One could argue that there is less "conscious rap" today than in the past.
The counterargument would be that some pretty popular rappers -- Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole, Logic, Vince Staples, etc -- can be pretty conscious.
Nevertheless, if we accept the theory that Hip Hop has less consciousness (or at least less pure consciousness) these days, Hell Rell thinks he knows why. [Jump to 35 minutes]
“We always had the Kid ‘N Plays, the Will Smiths, the Poor Righteous Teachers, the positive shit. I think labels targeted that element because it was raising the frequency in the community. They got rid of that whole genre. Who’s the new Common Sense, Talib Kweli or Mos Def? You got a few of ’em that’s trying to get in, but their genre has just been totally wiped the f*ck out. We always worked with that genre; we never looked down on the backpackers and the positive n8ggas. We collab’d with them. JAY-Z did songs with them. That genre kinda got wiped out ’cause I think they knew that shit was making n*ggas become more conscious.”
Agree?