12 Common Hip-Hop Terms: Significance of Hip-Hop Terms

Hip-hop music has a rich and varied history, starting in New York City in the 1970s:

• Origins: Early hip-hop music saw its roots in the 1970s in New York City. While the exaxt origins are unclear, the Bronx is often credited as the genre's birthplace. It reportedly started as a collaboration among intersecting groups of Black, Latinx, and Caribbean American youth at block parties—community gatherings that featured DJs playing soul and funk music. NYC DJs like DJ Kool Herc, Grand Wizzard Theodore, Grandmaster Flash, and Afrika Bambaataa began to experiment with different techniques during parties, including longer percussive breaks (called “breakbeats'' or simply “the breaks”), turntable techniques, scratching, freestyle, and improvised vocals based on Jamaican “toasting.” Music historians and fans alike have credited these acts as pioneers of modern hip-hop and rap music.
• Expansion through the US: In 1979, hip-hop trio the Sugarhill Gang released what is now widely considered the first commercially successful hip-hop record, “Rapper’s Delight,” which reached the Top 40 on the US Billboard charts and propelled hip-hop into the spotlight, making it a full-fledged genre.
• Diversification: In the 1980s, hip-hop was in full force. Many artists began bringing new ideas to the genre, including drum kits (especially the 808), more complex sampling, metaphorical rap lyrics, and broader collaboration with genres like electro music. The ‘80s also saw hip-hop spread to an international audience, especially across the UK, Japan, and Australia. Notable songs included “The Message” by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five.
• New school hip-hop: In 1984, several hip-hop albums—especially from artists Run-DMC, LL Cool J, and the Beastie Boys—introduced what became called “new school hip-hop.” This style emphasized drum machine beats, minimalism, shorter songs (which were more radio-friendly), and socio-political commentary. These artists shifted away from the party rhymes and funk influences of “old school hip-hop.”
• The golden era: The late 1980s and early 1990s were the golden age of hip-hop, in which many performers enjoyed huge mainstream success while introducing major innovations with each new record. Major artists included Public Enemy, Tupac Shakur, The Notorious B.I.G., MC Hammer, Boogie Down Productions, Snoop Dogg, Nas, A Tribe Called Quest, and Big Daddy Kane. The era also saw the rise of gangsta rap, a subgenre that emphasized the lifestyle of inner-city youth and artists like Schoolly D, Ice-T, and N.W.A. helped characterize.
• Commercialization: By the late 1990s, hip-hop was a major mainstream genre and created many high-profile artists, including Lil Wayne, Timbaland, Nelly, Puff Daddy, Jay-Z, Ja Rule, DMX, Eminem, and 50 Cent. In 1995, the Grammys added a new award category for Best Rap Album; Naughty by Nature became the first winners of the award.
• Alternative hip-hop: In the 2000s, many artists incorporated heavier influences from genres like punk, jazz, indie rock, and electronic. During this time, prominent or rising artists included Outkast, Kanye West, MF Doom, 2 Chainz, Gucci Mane, Juicy J, The Roots, Kid Cudi, Mos Def, Drake, Aesop Rock, Kendrick Lamar, and Gnarls Barkley.
• Contemporary hip-hop: The rise of internet distribution and streaming services at the turn of the century and into the modern-day created an explosion of artists, mixtapes, and experimentation. Artists that rose to prominence in recent years include Waka Flocka Flame, Cardi B, Future, Migos, Travis Scott, Megan Thee Stallion, 21 Savage, and Lil Uzi Vert.

The cultural significance of hip-hop terms is two-fold. First, they help hip-hop artists build a sense of connection by using many of the same slang terms as their listeners. The use of hip-hop slang words suggests that hip-hop artists share similar experiences with their listeners and understand the joys and challenges in their lives. Authenticity is crucial to the identity of many hip-hop artists, and lyrics that contain hip-hop terms foster the idea that the narrative of a song draws from a real experience.

Hip-hop terms are also culturally significant because they expand on a vernacular that is exclusively Black American in origin. For centuries, Black Americans created their own syntax to establish their cultural identity, now commonly known as African-American English Vernacular (AAVE).

There are hip-hop terms to describe every element of hip-hop culture. Some of the most common slang terms include:

1. 1. Bars: Bars refer to rap lyrics, but they can also be part of a compliment: If an emcee (MC) has “got bars,” they have talent in rhyming or improvisation. It’s derived from the music theory definition of bars, which are segments of time in a composition that contain a specific number of beats.
2. 2. Battle: A battle is a hip-hop contest in which two or more rappers, dancers, or DJs showcase their improvised talents before an assembled crowd, which determines a winner based on skill and prowess. Rappers display their creativity with spontaneous lyrics, especially put-downs (“disses”), while dance battles involve break dancing in one-on-one or team faceoffs. In DJing battles, opponents show off their turntabling techniques.
3. 3. Beats: Beats refer to the rhythmic element of rap songs. It may refer to the percussive element, such as the drum beats that give a track its particular rhythm, or the track’s broader rhythmic structure, including some melodic elements.
4. 4. Break: A break is an instrumental element—usually sampled from another recording— that repeats or “loops” throughout a hip-hop song. Breaks are typically isolated drum or percussion parts, also known as breakbeats; the most famous of these is Clyde Stubblefield’s riff from James Brown’s single “Funky Drummer.” But breaks can also refer to any repetetive element of a song, such as the bassline from Chic’s “Good Times” in the Sugar Hill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight.”
   
5. 5. End rhymes: An end rhyme is a couplet, which in rap songs refers to two or more lines that end with words that rhyme. It’s one of the basic rhyme schemes, or patterns of rhymes, in rap music.
6. 6. First verse: The first verse refers to the opening verse in a rap song. A typical rap song will feature two to three sixteen-bar verses.
7. 7. Flow: Flow refers to how the rhymes and rhythms interact in a hip-hop vocal performance. Flow also refers to the rapper’s skill at delivering the song’s verses within its rhythmic structure.
8. 8. Freestyle: To freestyle means to improvise rhyming lyrics without backing music or reciting memorized material. Freestyling was initially a reference to spontaneous rapping on the first subject that came into an MC’s head but is now typically part of a live hip-hop performance or rap battle to demonstrate the rapper’s skill at wordplay.
9. 9. Lyrics: Lyrics are the words of the song that impart information or tell a story. Rap lyrics often include a rhyming element, and the pattern in which the lyrics rhyme is the rhyme scheme.
10. 10. Rhymes: The building blocks of rap songwriting are rhymes, which are lyrics that feature similar vocal or vowel sounds. Aspiring artists who want to rap often write lyrics that rhyme and then deliver them over a beat.
11. 11. Rhyme schemes: The pattern of rhymes in a rap song is the rhyme scheme. Rap rhyme schemes can be simple four-line patterns, in which the first line and second line form a couplet that ends in rhyming words, as do the third line and fourth line. You can write the rhyme pattern as AABB. Different rhyme schemes include the alternate rhyme (ABAB), in which the first and third lines rhyme, and the monorhyme (AAAA), in which all lines rhyme.
12. 12. Verses: A verse is the primary part of a rap song with vocals. It’s frequently composed of sixteen rap bars, or rhyming lines, followed by a chorus or “hook” that reiterates the song’s main theme or an attention-grabbing element. Some songs also contain a bridge: a linking element in the song structure with a different delivery or rhythm that follows some rap verses.

Become a better musician with the MasterClass Annual Membership. Gain access to exclusive video lessons taught by the world’s best, including Questlove, St. Vincent, Sheila E., Timbaland, Itzhak Perlman, Herbie Hancock, Tom Morello, and more.