All Topics  
Rap rock

 

 
   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link
 

 

Rap rock
 
 
  Topics Rap rock Topic Home

Rap rock is a music genre
Music genre

A music genre is a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other types of music....
 fusing vocal and instrumental elements of hip hop
Hip hop music

Hip hop music is a music genre typically consisting of a rhythmic vocal style called rapping which is accompanied with backing beats. Hip hop music is part of hip hop culture, which began in the Bronx, in New York City in the 1970s, predominantly among African Americans and Latino Americans....
 with various forms of rock
Rock music

Rock music is a loosely defined genre of popular music that entered the mainstream in the mid 1950's. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rhythm and blues, country music and other influences....
. Rap rock is often confused with rap metal
Rap metal

Rap metal is a music genre of rap rock fusing vocal and sometimes instrumental elements of hip hop music with Heavy metal music. Rap metal is often confused with rap rock and rapcore....
 and rapcore
Rapcore

Rapcore is a music genre of rap rock fusing vocal and sometimes instrumental elements of hip hop music with punk rock, often hardcore punk. Rapcore is often confused with rap rock and rap metal....
, subgenres that include heavy metal
Heavy metal music

Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in England and the United States. With roots in blues-rock and psychedelic rock, the bands that created heavy metal developed a thick, massive sound, characterized by highly amplified Distortion , extended guitar solos, emphatic beats, and overall...
-oriented and hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
-oriented bands, respectively. These styles became the basis for nu metal
Nu metal

Nu metal is a sub-genre of Heavy metal music that emerged in the mid-1990s which combines grunge music, alternative rock, and alternative metal with hip hop music and various list of heavy metal genres, such as funk metal, rap metal, groove metal and thrash metal....
.

eeding the development of rap rock, some rock bands had experimented with old school hip hop
Old school hip hop

Old school hip hop describes the earliest commercially recorded hip hop music , and often by extension the music in the period preceding it . The image, styles and sounds of the old school were exemplified by figures like the Fat Boys, Kool Herc, Afrika Bambaataa, The Treacherous Three, Funky Four Plus One, Fab 5 Freddy and Grandmaster Flash...
 influences, such as Blondie
Blondie (band)

Blondie is an United States rock music band that first gained fame in the late 1970s and has so far sold over 30 million albums. The band was a pioneer in the early American New Wave music and punk rock scenes....
 and The Clash
The Clash

The Clash were an English Rock music band that formed in 1976 as part of the original wave of British punk rock. Along with punk rock, they experimented with reggae, ska, Dub music, funk, Hip hop music and rockabilly....
. In 1986, Run-D.M.C.
Run-D.M.C.

Run-D.M.C. was an influential Hip hop culture group from Hollis, Queens, in the Queens borough of New York City. Founded by Joseph Simmons, Darryl McDaniels, and Jason Mizell, the group is arguably the most important and influential act in the history of hip hop....
 collaborated with Aerosmith
Aerosmith

Aerosmith is an United States hard rock band, sometimes referred to as "The Bad Boys from Boston, Massachusetts" and "America's Greatest Rock and Roll Band"....
 on a remake of the latter's earlier song, "Walk This Way
Walk This Way

"Walk This Way" is a song by United States hard rock rock band Aerosmith. It was written by Steven Tyler and Joe Perry . It was originally released as the second single from their 1975 album Toys in the Attic ....
", first released in 1975.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Rap rock'
Start a new discussion about 'Rap rock'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


Rap rock is a music genre
Music genre

A music genre is a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other types of music....
 fusing vocal and instrumental elements of hip hop
Hip hop music

Hip hop music is a music genre typically consisting of a rhythmic vocal style called rapping which is accompanied with backing beats. Hip hop music is part of hip hop culture, which began in the Bronx, in New York City in the 1970s, predominantly among African Americans and Latino Americans....
 with various forms of rock
Rock music

Rock music is a loosely defined genre of popular music that entered the mainstream in the mid 1950's. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rhythm and blues, country music and other influences....
. Rap rock is often confused with rap metal
Rap metal

Rap metal is a music genre of rap rock fusing vocal and sometimes instrumental elements of hip hop music with Heavy metal music. Rap metal is often confused with rap rock and rapcore....
 and rapcore
Rapcore

Rapcore is a music genre of rap rock fusing vocal and sometimes instrumental elements of hip hop music with punk rock, often hardcore punk. Rapcore is often confused with rap rock and rap metal....
, subgenres that include heavy metal
Heavy metal music

Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in England and the United States. With roots in blues-rock and psychedelic rock, the bands that created heavy metal developed a thick, massive sound, characterized by highly amplified Distortion , extended guitar solos, emphatic beats, and overall...
-oriented and hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
-oriented bands, respectively. These styles became the basis for nu metal
Nu metal

Nu metal is a sub-genre of Heavy metal music that emerged in the mid-1990s which combines grunge music, alternative rock, and alternative metal with hip hop music and various list of heavy metal genres, such as funk metal, rap metal, groove metal and thrash metal....
.

History

Proceeding the development of rap rock, some rock bands had experimented with old school hip hop
Old school hip hop

Old school hip hop describes the earliest commercially recorded hip hop music , and often by extension the music in the period preceding it . The image, styles and sounds of the old school were exemplified by figures like the Fat Boys, Kool Herc, Afrika Bambaataa, The Treacherous Three, Funky Four Plus One, Fab 5 Freddy and Grandmaster Flash...
 influences, such as Blondie
Blondie (band)

Blondie is an United States rock music band that first gained fame in the late 1970s and has so far sold over 30 million albums. The band was a pioneer in the early American New Wave music and punk rock scenes....
 and The Clash
The Clash

The Clash were an English Rock music band that formed in 1976 as part of the original wave of British punk rock. Along with punk rock, they experimented with reggae, ska, Dub music, funk, Hip hop music and rockabilly....
. In 1986, Run-D.M.C.
Run-D.M.C.

Run-D.M.C. was an influential Hip hop culture group from Hollis, Queens, in the Queens borough of New York City. Founded by Joseph Simmons, Darryl McDaniels, and Jason Mizell, the group is arguably the most important and influential act in the history of hip hop....
 collaborated with Aerosmith
Aerosmith

Aerosmith is an United States hard rock band, sometimes referred to as "The Bad Boys from Boston, Massachusetts" and "America's Greatest Rock and Roll Band"....
 on a remake of the latter's earlier song, "Walk This Way
Walk This Way

"Walk This Way" is a song by United States hard rock rock band Aerosmith. It was written by Steven Tyler and Joe Perry . It was originally released as the second single from their 1975 album Toys in the Attic ....
", first released in 1975. The success of the remake helped bring hip hop into popularity with a mainstream white audience. Beastie Boys
Beastie Boys

Beastie Boys are an American hip hop music group from New York City consisting of Michael Diamond, Adam Yauch, and Adam Horovitz. Since around the time of the Hello Nasty album, the DJ for the group has been Mix Master Mike, who was first featured in the song "Three MC's and One DJ"....
, formerly a hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
 group, began working in the hip hop genre. Their debut album, Licensed to Ill
Licensed to Ill

Licensed to Ill is the debut album by the Beastie Boys, 1986 in music.It is the first rap LP album to top the Billboard 200 chart. It also peaked at #2 on the Top Hip Hop/R&B Albums chart....
, largely featured a rock-based sound. Detroit rapper Esham
Esham

Rashaam Attica Smith, better known by his stage name Esham , is an American rapping from Detroit, Michigan known for his hallucinogenic style of hip hop music which he refers to as "acid rap", which fuses rock music-based beats and lyrics involving subjects such as death, drug use, evil, paranoia and sex....
 became known for his "acid rap
Acid rap

Acid rap is a subgenre of hip hop music, fusing rock music-based beats and lyrics involving subjects such as death, drug use, evil, paranoia and sex....
" style, which fused rapped death metal
Death metal

Death metal is an extreme metal subgenre of heavy metal music. It typically employs fast tempos, heavily distorted guitars, deep death growl vocals, morbid lyrics, blast beat drumming, and complex song structures with multiple tempo changes....
-influenced lyrics with a sound that was often rock and heavy metal
Heavy metal music

Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in England and the United States. With roots in blues-rock and psychedelic rock, the bands that created heavy metal developed a thick, massive sound, characterized by highly amplified Distortion , extended guitar solos, emphatic beats, and overall...
-based, and is considered to be an influence on the development of rap rock and rap metal. Rappers who sampled rock songs included Ice-T
ICE-T

* Ice-T is a U.S. rapper and actor.* ICE-T is a tilting model of the German DBAG Class 411 series of high-speed trains....
, The Fat Boys
The Fat Boys

The Fat Boys was an United States hip-hop music trio from Brooklyn, New York City, that emerged in the early 1980s....
, LL Cool J
LL Cool J

James Todd Smith , better known as LL Cool J, is an American rapper and actor. LL Cool J stands for "Ladies love Cool James." He is known for romantic ballads such as "I Need Love" and "Hey Lover" as well as pioneering hip-hop such as "Headsprung", "I Can't Live Without My Radio", "I'm Bad", "The Boomin' System", "Mama Said Knock You O...
, Public Enemy and Whodini
Whodini

Whodini is a hip hop music group from New York that was formed in 1981, made up of Jalil , Ecstasy and Grandmaster Dee ....
.

Rap rock began to enter the mainstream arena in the 1990s. Rock bands such as 24-7 Spyz
24-7 Spyz

24-7 Spyz are a band from the South Bronx, New York, formed in 1986, originally consisting of Jimi Hazel , Rick Skatore , Kindu Phibes , and P....
, Faith No More
Faith No More

Faith No More is an American alternative metal band who formed in San Francisco, California, and were active between 1984 and 1998. Faith No More combined elements of heavy metal music, funk music, progressive rock, hip hop music, hardcore punk, thrash metal, and jazz, among many others, and have been hailed as an influential rock band....
, Living Colour
Living Colour

Living Colour is an American funk metal band from New York City, formed in 1983. A prominent all-African American band of that movement, which also included Jane's Addiction, Faith No More, Primus , and 24-7 Spyz in the late 1980s, Living Colour rose to fame with their debut album Vivid in 1988....
, Rage Against the Machine
Rage Against the Machine

Rage Against the Machine is an American Rock music band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1991. The band's lineup, unchanged since formation, consists of vocalist Zack de la Rocha, guitarist Tom Morello, bassist Tim Commerford, and drummer Brad Wilk....
 and Red Hot Chili Peppers
Red Hot Chili Peppers

Red Hot Chili Peppers are a Grammy Award-winning American Rock music band formed in Los Angeles, California, California, in 1983. For most of the band's existence, the members are vocalist Anthony Kiedis, guitarist John Frusciante, bassist Flea , and drummer Chad Smith....
 fused rock and hip hop influences. The soundtrack album for the 1993 film Judgment Night
Judgment Night (film)

Judgment Night is a 1993 action film thriller film directed by Stephen Hopkins and starring Emilio Est?vez, Cuba Gooding Jr., Jeremy Piven and Stephen Dorff as a group of friends on the run from a group of criminals after they witness a murder....
 featured 11 collaborations between hip hop and rock musicians. Urban Dance Squad
Urban Dance Squad

Urban Dance Squad was a Netherlands band formed after what was originally intended at a one-time jam-session at a festival in Utrecht on December 20 1986....
 mixed funk
Funk

Funk is an United States Music genre that originated in the mid- to late-1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, soul jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music....
, heavy metal, hip hop and punk. Biohazard
Biohazard (band)

Biohazard was a band originally based out of Brooklyn, New York. They are acknowledged as one of the earliest bands to fuse hardcore punk and heavy metal music with elements of hip hop....
 is also considered to be a pioneering act in the genre. Cypress Hill
Cypress Hill

Cypress Hill is an American Hip hop music group from South Gate, California. Originally called DVX, the name was changed after Mellow Man Ace left in 1988....
's Black Sunday
Black Sunday (album)

Black Sunday is the second album by rap group Cypress Hill. It was released on July 20, 1993.It debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, recording the highest Soundscan for a rap group at the time....
 featured a rock-based sound and artwork which, according to Allmusic reviewer Steve Huey, resembled that of heavy metal bands. Beck
Beck

Beck Hansen is an United States musician, singer-songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist known by the stage name Beck. With a pop art collage of musical styles, oblique and irony lyrics, and postmodern arrangements incorporating sample , drum machines, live instrumentation and sound effects, Beck has been hailed by critics and the public...
's successful 1994 single "Loser" incorporated hip hop influences, including an imitation of Chuck D
Chuck D

Carlton Douglas Ridenhour , better known by his stage name, Chuck D, is an American rapper, author, and producer. He helped create politically and socially conscious rap music in the late 1980s as the leader of the rap group, Public Enemy ....
's rapping style.

Rap rock gained mainstream popularity in the late-90s. Among the first wave of performers to gain mainstream success were 311
311 (band)

311 is an American rock band from Omaha, Nebraska, formed in 1988. Their musical structure incorporates a variety of musical styles including alternative rock, hip hop, ska, reggae, funk, and heavy metal music....
, Bloodhound Gang
Bloodhound Gang

The Bloodhound Gang is an American alternative rock rock band from Quakertown, Pennsylvania. Their songs typically have humorous and off-beat, often satire lyrics....
, and Kid Rock
Kid Rock

Robert James Ritchie , known by his stage name Kid Rock, is a rapper turned singer/songwriter with five Grammy nominations. He was born in Romeo, Michigan on January 17, 1971....
. Rap rock would become the basis for the nu metal
Nu metal

Nu metal is a sub-genre of Heavy metal music that emerged in the mid-1990s which combines grunge music, alternative rock, and alternative metal with hip hop music and various list of heavy metal genres, such as funk metal, rap metal, groove metal and thrash metal....
 genre, and some bands in this genre are known for rapping, including Linkin Park
Linkin Park

Linkin Park is an American Rock music band from Agoura Hills, California, California. Since its formation in 1996, the band has sold more than 50 million albums and won two Grammy Awards....
 and Limp Bizkit
Limp Bizkit

Limp Bizkit is an United States nu metal band from Jacksonville, Florida, Florida. The band achieved success with over 50 million albums sold worldwide....
. Although the popularity of these styles is believed to be declining, some believe that rap rock may regain popularity, with younger music fans discovering bands in the genre.

Characteristics

Rap rock is varied in sound, with performers incorporating influences from various genres, including alternative rock
Alternative rock

Alternative rock is a genre of rock music that emerged in the 1980s and became widely popular in the 1990s. Alternative rock consists of various subgenres that have emerged from the independent music scene since the 1980s, such as Grunge music, Britpop, gothic rock, and indie pop....
, funk
Funk

Funk is an United States Music genre that originated in the mid- to late-1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, soul jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music....
, hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
, hard rock
Hard rock

Hard rock is a sub-genre of rock music which has its earliest roots in mid-1960s garage rock and psychedelic rock and is considerably harder than conventional rock music....
, heavy metal, or pop
Pop music

Pop music is a music genre that features a noticeable rhythmic element, melodies and hook , a mainstream style and a conventional structure.The term "pop music" was first used in 1926 in the sense of "having popular appeal" , but since the 1950s it has been used in the sense of a musical genre, originally characterized as a lighter alternat...
. In The Violent World of Moshpit Culture, Joe Ambrose describes rapcore
Rapcore

Rapcore is a music genre of rap rock fusing vocal and sometimes instrumental elements of hip hop music with punk rock, often hardcore punk. Rapcore is often confused with rap rock and rap metal....
 as "a mixture of white rap and hardcore". Allmusic describes rap metal
Rap metal

Rap metal is a music genre of rap rock fusing vocal and sometimes instrumental elements of hip hop music with Heavy metal music. Rap metal is often confused with rap rock and rapcore....
 as having "big, lurching beats and heavy, heavy riffs" that "occasionally [...] [sound] as if the riffs were merely overdubbed over scratching and beat box beats", and described rap rock as having a more organic sound, characterizing many songs in the genre as rock songs in which the vocals were rapped
Rapping

Rapping is the rhythmic spoken delivery of rhymes, wordplay, and poetry. Rapping is a primary ingredient in Hip Hop music, but the phenomenon predates Hip Hop culture by centuries....
 rather than sung
Singing

Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the human voice, which is often contrasted with regular speech. A person who sings is called a singer or vocalist....
. Allmusic also states that the rhythms of rap rock are rooted in that of hip hop, with more funk influences than normal hard rock.

Hed PE, which fuses punk rock
Punk rock

Punk rock is a rock music genre that developed between 1974 and 1976 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Rooted in garage rock and other forms of what is now known as protopunk music, punk rock bands eschewed the perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock....
 with hip hop, sometimes incorporates reggae
Reggae

Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s.While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Music of Jamaica, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady....
 and heavy metal influences. According to Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is a United States-based magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J....
 writer Rob Kemp, Incubus
Incubus (band)

Incubus is a Grammy-nominated alternative rock band based out of Calabasas, California, California. Formed by vocalist Brandon Boyd, lead guitarist Mike Einziger, and drummer Jose Pasillas while in high school in 1991, the band grew to include bassist Alex Katunich , and Gavin Koppell , both of whom were eventually replaced by bas...
' 1997 album S.C.I.E.N.C.E.
S.C.I.E.N.C.E.

S.C.I.E.N.C.E. is an Enhanced CD album by the rock and roll band Incubus , released on September 9, 1997. It includes an official video. The album has sold 740,000 copies in the US to date....
 "links funk metal to the rap metal". Kottonmouth Kings
Kottonmouth Kings

Kottonmouth Kings is an American Hip hop music and rap rock group from Orange County, California, California. Kottonmouth Kings officially formed in 1994, and describe themselves as "Psychedelic rock Hip hop music punk rock"....
 perform a style which they refer to as "psychedelic
Psychedelic rock

CharacteristicsThe musical style typically features electric guitars, 12 strings being preferred for their 'jangle'; elaborate studio effects - backwards taping, panning , phasing, long delay loops and extreme reverb; exotic instrumentation, with a particular fondness for the sitar and tabla; A strong keyboard presence, especially Hammond, Far...
 hip-hop punk rock". Kid Rock
Kid Rock

Robert James Ritchie , known by his stage name Kid Rock, is a rapper turned singer/songwriter with five Grammy nominations. He was born in Romeo, Michigan on January 17, 1971....
 incorporates country
Country music

Country music is a blend of popular American music forms originally found in the Southern United States and the Appalachian Mountains. It has roots in Traditional music, Celtic music, gospel music, and old-time music and evolved rapidly in the 1920s....
 and Southern rock
Southern rock

Southern rock is a subgenre of rock music. It developed in the Southern United States from rock and roll, country music, and blues, and is focused generally on electric guitar and vocals....
 influences, while Everlast
Everlast (musician)

Erik Schrody , better known by his stage name Everlast, is an Irish people-United States rapper and singer-songwriter, best known for his hit "What It's Like", and for his unique genre-crossing mix of hip hop music and acoustic music-based rock music he's dubbed "Hick-Hop." He was the frontman for rap group House of Pain until 1996 in m...
 fuses blues
Blues

Blues is a music genre based on the use of the blues chord progressions and the blue notes. Though several blues musical form s exist, the 12-bar blues chord progressions are the most frequently encountered....
 and rock with hip hop, performing with a live band that includes a DJ
Disc jockey

A disc jockey is a person who selects and plays sound recording for an audience. Originally, disk referred to phonograph records, while disc refers to the Compact Disc, and has become the more common spelling....
.

The lyrical themes of rap rock vary. According to Allmusic, "most rap-metal bands during the mid- to late '90s blended an ultra-aggressive, testosterone-heavy theatricality with either juvenile humor or an introspective angst learned through alternative metal". Although some alternative metal
Alternative metal

Alternative metal is an Eclecticism form of heavy metal music that gained popularity in the early 1990s alongside Grunge music. It is characterized by some heavy metal trappings , but usually with a pronounced experimental music edge, including unconventional lyrics, odd time signatures, more syncopation than typical metal, unusual technique,...
 and nu metal
Nu metal

Nu metal is a sub-genre of Heavy metal music that emerged in the mid-1990s which combines grunge music, alternative rock, and alternative metal with hip hop music and various list of heavy metal genres, such as funk metal, rap metal, groove metal and thrash metal....
 bands incorporate hip hop beats, rap rock bands were always fronted by rappers. Rap metal vocalists mix rapping and screaming
Screaming (music)

Screaming is a form of singing, most commonly heard in sub-genres of heavy metal music and hardcore punk, though screamed vocals also feature in music genres such as alternative rock, and more experimental music genres such as noise music....
.