Here’s an interesting article that was written for RBMA by Phillip Mlynar on his take when he researches the 90s hip-hop style that was considered as Boom Bap (READ HERE). He ends up finding out that the search for its origin is far more deeper than he originally thought. From rightfully noting that Pete Rock & DJ Premier championed the boom bap sound, Phillip continues to search and finds out that it goes as far as 1984 — when legend T-La Rock gave the sound its name. KRS-One even chimes in on the technical aspect of the term…

KRS-One, who released an album called Return Of The Boom-Bap, breaks down the template in wordier terms: “The ‘boom’ is the kick drum and the ‘bap’ is the snare. Boom bap is a style of music where the drums are highly emphasized, even exaggerated and distorted. However, this style of music isn’t just about distorted drums – there’s an aggressive marching, driving, dramatic rhythm to the production itself.” He adds that boom bap stays loyal to hip hop’s original make-up because it nods to the days when DJs and emcees had little in the way of recording equipment and were forced to make music from other artists’ sonic scraps. “The vibe of boom bap is to use the least amount of instruments to create the most amount of rhythmic sound,” he says.

T-La Rock speaks on how the labels would cut out the ‘boom-bap’ adlib at the end of the song….

Both KRS-One and Diamond D cited (T-La Rock’s) “It’s Yours” as the first time they heard the phrase ever used. Asked if he might be the inventor of the phrase, T La Rock is resolute. “Definitely. Who was doing it before then?” He adds that the only other person he recalled saying the phrase was The Amazing Bombay, a member of his previous group The Undefeated Four. “I also used it when I was recording other songs,” T La Rock continues, “but in those days they would always cut the songs shorter and edit out the ad libs towards the end of the song, which was when I would say boom bap quite often.”