Greathouse, Thank you for the welcome. I like it here, although the posts go by pretty quickly.
I am not an expert on rap music. It really depends on my mood. When I’ve just finished working a 14 hour shift and am driving home my 1.5 hour commute, I build up a little bit of road rage, and rap music gives me a little bit of stress release. Sometimes I’ll listen to more calming tracks like some of Snoop’s stuff that is on the radio, or if I’m more high strung I’ll listen to Noz or DMX. I imagine I’d feel the same about some metal too, although I have trouble understanding what they are saying sometimes. The lyrics are important.
How anyone can argue about what constitutes “real music” is absurd. As MrMyth so cleverly illustrated with his cricket example, it is something that is completely subjective. You may have better luck arguing that someone’s spouse is not attractive.
What the hell is it? It seems like a thread will be trucking along just fine, and then when I post to it, the thing withers and dies. Kinda like I’ve got the touch of death for a thread.
Greathouse, you have a great talent. Use it wisely.
Since this is about sampling, I have to say US3, Thievery Corporation and Zero 7 are exceptional artists, among many others, including the venerable Beck.
I like rap (old school stuff mostly…if a white guy can say that) for rap’s sake, but the sampling beneath the lyric is often so complex you might never get it all.
One perfect, underrated example: De La Soul’s “Three Feet High and Rising.”
The fact that rap can be an outlet for poverty-stricken people does nothing to prove that it is music. Painting can be an outlet for deaf people, but that doesn’t make it music.
Please keep in mind this is meant in the way you advised foxygal07here, Ilsa_Lund.
To say that poverty-stricken people have two choices to “really get ahead” in life by: [ul][] making it in rap or [] taking some hinted, unsavory career path[/ul] is not a very reasonable or informed view. I hope you don’t really feel this way.
DJ Shadow “Entroducing…” Fuck you if you listen to this and think sampling is crap.
Nas “Illmatic” Fuck you if you listen to this and think rapping isn’t an art.
Hip Hop is like any other music genre. You will have people that treat it (think of it) as an art and people that are strictly out to make money off of it. (Sprite?)
Oh yeah, it has impacted our (world)culture more in the last 20 years more then any other genre of music or anything else for that matter. Good or bad, it has. There has to be something there…
You know, when I was in eigth grade, I would argue til I was sick that country music wasn’t really “music” or “artistic” or anything. Then I grew up, opened my mind, heard forms of country music that I really liked, and came to appreciate it. It was just the Garth Brooks crap on the radio gave me a bias against all country.
So if all you know of rap is P. Diddy, then I can understand how you might think it sucks. But this, like the most commercial forms of ANY genre, is not representative of the best artisitic work.
You may not like any rap, and that’s understandable. But until you make an effort to listen to the best music of the genre, and understand why people like it, please do not make ignorant statements like “it’s not music” or “it’s not art.” It makes you look like a close-minded fool. There are no serious music critics out there who would dismiss an entrie genre, any genre. Rap has been around well over twenty years now and it’s not going away anytime soon.
What I took from World Eater’s statement was that of all the ways a poor person can make better life for themselves, becoming a famous rap star is one of the least likely ways. Not that it doesn’t/can’t happen, just that it is highly unlikely. I have no cite to back me up on this, but I would venture to say that it is tougher for a talented rapper to get a shot in the music industry than for a middle class bunch of kids in a garage/bar band. I may be way off base on this, and if so it wouldn’t be the first time, and I’m sure I can count on at least a couple of dopers to set me straight.
I would think that hitting the books, focusing on education, and trying to stay out of trouble and keeping a clean record would have a much higher likelyhood of delivering an underpriveledged, urban youth to a better and more fullfiling lifestyle than ignoring these things and focusing on thier rapping in the hopes of hitting it big. I am not naive, so I do understand that unfortunately not every urban youth who hits the books with a vengance will be delivered from the ghetto. I also understand that sometime simply surviving as an underprivledged, urban youth may not allow for focusing on education and staying out of trouble. But they may have a better chance of reaching thier goal, if thier goal is to leave the ghetto and possibly be able to provide a better life for thier children/loved ones/themselves.
[John Bender]
Screws fall out all the time, sir. The world is an imperfect place.
Well, if rap isn’t music, someone better call up Billboard and let em know… entirety of this week’s Top 10 (except for one 3 Door Down song at number 8) is rap artists. IIRC, the entire Top 10 of last was black rap artists, with the exception of the number one song, which was by Beyonce, an R&B artist with guest Sean Paul who I believe is a reggae artist.
But musically, there are other just as viable methods of self expression. There is still a lively jazz scene, the blues are still going strong, punk (and lots of these guys start off and STAY poor, even when successful. But for them, success is a more reletive standard) is alive and well. And before anyone asks, yes, there have been successful black punk and hard rock acts.
Anyhoo, the number of folks who actually make a living with music is ALWAYS a miniscule percentage compared to those that TRY to make a living with music. That goes across all forms of music.
Is rap music? Yeah, I guess. And I don’t care if they sample as long as the original writer gets some credit.
I would say that rap sucks, but I had a co-worker who was keen on listening to today’s country music. Rap, by comparison, is fucking brilliant.
I just want to explain a few things about myself to put my contribution to this thread in context:
I am a white (VERY white I can’t tan ) Western European. Not only that, I have a bachelor’s degree in Music and a masters degree in Music and Media Technologies. I play piano and viola, sang in a choir for 10 years, conducted the college orchestra, played in a string quartet and was steeped in the Western Classical Music tradition growing up (and I still love it!).
However, I’m here to say to all you dissenters:
RAP IS MUSIC!
Music consists of the manipulation of sound (pitches, rhythm, texture) into patterns that satisfy both an artistic, creative urge in the composer, and to entertain and stimulate the listener. Rap does all of this. (Even the lyrics of Rap songs are carefully crafted using alliteration, assonance, pauses etc. to bring out and emphasise the rhythm and musicality of the words). It may not appeal to you personally but that’s just a matter of taste. It doesn’t mean that it’s not music. Can I say that Pachelbel’s Canon isn’t music because I find it booooorrrring and sickly sweet?
Matchka said it too (see below)
Of course you can say music is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ but that’s a matter of taste and purely subjective. To say that a musical piece demonstrates ‘quality’ or not - well that’s an extremely difficult aesthetic question that’s still being discussed in university halls all over the world - same goes for any art form. Undeniably there are rappers who are well-respected by those who have listened to a lot of other rap so can compare in an educated fashion, and there are rappers whose music would be judged to be of inferior quality by the majority of those who study this music, but pinpointing the reasons for this are difficult in any musical genre.
Anyway I’m starting to write an essay here so I’ll stop and just re-iterate some of what Matchka said.
You said it!
p.s. I like some rap but not all of it just like I like some classical music but not all, some rock but not all etc. etc. etc. etc. Don’t be so arrogant as to dismiss a whole musical genre out of hand. If you listen you might be rewarded by actually finding something you really like.
) Western European. Not only that, I have a bachelor’s degree in Music and a masters degree in Music and Media Technologies. I play piano and viola, sang in a choir for 10 years, conducted the college orchestra, played in a string quartet and was steeped in the Western Classical Music tradition growing up (and I still love it!).