RZA Believes “Hip Hop Has Become One Sided” When Talking About Rise In Rap Violence and Deaths

RZA recently spoke on the alarming rise in violence and deaths in hip hop in a new interview with the Financial Times.

“We’ve lost more hip-hop artists in the last few years than ever before,” the legendary rapper and producer said. “Growing up in the golden age of hip-hop, we lost maybe like a couple of artists, but not a dozen artists or more.”

RZA continued, saying that “Sometimes Hip Hop music glamorizes certain things. It glamorizes prison life, it glamorizes gangsters and thugs. I understand that, because I grew out of that. But it doesn’t give you the total tragedy of what that can end up being, nor are we being represented with a lot of alternatives. The point being made is there was more bounce, there was more substance. Hip Hop has become one-sided.”

Do you agree with RZA?

RZA is set to drop a collaborative project with DJ Scratch, entitled Saturday Afternoon Kung Fu Theater on March 4th. You can preorder here.