Ever heard of Horrorcore Hip-hop? Nope, it isn’t the latest slasher flick—it’s actually its own subgenre which has in fact been stalking about in the Hip-hop scene for over 30 years. Today just happens to be birthdate—or to appease the horror-esque theme, spawn-date—of one of its biggest co-founders.
Lewayne Williams, better known as Ganksta N-I-P, was born August 28th 1969. Hailing from South Park, Houston, Texas, Williams cofounded the South Park Coalition along with another Houston-native, K-Rino. The Coalition reached nationwide recognition in William’s 1992 debut record South Park Psycho, which he distributed under Rap-a-Lot.
Produced by The Terrorists, Doug King, John Bido, and Williams himself, the album came to be known as a classic collective born out of Hip-hop’s southern brand; Moreover, many fans honor it as perhaps the earliest conceptions of a newer, more ferocious sect of Hip-hop.
In contrast traditional Hip-hop, Horrorcore digressed from its realistic lyrical approach, favoring the incorporation of supernatural elements into its music. And if you thought Hip-hop music was aggressive, the likes of Williams cranked them up to indeedsupernatural levels.
Despite its controversial themes and slasher-flick imagery, Williams’ premier album wrought stunning recognition, seated well among the ranks of the Top R&B/Hip-hop albums chart, scoring 4 out of 5 from Allmusic, and selling well over 100,000 copies in South Park alone.
The newly-introduced style continued receiving astonishing applause as Williams released his second studio record Psychic Thoughts, which ranked the charts at #30 and #5 on the Top Heatseekers listings.
The well-acclaimed god of Horrorcore, however, took a big leap of faith in 2015 when he donned the new title “Brother NIP”. Nationwide homicides moved the Islamic rapper (NIP stands for Nation of Islam is Powerful, by the way), into organized movements against senseless violence, with Brother NIP taking to street music as a means of reaching out.
Earlier this year, Williams (under the new title) released his latest work Street Messiah, which, according to Williams, features a man notoriously regarded as gruesomely explicit somehow manages to produce an entire album free from profanity and cursing. That’s breathtakingly-astonishing considering the hostile factors that led to its release.
Williams surfaces as one among quite a few faces who took the already considerably-dark lyrics and attitude of Hip-hop into a darker, more supernatural stage. Despite his enigmatic persona and dark concepts, one simply cannot dismiss the fact that Williams presents true artistry into the world of both Hip-hop and the real world.
By Jods Arboleda for RAPstation.com
