HOW CANNABIS CULTURE EVOLVED THROUGH HIP-HOP

Cannabis plays an essential role in hip-hop unapologetic culture, the influence of hip hop culture on pop culture cannot be easily understated. Rappers and marijuana have always been inseparable from the beginning of time. Various slang terms for weed include greenery, Chronic, herb, ganja, and nowadays ZaZa for exotic weed. Back then, attitudes concerning the usage of marijuana or cannabis were very covert. These days, this is the hottest topic, making headlines that flatter the oversaturated hip-hop stars to enter or launch their own brands and strains in the marijuana industry.

In 1988 The “Greenhouse Effect,” which is thought to be a factor in global warming, caused fear because it was the hottest year ever officially recorded in human history. Hip-hop was simultaneously starting to fuel a different type of green movement. There were a number of seminal, ground-breaking albums released during that historically scorching spring and summer, including but not limited to Run DMC’s “Tougher Than Leather”, EPMD’s “Strictly Business”, Public Enemy’s “It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back”, Eric B. & Rakim’s “Follow the Leader”, Salt-n Pepa’s “A Salt With a Deadly Pepa”, 2 Live Crew’s “Move Somethin”, NWA’s “Straight Out Compton” and Eazy-E’s “Easy Does It”. While 1980s rap had no trouble discussing alcohol, especially malt liquor, any mention of narcotics was vehemently opposed to its ideology, as demonstrated by songs like Melle Mel’s “White Lines (Don’t Do It)” from 1983. In this way, what N.W.A achieved was revolutionary because they embraced and exposed everything that was true to their environment, acting as “the TV news for the hood,” rather than just concentrating on wordplay.

This brings us to 1991, when a West Coast gangsta rap trio altered hip-hop by adorning their debut Album with a skull decorated with a marijuana leaf. While Dr. Dre’s The Chronic, released a year or more later, sold more copies, Cypress Hill’s self-titled debut nonetheless made the term “blunted” popular thanks to its open references to smoking and criminality set to a collage of rock, funk, soul, Latin rhythms, and reggae samples.