# Rap is not music? Are you smokin' krack? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 3, 2003, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804 "2003-03-03T19:11:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Intaglio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71e660/32.png) [@Intaglio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intaglio)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/41 "2003-03-04T16:03:51Z")
Rap isn’t my favorite kind of music, but I do listen to bands like POD and Linkin Park who have rap mixed in with the music, singing. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/42 "2003-03-04T16:18:28Z")
“You can’t hum ‘rap’” - Gerald Gates in _Next of Kin_ (paraphrased) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/43 "2003-03-04T17:55:56Z")
It seems to me that music, by definition, needs to have a tune. Rap doesn’t. Oh, it’s often accompianied by music, but if you’ve got a high school kid rapping to himself as he’s walking down the hall, what he’s doing is definitely rap, and it definitely doesn’t have a tune. But why the big deal? Rap is, definitely, an art form. Why does it need to be music, in particular? Da Vinci’s _Mona Lisa_ and Michaelangelo’s _David_ aren’t music, either, and nobody sees a problem with that. Nor does it make sense to criticize rap as a genre because of the content. Admittedly, some rap is totally reprehensible, but then, there’s some which is perfectly polite and well-meaning. I understand that there are even some religious rap groups. The genre is not defined by the content. ---
**Author:** ![MrMyth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e19b73/32.png) [@MrMyth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrMyth)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/44 "2003-03-04T20:00:49Z")
Turn off your radios. Flick away from MTV. For God’s sake, don’t go near BET 95% of the time. This is the stuff of ‘bling’, the stuff of flashy idiots who spend their entire album bragging about the diamond-studded wheels on their luxury cars that they just convinced some sad poor kid into helping purchase $17.99 at a time. These are the Billy Ray Cyrus’s of the genre, people. Bandages over clear skin and girl’s names on boys do not a good artist make. A deep voice and the ability to screw J.Lo don’t make you a hip hop artist. And these people do not an entire genre make. ---
**Author:** ![Intaglio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71e660/32.png) [@Intaglio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intaglio)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/45 "2003-03-04T21:09:45Z")
Beastie Boys, Beck, Red Hot Chili Peppers - are Artists I also listen too, they have rap in their music. ---
**Author:** ![Profane\_Creation](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/839c29/32.png) [@Profane\_Creation](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Profane_Creation)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/46 "2003-03-04T21:45:01Z")
You can’t spell ‘crap’ without ‘rap.’ ---
**Author:** ![Tedster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4491bb/32.png) [@Tedster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tedster)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/47 "2003-03-04T22:07:35Z")
Music is traditionally defined as having rhythm and harmony. While Rap has the former it is often deficient in the latter. Banging on garbage cans as someone mentioned, is not, strictly speaking, music. Rap is certainly the nadir (hopefully) of popular culture entertainment, to be sure. ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/48 "2003-03-04T22:26:14Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Profane Creation \* > \*\*You can’t spell ‘crap’ without ‘rap.’ \*\* You also can’t spell carp without crap too. Hmm. I guess I won’t listen to the fishes either. So lonely my lake will be. :rolleyes: There is some really good rap out there. Stuff that makes me think and/or shake my booty. For the most part, it ain’t my cup o’ tea. I guess I’m open minded to take each song on on an individual basis. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2003, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/49 "2003-03-04T23:10:58Z")
When I was in school, I learned that music is simply organized sound. So yes, rap is music. Rap may not have melody, but it IS 100% rhythm. It isn’t about speaking over music or beats. Take a piece like “Dear Mama” from Tupac Shakur. Take away his voice and you’re left with a looping background with an occassional “reprise”, true. But one could transcribe the rhythm of Tupac’s rap so that it could be replicated by any instrument. This means that you CAN hum the song, just by only rhythm rather than by melody and rhythm. Sinead O’Conner’s “I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got” is a song sung on a couple of pitches, with no instrumentation. The “tune” is very tenuous but the musicality of the song is undeniable. Rap should be viewed the same way. To say rap is not music is absurd. Rap is music because people accept it as such. If rap isn’t music, what is it? If it’s easy to accept the beats and the sampling as music, why not the rhythm being laid over the beats and the sampling? You might as well discount the musical usefulness of all percussive instruments, then. ---
**Author:** ![gex\_gex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/94ad74/32.png) [@gex\_gex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gex_gex)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/50 "2003-03-05T00:03:33Z")
A limited edition of Jurrasic 5’s _Quality Control_ contains a bonus disc with instrumental versions of every song on the album. So, I’m assuming that the second disc is music, while the first is not, since it has rapping? ---
**Author:** ![stpauler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@stpauler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stpauler)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/51 "2003-03-05T00:11:01Z")
[Merriam-Webster](http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary) defines music as such: > [@](#): > > 1 a : the science or art of ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination, and in temporal relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity b : vocal, instrumental, or mechanical sounds having rhythm, melody, or harmony So, spanking your butt at 76 bpm and saying “un-hunh, un-hunh” is music par definition. The spanking would be the beat (sound) in succession and for flavor, the verbalization could be melodious or monotone. Either way, it’s music. Music really all around us. There’s an album out there called [“Zounds! What Sounds!”](http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&uid=7:03:31%7CPM&sql=Ajc63tr2wkl5x) , it’s music with its majority composed from Cement Mixers, car horns, animals, and other urban and natural sounds with an orchestra in the background… Very interesting compositions. Rap, as I believe, is commonly misunderstood to not have a melody. For the most part, it does have a melody, not a great one. It’s hard for most of us to speak in monotone, rapping is the same thing. There are tones, albeit they don’t jump out as a non-rap vocal song may, they are not like a Ben Stein record would be…😃 ---
**Author:** ![MusicJunkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df788c/32.png) [@MusicJunkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MusicJunkie)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/52 "2003-03-05T00:20:46Z")
> [@](#): > > When I was in school, I learned that music is simply organized sound. So yes, rap is music Speech is organized sound therefore speech is music. Sorry but I don’t agree. ---
**Author:** ![MusicJunkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df788c/32.png) [@MusicJunkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MusicJunkie)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/53 "2003-03-05T00:24:05Z")
Damn it! Posted too soon. Not that rap isn’t music. It’s just that I find your definition too open. ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/54 "2003-03-05T00:34:09Z")
Art isn’t simply the sum of the materials used. It’s about the tension between the intent of the creator and the acceptance of the audience. Music _has_ to have a tune? An overheated boiling tea kettle has a tune. Is that music? Was making music the intent of the teakettle… or even the teakettle maker? Organized sound is music? A twenty one gun salute is loud and organized. Is that music? Was that the intent of the creator? Does an audience start boogeying down on the recoil? Melody… a train engine has melody. Harmony. Eight dogs begin howling at the moon simultaneously. But is that music? Music… is the conscious audible product made… by a musician, incidental or professional. Extra points if you can dance to it. Yodeling is music. I grant you that spoken word performances/rap have a fine line seperating them, arbitrary they may be. SO… I’d say if the words were meant to be _read_ and _heard_, I’d call it spoken word poetry. If it’s intended to be _listened to_ as free-flowing verse, it’s rap. Whether either is accompanied by instrumentation – computer generated, electronically digitized or spittin’ beats with a MC on a mic – is incidental. But whatever the performer says it is, it is. You don’t go around renaming someone else’s child. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/55 "2003-03-05T00:34:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Speech is organized sound therefore speech is music. Language is organized sound as well. Perhaps this is why thinkers have viewed music as a universal language of sorts. ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/56 "2003-03-05T00:37:25Z")
monstro: touche’. ---
**Author:** ![DKW](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dkw/32/3118_2.png) [@DKW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DKW)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/57 "2003-03-05T00:41:35Z")
My beef against rap is that it’s _purely_ about style and imagery, and it doesn’t require any real musical talent whatsoever. I mean, even a trashy eurobeat hack belting out some garbage about rhythm and energy etc. has to know how to _sing_. Anyone can recite poetry to synth music…it’s getting people to pay you for it that’s the hard part, and that’s where the paraphrenalia comes in. Of course, one man’s meat, it takes all kinds, etc. Still, I find it more than a little annoying that virtually nobody can see rap music for what it is. (As someone who spent a short yet memorable stint in the Boy Scouts, I can tell you that there are a plenty of pathetic losers who talk about drugs, booze, sexual encounters, and killing people.) And if this is the voice of the black person or whatever the hell, I think they can do a helluva lot better than this. ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/58 "2003-03-05T00:48:23Z")
> [@](#): > > Still, I find it more than a little annoying that virtually nobody can see rap music for what it is. (As someone who spent a short yet memorable stint in the Boy Scouts, I can tell you that there are a plenty of pathetic losers who talk about drugs, booze, sexual encounters, and killing people.) And if this is the voice of the black person or whatever the hell, I think they can do a helluva lot better than this. …and with that, a particularly obnoxious view on race is introduced to a topic that has NOTHING to do with race at all. Way to go, DKW!! ---
**Author:** ![Sagasumono](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Sagasumono](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sagasumono)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/59 "2003-03-05T00:57:57Z")
Actullay DKW brings up an intresting point. I have always held the notion that anyone who dosen’t like hip-hop/rap are racist. Reason I belived this is because I listen to all kinds of music from Classical to Common,from 50’s Oldies to 50 Cent. I’ve heard people of other races mention when I’m playing The Eagles “why do you listen to that white music?” I never saw it as white music, only as music. Likewise, if I’m in a room listening to Snoop, well to my face they say “I don’t like that music.” But behind y back, they love to call it “N\*\*\*\*\* music” much like an ill famed poster here did once. So it got me thinking. If I have the ear to listen to various kinds of music and enjoy it, does that mean others just don’t bother to listen to a certain kind of music because it’s made by people of a different melanian count, or bcause they actullay don’t have the “ear” for it. Can someone shed some light? ---
**Author:** ![mozart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@mozart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mozart)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2003, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804/60 "2003-03-05T01:00:06Z")
Rap is not music. It has next to nothing to do with anything that most of the world would call music. It may be much more important then that. It may be culture. I don’t mean “pop Culture”. I mean literature, Art, Poetry. It is the voice of young Black America and they have certainly created culture before. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rap-is-not-music-are-you-smokin-krack/158804.md?page=4)