Hardcore & Hip Hop: The End of the Great Divide

Denzel Curry with Knocked Loose

The recent collaboration between Knocked Loose and rapper Denzel Curry highlights how Hardcore and Hip-Hop continue to influence each other. This partnership is another example of how these genres overlap, despite ongoing efforts by some fans to keep them separate. My main argument here is to explore the deep, ongoing connections between Hip Hop and Hardcore, and examine why certain groups resist these collaborations.

Hip Hop and Hardcore both began as ways for people facing unfair treatment to build a community and express their frustrations. These genres originated among young people in inner cities and have grown from underground scenes to mainstream popularity over the decades. Notably, there are many similarities between them, and their crossover history is worth exploring. For example, Hip Hop has often crossed into Rock music, with bands like Anthrax, Korn, and, more recently, Knocked Loose collaborating with rappers such as Public Enemy, Ice Cube, and Denzel Curry. With these connections in mind, let’s look more closely at how these collaborations have taken shape.

Odd Future and Trash Talk

You simply cannot speak about early 2010s Hip Hop without mentioning Tyler, the Creator, and the infamous Odd Future rap collective. The collective was known for its loud, rebellious songs, lyrics, and overall nature. With most people claiming their live shows to be extremely vigorous and sometimes violent.

Tyler signed Sacramento Hardcore band Trash Talk to his Odd Future label in 2012. They were the first non-Hip Hop act on the label, with them releasing two albums, 119 (2012) and NO PEACE (2014), through OFWGKTA. The two groups would often tour together, melding the Hardcore and Rap crowds. Their partnership solidified a punk-rap fusion. It was driven by an aggressive, shared, rebellious energy from both fanbases.

Project Pat at Sound & Fury 25’

Last summer, the well-known Hardcore festival Sound&Fury took place July 12-13. While bands like Trash Talk, Knocked Loose, and Basement graced the lineup. There was one act that was quite unexpected. Iconic Memphis rapper Project Pat hit the stage at the festival, where he was met by crowd surfers and people rapping his lyrics by heart. Even online fans had a strong positive reaction to this crossover.

While Sound & Fury is absolutely rooted in Hardcore, many have noticed that they’ve recently been broadening their bills, with artists from non-metal backgrounds making their way into the lineup. Adding a Hip Hop act to a Hardcore festival invites the suggestion that people should rethink enforcing genre divisions. A popular rapper from the late 90s successfully connected with a punk audience and even (possibly) paved the way for more hip-hop acts.

Both Punk and Rap rejected mainstream culture and celebrated things like community and grit. Hardcore and Hip Hop both have a history of sharing DIY intensity and spirit.

Why The Divide Exist

The biggest reason Hip Hop/Rap is constantly separated from Hardcore is (believe it or not) not the sound.

It’s because of race.

It is not a secret to acknowledge that Hip Hop is deeply associated with Black culture. It became something like a safe space for Black artists in the late 70s/early 80s. I dive more into the importance of Hip Hop’s origins in my article here. But, it is also widely known that once the 80s hit, the Hardcore punk scene was predominantly White, despite bands like Bad Brains becoming popular in the 70s.

By the 90s, Hip Hop’s popularity had skyrocketed. With rappers like 2Pac and Biggie making mainstream hits. All of this was happening while Hardcore continued underground. This also contributed to the divide between the two. In response to Rap gaining mainstream attention, many in Hardcore saw it as “too commercial” or “too flashy”. Whereas, many people in Hip Hop saw Punk as being too detached from society.

Now, of course, sound plays an instrumental role in distinguishing the two genres. Hardcore centers around guitars, moshing, and the live music experience. Compared to Hip Hop, which is more about Aesthetics, catchy lyrics, and beats.  When you grow up with one genre, the other can feel foreign to you.

Many Hardcore and Metal fans who choose to vocalize their disdain for hip-hop tend to have a Superiority Complex. As if they should be noticed in a higher regard because they don’t listen to music about “money, drugs, and women” all day. This kind of behavior has been met with backlash, claiming that there are racial undertones behind their reasoning (spoiler alert! of course, there are).

But, They Have Always Overlapped

New York Hardcore bands in the 80s and 90s were influenced by Hip Hop rhythms. Beatdown Hardcore is heavily influenced by similar Hip Hop aesthetics, especially as of recently. And many Hip Hop artists were sampling Rock and Punk. Acts like the Beastie Boys were thriving between both worlds. And with Hardcore festivals beginning to add non-metal artists to their bills, and more and more rap aesthetics finding its way into Hardcore bands (see bands like Gridiron and Bayway, for example), the walls that divide the two communities grow thinner each day.

Both Hardcore and Hip Hop are rooted in marginalized youth, take a confrontational approach, and are anti-authority. And those are all things young music listeners need right now in this social climate. So, when acts like Denzel Curry are introducing their rap fans to bands like Knocked Loose, and vice versa, it exposes how fake the barriers are.