Holt summed it up, it's style over substance. Which is why big tracks by people like Kanye are the order of the day, and club and RnB joints are in, pushing real skills and real issues to the back.
Mmm, shame on me for sleeping on a real rapper. I'll get a listen to some of Cham's mixtape stuff.
Cam'Ron was never on Jay-Z level, though. He's better off dissing people he can actually beat, not trying to get the attention of the new owner of Def Jam. If Jay did actually reply, Cam's career would be good as dead anyway, so good.
Chingy, I never could stand. He has the pop touch from Jermaine Dupri, which gives him some good hits (Right Thurr, Holidae Inn...yer I liked that 1
) but as a rapper he's the same as most others you can name from the substance-starrrrrved Dirty Duuuurty right now.
Diddy is the 50 Cent of the previous era, but with better songs- G-Unit doesn't have a Biggie, an actual quality rapper who has the same star power as the rest. Diddy had loads of quality songs on Bad Boy- Flava In Ya Ear remix, Whoa, um, a few more I should really be able to remember
(go back to both Biggie's albums for further proof). Right now, he's into other projects, hip-hop isn't his main thing. I'm told Unforgivable's pretty good
Ja's awful. Nuff said. He tried rapping, he couldn't do that. Tried singing, that was worse. Then he trieed going at 50 and Eminem, which kiled his career. He's a bad Pac imitator who focuses on the RnB dollar.
Wayne's okay. The entire Cash Money roster can produce great songs, they're probably the best thing out of the south right now...mind you they've split now. So yeah.
Fabolous, I never liked either. Just a pop rapper, really. Breathe was alright, but Just Blaze could pull a hit out of his arse.
Chris Brown's a bad Jacko imitator
it shows that RnB's in the same decline as hip hop is- the same old subject matter. Run It was alright, but Scott Storch, etc, etc.
Both D4L and DFB are killing hip hop. Snap Music is the worst music around right now, like a watered down Crunk with the worst lyrics ever. Complete bollocks, really.
Difference between Ice Cube and Snoop is, Ice Cube's lost his passion for making good music. You can go on about his last album, but the fact that he had to go to Scott Storch and Lil Jon for most of it wasn't the most original thing in the world. Nobody ever expects Snoop to come up with a 5 star classic, so he's always trying to prove someone wrong. A better MC than most people think, IMO.
Budden's a legend, and if his second album ever comes out I'll definitely get it. He is underrated, and his first LP was excellent apart from the crap RnB tracks, I thought. Since then he's been limited to mixtapes by Def Jam, but hopefully now Jay's around things'll change.
Pharrell can't rap. He can be an excellent producer when he doesn't try to go all avant-garde but thats about it.
Can't believe I forgot Xzibit. One of my favourites since I got into rap, before he hooked up with Dre he was dropping topics of a conscious nature without being lumped into that category, showing much versatility. Now, he's lost it a bit, but his first two albums were stunning. Look forward to his next.
MC Ren, I don't think I've heard any of solo. Been wanting to for a while though, he was excellent- Probably lacked creativity but in a group with Eazy and Dre as rappers, eh?
Kweli is okay, his best days are behind him though. And Pyro, Kweli hasn't had a massive club song which has propelled him to chart success yet, so he can still be considered 'independent'. The man himself would probably be proud of it, for some reason.
Yeah, hip hop is becoming something based largely around soulless club joints and MCs who once loved the culture going for the RnB dollar like everybody else. But half the industry still hates this state of mind, it's pretty obviously not as if all hip hop cleanly fits the stereotype of 'gangstas' and every other one you've ever thought of...
If you're stuck for something to check out (which you're not), do so...
The Coup- Funk-infused political hip hop which always gets compared to Outkast, but is better. Speaking of which, anyone heard anything of their next album? (apart from the mighty O)
Sage Francis- Independent, Alternative and gasp, white, but the man is an absolute legend. If anyone's heard Simon Says by Pharoahe Monche, he parodies it...and hip hop...in style here:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=UiSZ26grU...fe%20is%20easy
Plan B- If you're from the UK, you've heard NME fans going into hyperbole because it's-shock horror- a rapper with a guitar. But surprise, he's actually an incredible rapper who loves hip hop and yeah, gets a lot of comparisons to early Eminem.
----
And real rappers ain't ones that spit about
their lives...Pac is the most overrated MC ever, period. Beans is alright but still overrated. We need someone to spread a message. We need rappers to spread a message of real hip hop, a
positive message unlike the stuff that's getting rotation today.
My Random Thoughts On Hip-Hop
Re: My Random Thoughts On Hip-Hop
