose single “PARAMEDIC!” became one of the most memorable cuts off of Kendrick Lamar’s Black Panther album.
Though we could continue excavating hyphy’s traces in modern music for another few articles at least, we’ll conclude here and leave further investigation up to you. Some great resources are the Rap Wiki and the Virtual Hip Hop Museum.
Photography by: Raymond Boyd/Getty Images
