Asian Hip Hop
By CNN Correspondent Ann Chu
HONG KONG, China (CNN) -- Hip-hop is quickly becoming the most popular style of music across Asia, even eclipsing today's big rock acts.
While the styles may differ slightly across the world, the moneymaking potential is exactly the same.
At a packed nightclub in central Hong Kong, Au-Yeung, a.k.a. Jin the MC, exhorts the mostly young crowd to "Make some noise if you love hip hop!"
The 21-year-old is the first Asian rap artist to sign with a major U.S. record label and Jin knows he's benefiting from the growing popularity of hip-hop in Asia.
"I rap about what I encounter and what I go through," he says.
"And if some part of that happens to be about being Asian, then yeah, that's what it is."
The ability of hip-hop to serve as an outlet outside of mainstream culture is exactly what is attracting young Asian listeners.
"It's more in tune with what's going on with youth in terms of angst and animosity, curiosity, rebelliousness and everything else," says Jin.
"It conveys what we want to say as teenagers right?"
And that angst and animosity is translating into dollar signs for major record labels worldwide. Universal Music believes hip-hop has become the hottest selling music genre globally.
The label says hip-hop currently corners about twenty-five percent of the American market and it's now looking to Asia to further boost sales already valued at around a hundred million dollars annually. The label says it's putting its money into urban hip-hop acts in Taiwan
"It's very street, it's very urban, it's almost the antithesis to ballads and love songs so in that sense I think it's definitely the voice of the generation," says Universal's Harry Hui.
But hip-hop in Asia is taking a softer approach to a music genre often criticized for glorifying gang violence and drugs.
Jin insists his music is less about violence and more about issues young people deal with in everyday life.
"In reality I couldn't relate to those guys," he says.
"They did what they did with their lives and I hear it through their music but I couldn't relate to it. I was working at my Mom's Chinese restaurant!"
So parents worried about explicit rap lyrics can rest assured, more often the baggy jeans and thumping beats are just another sign of Asian kids working through their growing pains.
