I try to be open and accepting of new/different things, such as music. Yes I like rap and hip-hop, but I like rock, pop rock and other sorts of music as well. It makes me really mad when I talk to my friends and they say that they don't listen to any other types of music except rap and hip-hop and won't even give different genres a chance. I feel that music is more than just it's image, you have to listen to the lyrics and then make a decision based on what the song is talking about. Judging things before you experience it is very ignorant in my opinion, and in doing so I think that you miss out on alot of cool new interesting things in life!
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I agree wholeheartedly, but could you please stop putting all your posts in bold? It makes the recent posts page all weird.
--Mike
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In my opinion there's only two types of music; good and bad. People who claim to love music, but who only listen to one genre, in short, don't love music.
I agree with you on the image part; for too many people, their musical taste isn't really musical taste, it's fashion sense. If the music doesn't have the right image for them, they won't listen to it. The funny thing is, that if these supposed hip hop lovers asked producers like Raekwon, 9th Wonder, Cut Chemist, Beatnuts, DJ Shadow etc., about their musical tastes they'd find that they span more genres than most people even knew existed. They have to, to keep their sound fresh. That's why so many amateur hip hop producers sound the same and produce unnoriginal material; if all they listen to is rap and rnb, then all they can do is copy what's already there.
One thing I would have to take you up on though is your line about lyrics, especially with rap. One key element for me as a rap fan is flow. I can listen to Spanish and French rap, and not understand a single word, but still be able to recognize genius rhyme structure and flow in the delivery. Too many people get hung up on a rapper who raps about drugs, guns and bitches, and ignore their flow and their delivery. they get so offended by the content, that they refuse to give the MC credit for gifted rhyme.
It works vice versa too, some people won't give an MC credit unless he's rapping about drugs, guns and bitches. Again they get so caught up in the content that they forget about the other components of rap. I constantly hear people claiming some MC with no flow, shit rhyme structure and generic beats, is dope simply because he uses 20 different terms for gun in a track and shouts about Hennie and grillz. It's image driven love of rap, favoured by people whose favourite rap tracks are the musical equivolant of Steven Segal movies; shit, with poor dialogue, bad acting, but loads of explosions and guns.
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I am the people my mother warned me about.
Personally, I go for the intellect factor. Flow is nice (which is why I stoop to MCs like Ludacris and Eminem on occasion), but an amazing metaphor, powerful imagery, a witty play on words, that's what does it for me. That's why I love Saul Williams.
--Mike
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I like Saul Williams, Twice the First Time is a track I love in particular. Not in My Name is another great one. I really consider him more of a beat poet in the dub poetry vein than an MC in the traditional hip hop sense though.
For flow I'd have to go for RA the Rugged Man as a personal favourite, with particular reference to his piece on Jedi Mind Tricks, Uncommon Valour track. Brother Ali is pretty sick too on tracks like Uncle Sam Goddamn and Slick Rick is nothing short of awesome, his track 'Run This' is one of my all time favourite rap tracks, an MC that lives up to his name as the slickest ever.
Don't know if you're interested, probably would be though I'd imagine if you like alt rap stuff like Saul Williams, some good UK MCs worth checkin out. You should find most stuff on Limewire. Roots Manuva, Taskforce, Klashnekoff. Some French stuff you might like: IAM, MC Solaar, NTM. Dunno, just some different flavours you might like to check out. UK stuff tends to have a more dub influence to it's production than alot of US stuff. French just flows beautifully in rhyme.
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I am the people my mother warned me about.
I'd call it more slam poetry than beat poetry (I love the slam scene). For flow, I'd have to give it to Blackalicious and (oddly enough) Zach de la Rocha. Zach has this track with DJ Shadow that I found on limewire called "March of Death." It's one of the sickest tracks ever.
--Mike
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Yeah, slam would be a better desciption. i really like Zach de la Roche, not for flow so much as content and voice though. incidently Snoop did a great track with Rage Against the Machine called 'Bounce' a while back. It is one of the best meldings of rap and metal, before the unforgivable rap-metal and nu-metal scenes sprouted up and ruined the chance of a decent rap-metal collaboration for the forseeable future.
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I am the people my mother warned me about.
I couldn't have said it better myslef. "Judging things before you experience it is very ignorant in my opinion, and in doing so I think that you miss out on alot of cool new interesting things in life!" This is definately true with music. A lot of my friends won't listen to certain music at all just because my other friends think it is bad, or uncool. If they jsut give it a chance, they will be surprised. This also reminds me of my mom cuz when I ask her about me doing something, she will decide weather or not I can go based on what she thinks it will be like. Or she'll decide based on what her experience in doing what I want to be doing was when she was my age. We all need to make decisions for ourselves- that is how we learn.