CrowleyHead
Well-known member
Yeah, right up there with self-loathing white dead prez fans, terrible J Dilla reissues, getting yelled at by KRS-One and that Marvel series of the rap comics that have no black artists.
Hip-Hop Culture Wars
- Thread starter luka
- Start date
Yeah, right up there with self-loathing white dead prez fans, terrible J Dilla reissues, getting yelled at by KRS-One and that Marvel series of the rap comics that have no black artists.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
I saw Mos Def live a few years ago. He was awful. As stoned slurring mess. Live instruments have no place in rap IMO. The only good bit was Ms. Fat Booty.
Crowley's posts are informative and funny and I agree with them in many ways but I wonder if your hatred for the smugness of college aimed rap is distorting things a bit. Was Common (who I admittedly do find smug and corny, esp. when addressing women in his raps) really technically shite in the Resurrection days? I loved that album and it felt much less self important than his later stuff.
The Meek vs Drake thing is captivating me at the moment. I've always felt a suspicion of Drake and so there's a certain glee I'm taking in seeing him exposed like this. A lot of the confusion I've experienced towards his music and persona is dispelled by the revelation of him using ghostwriters. In a weird sense it makes some of his music LESS cringeworthy. Its suddenly more like Al Pacino performing the role of a gangster rather than if Al Pacino started claiming he WAS a gangster.
Crowley's posts are informative and funny and I agree with them in many ways but I wonder if your hatred for the smugness of college aimed rap is distorting things a bit. Was Common (who I admittedly do find smug and corny, esp. when addressing women in his raps) really technically shite in the Resurrection days? I loved that album and it felt much less self important than his later stuff.
The Meek vs Drake thing is captivating me at the moment. I've always felt a suspicion of Drake and so there's a certain glee I'm taking in seeing him exposed like this. A lot of the confusion I've experienced towards his music and persona is dispelled by the revelation of him using ghostwriters. In a weird sense it makes some of his music LESS cringeworthy. Its suddenly more like Al Pacino performing the role of a gangster rather than if Al Pacino started claiming he WAS a gangster.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
LOL this is my life as a hip-hop nerd teenager. Made me wonder if the reason "true school" stuff is so big in Europe is that the audiences feel alienated from rap music and so feel like they can be closer to it by being aware of the "true" form it "should" take.
luka
Well-known member
The one thing I think crowley drastically underplays is the existence of a large black audience for all these artists, by no means all of whom are college educated and for whom expressions of black pride, condemnation of violence and criminality etc are in no way corny and are in fact a matter of life and death
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luka
Well-known member
Which is really the sort of thing I wanted to interrogate in this thread.
There was an underappreciation of street rap in 'the discourse' cue a much needed push to redress the balance. That battle has been won. What's the fallout? I would argue that we've become victims of our own rhetoric
There was an underappreciation of street rap in 'the discourse' cue a much needed push to redress the balance. That battle has been won. What's the fallout? I would argue that we've become victims of our own rhetoric
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
Dead @ last Luka post
I find Common has always employed a style where he never commits to a direct flow that rides the beat, instead flashing and displaying a sort of 'spastic' quality; this is the same thing I was complaining about in Kano who in all honestly raps INCREDIBLY CLOSE to Common. Its a lot of affected voice, very post-De La phrasings where you could imagine the voice looking like a heart pulse readout "I-surMIZEtheMAstuhMICconTROLla". I can concede that perhaps when he failed drastically after his first album in which he was rapping joyously about nothing and making a bunch of cartoon squeaks and gimmicky noises (because Common was signed on a huge buzz and if I recall correctly his first album was such a colossal flop critically and sales wise), that Resurrection's bitterness and borderline alcoholism is possibly a very real and compelling element. Then later on it was a lot of headwraps, smugness...
I don't like a lot of that College Rap/Soulquarians vibe, because there was a cynicism underneath some of those people. Q-Tip was bemoaning southern rappers and their behavior because his latter albums with Tribe didn't sell as much as Trick Daddy or whatever, but you really want to be proud of "Vibrant Thing", which is a blatant betrayal of the Native Tongues aesthetic to have club hits?
And the thing is, black pride, artistic takes on identity and everything went in various directions... David Banner and Killer Mike for example. Yet consistently people insisted it had to adhere to rap orthodoxy/conservatism of a certain aesthetic "college rap", "Backpack Rap", "Neo-Soul" and whatever other convenient labels to imply it was an alternative from the trashiness and hedonism of the mainstream.
I always return to that one Roots video where they're making fun of rappers hiring attractive women and buying champagne. Materialism is corny, sure, but if you know WHY displays of financial success (artifically boosted by the labels) are significant to people as a "WE MADE IT", why would you be so cynical to rib them for it? Especially if your albums are doing 1/3rd of them because you're not as commercial.
This actually ties into a big issue I have with the Drake and Meek Mill thing in which raps classism has really gotten bad. Everyone thinks that say "Right, Meek is saying he's a real rapper and Drake isn't" and while that's an argument with validity, that's not what he's talking about. Meek has been talking about how he's a street rapper, one of the few allowed on a pedestal of celebrity status (at least in the rap industry), for about a little over a year now. He's been remarking about how he doesn't concern himself with being compared sales/career wise to your J Cole, Kendrick and Drake's because they speak to a different audience and in certain cases have a different background than him. Drake cannot make a "Traumatized", pure and simple, nor does he have the courage to talk about real issues. Drake complains on songs that teens read phones more than books, or that men are emotional and petty... Those aren't deeper societal issues. Yet inherently Drake is always presumed to have more content than Meek.
So when Meek is criticizing and exposing a Drake, its not just the fact that Drake is fake, etc. A lot of social media is OFC defending Drake and claiming Meek is motivated by jealousy because of Nicki or w/e. Moreover, its the fact that Meek who is a genuine rapper rapper, diligent worker STILL has a glass ceiling on him, whereas Drake is less of a talent than a brand/industry can do whatever he wants and reap tons of rewards.
This is the issue I had years ago with the college rap scene, and what I have now with art trap or Drake or whatever... The double standard that AUDIENCES place on certain artists due to their perceptions of what their music is doing. Because rap is sooooo complex on multiple levels of technique, lyricism, production, presentation, whatever I get that sometimes its easy to get tripped up by visual signifyers like "Oh, so and so wears a lot of wool and talks very educated" and presume they perform a 'higher' art than another, but it isn't necessarily true.
I find Common has always employed a style where he never commits to a direct flow that rides the beat, instead flashing and displaying a sort of 'spastic' quality; this is the same thing I was complaining about in Kano who in all honestly raps INCREDIBLY CLOSE to Common. Its a lot of affected voice, very post-De La phrasings where you could imagine the voice looking like a heart pulse readout "I-surMIZEtheMAstuhMICconTROLla". I can concede that perhaps when he failed drastically after his first album in which he was rapping joyously about nothing and making a bunch of cartoon squeaks and gimmicky noises (because Common was signed on a huge buzz and if I recall correctly his first album was such a colossal flop critically and sales wise), that Resurrection's bitterness and borderline alcoholism is possibly a very real and compelling element. Then later on it was a lot of headwraps, smugness...
I don't like a lot of that College Rap/Soulquarians vibe, because there was a cynicism underneath some of those people. Q-Tip was bemoaning southern rappers and their behavior because his latter albums with Tribe didn't sell as much as Trick Daddy or whatever, but you really want to be proud of "Vibrant Thing", which is a blatant betrayal of the Native Tongues aesthetic to have club hits?
And the thing is, black pride, artistic takes on identity and everything went in various directions... David Banner and Killer Mike for example. Yet consistently people insisted it had to adhere to rap orthodoxy/conservatism of a certain aesthetic "college rap", "Backpack Rap", "Neo-Soul" and whatever other convenient labels to imply it was an alternative from the trashiness and hedonism of the mainstream.
I always return to that one Roots video where they're making fun of rappers hiring attractive women and buying champagne. Materialism is corny, sure, but if you know WHY displays of financial success (artifically boosted by the labels) are significant to people as a "WE MADE IT", why would you be so cynical to rib them for it? Especially if your albums are doing 1/3rd of them because you're not as commercial.
This actually ties into a big issue I have with the Drake and Meek Mill thing in which raps classism has really gotten bad. Everyone thinks that say "Right, Meek is saying he's a real rapper and Drake isn't" and while that's an argument with validity, that's not what he's talking about. Meek has been talking about how he's a street rapper, one of the few allowed on a pedestal of celebrity status (at least in the rap industry), for about a little over a year now. He's been remarking about how he doesn't concern himself with being compared sales/career wise to your J Cole, Kendrick and Drake's because they speak to a different audience and in certain cases have a different background than him. Drake cannot make a "Traumatized", pure and simple, nor does he have the courage to talk about real issues. Drake complains on songs that teens read phones more than books, or that men are emotional and petty... Those aren't deeper societal issues. Yet inherently Drake is always presumed to have more content than Meek.
So when Meek is criticizing and exposing a Drake, its not just the fact that Drake is fake, etc. A lot of social media is OFC defending Drake and claiming Meek is motivated by jealousy because of Nicki or w/e. Moreover, its the fact that Meek who is a genuine rapper rapper, diligent worker STILL has a glass ceiling on him, whereas Drake is less of a talent than a brand/industry can do whatever he wants and reap tons of rewards.
This is the issue I had years ago with the college rap scene, and what I have now with art trap or Drake or whatever... The double standard that AUDIENCES place on certain artists due to their perceptions of what their music is doing. Because rap is sooooo complex on multiple levels of technique, lyricism, production, presentation, whatever I get that sometimes its easy to get tripped up by visual signifyers like "Oh, so and so wears a lot of wool and talks very educated" and presume they perform a 'higher' art than another, but it isn't necessarily true.
rubberdingyrapids
Well-known member
basically in rap the bullies won (though i think a lot of hardcore street rappers at this point would welcome some 'conscious' artists too)
one of biggie's favourite songs at the time apparently
common made one brilliant album, resurrection, everything since i can take or leave, though hes had various good songs in between the iffier stuff that seems dedicated to the brand/niche hes created for himself, but that album is his illmatic, its perfect imo.
maybe cos they think materialism is just a reinforcement of a certain status quo, even if they understand the reasons and justifications for people who have come from poverty flaunting it?
one of biggie's favourite songs at the time apparently
common made one brilliant album, resurrection, everything since i can take or leave, though hes had various good songs in between the iffier stuff that seems dedicated to the brand/niche hes created for himself, but that album is his illmatic, its perfect imo.
maybe cos they think materialism is just a reinforcement of a certain status quo, even if they understand the reasons and justifications for people who have come from poverty flaunting it?
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Corpsey
bandz ahoy
I think Meek's COMMERCIAL glass ceiling is never going to be shattered by him yelling so much, honestly I don't think its purely classism that makes Drake more successful. To me, and I would say to a lot of people, Meek's style is less pleasing/easy to listen to. I see the point you're making (I think) in that Meek has a lot more actual substance in his lyrics than Drake. Drake has practically no depth as an artist, despite having this (self-vaunted) reputation for being uniquely honest/sensitive or whatever. The illusion of "depth" is conferred on him by his production team's aesthetic. I think, again, of Luka's description of Burial as ''lachrymose" and I think this is true of Drake, too. He's drippy and gloomy and so he MUST be deep. (And see how critics rate Burial - who I like, btw - over the UK Garage he was inspired by. It's the old Energy Flash debate over nuum vs gluum... well, not gloom itself tbh but I couldn't resist the shit pun.)
What do you think about the R&B (e.g.) vs. Rap perspective on songwriters? I mean, nobody would give a fuck about this at all if Drake was an RNB artist. I guess the crucial thing here is that Drake is making claims to being an elite rapper on the level of Jay-Z/Nas/Biggie and this completely undermines those claims (if they had any validity in the first place). I actually can get more into Drake's music if I see it ala. an RNB singer cos a big part of why I didn't like him was his risible claims to being a hard-man or whatever when its obvious he's the opposite of that.
Have we spoken about the OTHER cultural war masquerading as personal war this week of Bronson vs Ghostface? I mean, aside from the style biting, there has to be seen to be some sort of racial element to it, right? Bronson, the Noisey-favourite and Ghostface dead ringer, getting dressed down and threatened by a representative of pre-hipster rap?
What do you think about the R&B (e.g.) vs. Rap perspective on songwriters? I mean, nobody would give a fuck about this at all if Drake was an RNB artist. I guess the crucial thing here is that Drake is making claims to being an elite rapper on the level of Jay-Z/Nas/Biggie and this completely undermines those claims (if they had any validity in the first place). I actually can get more into Drake's music if I see it ala. an RNB singer cos a big part of why I didn't like him was his risible claims to being a hard-man or whatever when its obvious he's the opposite of that.
Have we spoken about the OTHER cultural war masquerading as personal war this week of Bronson vs Ghostface? I mean, aside from the style biting, there has to be seen to be some sort of racial element to it, right? Bronson, the Noisey-favourite and Ghostface dead ringer, getting dressed down and threatened by a representative of pre-hipster rap?
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
I dunno about this actually, if you look at how big Kendrick is, Drake is (hard-man posturing notwithstanding, although I suppose that's totally relevant), J Cole is... The really hardcore gangsta artists like Meek and Rick Ross (gangster MUSIC if not a real gangster) and Jeezy have huge street audiences and sell a lot of records too but aren't really on the same level of crossover appeal. And then there are up and coming rappers like Chance the Rapper... Even Earl Sweatshirt is more of a geek than a bully. EDIT: OH and KANYE, of course! Obstreperous and not adverse to misogynistic chest-beating, but fundamentally a nerd/weirdo and proud. I'm perhaps wrong about this but it seems like 50 Cent was the last gangster rapper to be really big, and musically speaking he's seen as pretty irrelevant these days.
Perhaps this is missing your point, though. I think that it tends to be the more violent/gangsta rap that is musically innovative and has raw energy, because as Crowley says the conscious rap crowd seem to have settled for that old jazzy soulquarian vibe (Kendricks latest album e.g.). Why? Maybe because it's made by younger artists, usually from inner cities, and tastefulness is not as powerful an aesthetic engine as intensity.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Lupe Fiasco on I.G.:
The Haunting.
A Letter
Part 1 of 2
To rappers from a rapper...simply write your own rhymes as much as you can if you are able. Ghostwriting, or borrowing lines, or taking suggestions from the room has always been in rap and will always be in rap. It is nothing to go crazy over or be offended about unless you are someone who postures him or herself on the importance of authenticity and tries to portray that quality to your fans or the public at large. Then we might have a problem. Some of the most pivotal moments in rap have been ghostwritten verses. This leads to a bigger point. Rapping is not an easy thing to do. It's takes years of work and trail and error to master some of its finer points. Respect from other MC's comes in many formats. Sales, live performances, realness etc but the one thing that is the most important is the raps themselves at least in the eyes of other serious rappers. The phrase "I'm not a rapper" gets thrown around as if it's a badge of honor. And that's fine. If rap is a side hustle for you or just a come up then by all means may the force be with you. But I know a lot of MC's where rap is the first love and the first thing they think about when they wake up and the last thing they think about when they go to sleep. Rappers who pursue the art form with this level of intention may not become rich and famous off selling their raps to a wide audience but that has never been an accepted metric to begin with in terms of quality or level of skill. The vast majority of rappers will never sell 100 records in their lifetimes let alone millions. But that's not the point, the point is that what pursuing the craft gives us in terms of the intangibles is something that record sales or fame could never represent. We achieve a mastery of language and poetics that competes on the highest levels of discourse across the entirety of human history. We express ourselves creatively and attain a sense of liberation and self-esteem via this sacred mode of creation and communication.
Part 2
Modern Radio and the commercial realm of music has injured rap. It set up ambiguous rules and systems for success that don't take into consideration the quality and skill of the rappers craft. It redefined rap as just a being beat driven hook with some words in between and an entire generation has surrendered to chasing the format instead of chasing the art form. While mastering any format should be the pursuit of any self-respecting rapper including the commercial format it must be kept clear that it is just one of many formats and that you should strive to master all of them. The art form is kept alive and progressive in the activities of the tens of thousands of rappers around the world who are everyday trying to think of that next witty bar. Trying to put that crazy verse together while at work. Trying to find that word that rhymes with catapult so they can finish off that vivid story rap about their childhood. Meek Mill struck a nerve accusing Drake of having a ghostwriter and the entire rap world reacted on all sides of the fence because rap is alive. It's active and it feels. Its rules and traditions are vibrant and responsive. I enjoy both these brothers music and find inspiration and appreciation from both of them. I remember being in Toronto at Goodfoot years ago and it was a stack of CD's on the counter and the guy behind the counter was like "Lupe you gotta take this CD. It's my mans mixtape." I didn't really pay it any mind I took it to the car and looked it over and just kind of set it aside focused on other things. I vividly remember saying "what kind of rap name is Drake?" The rest is history. Once while in Philly I went to do an interview in a shabby and very hood basement studio complex. I peeked into one of the rooms and it was this tall kid with his shirt off bouncing up and down in the booth with an energy that was electric. I gave him my regards. He gave them back. I think I mentioned something about him cutting his dreads. As I left I remember him rapping something about being a boss. The rest is history. At the end of the day, for better or worse, rap is alive even if some of its greatest moments are written by ghosts.
The Haunting.
A Letter
Part 1 of 2
To rappers from a rapper...simply write your own rhymes as much as you can if you are able. Ghostwriting, or borrowing lines, or taking suggestions from the room has always been in rap and will always be in rap. It is nothing to go crazy over or be offended about unless you are someone who postures him or herself on the importance of authenticity and tries to portray that quality to your fans or the public at large. Then we might have a problem. Some of the most pivotal moments in rap have been ghostwritten verses. This leads to a bigger point. Rapping is not an easy thing to do. It's takes years of work and trail and error to master some of its finer points. Respect from other MC's comes in many formats. Sales, live performances, realness etc but the one thing that is the most important is the raps themselves at least in the eyes of other serious rappers. The phrase "I'm not a rapper" gets thrown around as if it's a badge of honor. And that's fine. If rap is a side hustle for you or just a come up then by all means may the force be with you. But I know a lot of MC's where rap is the first love and the first thing they think about when they wake up and the last thing they think about when they go to sleep. Rappers who pursue the art form with this level of intention may not become rich and famous off selling their raps to a wide audience but that has never been an accepted metric to begin with in terms of quality or level of skill. The vast majority of rappers will never sell 100 records in their lifetimes let alone millions. But that's not the point, the point is that what pursuing the craft gives us in terms of the intangibles is something that record sales or fame could never represent. We achieve a mastery of language and poetics that competes on the highest levels of discourse across the entirety of human history. We express ourselves creatively and attain a sense of liberation and self-esteem via this sacred mode of creation and communication.
Part 2
Modern Radio and the commercial realm of music has injured rap. It set up ambiguous rules and systems for success that don't take into consideration the quality and skill of the rappers craft. It redefined rap as just a being beat driven hook with some words in between and an entire generation has surrendered to chasing the format instead of chasing the art form. While mastering any format should be the pursuit of any self-respecting rapper including the commercial format it must be kept clear that it is just one of many formats and that you should strive to master all of them. The art form is kept alive and progressive in the activities of the tens of thousands of rappers around the world who are everyday trying to think of that next witty bar. Trying to put that crazy verse together while at work. Trying to find that word that rhymes with catapult so they can finish off that vivid story rap about their childhood. Meek Mill struck a nerve accusing Drake of having a ghostwriter and the entire rap world reacted on all sides of the fence because rap is alive. It's active and it feels. Its rules and traditions are vibrant and responsive. I enjoy both these brothers music and find inspiration and appreciation from both of them. I remember being in Toronto at Goodfoot years ago and it was a stack of CD's on the counter and the guy behind the counter was like "Lupe you gotta take this CD. It's my mans mixtape." I didn't really pay it any mind I took it to the car and looked it over and just kind of set it aside focused on other things. I vividly remember saying "what kind of rap name is Drake?" The rest is history. Once while in Philly I went to do an interview in a shabby and very hood basement studio complex. I peeked into one of the rooms and it was this tall kid with his shirt off bouncing up and down in the booth with an energy that was electric. I gave him my regards. He gave them back. I think I mentioned something about him cutting his dreads. As I left I remember him rapping something about being a boss. The rest is history. At the end of the day, for better or worse, rap is alive even if some of its greatest moments are written by ghosts.
rubberdingyrapids
Well-known member
@Corpsey
sure, there are more middle class rappers doing well than ever before - so you get j cole, drake and co. but even these guys arent really totally able to ignore the need to project some sort of tough guy image (which in drakes case seems wildly contradictory). even the 'soft' rappers need to be hard in some way, which isnt new - even mos def has rapped about holding guns etc. or his crew holding them. but the diff is that with all these merged personas in rap's premier league, im not sure there is any real opposition, or alternative, challenging voice, like how previously you might have had common and the roots against jay-z or biggie or whoever. even if you thought they were corny, they at least held up some sort of challenge to that.
sure, there are more middle class rappers doing well than ever before - so you get j cole, drake and co. but even these guys arent really totally able to ignore the need to project some sort of tough guy image (which in drakes case seems wildly contradictory). even the 'soft' rappers need to be hard in some way, which isnt new - even mos def has rapped about holding guns etc. or his crew holding them. but the diff is that with all these merged personas in rap's premier league, im not sure there is any real opposition, or alternative, challenging voice, like how previously you might have had common and the roots against jay-z or biggie or whoever. even if you thought they were corny, they at least held up some sort of challenge to that.
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Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Hmm I guess Crowley probably has a better perspective to assess the relative popularity of different rappers from. I mean, rap has always (or at least for a very long time) been about projecting a tough/masculine image (even in the case of female rappers). Even knowledgeable MCs like KRS and Rakim were "bullies" in a sense.
I guess you're saying the balance is missing, though. But where The Roots, Mos Def et al really competing on the same commercial level as Rocafella and Bad Boy back in 1998? And isn't Kendrick Lamar a hugely popular alternative to Rick Ross or whoever? Personally I think there's been a lot more room in rap in the last few years for alternative/intelligent acts following Kanye/Drake/Kendrick etc. But then maybe that's the internet distorting my perspective.
It's true that at the mainstream level rappers seem much more cooperative and collusive than ever before - that's why this Meek vs Drake thing is an even bigger deal, because he's broken rank from the general agreement there seems to be between rappers at that level to feature on each others tracks.
The other interesting thing is the point you raise about middle-class rappers. Perhaps this is one reason why violent lyrics might be more en vogue - insecurity about rap music leaving its origins in the ghetto? On some rap forums I read being bougie is the second worst thing you can be after being white. Drake's ''Started from the Bottom'' is again very telling - Drake acts as if he's very open about his middle class origins but at the same time he knows or feels that rap music isn't about being set up for success and triumphing. And naval gazing sensitivity might be said to be a middle class luxury... It's interesting to consider whether Drake has adopted the trappings of a Trap rapper because he wants to appear more tough, or just because he knows its what is big in the clubs at the moment.
It's fascinating really looking at how rap has changed and is constantly changing. I don't think you get this level of change, friction, evolution in rock music e.g. One interesting thing has been the rise of so-called ''feminine'' fashion trends in rap, again something partially ushered in by Kanye, almost culminating in Young Thug's subversion of gender identity and flirtation with gay imagery/language, which of course is greeted with derision/hatred by a lot of rap's traditional audience. This is to say nothing of the aesthetic changes going on - compare rap music in the year 2000 to rap music in the year 2015 and it's really quite amazing how different some of it is.
I guess you're saying the balance is missing, though. But where The Roots, Mos Def et al really competing on the same commercial level as Rocafella and Bad Boy back in 1998? And isn't Kendrick Lamar a hugely popular alternative to Rick Ross or whoever? Personally I think there's been a lot more room in rap in the last few years for alternative/intelligent acts following Kanye/Drake/Kendrick etc. But then maybe that's the internet distorting my perspective.
It's true that at the mainstream level rappers seem much more cooperative and collusive than ever before - that's why this Meek vs Drake thing is an even bigger deal, because he's broken rank from the general agreement there seems to be between rappers at that level to feature on each others tracks.
The other interesting thing is the point you raise about middle-class rappers. Perhaps this is one reason why violent lyrics might be more en vogue - insecurity about rap music leaving its origins in the ghetto? On some rap forums I read being bougie is the second worst thing you can be after being white. Drake's ''Started from the Bottom'' is again very telling - Drake acts as if he's very open about his middle class origins but at the same time he knows or feels that rap music isn't about being set up for success and triumphing. And naval gazing sensitivity might be said to be a middle class luxury... It's interesting to consider whether Drake has adopted the trappings of a Trap rapper because he wants to appear more tough, or just because he knows its what is big in the clubs at the moment.
It's fascinating really looking at how rap has changed and is constantly changing. I don't think you get this level of change, friction, evolution in rock music e.g. One interesting thing has been the rise of so-called ''feminine'' fashion trends in rap, again something partially ushered in by Kanye, almost culminating in Young Thug's subversion of gender identity and flirtation with gay imagery/language, which of course is greeted with derision/hatred by a lot of rap's traditional audience. This is to say nothing of the aesthetic changes going on - compare rap music in the year 2000 to rap music in the year 2015 and it's really quite amazing how different some of it is.
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rubberdingyrapids
Well-known member
not in sales terms, but culturally they mattered enough for biggie to be upset by the what they do video, and for questlove to be asked to write an open letter in the source about it. also enough for jay-z to get the roots for his unplugged album a while later in an effort to repair the chasms. puffy was not at all happy about some of what mos def and talib kweli had to say back in the early rawkus days. etc etc.
yeak kendricks great and everything but hes never going to say anything bad about the content of some of his peers/equals. which is good in one sense cos it means hes not just a reactionary artist, but also just means there is little discourse about any of what goes passed unchecked more or less.
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luka
Well-known member
this is my sticking point too. the conservatism. and its even worse when this mob go experimental. it usually means rock guitars.
as an aside i read the kano flow as being modelled on the jay-z flow which also has a certain spastic quality.
is a good description but i dont think its bad in some kind of objective musicological way. its just another way to bridge beats. the line is allowed to unspool and then is pulledin tight. i dont think theres anything inherently worthier about 'a direct flow' by which i can only assume you mean a relatively fixed cadence in lockstep with the beat ala black thought.
droid
Well-known member
Isnt there an inherent and pervasive conservatism in the development of any form of mass entertainment though? Its systemic rather than conscious, but still results in a gradual restriction of the scope of possibilities. Its like entropy in a closed system.
So do you consciously enforce 'rules' to restrict or freeze development at a certain stage, (a doomed project of course) resulting in one type of conservatism, or you increase engagement with the mainstream, become the mainstream, leading inevitably to another type of conservatism.
The question is, at what point do the results of scenario B become less appealing than those of scenario A?
droid
Well-known member
Sure, there's loads of other stuff going on, but implicit with engagement with the mainstream is a reduction of vocabulary, of possibilities, and eventually a tipping point is reached where restriction chokes innovation. This is implicit in the development of any genre, regardless of popularity, but mass markets accelerate the process.
Historically the problem is solved by the ground breaking auteur, or fresh blood from the fringes, but it seems were in the land of diminishing returns, the loops are getting shorter and the blood is diluted.
Does anyone believe that the prospects for hip hop/rap are good? That its not already far inside the gravity well?
Historically the problem is solved by the ground breaking auteur, or fresh blood from the fringes, but it seems were in the land of diminishing returns, the loops are getting shorter and the blood is diluted.
Does anyone believe that the prospects for hip hop/rap are good? That its not already far inside the gravity well?
droid
Well-known member
That is more or less the ideological positions in the culture wars isnt it?
But I would paraphrase, the options are stasis or decline. Its inevitable.