by Crystal Bridges
Growing up as a young preacher’s kid in the late 90’s and early 2000’s, I had no idea that any music for Black people existed beyond the gospel and oldies R&B my parents raised me on. One of my earliest encounters with Hip-Hop culture came when I watched the Sister, Sister episode of Mya and Blackstreet performing “Take Me There.” While the song technically falls into the R&B category, it’s charged with the same uptempo, beat-knocking rhythm that captivated me and so many other Hip-Hop heads at the time. When Netflix became the streaming home of classic Black teen shows like Moesha and Sister, Sister this past September, it reminded me of a time when Black teen shows were deeply intertwined with Hip-Hop. Watching cool, stylish and relatable Black characters embrace a culture specifically for us provided some semblance of self love and pride in my Blackness as a kid. The Hip-Hop theme songs, show scores, musical guest stars and performances and often the storylines themselves set the stage for the consumption of Hip-Hop music with millennials and the world. It was these Black teen shows of the 90’s that celebrated and embraced the culture in a fresh way that has yet to be duplicated.
Many Black teen show theme songs of the 90’s followed the classic Hip-Hop song formula: rapping and drums, a sampled song or baseline, a synthesizer. etc. Kenan and Kel’s intro performed by Coolio is the first to come to mind, with the rapper spitting rhymes about the pair’s schemes while reminding kids to tell their “homeboys and homegirls” to watch the show over a synthesized beat. Although All That didn’t have an all Black cast, the show’s diverse cast and content made TLC’s theme song a perfect fit. The R&B/Hip-Hop group’s use of the catchy phrase “all of that” became an indispensable part of the show’s identity, and a quick shout “oh oh oh” in a room full of people will surely be followed by the harmonization of “this is all that.” And I would be remiss to not mention The Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song, the timeless “story all about how” rapper Will Smith’s eponymous character of the same name’s life changed, just as it did off of the small screen by charting the course for rappers in television sitcoms.
The theme songs weren’t the only pillar of Hip-Hop celebration on television. Moesha and Sister, Sister were both vocal about their characters’ love for Hip-Hop culture, made evident by the guest appearances from musicians-either as themselves or written in as a part of the cast. Appearances by artists like Lil Kim, Master P, Kid of Kid N Play, Bow Wow, Mc Lyte, and more, affirmed Hip-Hop as both a cultural powerhouse and pop culture period. And while many musical acts did indeed perform, they were also often characters with plot points that added to the drama and hilarity that ensued during the show.
After the 90’s the 2000’s saw a decline in Black television shows, as a result of the 2007 writer’s strike, the WB and UPN merger that led to the cancellation of many of our Black primetime favorites, and a general deprioritization of Black-centric sitcom content overall. it seemed that networks looked at Black teen shows and the Hip-Hop culture pulsating through them as a passing fad instead of the rich, resilient and ever-evolving culture they represented. With the inception of the CW network, television programming on the CW and Fox leaned back into shows that catered to mainstream, white audiences. In 2018, Sesali Bowen interviewed Kenan & Kel and Sister, Sister producer and writer Kim Bass, who said:
“Black teens are just like all other teens except how and where they are not. And how and where they are not, oftentimes, has to do more with perception, pride, and placement than any particular penchant for any particular programming.”
According to Bowen, companies are less concerned with delivering Black shows because “they aren't revolutionary or progressive to a generation of young people who have grown up watching these programs in syndication.” She says that Black teen stories being everyone's stories is no longer a new concept, affirming the aforementioned statement that Hip-Hop culture and more broadly Black culture are popular culture. As a result, while more calls can and will be made for more diverse representation in television, “diversity” is no longer predicated on casting when every character, no matter who they are, is given the space to occupy and perform our culture.
One could describe the introduction of shows like Insecure and Atlanta to our screens as a renaissance for Black people on television, and the same could be said of shows aimed at younger audiences such as Grownish and All American, whose incorporation of artists directly from the Hip-Hop culture like Diggy Simmons and Coop’s character rapping alongside a Hip-Hop score, respectively, incorporate the culture into the shows in a way that is somewhat reminiscent of televisions shows of the past. However most examples are far and few between, and the cancellation of The Get Down represents yet. another loss of the representation of Hip-Hop culture through Black characters. Lauren Cramer notes in “A Hip-Hop Joint” that:
Blackness and Hip-Hop exist in a recursive loop: Blackness generates the spatial organization of Hip-Hop and Hip-Hop is so racially charged that it produces blackness. As a result, Hip-Hop images can serve as the site for unexpected encounters with Blackness—specifically, visualizing Blackness in spaces that are not occupied by actual Black bodies.
Therefore, the same Hip-Hop theme songs, show scores, musical guest stars and performances and storylines that once seemed to belong exclusively to Black people can. now present across all races and ethnicities. A quick scroll through your favorite streaming services or television channels will show you non-Black characters rapping and performing parts of Hip-Hop culture. Thus, we might never get a time as golden as the 90’s again. Thankfully, streaming services and video archives allow us to look to those shows and reminisce. And I personally hope that a writer, directors and producer will be inspired to use those Black teen shows to tell more stories that show the evolution of Hip-Hop and its ever present role in Black teen life.