did PE really never receive any radio play, at all?? :confused: but you got my point anyway, just replace them with Biggie or pretty much any other respectable rapper from the 80s-90s. the radio playing your songs doesn't make you "less hip-hop" than others..

Can we please stop using the word canvas when describing some music?

if you actually read the words that are being rapped these days by the rappers coming up, all they talk about is how much $$$ they made selling drugs, how they then used that drug $$ to buy themselves a record, and a video, and fly shit, and how they never ever stop earnin'.

It is bullshit. half of these fucks are talking out their asses daydreamin and pipe-dreamin and rapping about owning Bentleys and Mosbachs when they have to borrow money from some gangster to RENT one for the video shoot, which they can't even drive because that would cost more...

Many of the others? They really DID sling rock and heroin , or pimp women, and help ruin the lives of countless hundreds of people, possibly killing people, then they realized the "real game" was in hustling CD's and making beats.

I respect Drake for what he has done. I do not enjoy his rhyme schemes nor his MC voice. That's just me. But he has done it the "proper" way I guess.

PE rarely received any goddamn radio play at all, and barely any MTV play, even on Yo MTV Raps.

The shit was too agitating!

you gotta remember that hip hop/rap music got minimal airplay unless it was straight pop fluff like Hammer, or the endless repeats of Sugarhill Gang, and it took a while for middleamerica/whitefolks to not be scared. People were SCARED of RUN DMC. They looked like hoodlums, not "rock stars" and it freaked folks out. You should have been alive to see the UPROAR! that was caused by 2LiveCrew's rapping wack-ass nursery rhyme profanity! It went all the way to fucking Congress!

Either way, I cannot get Wetty Fap's TRAP QUEEN out my goddamn head! Screw you StreetFlava!

translation: Get off my lawn!

I wish I had a lawn...

Anyone worth listening to isn't doing that at all. In fact the general consensus for best rap album of the year* on here all couldn't be futher away from your view of what modern day rap is about. Is there shit? Of course there is, but no more than there was 'in the good old days'

"Life ain't nothing but bitches and money" a line by a group who romanticised violence and misogony...in the wonder years of 1988. To make out that braggadocio and is something exclusive to modern rap is clearly not true, and you know it.

*Joey Badass, Kendrick, Lupe Fiasco, Vince Staples and so, and so on.

I was not talking about braggadoccio. I am talking specifically about the dearth of lyrical variety in what is the newest hip hop that are anything other than how much $$ you have, how much $$ you spend, how you got your $$, how you treat your "bitches", etc.

I am a 41 year old man, who understands that music, art and poetry have license to speak of whatever they want, but quite frankly, to my ears, the music and beats are far outpacing the lyrical content of much new underground hip hop in terms of originality and kick-assness.
The beats are sick, the bass is sick, the song "structures" are innovative and disjointed in the very best way, then the rapper starts spouting off about his Maybachs and bankroll. Tired lyrics.

Chuck D wrote in the liner notes to Nation of Millions... that his advice to young MC's is to read and learn and soak up as much as you can because the more you know the more you can rap to your people about. The way the industry exists currently it is hard for the conscientious rappers to get over and heard by the masses, who are happy to hear banging club beats and hyper-repetitive "rhymes."

It's a shame. It happens with all genres. Look at what passes for popular "rock" music these days....


BTW, that "life aint nothin but bitches and money" line came from a group of guys who were for the most part raised middle class, and who were FAKING being street hoods to shock, as young folks are wont to do. Be careful what you pretend to be, cuz the "kids" take it seriously.

Rob again, lyrically, I (we) don't think you're listening to Kendrick, Joey Bada$$, Vince Staples, Chance The Rapper, etc... as they're not at all what you're describing.

What's this? I've spent my entire life in the nation's most liberal areas. It's only made me realize how irritating liberals are. Why then does this mean that "there's more than a chance" that I "can't compete" with you and your opinions?

Did you get lost in your own use of positives and negatives, or was this just one of your deliberate attempts to not make any sense?

And louder, sorry my friend but rap and hip hop really aren't the same thing. It's more like a square is a rectangle is a square situation. Rap, as a genre, is basically just "hip-hop with vocals".

Hip-hop is obviously much more broad. Hip-hop includes instrumental music, beat, scratching production, or sometimes just a vibe. Frank Ocean is hip-hop, more or less, and he was in a rap-heavy collective, but is he "Rap"? No.

Anyway, really. Rectangles and squares.

Rob's post is great but I am not sure what rappers or rock and rollers should be treating as interesting lyrical subjects anymore. There are many things you can write about in a ‘’deep’’ way now, probably a lot more than before. I am not sure the time span you were allowed to use to work out an interesting lyrical context in the past is the same that many musicians have now though. The way almost everyone seems to feel jaded when it comes to listening to music these days is only one of the many obstacles a musician starting out faces when trying to reach out to a crowd large enough you can call a fan base. Obviously you also have many examples of people not giving a shit and being plain cynical businessmen posing as your best friend to squeeze a few bucks out of your naive self. This would never have happened if Sonic Youth were still around, of course. They were pure until the end.

Those are all great lyricists. I was specifically discussing what is popular in hip hop these days with the kids. the underground rap has always had consciousness. the mainstream used to too

when Rhythm & Bullshit acts started being labeled as "Hip Hop" to try and keep their lame-ass love songs relevant and "edgy" that shit spelled the death of true rap music on radio. If your song does not have a sing-along chorus, or a standard verse, chorus-verse structure, it will very likely not be played on what acts as Hip Hop radio these days.

Hip Hop has always been a culture (beats, rhymes, breakin, B-Boys, tagging/graffitti, DJ's and MC's). It was, like all youth culture/counterculture, co-opted by those with the means and ways to make $$ off of selling it to those who had yet to experience it.

The same thing is happening with EDM right now. The sounds have been co-opted by mainstream "artists" and are no longer seen as groundbreaking.

Can't wait to see what is next.

Yeah, stop confusing this poor old bastard with simile and whatnot!

you're missing my point man... I can't imagine that there's any rapper more popular with the kids than Kendrick right now. Unless I'm just out of touch?

Funnily enough my first thought when I read your use of it was the many times I've seen it used by old music journalists in the past. In my book that makes you a plagiarist, as well as a lame poser.

Oh hey, is anyone out there listening to TWELVE REASONS TO DIE II?

'cause I am.

Frank Ocean is R&B man. i wouldn't consider him "hip-hop" in 100 years.

we can argue about genres all day so whatever.

Hip Hop is a noun. Rap is a verb.

Eminem is still the most popular rapper out there. Drake and J. Cole outsold him too.

maybe the true "heads" see Kendrick as their fave, but I'm telling ya that most are more into what are the big hits

in 2015, these are the top songs as rated by radio play
Big Sean - I don't fuck with you
Pitbull & Ne Yo - Time of Our Lives
Fetty Wap - Trap Queen
Wiz KHalifa - See You Again

in 2014 it was these

Niki MInaj - Only
Big Sean (again) - I dont fuck with you
Bobby Shmurda - Hot Boy
Iggy Azalea - Black Widow
Nicki Minaj - Anaconda
Iggy Azalea - Fancy
Pitbull & Ke$ha - Timber

Kendrick is nowhere near these acts in terms of exposure and popularity.

You may not be out of touch, just only in touch with those that think as you do Re: rap and hip hop.

It happens to anyone. I thought that Sonic Youth was the biggest act out there when I was 23, only to find they have only one album that sold more than 400,000 copies. Turns out I am the only one of my friends that truly LOVED Sonic Youth.

no because it's not out until the 10th in the US. Because for some stupid reason the industry thought they should change new releases to Fridays now. Meh.

it's possible. I listen to "popular radio" at the beach, but that's all like girlie pop, they don't really play hip hop. So maybe yeah, what do I know. I was only thinking of like Kendrick being on a lot of late night shows and stuff. Guess I figured there was a lot of popular exposure. Don't know. (Don't really care either haha)

I liken current Kendrick Lamar to U2 in 1985. They were "important" Their songs "mattered" and everyone who thought they had good taste loved them.

Kendrick has the potential to crossover like U2 did, and create more universally loved music, like U2 did, while keeping much of the original fanbase and adding a bunch of people who would not have known U2 was good unless MTV or the radio burned it into their heads with endless replays.

I fucking cannot stand M&M though. I just do not give a fuck about whatever problem he happens to be whining about in his latest tunes.

yeah Eminem has become pretty much the worst.

Lil Wayne lost so much of his relevance, when was the last time he had a hit record? it's crazy.

Dammmmnnn.. i ain't seen my man burn someone on SYG like that since back in the day yo!

You are trollingz us right? You can't be that naive.. overcoming struggle? Bullshit all this "rap" is pure corporate greed, hedonism, and ignorant bragging. These dudes are triumphing by milking the community, and selling out to an audience of middle class white kids, period. At least initially rap music was full of people ACTUALLY from the street, now? Bunch of studio gangsters and self absorbed narcissists

I liked MMLP2 and Shady XV quite a bit actually. Certainly more than Relapse and Recovery.

like other people already pointed out, i was referring to the "good shit".

I'd rather listen to MC Serch.... ;)

No. Even then its not what it was or even could be.. the reality is rap is like Delta Blues, it was authentic only in the particular societal circumstances that gave birth to it. When Jim Crow died blues became Elvis.. a corporate ghost.

Same with punk.. punk was an underground gutter music, put it on the radio what does it become? Green Day...

Rap came out of the Reagonomics 80s.. contemporary rap is an artificial nostalgia. The society that gave it life no longer exists.

Rap has been taken over by "the industry" and so has become a caricature of itself. This is what Kanye epitomizes, and why most of us here don't like or respect him as an artist.

i think that with ShadyXV he's lost the last bit of artistry he still had left on MMLP2. by this point it's pretty safe to say that Em really hates music and loves rapping. his production is as minimal and non-melodic as it gets, and he puts the most effort on rapping with that choppy flow using over complex rhyme schemes, while he truly says nothing behind it all. i think that deep down he's just one of those weirdo underground rap nerds, who really admires the aspect of technical rapping, even though he's still a huge artist popularity-wise.

I dont' necessarily disagree... but Shady XV was still better than Relapse, Recovery and Encore haha. And I did really like MMLP2. Having said all that, I could make a long list of dudes I'd rather listen to for sure.

we've shown you the deeper/more substantial side of Kanye many times, and the album "Watch the Throne" as a whole is exactly what i described, but okay.

like i've said here many times, i have a soft spot for Relapse. but i agree about MMLP2 being better than Recovery/Encore. not that it says it much though..

You missed the point by a country mile because you are so absorbed with Kanye's narcissism that you cant accept his faults as being reality. And his faults are typical of EXACTLY what is wrong with contemporary rap music

Relapse is def better than Recovery and Encore. It's at least an interesting album. And when it's good it's really good. It just has a lot of missteps. Less than f'ing Encore tho haha.

Let's not do the pointless Kanye tug-o-war yet again, plz.

admittedly i do find Kanye's last three solo albums to be flawless. i've listened to them many times, still can't find any faults in them. i do have a lot of criticism for his other works though, and i also think he says a lot of dumb/unnecessary shit on his interviews, at times even to the point where it's hard to take his words seriously. i also find his recent obsession with fashion design kinda boring. etc. i might be a huge fan but am definitely not blind..