 The task for next big thing emcees was Hiplife; the emcees who are so accustomed to hip hop had to go for lessons from no other person the Grandpapa of hip hop and hip life Reggie Rockstone.
Reggie Rockstone released his first debut album Maka Maka in 1998, a fusion of rap and highlife and later became known as Hiplife. Reggie said hip hop is of black origin so the emcees should own hip hop and not be intimidated by that fact most people see it as foreign.
He said one of the challenges he faced when he came out with his hip life album was acceptance and understanding. Ghanaians had gotten used to the highlife rhythm so adapting to the new form of music was very difficult but with time they warmed up to it and now is the fastest growing music in GH.
Reggie said although hip hop is still not well accepted in GH it has a great future so the upcoming emcees should be ready to take hip hop to the next level and continue the good work D-Black, EL, Kwaku Tee and other hip hop artiste are currently doing to put GH hip hop on the world map.
“Hip hop is my religion and if I had known the hip life would one day become this big, I would have registered it in my name so I get the royalties”. Notwithstanding this, Reggie is proud to see that the hip life movement he started years ago has paid and said bigger things are yet to come.
For the next big thing emcees hip life task on Sunday, Reggie told them that converting from hip hop to hip life especially when they are singing about love will be a bit of a challenge since they are used to the hardcore rap. However their songs should have good punch lines, good rhyming, interesting messages and most of all good delivery.
His final words to the emcees was to listen to everything Okyeame Kwame tells them because Okyeame learnt from him Reggie and is time the emcees also learnt from Okyeame Kwame.
On the night of the hip life task performance, most emcees listened to Reggie’s advice and produced songs with good punch lines, rhyming, interesting messages and good delivery. Some emcees forgot their lyrics on stage whiles others forgot to wear the love mood but on the
whole, it was a good night and judges were moved by the songs the emcees produced.
The competition said goodbye to Nate-Pro as he was the weakest link on the night of Gospel, hence he got low votes and eventually had to be evicted. .
Viewers are advised to keep voting for their favorite emcee by texting their names to short code 1758. One can also log on the facebook page www.facebook.com/NextBIGThingGH page or the website for more information and leave shout outs to their favorite emcee which will be read during the live shows. |
