Nerdcore hip hop

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Nerdcore hip hop, or geeksta rap, is a subgenre of hip hop music that is performed by nerds or geeks, and is characterized by themes and subject matter considered to be of general interest to nerds. Self-described nerdcore musician MC Frontalot coined the term in 2000 in the song "Nerdcore Hiphop". Frontalot, like most nerdcore artists, self-publishes his work and has released much of it for free online. As a niche genre, nerdcore generally holds to the DIY ethic, and has a strong amateur tradition of self-publishing and self-production. The only things required to enter the nerdcore community are a microphone, a computer, and a webserver. No recognized nerdcore albums have ever been released on a major record label, and MP3s, not CDs, are the primary means of distribution.

Though nerdcore rappers rhyme about everything from dextromethorphan use (mc chris, "The Tussin") to politics (Frontalot, "Special Delivery"), there are some perennial favorites in nerdcore subject matter, including Star Wars (Frontalot, "Yellow Lasers"; 2 Skinnee J's, "Mind Trick"; mc chris, "Fett's Vette"), science (MC Hawking, "Entropy"; 2 Skinnee J's, "Pluto"), and computers (Optimus Rhyme, "Reboot"; Monzy, "Drama in the PhD"; MC Plus+, "Computer Science for Life"). Making music about these topics does not make one automatically nerdcore—they are also popular themes in geek rock, filk, and other nerd-centric genres; the combination of hip hop and the subject matter makes them nerdcore. Somewhat less straightforwardly, there are hip hop artists who have recorded compositions which focus on similar topics, but who are not generally considered nerdcore. (An example would be Blackalicious, who are generally agreed to not be nerdcore artists despite science-oriented songs like "Chemical Calisthenics".) Conversely, one does not need to concentrate on those topics to be nerdcore: most of the songs by both of the undisputed leaders of the genre, Frontalot and mc chris, do not focus narrowly on stereotypically nerdy topics. The difference is largely one of self-identification; Blackalicious do not identify as "nerds", while Frontalot and chris both do.

The word "nerdcore" is also occasionally used as an adjective to describe a "hardcore nerd" (that is, someone who publicly takes pride in being nerdy) or anything which is nerdy to an extreme level. It is considered quite complimentary within the community.

1 The sound
2 History of nerdcore
3 Notable nerdcore artists
4 Related artists and songs
5 Media coverage
6 External links
7 See also

[edit] The sound

Nerdcore has no unifying musical manifesto, and the sound of nerdcore varies wildly from artist to artist. One common theme, especially in the early days of the genre, is uncleared sampling. MC Frontalot addressed this directly in his 1999 song "Good Old Clyde", a thank you of sorts to Clyde Stubblefield for the "funky drummer" break - which, of course, was sampled to provide the song's beat. Sources for samples in nerdcore range from Vanilla Ice ("Ninja Rap", sampled in mc chris's "Bad(dd) Runner)") to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart ("Rondo Alla Turca", in MC Plus+'s "Computer Science for Life"). YTCracker's Nerdrap Entertainment System is an entire album made up primarily of samples from 8-bit Nintendo games. Though some artists have moved away from this - Frontalot, for example, completely remixed several songs to remove uncleared samples before releasing them commercially on his 2005 album Nerdcore Rising - it is still quite common, as most nerdcore tracks are released non-commercially and thus attract little to no attention from the RIAA.

Several DJs have provided beats and done remixes for multiple nerdcore artists, most notably Baddd Spellah, who currently mixes the majority of Frontalot's tracks. Spellah also won mc chris's remix competition in 2004 and received a track in his honor ("Bad(dd) Runner") as a prize.

[edit] History of nerdcore

The term "nerdcore hip hop" was coined in 2000 by MC Frontalot. However, the genre itself arguably dates back to at least 1998. Even earlier, artists as varied as the Kool Keith, Deltron 3030, MC 900 Ft. Jesus, and Daniel Dumile began exploring topics far outside of the traditional hip hop culture, including stereotypically "nerdy" topics like space and science fiction. Though these underground artists were generally outside of geek culture and are not considered nerdcore, they can be said to have set the stage for artists like Frontalot, who has listed several of them as influences. Nerdcore had clear influences from geek culture as well, including geek rockers like They Might Be Giants, parodists like "Weird Al" Yankovic (who released a rap called "It's All About The Pentiums" in 1999 and White & Nerdy in 2006), and others.

In 1998 the 2 Skinnee J's released the album $upermercado, featuring the song "Riot Nrrrd", which, though it predated the term "nerdcore hip hop" by two years, may nevertheless be claimed as the first true nerdcore song to achieve wide release. The title is a pun on the "riot grrrl" underground punk movement, and may have come from Douglas Coupland's influential 1995 novel Microserfs. "Riot Nrrrd" appeared on the soundtrack to the movie Never Been Kissed a year later. However, it was only in the 21st century that nerdcore really came into its own, led by Frontalot. The new genre was popular within the nerd community from the outset. New artists began springing up and gaining prominence, though only a few garnered any real following.

By 2005, the new subgenre of geeksta rap (named for gangsta rap) had definitively emerged, largely independently of more traditional nerdcore. The difference was in both lyrics and attitude; the geeksta artists (mostly computer scientists) focused on proclaiming their prowess with computers and other technical abilities. This braggadoccio led to the first nerdcore feud, between MC Plus+ and Monzy.

Although it is worthy of note that some consider the names of the genres to be confused; as the term "nerd" is usually assigned to those more technically minded, often obsessed with science or technology and often a lack of social skills. Whereas the term "geek" is more often attributed to people with a strong love of science fiction, comics, video games and things of that nature. Therefore the artists often considered in the "nerdcore" genre are more accurately geeks than those in the "geeksta rap" genre. As a side note, the term "dork" is a combination of the two, "dorks" usually share the same interests as geeks but tend to have less social skills.

Nerdcore artist MC Lars achieved some mainstream success with "Download This Song" in 2006, especially in Australia. The single received sustained radio play and the video was regularly featured on pay-television channels. It spent eight weeks on the ARIA charts, peaking at #29.

[edit] Notable nerdcore artists

There is no canonical definition of nerdcore - nor, arguably, of hip hop. The most general definition of a nerdcore artist would be "a rapper who is also a nerd". However, not everyone accepts this. Some limit the genre to artists who openly proclaim themselves as "nerdcore", which automatically precludes any artists who stopped recording before Frontalot coined the term in 2000. Others consider bands to be nerdcore if they are called nerdcore by other nerdcore artists. Many automatically exclude artists who have been released on a major label and/or had some level of commercial success, while others consider this irrelevant. Further, "notability" is somewhat hard to define in a nerdcore context, due to two facts: almost all nerdcore is self-produced and self-distributed, and the genre has not broken into the non-nerdy mainstream. Any list is therefore inherently incomplete and subjective. That said, any list of major players (past and present) in the nerdcore scene would include most if not all of the following:

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Nerdcore hip hop

There are many lesser known nerdcore artists; see the external links, below.

[edit] Related artists and songs

Although the works of the following notable artists are not generally considered nerdcore, and the artists may not consider themselves to be a part of the nerd culture, they do feature themes typical of the genre: