DJ Cool Waters

The Influence of Hip Hop

This video really hit me hard, from the age of 12 until 27 I had what can only be described as an unhealthy obsession with rap music, and it was without a doubt the single biggest (and worse) influence on my life.

I can still remember; the very first time I heard “Gangsta-rap” one of the kids at school had brought in a Snoop Doggy Dogg Cassette which he took off his older brother.  I had never been exposed to anything like it before.  

Being so young I found it exhilarating, from the language and the sex talk to the skit on the album with the kids telling the teacher what they want to be when they grew up. 

After that day my life was changed forever, the sports posters were replaced with posters of Snoop, Dre, Tupac, Ice T, and I even had the infamous Ice-cube “Kill at Will” poster with him holding out a gun.   

It breaks my heart now writing this as the memories come flooding back, I stopped playing soccer (which I was extremely good at) and started smoking because I saw rappers do it and heard them talk about it.

I replaced soccer with basketball because I saw that as “a lot more Hip Hop”, I still love basketball to this day and I’m quite good at it, however I’m nowhere near the level I would’ve been at soccer had I continued playing.

I had no respect for any sort of authority including my parents, teachers and the Police.  I started acting, dressing, walking and talking differently, and perhaps the saddest thing of all, I never understood women & saw them mostly as sex objects, not only because of how the male rappers would rap about them but also because of how the female artists I listened to would expose themselves and also rap about seemingly with pride what they also did sexually to men, because of that and rap music’s close relationship with the porn industry I made the awful assumption that women were just as into casual sex as most men, of course a small number are but I thought the majority of women were that way.

It wasn’t just the music that influenced me in a negative way too, I was equally obsessed with heavily Hip Hop influenced movies like Menace 2 Society, Boyz N the Hood and Above The Rim, being impressionable I had a hard time separating the characters in the movies, to the rappers playing them.

Obviously as I got older and the internet really hit big my knowledge of the music expanded and I was exposed to even worse things on records, but it wasn’t just the underground rappers that did that, when Eminem first came out he took the game to a whole different level with some of the tracks he made and then you had Bone Thugs N Harmony, whom I loved, talking about Ouija boards and all sorts of things I believed to be normal and harmless at the time.   

What I failed to understand was that these rappers where just characters, the majority of them didn’t actually do what they claimed and it was just entertainment. I took what they said as gospel and saw it as a lifestyle. Ignorance isn’t innocence though and although I think these guys should hold themselves more accountable for what they do and understand they are heroes to many children, I too shouldn’t have taken so long to come to this realization.  

I even started rapping with some local guys, some of which were extremely gifted, (I wasn’t) I rapped/bragged about things I didn’t do, and had numerous disrespectful lines towards females because that’s what I had grown up hearing, I am so embarrassed looking back on it now, I would say out of the terrible raps I wrote, 80 plus percent of the content would’ve been about sex.  

One positive that came out of my love for Hip Hop was that I started DJ’ing at 15 and unlike my rapping; I wasn’t bad at it at all;

But still I am so ashamed and embarrassed looking back on my past and I think what upsets me the most is that when I was 19 I became a father (out of wed-lock) I still continued to act with this fake persona.

Although I always loved my son and thought I was a good father because I never knew any different, I look back and realize that I wasn’t.

I wouldn’t think anything of having SPM or DJ Screw tapes banging out the speakers of my car whilst he was riding with me, so he was exposed to it really from the day he was born.

The last secular rap albums I bought were in late 2008, (by Lil Wayne and a TI) I still enjoyed them and was impressed by there skill-set but I think God was calling me to grow up.

In early 2009 I knew I wanted to change and started having lots of questions about Christianity, I found an old friend, a guy I met through basketball who was an evangelist and he starting telling me about the gospel, I went to hear him speak a few times at his church and even joined a church in my own town.

I then searched on the net for Christian rap, I didn’t even know it existed and assumed if it did then it would be corny and geeky, how wrong I was.  

I soon discovered there was a whole rap scene full of talented, normal guys, it was so exciting for me to hear people like Lecrae, Sean Slaughter, Sauce Remix and Braille for the first time, and so refreshing to hear something positive coming out of my speakers.

I then got in touch with Preach Dat Fire who challenged me to get rid of all my secular rap, in return he would send me all of his music. I gave away every single one of my 100s of CDs, threw away all my cassettes, deleted all my gigs worth of music off my computer and all my vinyl is now in my attic collecting dust and With the music he sent me a Christian DJ was born.

I am now in love with Hip Hop again but in a much healthier form, my son (who turns 10 in May) loves it too, there is no shame in us banging and rapping along to the sounds of KJ-52 and Jin when we are in my car.

I know that I am an extreme case and there are many people who listen to Rap music and can take it for what it is (entertainment) without it having any negative affect on their life at all but I am sure there are also lots of children and young adults out there now who it is affecting in a negative way. 

What Tre9 & Scott Free are doing in this video is so inspiring, I pray they save many kids with their mission & wonder how different my life would have been had I got that message when I was a kid.

As God continues to change my own heart, my lifestyle continues to improve, I still have my struggles, mostly anxieties from my past but I know that Jesus loves me and I love him.  His love has given me a whole new outlook on life, I got married in November last year and I think for the first time since I was 12, I can honestly say now that I am no longer selfish. I also have no desires whatsoever to listen to or watch the wrong things.

Justin Bieber is a believer

Courtside HD view of Linsanity hitting the game winner Vs. Raptors