If, as the Wu-Tang clan once observed, Cash Rules Everything Around Me, what does the hip-hop fraternity do when the credit crunch puts high-end bling out of reach? Like the rest of us, it seems, they economise. According to one celebrity jewellery-maker, rap artists and those who idolise them are now asking for cheaper rings and medallions studded with fewer precious stones.
"A lot of these rappers simply don't have the money for real stuff any more," Jason Arasheben told the Wall Street Journal. "It's to the point where they are wearing imitation jewellery, and that's ridiculous." One of the first indications of the economic downturn's effect on the world of turntables and mics came this year when an auction house postponed its sale of $3m worth of "Hip Hop's Crown Jewels". Since then, falling concert revenues and the growth of internet piracy have cut into hip-hop's profits.
During a recent radio interview, one of the genre's most successful artists, 50 Cent, suggested that his fellow rapper Rick Ross had taken to wearing jewellery that wasn't all it seemed. "Everything that you see has to absolutely be fake," said 50 Cent, aka Curtis James Jackson III.
Ross, who is also known as William Leonard Roberts II, has denied the claims. Others have noticed a decline in quality.
"People think these big pieces are blindin' but they be like D-quality diamonds, and when you try and sell them you learn they ain't worth a thing," said Slim Williams, who founded Cash Money Records with his brother, Bryan "Birdman" Williams, in 1991. "You can't be doing it like we did it no more."
"Times are hard, ain't nobody rocking it like that anymore," Birdman said.
Johnny Dang, a Houston-based jeweller, said that he was offering more modest pieces. "The look is still big, it is still bling, but people are going with smaller diamonds and lower-karat gold."
