Yeah that is a totally fair critique of my critiques so far. I've really only listened to these once or twice each, and understanding the lyrics will take a lot more listens.Catalog, one thing I've noticed in this thread is that you don't really talk about lyrics or the rap itself. To me, that's one of the most important components and being a rap fan is in part about deep involvement on this level. There is that dichotomy between rap lyric and rap as sound but still - it seems missing from your analysis. Is this accurate? Fair? Thoughts?
Maybe that is one of the issues with hip hop nowadays. As in, no one (I mean me) has the attention span to give a song its full due in terms of actually listening?
The words are so complex, so hard to hear, hard to parse, that music without words wins out? Or where the words are clearer?
And running concurrent, a bigger more coherent beat just takes over? The hook becomes very important.
If we take Kanye as an example, you can get most of the whole song, including some of the lyrics, off a first listen. The songs then reveal themselves to be very basic and of a type, so you do also get bored easily after a few listens.
I did pick up a few lyrics on the 2nd listen, but I never got the full drift in any of these songs really.