If current hip-hop culture has you thinking you are living in a time warp, you are not the only one.
Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are dominating the box office with the latest instalment of their Bad Boys franchise and Eminem bleached his hair again to release a sequel to his 1999 major label debut The Slim Shady LP.
The new work, The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grace), is expected to top the charts worldwide this week and continues the trend of hip-hop stars releasing companion pieces to their seminal work.
In the case of Eminem, who will perform as part of the Abu Dhabi Formula One Grand Prix in December, this is the second sequel in his catalogue and comes after 2013’s The Marshall Mathers LP 2. The latter is the follow-up to the 2000 masterpiece The Marshall Mathers LP, one of the biggest-selling hip-hop albums of all time with more than 25 million copies sold.
Nicki Minaj also took inspiration from the past by releasing Pink Friday 2, a sequel to her 2010 breakout debut album Pink Friday. Meanwhile, rapper Nas recently concluded a manic run of six albums split into two trilogies.
So what’s going on here? While rappers always used cinema as inspiration for songs, is this thirst for sequels the latest trend hip-hop took from Hollywood?
Not so fast says Spek, executive vice president of international and emerging markets for music publishing company Reservoir Media. As part of his role, Spek signed acclaimed US rapper JID, now featured in The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grace).
A hip-hop artist in his own right and a UAE resident, Spek, whose real name is Hussain Yoosuf, says it's no surprise that hip-hop acts emerging from the CD era are releasing sequels.
“That whole idea of creating a cohesive body of work that is full of characters and themes come from the previous recording formats of CDs and vinyl,” he tells The National. "When it comes to Eminem, he created this Slim Shady character that people loved and allowed him to act as his most outrageous. After going through different patches and themes in his career, he wants to go back to this particular era.”
That said, Hollywood’s inspiration for hip-hop album sequels is apparent in the creative qualities it affords rappers.
With Pink Friday 2, Minaj joins Eminem in tapping into her alter-ego, the erratic and flamboyant Roman Zolanski. And in Jay-Z’s Blueprint trilogy of albums, he builds a sweeping story arc of himself entering the music industry as a hustler and emerging victorious yet flawed.
"It's that narrative drive that excites the artist and has fans buying into it as well," Spek says. "When you look at Jay-Z's work, he is telling you a particular story that is not too dissimilar to watching the Godfather films in that there is a clear, beginning and end to them."
In the case of Nas’s King's Disease and Magic trilogies, the thread linking them together is its sounds. With all six albums produced by the Grammy Award-winning beatmaker Hit-Boy, the work’s sonic unity allowed it to be viewed as an overall body of work, despite the different subjects tackled in the songs.
As head of artists and repertoire for Warner Music MENA, Karima Damir says artists are resorting to releasing sequels to keep fans engaged in a streaming world where thousands of songs are released daily.
"What you are hearing with these sequels is essentially the artist investing in their hardcore fan base, because they are the ones that will save up to go see the shows, stream the records as well as buy the physical releases like vinyl,” she says. “Sequel albums also mark a certain moment of time for the artist and their fans. It is a chance to reflect on how they both grew up together over the years. It’s that kind of emotional pulling power that will always keep the sequel album appealing.”
Additionally, artists fundamentally want to be remembered through a distinctive catalogue of work. With the search for new sounds and voices rooted in the DNA of hip-hop, Damir says hip-hop sequels often act as reminders of a seasoned artist's vitality.
“It is a form of legacy building and a tool in a healthy competition against newer artists,” she says. “At the end of the day, for music to resonate it needs to have a meaning and reason to it – this is what listeners respond to.”
Spek agrees, stating such a resonance is increasingly hard to find in the music landscape where songs favour albums and brevity trumps depth. "Streaming and social media have affected the way we consume music in that it has become more disposable or we are hearing more songs in isolation to the wider body of work," he says. "So I think it's great that artists like Eminem are more interested in creating a tapestry of work and a world that you can get pulled into. It's the best kind of escapism.”
