The 2012 BET Hip-Hop Awards air tomorrow night at 8:00pm ET. The show was taped about a week and a half ago, and as some of you may have heard, multiple physical altercations between various rappers and their crews took place at the event. While HHSR will refrain from reporting on that nonsense (if you can’t tell by now, we try to keep things positive on this site), we will focus on the music.
It seems as though the overall quality of most award shows has been on the decline in recent years, and the BET Hip-Hop Awards is no different. You can expect 5 or 6 performances ranging, from decent to mediocre, and BET will sporadically pass out three or so awards over the course of two hours. But the main reason people tune into this particular show is to see the cyphers.
Cyphers are the truest expression of the art. Freestyling, especially when done off the dome, is what separates hip-hop from every other genre of music. The creativity, humor and competition collectively embody what the culture was founded on, and still stands for today. This year’s crop of lyricists looks promising, and includes a balanced amount youngsters in the game (A$AP Rocky, Kendrick Lamar, Joey Bada$$, Childish Gambino, ScHoolboy Q, Iggy Azalea etc.) and living lyrical legends (T.I., RZA, Talib Kweli, DMX, Snoop, Kurupt, E-40 etc.), so we’ll definitely be tuning in to see who rips the mic and who disappoints.
In the meantime, here’s a look back at two of our favorite cyphers. Last year’s Shady 2.0 cypher (featuring Eminem, Yelawolf & Slaughterhouse) was lyrically exceptional and should definitely serves as an appetizer for tomorrow night. But the cypher featuring Ice Cube, Rev Run and their sons was also very dope as it showed hip-hop’s growth and highlighted the father/son relationship. Plus, Cube demolished his verse, in typical Cube fashion.