Hello! I absolutely l
ove music, as we all do, I'm sure. Additionally, I'm very
open minded to it, being able to listen to any and every genre. Of course, we all have our favorites. In my case, it's rap. I even plan on making my own music when I live alone, which should be in about 6 months. I know what you're thinking, "Oh gosh, another horrible rapper", and well that's debatable
.
However, we're not here to discuss my musical ability, but I just want to talk about Rap in itself. I study it. Literally, study. That may sound weird, but it's a beautiful art. When you have a genre consisting of people who weren't gifted with the ability to sing, I think it's highly important that what you're saying is meaningful, obviously right? I mean it makes perfect sense. With that being said, I'm not into the radio music, what we hip hop heads refer to as "
Mainstream". Sure, it's fun to ride to a party to, or play when you need something on instantly, but if you're not an avid listener of rap, I'm here to tell you, "
That does not represent the entirety of us", believe me. If you hate rap, that's fine, it's opinion, but I would suggest listening to
real rap.
There's tons of factors in rap, "
lyricism" to name one. The focus on lyrics. Not only what it means, but rhyming consistency to name one, (Seeing how often you can rhyme in a single bar), and wordplay, (Literally playing with words, being witty), and double "entendres", which is wording a phrase a particular way to have more than one meaning, this is to name a few concepts of "lyricism" alone. Here's some example to name a few. I'll throw one of for "Rhyming consistency".
Eminem would be a great example.
"My words are like a
dagger with a
jagged edgeThat’ll
stab you in the
head, whether you’re a
fag or
lessOr the
homosex,
hermaph or a
trans-a-vestPants or
dress, hate
fags, the
answer’s “
yes”
Sorry if anyone was offended, but that was a verse with exceptional rhyming, jam packing his sentences with rhymes. He is known for pronouncing words to make them rhyme with words that usually wouldn't rhyme on paper, such as the "
dagger" and "Her
maph". Which the ear picks up on.
Here's
wordplay. From
CyHi Da Prynce.
"Back when my daddy was bumping
Earth,
Wind and
FireBlowing 'erb from the
earth and the
wind wants to hit the
fire"
He was playing with the words "Earth, Wind, and Fire", which was also a popular hip hop group back than. Not only does he imply his dad was smoking weed while listening, but he say's the weed is so good, even the wind wants to hit (Smoke) the fire (Blunt).
Double entendre. (These are fun)
"Skinny Jeans don’t mean your ass shoot. It means your booty claps." -
Joel Ortiz."Too many Urkels on your team, that's why your wins low" -
Kanye West.
Those should be easy to catch.
All of this isn't even including the "
History", and "
Emotion", rap carries. That's another whole BOOK!
Maybe the lyrics I'm providing may be setting a bad example, showing how ludicrous rap lyrics can be sometimes. I apologize. All is fun though, right?
. How about some real rap to ease our mental.
For example, I listen to the conscious rappers, like
Kendrick Lamar,
J. Cole, and
Big KRIT, to name a few new school ones. If you love rap, than
Nas,
Pac, and
Wu-Tang Clan, to name a few old school. These are individuals who are not only undoubtedly talented, but more than often are saying something. Then you have your rappers who are insanely gifted with pure lyricism,
Eminem,
Most Def,
Kendrick,
Big L,
Big Pun, and
Notorious B.I.G, to name a few. Also there's rappers who are insanely witty with wordplay,
King Los,
CyHi Da Prynce, and
Kanye West to name a few. Of course there's the pioneers of rap, but that list would be enormously large, but I'm sure most of you are familiar with two who are still relevant,
Jay Z and
Dr. Dre. Some of the rappers listed also belong in all those categories, such as
Eminem,
Pac, and
Nas, while all the others belong in multiple. My point is, rap is an art of many trades, and to me, is a blessing. So, I thought I'd start a post, tell me about music in
your eyes, and maybe even drop a few songs for me to check out! Please be open minded and respectful to anyone posting! No matter the genre. Have fun!
Love, Brad.
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