Jump to content

Chopped and screwed

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 192.88.124.202 (talk) at 15:20, 17 November 2005 (rv vandalism). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Screwed & Chopped is a term that refers to a certain technique of remixing hip-hop music by slowing the tempo and applying various DJ techniques such as skipping beats, record scratching, stop-time, and sending portions of the music through stand-alone effects to make a "chopped-up" version of the original song. Though currently "Chopped and Screwed" is mostly widely used, "Screw" or "Screwed and Chopped" was the original term applied to the music.

DJ Screw, a South Houston DJ, is credited with the creation and early experimentation of the genre. DJ Screw started making "screw-tapes" in the early ninties, after spending a year perfecting the mixing technique. Originally, this process involved two copies of the same record, slowed down either on the turntables themselves using pitch shift or with an after-mixer device. Phasing and echo effects were originally the result of the two records being played at millisecond intervals, i.e. very close to the exact same time.

The genre was heavily associated with the use of "syrup", the abuse of over-the-counter cough syrups containing codeine and has been credited as an explanation for the genre's psychadelic style. DJ Screw went on to make countless mixes (purported to be in the thousands) that usually had a theme and often provided a significant outlet for MCs in the South-Houston area, such as Lil' Flip, E.S.G, UGK, Lil' Keke and Z-Ro. Early tapes were often Screwed and Chopped versions of instrumentals over which rappers would freestyle (e.g. DJ Screw's "Who Next Wid Da Plex", Lil' Flip's "Freestyle Kings"), later tapes were mostly vocal tracks with occasional toasting or freestyle intermissions. By the end of the 90's, rivalry had developed between North and South Side DJ "Clicks". By the time of Screw's death in 2000, the genre had become widely used throughout the South.

Mississippi rapper David Banner released a Screwed and Chopped Version of his "Mississippi: The Album" in 2003, which would mark one of the first successful efforts by a major recording label to exploit the success of the genre. Other Southern recording artists had had similar success beforehand, such as Eightball and MJG, The Geto Boys,Three 6 Mafia and Chicago's Do or Die.

Currently, the style is exemplified in the music of North-Side Swishahouse DJs such as O.G. Ron C and Micheal "5000" Watts. Arguably maintaining a stranglehold on the remixing platform, their work helped establish current rappers Paul Wall, Slim Thug, Mike Jones and clics, Chamillionaries-- Paul Wall and Chamillionaire. Their mixes saw an expansion of the usual roster of artists that are Screwed and Chopped, as more major recording labels embraced the genre that often sold more units than the usual version of a rapper's albums. It is rumored that Swishahouse originally labelled their tapes Chopped and Screwed to differentiate their mixes from South-Side crews that operated out of DJ Screw's style or tutorledge.

Success in 2005 established Paul Wall as somewhat of a public face for the commercialization of S&C. It also popularized a production technique that moves away from turntables to the use of software programs such as Sony's ACID. Paul Wall was invited onto the digital cable channel MTV Jams during the summer of 2005 to host a block of Screwed & Chopped music videos and to talk about the remix technique that he uses.

During the spring and summer of 2005, several popular urban music videos were released in a Screwed & Chopped remix form in addition to their original. These include:

The genre has occasionally lended itself to music other than hip-hop; Paul Wall remixed The Transplants album Haunted Cities in 2005, a punk group featuring Blink 182 drummer Travis Barker.

Quotes

"Hip-hop records are literally slowed down to a molasses-like pace, and beats and lyrics ooze lazily out of the speakers. The result is a heavy, drowsy groove that, over the last 14 years, has exerted a major influence on Southern hip-hop culture." -Joseph Patel, MTV.com


Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Chopped_and_screwed&oldid=28596815"