[Rob Instigator]

It all starts with slick rock for me.

everything before was disco toasting.

[Severian]

Wow, Kanye has overtaken MJ for most top 40 singles.

Of course, they're both below chodes like Chris Brown and Drake for some reason. But I imagine that has a lot to do with the latter two having so much of their success in the streaming era, where a "single" doesn't need to be an actual single to chart.

If every song from Thriller or Dangerous was allowed to enter the charts based on how many people listened to them, MJ would be king of the mountain for solo artists... next to Elvis, since MJ didn't release as many songs.

Also there's a caveat in that any song with a feature by the artist in question, whoever it may be, is eligible for a spot. So Drake charted for "Tuesday" (which is bullshit) and Kanye charted for "American Boy" (which makes more sense because he produced and co-wrote the track and performed half of it.... And because I'm totally biased).

The whole "system" as it stands is flawed in that it fundamentally favors artists from certain genres and certain eras. Specifically hip-hop/hop-hop related artists — who are about 100x more likely to record feature tracks than any artists from any other genre — and artists of the streaming era, who can enjoy seeing every song on an album chart as a "single," as Drake did on IFYRTITL and VIEWS, while also having those exact same figures count toward "album equivalent" figures. When those Drake songs charted, they did double duty, counting toward his official solo Billboard song record and also counting toward his album sales.

This is frustrating to me. Sure, I love Kanye (in case you guys missed that bit), but he's had plenty of chart success on his own. Scoring multiple #1 singles over multiple albums is a big deal for any artist. Nirvana never really came close to a #1 single. Led Zeppelin never had one. But in the first real decade of all around decline for album and single sales alike, Kanye West thrived in both album and single sales. That's good enough for me. I don't think he should necessarily get credit for his verse on "THat Part," because that song isn't a "Kanye West Joint" in any way, shape or form.

And don't get me started on Drake again. Goddamnmotherfucking Drake.

Anyway, here's an article from NME magazine where Mike's daughter defends Kanye against a super fucked up commenter who suggests that Kanye should be dead instead of MJ. Ms. Jackson also says the first time she heard Kanye West was when her father (a Kanye fan) played 808's & Heartbreak for her repeatedly in '08.

Somehow it really makes me happy that Michael Jackson "loved that album." I'll bet Kanye would be over the moon about it too, as MJ was definitely a massive inspiration to him overall, but perhaps moreso on 808's than any other project. Kanye's "pop singer" persona always felt like an attempt to recapture some of the singular magic of MJ's power-period, right down to the glove.

http://www.nme.com/news/kanye-west/95703

[Severian]

Originally Posted by Rob Instigator

It all starts with slick rock for me.

everything before was disco toasting.

I can't help but feel that at the very least the timeline should start with Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five's "The Message," if not Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" in '79/'80. Perhaps earlier.

It would be a crying shame to say rap started with Blondie's "Rapture," but that was the first track with a rap to hit #1, and that was in '81. I think '85 is a bit late. Sure, what came before may have been "proto-rap" compared to what followed, but "rap" was an established slang term by 1980 and I think that should count.

I tend to trace punk back to Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat. It was proto-punk... definitely wasn't punk-punk, but it was also punk as all fucking hell, and pretty much everything that came after is considered proper punk, from the first Stooges album on. So as far as I'm concerned, punk — real punk, not the kind of singalong Benzedrine mod stuff the Who was kicking out in '65 — started in 1968. So I'd be more inclined to trace rap back to a period before '85. I mean, Run DMC had an album out in '84, so there's that.

Anyway. Whatever.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

i agree with Velvet Underground and Lou Reed being proto punk, i think Rock And Roll Animal era Lou invented the punk image and style on top of the music being so influential to later punk bands.

about rap in 85 again I'm comfortable with my decision

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

indeed since 1978 the original LA rappers were performing at clubs and party scene BUT i think of it as proto rap because like rob said, a lot of it waas still as much disco and funk as much as it was rap. Egyptian Lover came out in 84, and while it was a huge part of early LA rap, indeed On The Nile with Egypt, Egypt is more or less the Beatles British Invasion of LA rap, it influenced EVERYBODY... but that record still sounds as much a funk record as anything

[Rob Instigator]

I would grant the Message primal seminal status. That was 1982.

Blondie's "rap" sounds worse than when Theo and Cockroah tried to rap shakespeare Macbeth....


You go out at night eating cars
You eat Cadillacs Lincolns too
Mercurys and Subaru
And you don't stop, you keep on eating cars
Then when there's no more cars you go out at night
And eat up bars where the people meet
Face to face, dance cheek to cheek
One to one, man to man
Toe to toe, don't move too slow
Cause the man from Mars is through with cars
He's eating bars, yeah door to door
Wall to wall, hall to hall
He's gonna eat 'em all
Rapture, be pure, take a tour
Through the sewer, don't strain your brain
Paint a train, you'll be singing in the rain
Said don't stop to the punk rock

[Severian]

Yeah but The Message!

Most people clock rap back to Sugarhill Gang, but if not "Rapper's Deligh," I think The Message is as recent as I'm willing to go with it personally.

[noisereductions]

End of year I am gonna ask if yall heard Impossible Kid yet...

[Severian]

Originally Posted by noisereductions

End of year I am gonna ask if yall heard Impossible Kid yet...

I will. I always try to listen to as much as I can. I've just been really busy. Haven't listened to any music in the past couple days.

[louder]

It's been too bright and warm here so I haven't been in the mood for the more "lyrical" hip hop, I'll have to wait until the fall before I can bump the likes of Atmosphere.

Been playing the new Rae Sremmurd nonstop in the last few days.

[louder]

The new PARTYNEXTDOOR album is his most well received album critically so far, but in my opinion it's easily his weakest. I don't get the critics at all nowadays, man..

[louder]

Why does every artist under Drake's label make such subpar music? And they all do really bad commercially too, despite having support from the biggest artist in the world. Weird..

[louder]

I think it would make a lot of sense if Drake really took PARTY's best songs for his own last two projects. PARTY is a talented dude, but a lot of the songs on his new one sound like a bunch of uncooked demos.

For those who didn't know, he also wrote "Work" by Rihanna and Drake (which was a #1 hit for 9 consecutive weeks).

[Severian]

Originally Posted by louder

Why does every artist under Drake's label make such subpar music? And they all do really bad commercially too, despite having support from the biggest artist in the world. Weird..

Dude, let's not call him that. Please. Let's just not go there. He wants us to think he is the biggest artist in the world, but even if that title holds for the immediate present, it still comes with a shit ton of asterisks.

Did you read the comments in that story you posted about the statistics of VIEWS sales? From what I read, there was nobody commenting that didn't agree with the premise of the story: that Drake's actual popularity and influence have been overstuffed, by someone or something, and that the sales don't hold up to close scrutiny. Not a single person said, "No way, Drake's the best!" In fact everyone seemed to agree that they didn't know anyone who talked about the album! One comment in particular struck me... it was something along the lines of, "I've heard more people playing and talking about Chace the Rapper's Coloring Book by far."

I actually just read an atypically intersting Business Insider article about lil Chano, in which his rise was documented, and HE was more or less referred to as the biggest artist in hip hop right now.

Drake has the benefit of being a rather faceless and absolute pop "artist." He drops really safe singles that appeal to the kinds of people who buy a lot of singles. That is, non-hardcore music fans. Whatever the 2010s version of "whatever's on the radio" people would be.

Drake is like Justin Bieber and Chris Brown. He's more likely to inspire total loathing than devotion. But the songs he drops are safe and (to quote Meek Mill, which I never thought I'd do) "buttery soft" enough to appeal to the masses. Among keen eared listeners who really value the craft, he's a joke. But he's a joke who puts his grating voice on catchy shit, so even the critics can't help but approve of his singles (if not his albums).

[Severian]

Because I'm a very strict once-daily minimum schedule of mentioning Kanye West, allow me to use him as a comparison. I've said before that Drake has gone from being Kanye-lite to being the anti-Kanye, and I think that's more true than ever now. Take what I just wrote... Drake is (often grudgingly) approved of by the music fan equivalent of "basic bitches;" people who don't really care much about what they listen to or where it comes from, but still want it in their lives. They listen to Pandora, they like what's on the charts because it's on the charts and easily accessible, and Spotify will play it on their Hot Tracks playlist -- or whatever it's called... I dropped Spotify a few months back. But how often do you encounter someone who genuinely loves Drake? I work with a number of sickeningly young folks these days... interns, or reporters fresh from journalism school, or, worse yet, multimedia kids who basically majored in "Fucking around with MacBooks." They all like this Drake song or that Drake song, but even they think he's an absolute tool, and while they may know "Hotline Bling" and "Work," they don't know the names of his first few albums.

Enter the Kanye comparison. Kanye is hated by a lot of people, sure, but generally speaking they represent a completely different type of listener. Kanye is known as an asshole or crazy by the masses, by the "whatever's-on-the-radio" folks who like Drake songs they can't name, but those people almost always — in my experience — concede that he's a crazy talented artist. They most certainly know the names of every one of his albums dating back to 2004, and while they may not necessarily bump "FML" or "Hold My Liquor," they can sing along with pretty much every Kanye single up to 808's, before he started going anti-pop.

The effects are similar, but at opposite ends of the spectrum. Drake isn't considered a "legend" by anyone but himself. Scoring pop hits doth not a legend make. People who don't really "know" music still know Kanye, and real music fans, even the ones that hate him, acknowledge his enduring influence and skill. He may not be scoring #1 singles anymore, and his songs may not be jumping from the speakers of every high school kid with an iPhone, but he's universally respected as an artist. Drake is the opposite. He's finally got a #1 single, 7 years into his career, but it's called Fucking "One Dance" and it eats shit. Then there's "Work," a Rihanna track that as you mentioned was written by PND, and "Hotline Bling" that was outright stolen. His songs are consumed blindly by millions of fair weather fans, but he's universally known as a douche. And as Wheelchair Jimmy. And nobody thinks he's a skilled or gifted artist. The possibility doesn't even pop into people's heads, and the word "genius" is not even part of the conversation.

Drake is utterly of the moment, reflective of these unbearably stupid times we live in. Calling him the biggest artist in the world is a disservice even to other empty pop artists. He's like the Coldplay of rap. His music requires no thought or understanding, his character is utterly one dimensional and opportunistically, falsely, self-deprecating. But his songs are inoffensive, easy, mass marketed shit. He won't upset your parents (he's not black enough... amirite?), and he has so totally inserted himself into hip hop culture that even real rap fans kind of have to accept him because he's featured on this track and that track by this or that "real" rap artist.

Essentially, Drake is big because he's inevitable, not because he inspires genuine affection from fans. He has become part of the cross-promotional wind in modern music, and you can't get away from the wind. And who doesn't like a nice breeze sometimes? Nobody. But Drake's impact is just as fleeting as a passing breeze, and somehow a good deal lighter.

I think I hate Drake more than I like Kanye.
I actually wanted Eminem to release that rumored diss track to put him in his place. Eminem. Me. You know me well enough to understand how much it says about my hatred for Drake if I see fucking Eminem as the lesser of two evils.

Anyway, hopefully he just goes away. I thought his initial plan was to not rap past he age of 30... wasn't that it? Well, he's fucking 29, so if he sticks to that he's pretty much out of here. But I think that number has grown to 35 at least, if not 40, God help us. God Fucking damn him. God damn that stupid beard! God damn his stupid fucking face!! And that ridiculous racing stripe he sometimes cuts into his stupid hair. God damn the shape of his head. God damn his creepiness -- why's he checking girls' phones? That's red alert creeper behavior in the real world!

Ok I'm getting worked up.

[Severian]

BTW there's a new Danny Brown single.
Kanye's releasing new music with Yeszy season 4.
And there's an "I Miss the old Kanye" beer out there! But most of you probably know this because you probably check Pitchfork once a day just like I do, even though I'm loathe to admit it.

[louder]

I didn't mean it as a compliment.. I, for one don't give a damn about Drake's popularity. But I'll take your word for it, maybe he isn't the biggest (as in most commercially successful) person who released music this year.

[noisereductions]

Originally Posted by louder

It's been too bright and warm here so I haven't been in the mood for the more "lyrical" hip hop, I'll have to wait until the fall before I can bump the likes of Atmosphere.

the Atmosphere is good, not great. It has a couple great songs, though.

The Aesop Rock is just great all the way thru.

[louder]

Originally Posted by noisereductions

the Atmosphere is good, not great. It has a couple great songs, though.

The Aesop Rock is just great all the way thru.

Ah I see.

By the way, the Tory Lanez debut isn't as good as I wanted it to be, he "borrowed" too many ideas from the likes of good kid m.A.A.d city, Take Care and Rodeo.. to the point where he just comes across as a confused artist looking for identity.

Still waiting for y'all to listen to SremmLife 2 though.

[Severian]

Originally Posted by louder

I didn't mean it as a compliment.. I, for one don't give a damn about Drake's popularity. But I'll take your word for it, maybe he isn't the biggest (as in most commercially successful) person who released music this year.

Yeah I know you didn't. I just get overtaken by hatred when Drake comes up.