'80s hip hop

Style markers
- Displaced 8th-note endings

Style marker

Displaced 8th-note endings

It was common in the '80s (and late '70s, and very early '90s) to end a rap line with this rhythmic figure on the third beat of a measure:

Notation in which the third beat articulates three of its four sixteenth notes, omitting the third.

It fell out of favor by the mid-'90s.

Basketball (1980)

Kurtis Blow

1

&

2

&

3

&

4

&

bas

ket

ball

I'm

Mist

er

Kurt

is

Blow

My Adidas (1986)

Run-D.M.C.

Microphone Fiend (1988)

Eric B. & Rakim

1

&

2

&

3

&

4

&

I

grab

the

mic

and

try

to

say

yes

y'all

References in later music

The Pharcyde

The Pharcyde's 1992 song Return of the B-Boy, which opens with the lyric "yo, is '87 in the house," uses this rhythm to imitate the sound of the '80s.

Return of the B-Boy (1992)

The Pharcyde