Hip hop skit

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A hip hop skit is a form of sketch comedy that appears on a hip hop album, and is usually written and performed by the artists themselves. Skits can appear on albums as individual tracks, or at the beginning or end of a song. Some skits are part of concept albums and contribute to an album's concept. Its roots can be traced back to the blackface performers of minstrel shows or vaudeville (Emmett Miller's The Minstrel Man from Georgia has some excellent examples). Skits also occasionally appear on albums of other genres.

The first hip-hop skit appeared as the first track on De La Soul's 3 Feet High and Rising (1989), produced by hip hop producer Prince Paul, and featured De La Soul as contestants on a game show; the same year saw Ice-T record the skit "Black n Decker" on The Iceberg.

The hip hop skit has since established itself as a hip-hop tradition and have been performed by artists such as G-Unit, 50 Cent, Lloyd Banks, Tony Yayo, Dr. Dre, The Notorious BIG, Snoop Dogg, The Game, Kanye West, Jay-Z, Eminem, The Wu-Tang Clan, Black Eyed Peas, 2Pac, Slick Rick, Warren G, Nas, Outkast, Goodie Mob, Master P, Ludacris, R. Kelly, Xzibit, A Tribe Called Quest, Pharcyde, D12 The Coup, Gang Starr, Public Enemy, Tenacious D, Dilated Peoples, Digable Planets, Ice Cube, Geto Boys, M.I.A., Eazy-E, Jin, and Sway Dasafo among others.

Some skits by certain artists have the same theme throughout. For example, Eminem regularly has conversations with his manager Paul Rosenberg.

Some common themes are: racism, telephone conversations or voicemail messages, performing sexual acts or the sexuality of the artists, performing criminal acts, being harassed, harassing others, living in the ghetto, intoxication, ridicule of other artists and ridicule of the performing artists. Another popular motif features young children, frequently the "seed", or offspring, of the artist, inappropriately using adult language and/or introducing the next track on the album. It is becoming more popular for skits to feature cameo appearances of other hip hop artists and comedians.

Not all skits are comedy, a skit in the album D12 World contains deceased rapper Bugz dissing an unknown individual