ATLANTA — As the country is celebrating 50 years of hip-hop, some Atlantans are tracing how Atlanta has made its mark in the hip-hop scene.
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So yes, Outkast member Andre 3000 was right when he said during the 1995 Source Awards, “The South got something to say.” Filmmakers in Atlanta are making sure the South is heard.
Filmmakers at Atlanta Journal-Constitution Ryon Horne, his brother Tyson Horne, and AJC writers Ernie Suggs, and Deasia Paige want the world to know what role the South, specifically Atlanta, plays in the popular genre hip-hop in their film “The South Got Something to Say”.
“At the start of hip hop in 1973, we also found our first African American mayor and those things were all brewing at the same time...hip hop (and) the hip hop culture,” Visual Journalist, Ryon Horne said. “The stuff that Mayor Jackson was doing, making it into the international city, the Olympics, all these things are happening at the same time. We just felt it was really important to kind of tell this story.”
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The four mayors who served after Jackson all have something to say in the documentary, along with Atlanta’s own Jermaine Dupri, Killer Mike and the members of Goodie Mob along with other local hip-hop royalty.
“If you look at this film, we’re telling the story of Atlanta. We’re telling the story about Maynard Jackson, the Red Dogs, the story about the Atlanta child murders and the events of 2020 (and) about the Olympics,” journalist Ernie Suggs said. “We’re telling all that story. But at the same time, this amazing form of art that has been created was created in 1973.”
Editor-in-chief Leroy Chapman told Channel 2′s Karyn Greer that the decision to document 50 years of hip hop in Atlanta on film was an evolution for one of the south’s oldest newspapers.
“Our future is not only the printed page...our future is digital, and we have to meet people where they are. People have a high expectation,” Chapman said. “We have to meet those high expectations, whether it be our reporting that does wind up in a printed newspaper or on our website and a podcast, or even in a film.”
The documentary will be available for streaming here for a limited time beginning Nov. 3.
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