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Bling bling is clearly a trend and is prevalent in the 'hip hop ' culture that has been sweeping the world from inner city ghettos to suburban America to the cities of Japan and Europe. Bling bling is essentially a term used for excessive jewlery that 'blings' or sparkles and is shiny. Many rap and hip hop superstars spend up to millions of dollars for a single piece of bling from chains and pendants to mouth grilles and earrings. Bling can also be used to describe customizations to cars such as shiny chrome 'shoes' (car rims). Like jewlery anything that is an accessory can be 'blinged out' including cell phones appearing with diamonds on them and handbags lined in diamonds.

The trend is already starting to see a slight decline as many staple hip hop artists pass age 30 and begin to put their money into better investments. Some rappers have expressly talked about their fading interest in bling including rappers such as Xzhibit, Nas, Dr. Dre, and others. While many young rappers such as 50 cent and Bow Wow continue to rap about how much bling they have and how many cars they own, older rappers are either tackling more serious issues or continuing to craft their unique rhymes that seperate them from the bling bragging rappers. As many hip hop fans age with their idols the presence of bling will most likely see a decrease. As rapper Nas proclaimed: "Hip Hop is Dead." and he is right. More and more we see music in other genres finally pushing hip hop from its decade long reign of the charts and surviving rappers either doing what makes them standout or rapping about things other then bling, women, money and cars.

However bling bling is beginning to be noticeable in other areas of entertainment including oddly enough the BMX world and skating world. Some think this move is a joking attempt to claim some of hip hop's excesses as their own but due to the bling bling shifting to other areas and genres it may change but it won't vanish completely.

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