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N.W.A.
From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist
N.W.A. · N.W.A was a hip hop group from Compton, a district of Los Angeles. Eazy-E, who had founded the label Ruthless Records with Jerry Heller, brought the group together in 1987. He worked with the producers Dr. Dre and Arabian Prince and with the rapper Ice Cube. DJ Yella and MC Ren joined later. The rappers told of life in their neighbourhood: poverty, gangs, drugs, racism and police violence.
Music and breakthrough
In January 1989 Straight Outta Compton was released. The album opens with three tracks that set the tone: the title track introduces the group, Fuck tha Police protests against police violence and the stopping of people because of their skin colour, and Gangsta Gangsta sketches the worldview of young people from the city. Dr. Dre, DJ Yella and Arabian Prince made the beats, with hard drums and samples from funk and soul. The group itself called it reality rap, but it became known as gangsta rap. Fuck tha Police brought a warning letter from the FBI, and police officers refused to provide security at concerts. That uproar only made the group better known.
Influence
The lyrics were also controversial because they demeaned women and gay people and glorified crime. Many radio stations did not play the music. Even so, N.W.A sold millions of records and the group also reached a white audience. Ice Cube left at the end of 1989, and after Niggaz4Life (1991) the group broke up. Dr. Dre, Ice Cube and Eazy-E became successful solo. N.W.A gave rap a hard, political voice and influenced generations of hip hop artists.
Listening
Fuck tha Police · N.W.A., 1988Apple Music ↗
Discography
Studio albums
- 1988Straight Outta Compton
- 1991Niggaz4Life
In School of Rock
The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.
- Mixtape 6: Fear of a Black PlanetNL Reader
Mentioned in other articles
- Gangsta rap Genre
After forerunners such as Schoolly D of Philadelphia and Ice-T of Los Angeles, N.W.A.
- G-funk Genre
Dre, a former member of N.W.A., developed G-funk with The Chronic (1992): slow grooves with samples from George Clinton's P-Funk, a high synthesizer line and plenty of space.