Hip Hop is a cultural movement which formed during the late 1960s among the African American youths residing in the South Bronx in New York City. The influence of the culture had rapidly spread out from the origin in various forms such as music, dancing pattern, way of talking.
Hip Hop culture reached Asia continent mostly around the late of 1980s by coming to China and Taiwan first, then Japan and other countries afterward. These are examples of the influence from Hip Hop culture.
Music - Music was the form that was the most popular in Hip Hop culture for Asians, The Hip Hop music scene mostly debuted in 80s or 90s. In the early 80s a rap song from Harlem Yu, a Taiwanese artist, which was parallel to the New York 80s rap songs, was the first rap song in Taiwan. The Hong Kong hip hop scene debuted in 1991 from Softhard, then evolutionized in 1999 with the formation of LMF which was the first rap/rock group signed by a major record label, Warner Music. Japan hip hop music scene was relatively weak compared to other countries but in Seoul, the Korean hip hop scene has expanded into a form of cultural phenomenon. Notable performers include Jo PD, Drunken Tiger, and Epik High. Many rap artists have been successful in the mainstream of Korean music. These include performers such as Jinusean, 1TYM, Tempo (T.O.P), Supreme Team, PSY, MC Sniper,Jo PD, Jay Park and Epik High.
Drunken Tiger, Hip Hop performer in Seoul
Dancing - In the early, Japan Hip Hop music wasn’t a hit for the country but graffiti and breakdancing sparked the first true rise of Japanese Hip Hop in 1983. In the mid 1980s, hip-hop was introduced into China through Break Dance (1984) and other American movies, attracted a large number of local young people and brought the first wave. Nowadays, In the streets of Chinese cities, we can often see teenagers wearing a loose T-shirt and saggy pants jumping, turning around, swinging and dancing with various hip hop styles accompanied by the fast-paced rap music.
Break Dance crew from China
In Thailand, Hip Hop was introduced around 1992 from an artist called J-Jetrin and Touch-Thunder. The songs from them are not fully hip hop style but just a mixing between hip hop and pop-dance. Hip Hop songs became widespread four years later by an artist called Joey-Boy which he created an album full of rap songs and Thai youngsters adopted this new sound really well. Since that, Hip Hop culture has become parts of Thai culture, we can see a graffiti everywhere in the city and people do some breakdancing or singing in a rap style. Thai youngsters who favorite in hip hop tends to wear a cloth which is bigger than the size of their bodies with a cap on their head and a chain on their necks.
Graffiti in Thailand