Christian Hip-Hop is a sub genre of Hip-hop that originated in the 80’s and began to gain prominence at the turn of the millennium. Today, due to artists like Social Club, Flame, Lecrae, Swoope, Bizzle, etc. Christian Hip-hop (CHH as it is popularly called) has begun to make waves in mainstream Hip-hop. However in Nigeria, I have to say that CHH is lacking
Firstly unlike its foreign counterpart, Nigerian CHH has just a handful of artists and if I’m being lenient only a few have ‘blown’. This leads to another issue of CHH in Nigeria. Too many of these cats are too eager to ‘blow’. So they dumb down the message to gain a wider reach. (Can someone please tell gospel artists to quit telling us to claim our blessings?)
In all fairness, CHH in Nigeria is still relatively young and it is struggling to survive in a music industry that doesn’t promote conscious music. Perhaps I should cut CHH artists some slack
I should also say that there is very little to CHH in Nigeria. What we have is Contemporary Christian Music at best. Calling it Hip-hop would be a stretch. The few artists who specialise in Hip-hop have modified their sound to make it sound more Afro. The problem is not the modification; the problem is that they also modify the content. Perhaps they forget that it’s the content that really makes it Christian.
Then there is also the issue of support. Unfortunately, there are some people that feel Hip-hop is unholy and ghetto. Also a lot of ‘fans’ only pop out their gospel playlist on Sunday just before church. Now as an artist, I know that support is the bane of the music community. So how do we expect CHH to do well when there is little support from the people? Art that isn’t supported eventually dies.
[blockquote]Here is a question posed to anyone reading. Is CHH in Nigeria undergoing an evolution or dying off?[/blockquote]However, there is still hope for CHH in some of the up and coming artists. Perhaps they can forge a culture of good conscious music in Nigeria. Perhaps they can revolutionise CHH and Contemporary Christian Music in Nigeria. Perhaps it isn’t their burden to bear.
