Chinese hip-hop goes mainstream but some say it's too commercial

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By CGTN's World Insight

“It started as African American music but now hip-hop has been embraced around the world,” said Chinese American hip-hop performer Jeffrey Kung.

“I have a radio show called The Park, it’s the first hip-hop radio platform in China, and we interviewed a really good artist named Questlove and he said something interesting, he said he feels like the spirit of hip-hop is stronger abroad than it is in the US, because in the US, hip-hop has become a very commercial genre of music," he said.

And hip-hop fans’ anger at what was once a purely underground, urban genre being embraced by the masses and commercialized is a process which is now sweeping China, all thanks to a hit TV show.

/CGTN Screenshot

“The Rap of China” is the country's first talent show with a focus on hip-hop and has brought many artists previously considered underground into the mainstream.

The show was viewed online more than 100 million times in the first four hours after transmission and a little more than two months into the series run, it has received more than 2 billion views.

But despite the large audience figured, the show itself has received mixed reviews. Some have questioned the credibility of the judges, while others have voiced concerns that the program is over-commercializing Chinese rap and hip-hop.

“Popularity is a double-edged sword for the music”, said Kung, adding that hip-hop in the United States came from the streets.

/CGTN Screenshot

“It came as a way for kids in the city to communicate with each other, to tell their story, because no one would listen to them,” he said, adding that its commercialization has meant it has “kind of lost its real roots of where it is came from.”

Hip-hop first appeared in China in the early 1990s, but the genre has remained largely underground.

Despite the mixed reviews and complaints about over-exposure one thing is for sure, the huge success of “The Rap of China” has pushed this genre into the spotlight and revealed a hidden passion for rap among many young Chinese.

World Insight with Tian Wei is a 45-minute global affairs and debate show on CGTN. It airs weekdays at 10.15 p.m. BJT (1415GMT), with rebroadcasts at 4.15 a.m. BJT (2015GMT).

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