Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
If you use an @yahoo.com email or any related Yahoo services, they have blocked us also due to "user complaints"
-UE
Super Lazuli rants about rap music
So, I'm not sure how many people here listen to hip-hop at all. I don't know how many of you are going to care about this thread in the slightest, but I have some things I want to say, and this is simply the best place to say them.
There's gonna be two parts to this post, perceptions people have about hip-hop that bug me, and things hip-hop artists and fans do that bug me.
PART 1: PRECONCIEVED NOTIONS
*Hip-Hop Isn't Music!: This one is probably one of my biggest how-can-you-actually-think-this things ever. Simply because it's easily proven wrong. There is no general consensus on the definition of music, but as far as various things that get called music go, hip-hop is pretty tame compared to say, noise music or avant-garde sound collages. I think one of the weirdest arguments I hear on occaison is that hip-hop isn't music because you can't harmonize while rapping. This is bullshit for two reasons 1) "has the ability to harmonize" is not any commonly accepted definition of music, 2) you totally fucking can, and when you say this, you are revealing that you don't know the first thing about rap music. Just off the top of my head, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony used to harmonize all the time, and that's just one artist. A rather well-known one at that.
*Anything with rapping is hip-hop: This is, simply put, false. Flo Rida, Pitbull, etc. are not hip-hop artists. They are rappers, but what they are making is dance music. Similarly, instrumental hip-hop is a thing that exists. Examples: DJ Shadow, DJ Krush, J Dilla's solo work.
*All rap is about "gangsta" themes or how rich the artist is: This is, again, just plain wrong. Hip-Hop, like any other genre, has a variety of lyrical themes an artist can sing about. Now, it is true that a lot of mainstream hip hop is "glam rap", which is a sort of popped-up form of gangsta rap. But a lot of it is also stoner rap (pretty much exactly what it sounds like, a good example is Mac Miller, and another is A$AP Rocky). And there are artists rapping about everything from sunshine and rainbows to things that wouldn't sound out of place on your stereotypical metal album, to extremely abstract lyrics like those of most artists on the anticon. label, which are difficult to describe.
*The first rap song was Sugar Hill Gang's "Rapper's Delight": This is one borne more of simple ignorance, but it's again false. Just like there's a lot of dispute about who made the first rock song, there is just as much, if not more dispute about who made the first rap song (popular candidates include "Personality Jock" by The Fatback Band & King Tim III and "Here Comes the Judge" by Pigmeat Markham. Smartasses will also say "Rapture" by Blondie, but if anyone ever says this to you, you are legally allowed to punch them, true fact.), but the simple fact is that rap as a genre existed long before it was ever recorded. Even "Rapper's Delight"'s lyrics are mostly lifted from the rhyme book of one Grandmaster Caz (a well-known party MC, and legend in the genre to this day).
PART 2: ARTISTS & FANS
*Misogyny and Homophobia, Fucking Everywhere: This is probably my biggest problem with rap as a genre. Even groups that don't ''mean'' anything by it constantly use misogynistic and homophobic language, and it's just stupid and unnecessary. I'm somewhat less bothered by gratuitous cursing, but it's also a problem. The latter seems to finally be lifting a bit now that Frank Ocean's come out of the closet, but time will tell if that has any lasting impact.
*Success = Talent: Moreso than any other genre, hip-hop is driven by the idea that being mainstream and getting lots of money is good. There's also the backlash to this, which says that being mainstream is inherently bad. Both are wrong, you're never going to convince me Soulja Boy is a good rapper, but you're also never going to convince me that Esoteric's a good rapper.
*Blind Nostalgia: This has been a problem in rap music basically since there's been such a thing as rap music, but for some reason, rappers really, really like talking about "the old days" a lot, and usually in a positive context. Lately this has gotten even more ridiculous, as several recent mixtapes have been titled after years gone by, and a number of rappers (mostly the unfathomably bad Joey Bad@$$, and yes that's how he spells it) have been somewhat successful solely based on the fact that they "sound 90s".
*Disses as publicity: I don't know who started this (there are a lot of likely candidates), but for some reason it's become very fashionable to just diss everyone and hope enough people don't like the people you're dissing that you can get successful off of it. This also contributed to the aforementioned Joey Bada$$'s success, and other examples are Hopsin and SwizZz.
*Rap Fans vs. Metal Fans and/or Rap Fans vs. Country Fans: I don't know why this is a thing, but it's stupid. Stop it. |:|
that's pretty much all I can think of at the moment. Sorry if it seems ranty or not very coherent, but I'm rather tired.
Comments
I liked this scenario better when it was punk vs. metal, because then it made a kind of sense.
No it didn't. Especially not since the early rap scene mixed with the early punk scene quite a lot.
I mean seriously, Afrika Bambaataa and John from the Sex Pistols did a song together at one point. Plus you had things like the Ramones trying (and failing) to rap. If anything, that makes even less sense.
It's a moot point anyway because music rivalries are dumb.
See now I just want a rap version of Dueling Banjos fighting against a metal version of Dueling Banjos.
Someone has probably sampled Dueling Banjos.
It actually did. That didn't mean it wasn't dumb, but I can see how that rivalry would begin. As classic rock began to wind down, the question emerged of where it was going to go, and both metal and punk scenes wanted to stake their claim. Each scene had the idea that it represented more purely an evolution of that mutually-cherished style of music, with the punk scene arguing that complete balls-to-the-wall rawness was the point while the metal scene argued in favour of stronger and more diverse technical application of instruments.
Metal won that one on a default from punk, given that punk met with more disaster. Not that metal fared well during the 80s all up, mind, but what happened to metal then was a series of mistakes rather than a core denial of its premise. So it's no wonder punk adapted into hardcore and then met metal halfway via thrash metal, ending the whole debate by the time the 80s were over.
The conflict between punk and metal was good because it essentially has a happy ending. We got new genres that represented the core appeal of both sides, often at once, and those genres have gone on to become stronger with time. The same can't be said of this conflict, which doesn't have any musical or otherwise coherent basis, and where crossover efforts in the past have almost always been awful.
And yes, the Sex Pistols were a marketing ploy from the start and a cornerstone of early punk, ect. ect. But I suppose that's music's entry into post-modernism for you, and is kind of prophetic concerning what indie rock has become these days. We can sift through layers of irony or we can just accept the idea that punk was always a clusterfuck by design.
I'm not sure what any of that really has to do with any of the rap/whatever rivalries making sense?
Also, I'm well aware of how the Sex Pistols worked. Malcom McLaren is a pretty infamous figure on both sides, though he does have somewhat more defenders in the rap arena.
Also I just want to point out that "punk rap" is a thing. Or at least it's a term that's used with some frequency, mostly to refer to Death Grips.
It doesn't have much to do with the rap/hip-hop vs. metal rivalry, but I'm talking about how the punk vs. metal rivalry made sense in context of what was happening to rock music as a whole at the time. The punk vs. metal rivalry is by and large dead for good reason -- neither genre exists in the state they used to and the two have largely converged.
The rap/hip-hop vs. metal rivalry is several degrees less sensible and I would presume it's based on masculinity rather than musical expression. You know, the question of who has the more "hardcore" or "raw" genre, which has no objective outcome but is based on subjective interpretation of the subject matter.
OK, then why did you say it?
Not trying to be a douche, that's a genuine question. I'm not objected to talking about rock music, but this isn't really the thread for that. You also might be making a connection I'm just missing, that's also totally possible.
On that note do we have a general music thread? Cuz we should have one if we don't.
I posted:
You posted:
I posted:
And so on. Sorry I didn't quote in my post, but it was a direct follow-on from your post.
I made a music dump thread, but I suppose we could convert it to a general music thread. I mean, I would still just dump music, myself, since I don't have much common ground with anyone except Formaldehyde, but if people want to talk about music, sure.
Alex: That makes more sense, yes. Sorry, I have trouble following conversation lines sometimes, even ones I'm involved in.
Thing is that music dump threads aren't really too conductive to any kind of discussion at all. Usually it's just people going "MAN THIS TRACK IS SICK AS FUCK I BET EVERYONE WILL LOVE IT" posting it, and then no one saying anything, and then another person thinks the same thing, repeat ad infinitum. They're not necessarily bad threads but they're kind of content-bare. I think a music discussion thread would only have embeds or links when they're relevant to what's being talked about.
IDK if that's a distinction only I make though.
In that case, you can make a music thread.
oh shut up and get into mumu fuckasses
>mumu
>with a bunch of metalheads
no sir, I will not submit myself to such tortures. :B
All cool kids use plug.dj anyway.
(too obvious?)
Just a bit.
The most rap i've probably ever listened to is Odd Future, and I like them just because they're fucking ridiculous.
reason #345 why macklemore is my favorite
(edit: i am absolutely not in the mood to mess with that link until it becomes an embed)
I'll be honest, I don't really fuck with Macklemore, but that's a really nice song.
I honestly hadn't ever thought of the distinction between rapping and rap/hip-hop music. That was enlightening. As was learning of the existence of instrumental hip-hop.
That said, there are commonalities between stereotypical current party music and hip-hop, beyond just rapping, so the distinction isn't always perfect.
Considering that I tend to prefer instrumental music, maybe I should go check that out.
It's usually not quite instrumental (although very atmospheric), but if you haven't you should probably give a listen to some trip-hop artists: Massive Attack, Portishead, Tricky etc.
there's a lot of instrumental trip-hop artists. I mentioned DJs Shadow and Krush in the OP, but there's also DJ Vadim, Wagon Christ, and Kruder & Dorfmeister, just off the top of my head.
I can't figure out how to embed videos, but I wanted to hear your thoughts on this one hip hop song I heard.
Here's a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GOY6bFLpWQ
Warning: There's lots of animated blood and violence. And some huge cartoon tits.
I'm not particularly impressed, but it is pretty good.