ABSTRACT
Rappers have to negotiate multiple struggles on an everyday basis to live an authentic life. The changing cultural, social and economic climate of London along with shifts in music-making practices mean that the 'rules' are not clear anymore and uncertainty abounds in the hip-hop community This chapter is structured according to key tensions that constitute the struggles rappers are negotiating in everyday life to keep it real, based on a critical realist understanding of authenticity as dialectic and emergent. These struggles are characterized as follows: innovation versus rules, black versus white, working-class versus middle-class, rapper versus self, underground versus mainstream, young versus old and faker versus real. It can be based on 'hip-hop authenticity' versus 'rapper authenticity' where rappers experience a sense of struggle in wanting to continue hip-hop's legacy as based on its history and origins, yet also incorporate their individual tastes, aspirations and making it their own.
