Hip-Hop Goes Prime Time With Source Music Awards

The celebration of the fresh, rebellious culture and sound of urban, (mostly) African American youth known as “hip-hop” will be honored for the first time on network television with tonight’s premiere of “The Source Hip-Hop Music Awards” on UPN.

Even though hip-hop has emerged in the U.S. as one of the dominant art forms of the ‘90s, it may be hard for some viewers to believe that there is any musical virtue, much less any art or culture in a form whose four principal modes of expression are graffiti, DJ-ing (manipulating recorded sound), MC-ing (rapping) and break-dancing. Yet with its sizable impact on American popular language, fashion, literature, athletics, advertising and film--not to mention music revenues, which now account for nearly 10% of the $14 billion a year in U.S. record sales--it may be time to grudgingly admit that the much-maligned “fad” known as hip-hop has definitively arrived.

Tom Nunan, UPN’s president of entertainment, is certainly a believer.

“Ever since [Grammy winner] Lauryn Hill graced the cover of Time magazine,” says Nunan, “the world has just woken up to the fact that hip-hop music has replaced rock, pop, country and virtually any other popular music forms as being the defining music of, let’s say, Generation Y, the new kids coming up, buying records and creating trends and pop culture.”

Nunan has ample reason to smile, he admits, given the uptick the show has already brought UPN’s bottom line.

“The advertising community has just gone crazy,” he says, booking 30-second spots on the program at $60,000, which is more than twice the average rate UPN has been getting for prime time. “We’re in business with advertising agencies and clients that we’ve never been in business with before.” Among them are Nike, Coca-Cola and Levi Strauss & Co.

“The Source Awards,” taped Wednesday night at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, features performances and presentations by Hill, Will Smith, Sean “Puffy” Combs, Queen Latifah, Mary J. Blige, Brandy, DMX, Master P and athletes Shaquille O’Neal and Mike Tyson among others. UPN co-produced the event with Source Entertainment, a multimedia division of the Source, the seminal hip-hop magazine that, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulation, is now the No. 1-selling music magazine on newsstands in America.

The program features several dramatic pairings of significance for hip-hop enthusiasts. For example, former feuding moguls Combs, of Bad Boy Entertainment, and Steve Stoute, president of black music at Interscope Records join together. And Combs performs onstage with Nas, the rapper whose controversial music video, which included a cameo by Combs, is said to have triggered an April dispute in which Stoute was allegedly assaulted by Combs and others--and for which Combs has since apologized.

“Bringing them together, to me, was a really strong message to send to show that we can put these differences behind us,” said David Mays, the publisher of the Source. “It will show that the hip-hop industry is not just a bunch of young animals running wild and beating each other up all the time. That is something that was obviously of concern to everyone in the business, when these kinds of incidents take place, particularly between two young black male executives, with the stereotypes that exist already about young black males that have been reinforced throughout the media. It was important that we try to counter the perceptions that were out there as best we could.”

Ironically, Mays, hip-hop’s peacemaking true believer, is white, and 70% of hip-hop recordings are purchased by white kids. And there are now emerging hip-hop movements in Europe, South America and Japan. Mays had made several unsuccessful attempts, circa 1992 and 1995, to showcase the artistry and significance of hip-hop on national TV.

“A lot of people don’t recognize that there are stars today continually emerging in every facet of popular culture from fashion to sports to film and TV that are all products of hip-hop music and culture,” he says.

Still, he has noticed that corporate attitudes have changed significantly since his last failed attempt to mount a hip-hop awards show, and he had statistics that bolstered his argument that the show could draw a broad audience.

Rap Music’s Revenue Confirms Popularity

“When we went out with this show in ’94 and ‘95, there was no interest whatsoever. [Rap’s] growth over the previous year was leaps and bounds above any other genre, in terms of percentage of growth. It was a real turning point, and I felt the acceptance level was there where a network could see,” Mays says.

He notes, as did Time, that rap sold more than 81 million CDs, albums and tapes last year, and increased its overall sales by 31% as compared to 2% increases for country, 6% for rock and 9% for the industry as a whole. “UPN--and Tom Nunan--was the only network that really got this, really saw the vision, really understood how big this thing could be,” Mays says. “And they put their money where their mouth was.”

Unlike the other indigenous musical forms of jazz, country and rock, the roots of rap can be traced back to a specific location (the South Bronx), and an acknowledged handful of individuals, among them its undisputed originator, DJ Kool Herc (who coined the term “b-boys” among other innovations), and Grandmaster Flash, Grandwizard Theodore (who invented “scratching”), DJ Hollywood, and Afrika Bambaataa. The program will bestow Pioneer Awards on Herc, Bambaataa and Flash.

Grandmaster Flash, now a featured regular on HBO’s “Chris Rock Show,” has been quite moved by the honor. “I have mixed emotions,” he says. “Of course, I’m very happy about it. But another part of it makes me slightly nervous, because when I did this I did it for the love. Never in my wildest dreams had I thought that this would touch so many people.”

But, he adds, “Hip-hop has been under constant attack for a long time, but it has proven it can stand the test of time. So now, it’s about time.”

Pioneer Awards for Rap’s Originators

One of the evening’s most historic moments arrives when Lauryn Hill, a five-time Grammy winner, and current media darling, presents the Pioneer Award to DJ Kool Herc--rap’s W.C. Handy, P.T. Barnum and Bill Bojangles rolled into one. Quipped Herc, the unabashed progenitor of the form, who is now 46 and still spinning discs, albeit in relative obscurity at house parties and Masonic halls across the East Coast: “I am the Little Richard of hip-hop. I get no respect. When I give my acceptance speech, a few heads are going to duck. . . . You see, I create, you appreciate, and others imitate. And I did it well too. But can I eat? Can I live? Can I get a piece of the pie?”

Hill picked up some honors too, as best new artist of the year and for best album (for “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill”) at Wednesday’s ceremony. Rapper DMX won artist of the year and best live performer honors. Double honors also went to director Hype Williams, for the controversial movie “Belly” (movie of the year) and for his work on the Busta Rhymes-Janet Jackson video “What’s It Gonna Be” (video of the year). Additional honorees included Outkast (best group), Jay-Z (lyricist), R. Kelly (R&B; artist) and Juvenile (single of the year for “Ha”).

Said Nunan of his move to identify the decidedly “guy-friendly” UPN brand name with the rogue image of hip-hop, “Hopefully ‘The Source Hip-Hop Music Awards’ is symbolic of the kinds of programming choices we are going to make in the future. Which means that we’re going to take chances on new and provocative relationships with publishing companies, with musical artists, with writers and directors, actors and producers who want to try something different for viewers who have become completely disheartened with how out of touch network television generally is with the culture and the desires of an average viewer. We want young people in particular to stand up and say, ‘Wow, those people at UPN really get it.’ And this will be among the many first steps to help cement a relationship with those viewers.”

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* “The Source Hip-Hop Music Awards” airs at 8 tonight on UPN.

On the Red Carpet: * Music, fashion and sports converged outside “The Source Hip-Hop Music Awards.” E1