...:::::...::Real Hip-Hop:::...::.... 2015

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CrowleyHead

Well-known member
Should I go through the entirety of the tape and just confirm? Lets.

Yeah he uses auto-tune maybe twice, there's bad notes all over the place.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
Pretty sure you've got him mixed up with t-pain. No need to get defensive though. We all make mistakes
 
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CrowleyHead

Well-known member
Its not unfair though, because its autotune influenced singing. They're mimicking the sound of rappers just finding their voice by just SINGING in autotune. T-Pain if anything, tries to actually SAAAANG, which is ultimately uninteresting to me.

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Here's an example, Kwony (the 2nd guy) is obviously straight autotune abuse. But K Camp's singing is influenced by the way auto-tune is very subtly used on him, and as a result, it affects his tone when he isn't singing with autotune.

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This is true for Thug, Quan, a lot of the Atlanta people. As I've said here before, I think a subliminal influence might be dancehall, as a lot of the kids who've been doing this in Atlanta come from a West Indian background.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
That's quite a subtle argument and although I can just about see where you're coming
From I think for me describing young thug as an autotune artist is just wrongheaded and unfair. It's not a part.of the aesthetic in any meaningful way and neglects all the stylistic choices and tics which make him interesting.

It's the way he interacts with the beat which is important not the (imagined) textural/timbral quality of autotune

It's timing. It's the suppleness of the line. It's the hanging back and then sprinting to catch up. It's the variations in tone, pitch and volume, it's the (precise to the point of prissiness)
placing of syllables, the open unfixed cadence, the micro hooks littered across every song- lines so rhymically satisfying that they act as stand alone hooks (eg this that, rich shit, I eat fish and grits in dream from barter 6 or, from the blanguage, I'm chilling at the studio these bitchs wanna fuck on the banana boat)

It's the swooning abandoned-to-bliss tone he can reach, gurgling bliss which is unique in rap as far as I know (pelican flys oh gawd oh gawd oh gawd is an example for you)
 
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luka

luka

Well-known member
It's not just unhelpful it's actively misleading. It's
complacent lazy listening
Dislike him by all means but at least object to things which are actually there in the music
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
Plus ad libs, melody , use of negative space blah blah nlah
 
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mistersloane

heavy heavy monster sound
The "oh god oh god oh god" one is real jouissance, see also (for me) "l.e.a.n.i.n.g. lean lean lean lean LEAN LEAN LEAN!!!" which just has me every time.

I really like Keef's Almighty DP. The hour long Faneto video is fab too at points. I look forward to the day that kinda stuff is played in pubs, in the background like cricket.
 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
luka said:
From I think for me describing young thug as an autotune artist is just wrongheaded and unfair. It's not a part.of the aesthetic in any meaningful way and neglects all the stylistic choices and tics which make him interesting.

It's the way he interacts with the beat which is important not the (imagined) textural/timbral quality of autotune...
Click to expand...

Great post! YOU should be the rap critic for the wire, really.
 
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rubberdingyrapids

Well-known member
ok so wire mag style analysis (and my own wrong autotune accusations) aside, 1017 actually sounds better than i remembered it (i must have just been reacting to all the hype when i first got it - when i heard it today, i thought pretty much every song was brilliant, i didnt realise how much of it i remembered - i rank it up there with back from the dead 2). but sorry, barter 6 just sounds subdued and kinda torpid in comparison. feels like hes either just taking it easy (or lazy), or saving it for the album proper. the beats being mostly non-distinct doesnt really help either. or maybe its kind of a reaction to everyone who likes him for being 'weird'. only heard it once i admit, but barter 6, by his standards at least, is pretty 'straight' sounding. if someone told me to check out young thug and barter 6 was the first thing i heard, i wouldnt really be too excited. *shrug*
 
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rubberdingyrapids

Well-known member
dunno if anyone here reads about rap in places that arent the wire/pitchfork/quietus (or wherever), etc, or ever did, but i found this comment on noz's tumblr interesting -

225grams asked: Why do you say hip-hop journalism is over? It's a bit discouraging to hear that as hip-hop is the reason I'm getting into music journalism in the first place

There’s no infrastructure for it. All of the old guard hip hop institutions have become tabloids or aggregation zombies. And yes you can go write about hip hop music at a fashion magazine or an “indie rock” website or maybe the culture vertical of a multinational corporation that also sells dishwashers and tiny confederate flag lapel pins. You can make $45 a week accumulating content there and theoretically do some good work before you burn out or the building burns down but you aren’t going to be a hip hop journalist exactly. At best you’ll be a tour guide. Your job will be to explain hip hop to readers whose interest in the subject runs no deeper than their desire to add a tab for Significant Rap Talking Points to their Cultural Investment Portfolio. Because of this the core hip hop audience will forever approach your work with a hint of skepticism (rightfully so). And every time you file an article you will have to cross your fingers and hope the sloppily reported wow aren’t rappers with guns cool video documentary that your bosses’ bosses just got a few young black men sent to jail behind doesn’t pop up as a related link.

Imo hip hop journalism is about being a voice and responsible advocate for the primary consumers and producers of hip hop music. It’s about contextualizing the culture for people who are of the culture or at least seriously invested in the culture. It means telling stories about entire communities and sometimes even about humans who aren’t famous recording artists/being groomed to become famous recording artists. As far as I can tell none of the publications that still have an audience and a budget for covering rap music are especially concerned with any of that.

4:30 am • 31 May 2015 • 302 notes
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luka

luka

Well-known member
As a teenager I read the hip hop press
The source, rap pages, HHC etc not so much now
Read the blogs when they were popping
Rnt, noz, etc, still check tumblin erb a bit, a few twitter feeds
 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
That's interesting. I don't actually know if he writes for The Wire anymore. As he says, it is weird writing about rap for people who presumably aren't that into it. (Not to mention I'm completely outside of it as a culture, despite my efforts when writing about it.)

The best music writing IMO tends to be investigative and to feature prominently the voice of its creators and consumers, rather than just being the considered opinion of one journalist. I think that latter type can be interesting and sometimes even accurate but things certainly seem unbalanced in favour of the laptop loner these days.

Barter 6 seemed disappointing to me but I haven't given it much of a go and I like a lot of the leaks so I should revisit.
 
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rubberdingyrapids

Well-known member
i did flick through xxl and the source last week in smiths though - not sure why they even still print it, theyre literally about half the size they used to be. more like a pamphlet. but theres something different about reading them as mags and also how they address the reader, its easier to navigate for newbies (they also dont get caught up in trying to sound all worthy like some of the rap reviews on pitchfork can do, even when its keef or young thug, or ESP when its one of those two). a lot of website reviews still seem to get too caught up in the online hive mind/hype which i find annoying (eg barter 6). though maybe thats just more to do with impressionable critics than anything else. i suppose complex is more addressing the actual rap fan these days? still xxl and the source too. hip hop dx i find a bit boring to read.
 
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CrowleyHead

Well-known member
Yeah, Noz appeared on the Stay Hatin' podcast relatively late last year discussing a lot of these issues prior, he picked a heck of a time to raise these issues and then decide he's going to hurry away and start a record store if you ask me, but hey.

I don't have a lot to say about rap journalism b/c I don't want to be a journalist per se and while its bad its been bad for so long I can't say it affects me other than I have higher demands of writers to just write. I mean, yeah, everyone wants financial reward in order to do their job, the woes of capitalism, etc. etc. But it isn't hard to find an audience for ideas.
 
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mistersloane

heavy heavy monster sound
I come back to Barter6 most, which is quite alot at the moment. Some of the Bleaks2 are nice as well on that woozy tip. The first three Barter6 tracks are mind-blowing. I like the fact that the keyboard refrains in With That and Can't Tell (2nd and 3rd tracks) are in the same key and are made up of variations on the same riff, so that by the end of Can't Tell (in a certain state) , you can't tell whether you have been listening to the song before it or to that one, or if it's just been the same song going on for 10 minutes, or if it's repeated the second tune again, you Can't Tell! And it's called Can't Tell. I thought that was deep.
 
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