I watched 'Life of Rhyme' and I got fed up with the constant 'this is the new poetry' schtick, which Akala kept coming back to in his links and which was the main drive of most of the interviews. I presume Channel 4 wouldn't commission a straight documentary about the history of the British MC, or that it wanted to avoid the grimier (clever wording I know, cheers) end of things, but I rapidly grew weary of the constant belabouring blows of "this is poetry". (The English lesson where Devlin was compared to some 19th century verse was particularly cringy.)
The fact that every ad break was bumpered by a 16 bar acapella performance was further grist to this mill (look! They're rapping without beats! They're
poets!), and yeah, some were ok, but then you got a brief snatch of Wooo Riddim as well, and I couldn't help thinking: why didn't they get them to do their bars over Wooo instead? (Like this:
http://thegrimereport.blogspot.com/2010/05/free-download-s-x-wooo-mixtape.html) There are very few MCs I'd want to hear perform acapella at any great length, part of the skill of the MC (and the differentiator from the poet) is fitting the rhymes to the beat, surely? Conveniently ignoring the relationship between the MC and the music for the sake of the 'poetry' narrative seemed a bit aberrant, really.
That said, there were a few good interviewees, and like Muser, I enjoyed the more theoretical parts (about 'flow', particularly), but this seemed a strange thing to choose as the central strand of the programme.
(Also, I watched 'How Hip-Hop Changed The World', and it was diverting in the way that any list show is, but it was tailored very much to the non-initiate. I guess Channel 4 have to aim for the widest possible audience, but I would have preferred fewer 'LOL MC Hammer'/George Bush says "Yo Blair" bits.)