Jay was on a different level with it. Big was still talking about robbing people so you knew he was never more than a nickel and dime hustler. Jay on the other hand presented himself as a kingpin right away. I thought it was a gimmick at first due to the Mafioso thing being cool at the time. But his second album he proved that's who he really was
And if u look closely BP2 didn’t sell 3 million in one month. That place is not particularly the most reliable placeIt went 3x platinum 2 years later if you look closely
Well wasn't just him but a lot of people start jumping on that bandwagon.
I remember Nas even talking crazy about Tribe Called Quest because it was a street Nigggas. They where setting a bad precedence.
Notice you started seeing the cat blows, tribe called quest's, they lostCalled quest's, de la souls fade from the scene around the late 90s early 2000s.
notice you started seeing more lackluster east coast rappers that was being put on by they boys like Memphis Bleek.
Simple fact that nikka Memphis Bleek thought he could even stand next to Nas.
of losing 92 bricks. Why are people so adamant of protecting Jay-Z's alleged image as a former drug lord as if it's something to be proud of? 
Why does that make him "real"? If selling crack to pregnant mothers and and shooting at people you went to elementary school with makes you "real" call me fake as fukk because I grew up in the inner city in Cali in the early 90's and that shyt is nothing to fukking glorify. 
Bobby Shmurda reminded us of that. If you're selling dope in the hood, chances are you're not going to become a multimillionaire Rap mogul. 
In some ways, Jay-Z is the ultimate industry plant of the last 20 years. I remember in 1997 to 1998 prior to Hard Knock Life and seeing Reasonable Doubt and In My Lifetime Vol. I sitting on the shelf collecting dust in Best Buy and nobody knew who he was while every new weekly No Limit release was in the front of the store on the best sellers shelf.
Didn't read past page one, but your not describing jigga breh, ice t was before him with the whole "I'm a Hustler not a rapper" gimmic
That perception is likely due to generation differences.
Nobody in 1986 is thinking of Run-DMC as broke. They were considered as big and as wealthy as any super
successful rock or pop group.
was on top
I’m not saying Wayne killed hip hop, I’m saying he’s partially responsible for the influx of druggie rappers with all sorts of dumbass tattoos.It's not that Jay was the first to talk about hustling.
He was the first credible one to act like he didn't care about rapping as much as he cared about "business".
If he wasn't a credible dude from New York, it never would've worked.
Ice-T was from California and wasn't held to the standards that a Brooklyn MC was.
"Gangsta Rap" was a novelty back when Ice-T was coming out. It was almost like a gimmick that most people thought wouldn't ever sell or be popular.
Jay came on the heels of Biggie & Nas' success. Those guys were seen as the best in Hip-Hop and Jay is supposed to be follow them.
To be fair, crack era Hip-Hop from (1986-1996) is the best era of Hip-Hop
The difference is when dudes started abandoning the artform of Hip-Hop for the art of "hustle"
That's completely false.
Yeah, we knew Run-DMC wasn't broke, but we knew they weren't selling as many records as Guns N Roses and The Rolling Stones were.
Rap music was seen as not even real music back then, much less something that could make guys as rich as Paul McCartney & Sting are.
Run & them were seen as just a little bit richer than everybody else in the hood.
We used to think rappers actually lived in the hood and a lot of them did because they didn't make that much money.
Nobody envisioned Eric B & Rakim hanging out with Bill Gates and vacationing in The Hamptons or something.
We pictured them doing the same shyt as us, but on a little bit higher level.
Hip-Hop was fukked WAYYYYYYY before Wayne
Wayne didn't reach his peak until like 2008 or something. Hell, Nas made Hip-Hop is dead in 2006. Anybody who actually loved Hip-Hop had been complaining about it since the late '90s
