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Our new podcast about rhyme and punishment in America. Dale Edwin Murray for NPR Rhyme and punishmen
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Our new podcast about rhyme and punishment in America.
Dale Edwin Murray for NPR
Rhyme and punishment go hand in hand in America. [Louder Than A Riot]( a new podcast from NPR, traces the interconnected rise of hip-hop and mass incarceration in America through the stories of artists like Bobby Shmurda, Nipsey Hussle, Killer Mike and Isis Tha Saviour. Over the course of this season, the podcast will take you beyond the headlines to break down stories of rap, race, infamy and injustice with the artists caught up in it all.
Hosted by [Rodney Carmichael]( NPR Music’s hip-hop writer, and [Sidney Madden]( a reporter and editor for NPR Music, Louder Than A Riot is focused on power: the people in places of power in the music industry and the prison industrial complex, and the way structural racism and interpersonal dynamics have led to imbalances of power in the rap world. We spoke to Carmichael and Madden to get a preview of the series, which premieres today. The first two episodes are available now, and you can [subscribe on Apple Podcasts]( for new episodes weekly.
Q&A With Louder Than A Riot
NPR Music: What was the impetus behind this investigative project?
Sidney Madden: This show came from our love of hip-hop and the knowledge that this music has the ability to pinpoint sociological issues long before others call it out. The arrests of high-profile rappers and the cultural consequences of their downfall don’t happen as isolated incidents or exist in a vacuum, so by exploring some of these cases historically, we’re showing how hip-hop has always been a microcosm for Black America’s relationship with crime and punishment.
Rodney Carmichael: My favorite rappers were schooling me on the inherent injustice of America’s criminal justice system way before I was exposed to it anywhere else. But we also wanted to look at how the art form reflects not only reality but also market demand as it becomes an industry commodity. We wanted to question how that influences the genre and even artistic agency.
This summer has seen a new wave of the Black Lives Matter movement and increased conversation about policing and incarceration. But your podcast traces a history that begins much earlier. Why is it so important to understand that history right now?
Carmichael: We start in the early 1980s because that’s when both institutions begin to take off on this parallel course — the growth of rap as a recorded genre begins and the rate of mass incarceration starts to skyrocket in conjunction with Reagan’s War on Drugs. We could’ve started much earlier, in terms of prejudicial policing and the disproportionate impact of mass incarceration on Black people in this country. But the intersection between the two is so key to understanding where we are now, with hip-hop as the most-consumed genre and America having the world’s highest incarceration rate.
Let’s talk about some of the key figures you talked to for the show. Whose perspectives did you think were crucial to telling this story?
Madden: We really tried to pass the mic to the artists and people who live these stories as much as possible. We traveled to upstate New York to talk to Bobby Shmurda, who's currently serving a seven-year sentence. Editor Chiquita Paschal shadowed Isis Tha Saviour all across her hometown of Philly, where the artist has been speaking out against inhumane prison conditions — something she knows about from experience — through her music and grassroots activism. We went to Louisiana to explore the history of police corruption and racial profiling in the case of No Limit Records’ Mac Phipps.
Carmichael: The thing we’ve pushed for the most is that the culture should speak for itself. We didn’t want these to be stories told from an outsider perspective or from an angle or gaze that centered any culture other than hip-hop. And that’s a challenge when the systems confronting these artists are the same systems we tend to defer to in journalism. So, while we do talk to prosecutors and police, it was about making sure we interrogate the systems of power they represent, the same way they’ve historically interrogated the artists and the communities at the center of our stories.
What was the biggest surprise or revelation you had while working on the show?
Madden: There’s been a lot of revelations along the way both about individual rappers’ cases we cover and about how the topic can be connected to other facets of inequality: housing, healthcare, education and more. Even if you consider yourself a dedicated hip-hop head or a true crime buff, you’ve never heard anything like this before.
What’s one key takeaway you hope listeners walk away understanding?
Carmichael: I hope listeners walk away understanding that all rap is political because, whether it’s overtly “conscious” music or not, it’s all commentary on the conditions faced by America’s outcasted class — whether you’re Black or brown, poor or ignored.
Madden: I hope they learn that hip-hop’s entanglement with the criminal justice system is more insidious than some might want to admit, and hip-hop’s artistic rebellion against the criminal justice system is more powerful than some could have ever imagined.
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