One of the unique things about Interlochen Public Radio is that the people who work here are often full of surprises. Take, for example, Classical IPR host Amanda Sewell.
Amanda is a musicologist and has studied plenty of traditional classical music from the likes of Bach, Beethoven and Mozart. But, she’s also published academic studies on hip-hop. During her music studies, she discovered a hip-hop niche called "nerdcore."
So, what is nerdcore hip-hop?
“Take everything you know about mainstream hip-hop in terms of the artists and the subjects and throw it out the window,” Amanda explains. “The artists are white and male and generally middle class. Most of them are college educated, a number of them have graduate degrees, and they rap about the subjects that are familiar to them.”
Definitely not Compton-related topics, but rather things like computers, video games and Star Wars, for example.
Amanda says she identified with these different nerdcore hip-hop artists because they were talking about subjects that they know and loved — even if those weren’t necessarily the “coolest” kinds of topics.
“That was something that just really spoke to me,” Amanda says. “As far as this idea, ‘What do I know? What do I love?’ And just really turning that into what I do.”
As far as expecting to hear any nerdcore on your favorite hip-hop radio station — don’t hold your breath.
“What makes it remarkable is that it exists kind of on the fringe of mainstream culture,” she says. “These are not artists or songs that are going to be selling millions of copies anytime soon because they speak to a very specialized kind of audience.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8Z0VynTR84
Tracks featured in this episode:
"Penny Arcade Theme" by MC Frontalot
"Fett's Vette" by mc chris
"Flow Like Poe" by MC Lars