Dominated by a handful of powerful labels and radio owners,

corporate rap was also defined by a shrinking cadre of celebrity pro-
ducers—Timbaland, The Neptunes, P. Diddy—whose main charge
was to keep the nation’s pop and urban radio airwaves bouncing. Rap
was no diƒerent from the other genres it competed against for mar-
ket share and status in the corporate-controlled milieu of broadcast
radio. The genre’s elite players focused on gaining access to commer-
cial radio and music video, the two essential gateways to America’s
pop consciousness.

All of this explained why the hip-hop movement’s most voluble

voice—rap music—had surrendered much of its ambition and orig-
inality for music that cared more about servicing rather than sub-
verting the status quo. It explained why Public Enemy had become
essentially obsolete and disposable and, like so many others longing
for fresh voices and perspectives in hip hop, sought refuge in the dig-
ital underground.

. . .

Public Enemy’s flair for political drama and socially conscious rap
took place mainly among the bright lights and hype of pop culture.
That fact alone established both obstacles and opportunities for its
message of protest. When the pop culture stage shifted its appetite
away from the group’s hyper-political stage show, Public Enemy
found itself looking for new ways to keep hip hop’s social conscious-
ness alive and well.

Hip hop’s digital underground—websites and webzines, chat

rooms, Internet-based radio programs and music labels, and digitally
enabled activism—fought to reinvigorate hip hop’s legacy of social
and political struggle. The digital underground was a resilient rejec-
tion of the media consolidation and conglomeration that dominated
the nation’s media airwaves and severely restricted hip hop’s creative
spirit.

Hip hop’s digital underground embodies a growing cascade of

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