Tsengian hip-hop

Tsengian hip-hop is a subgenre of Tsengian music. It originated between the late-1980s and early-1990s in the cities of Taihua and Tseng City. Taihua rapper DJ Zhongguo is often considered to be the first rapper to achieve mainstream popularity in the country. Since the 2010s, hip-hop has become one of the most popular music genres in Tseng.

History
Tseng is one of the most Western-influenced countries of Asia. American hip-hop-related movies such as ' (1983) and ' (1984) enjoyed great popularity among the Tsengian youth. American hip-hop artists of the time such as and  scored hits on local music charts, toured Tseng and made appearances on television shows such as TBS-1's Disco Show, TV0's The Friday Night Show and Tseng 4's The Big Concert. Some early artists such as,  and  also saw success in Tseng, particularly among club crowds. As early as 1986, clubs playing solely hip-hop music began to pop up in Guang District in Tseng City. In 1988, pop singer Li Meng experimented with hip-hop in his song "April 2".

Despite this, rap remained rather underground and marginalized, as rap was seen as a "delinquent and immoral" activity, done by gangsters and people with low socioeconomical status and education.

In 1995, DJ Zhongguo released the track "Confucius", which became a great hit and launched hip-hop to the mainstream. Selling 200,000 copies, it kickstarted hip-hop's influence in Tsengian music, and inspired many artists to go into rapping. For instance, pop boy band Downtown completely switched genres and became the first hip hop group to achieve significant commercial success, with their 1996 album Mark Our Words selling 50,000 copies. Xiangyuanchuan native Luo the Expert had a major hit with the 1998 track "The Monsters". Huanzhou native Monsieur J was the first to experiment rapping in Tsengian French and langue tsengienne, with his 1998 song "Origami" selling 20,000 copies.

By the turn of the century, hip hop became more and more commercially viable for record labels.