- Yo, it's Iman.
(upbeat music)
This is Hip Hop.
- This is Hip Hop.
- This is Hop Hop Defined.
- Whap wha wha whap whap.
(hip hop music)
- How do I embody hip hop culture as a comedian?
Run the tape.
♪ Everything all right ♪
♪ Uh-Huh ♪ ♪ Move all in the half come on ♪
♪ Let's go ♪
♪ Everybody show ♪
♪ Come on, come on ♪
♪ Too short ♪
♪ I can't think of nothing ♪
♪ But I ain't no lame ♪
♪ Tell that (beep) in spanks ♪
♪ Stop wearin' those fake ass chains ♪
(Laughs)
- I embody hip hop culture as a rapper because
I'm a lyricist.
The ladies who paved the way for me such as
Missy Elliot, Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, Rah Digga,
Rap City, Nicki Minaj, I can go on and on
we're all about word play and being word smiths
but at the same time story telling.
So I think that' show I embody hip hop culture.
- I embody hip hop culture because I am hip hop.
So I'm hip hop first.
Hip hop actually taught me how to be a comedian.
I started b-boying, MCing, a little bit of graffiti,
even DJ'd a little bit.
We start everything from freestyle,
if I'm in the break dancing circle or the beatboxing circle,
I'm not choreographing nothing.
I'm just going off what the beat tells me.
Same with MCing.
When I hear the beat, I go off the head.
That's how I learned how to improv.
Which was, oh, this is the stuff I used to do in the circle
and on the mic.
All right, so that's how I learned to be a comedian.
Through hip hop, so I am hip hop.
I embody that shit.
- I just feel like there's nothing to it but to do it.
I'ma own it.
I don't have to tell nobody to respect me.
I'm gonna demand it.
And if you don't wanna give it to me I'mma take it.
Period, like I just did.
- I come from an era that's new enough to understand
what's going on today but also I did enough research
to understand what brought us here.
So I think like, I bring the best of both worlds.
- I'm 17, so like in the day and age of hip hop now
it's really melodic bars and metaphors
and not really as valued as it used to be.
And I feel like I'm the one who brings that back.
I'm the one who's able to bridge that gap,
I'm able to relate to my peers but do it in a way
that's still fly and still fresh for adults to listen to.
- I think I embody hip hop culture 'cause I'm nobody
but myself.
I feel like everything I do is super vulnerable and real
and I'm just telling my story and trying to help people
out who might've had a similar one.
- How do I embody hip hop culture as a comedian?
My whole style is hop hop.
My whole deliver is raw, unapologetic,
it's truthful, brash, in your face, I'm vibing to the beat.
I got my own style, cadence, flow, ideas,
I'm creating.
It's just hip hop lives through me comedically.
And to throw the punch line of the joke throughout the set.
The best rappers have the best what?
Punch lines, this is Hip Hop, baby.
- I feel like it's a new era.
I try to do my own thing and just be kinda organic
with people.
- Most of the things that's talked about in hip hop
from the very beginning, I've lived through that.
- I embody hip hop culture by respecting
what came before me.
Respecting, studying and finding a way to create
new sounds, new cadences, new flows, new waves
that people could hop on.
As artists, it's all our duty to keep inspiring
the next man, while also still knowing your shit
when it comes to people that came before you,
hits that came before you.
I know you had a sale on that hoodie.
My thing that I add to it is just tryna you know
always give you something fresh.
Always give you a new cadence, a new vibe,
a new bop.
Just constantly doing that while remaining a student.
That's a rap.
- It's a rap (laughs)
(hip hop music)