BET is shutting down Rap City, the onetime cornerstone of its lineup, and we can’t help but be a little bit nostalgic. In the age of YouTube, pining for the heyday of music-video shows is almost like reminiscing about the sturdy feel of the typewriter, but some of us remember coming home from school and letting our impressionable minds be molded by sometimes questionable footage: André 3000 popping his shoulder pads in the “Rosa Parks” video, the 504 Boyz making it “Wobble, Wobble.” The Times points out that the show had been around since 1989, when it was introduced as a competitor for Yo! MTV Raps, but we more or less just remember Tha Basement years with Big Tigger, especially the dude’s terrible freestyles in the booth. They’re replacing it with a show about the music industry called The Deal, which is maybe indicative of the state of hip-hop — people are more interested in seeing what happens behind the scenes than in taking in what that industry is actually producing.
