Westside
Subtitle: young men and hip hop in L.A.
By: William Shaw.
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2000
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 332
Subjects: African American young men -- California -- Los Angeles -- Social life and customs.; African American young men -- California -- Los Angeles -- Biography.; African American young men -- California -- Los Angeles -- Social conditions.; Hip-hop -- California -- Los Angeles.; Rap (Music) -- California -- Los Angeles.; Music trade -- California -- Los Angeles.; Los Angeles (Calif.) -- Social life and customs.; Los Angeles (Calif.) -- Social conditions.
Genres: Biography.
Description: "From author and journalist William Shaw comes this probing exploration of the dreams and the realities of seven young African-American men struggling to make it in Southcentral Los Angeles, the world capital of gangsta rap and West Coast hip hop."

"In the late eighties, hip hop was revolutionized by the hard new sound that exploded from Los Angeles. The exhilarating and shocking new music described a place where guns, sex, and life are cheap and disposable and where the struggle for success, stability, and respect is hard fought. The seven young subjects of this chronicle have all grown up in a neighbrohood riddled with violence where the notion of manhood seems constantly under threat - and all of them dream of transforming this urban experience into the platinum success enjoyed by their heroes, rappers such as Tupac Shakur, Snoop Dogg, and Dr. Dre.

The sometimes troubled products of a ruthless environment, they look to hip hop as their only viable form of expression, as their key to survival, and as their greatest hope for escape."--Jacket.