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Rap is honestly complete shit - Page 2

Blogs > EngrishTeacher
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batsnacks
Profile Blog Joined April 2014
United States4466 Posts
June 20 2015 15:01 GMT
#21
You shouldn't generalize the entire genre just because your friends listen to shitty music. "Rap" isn't even one genre or subculture. This blog is the equivalent of declaring that "rock," and with it metal, classical, grunge, etc, is complete shit because their friends won't stop listening to Creed.
helpman177
Profile Blog Joined June 2015
56 Posts
June 20 2015 15:41 GMT
#22
Yeah it's like saying A Song of Ice and Fire is shit because writing it didn't require as much skill as writing Ulysses.
Glowsphere
Profile Blog Joined November 2014
United States170 Posts
June 20 2015 15:55 GMT
#23
I think to appreciate rap you have to be sensible to rhythm over melody. As others have said, there is artistic rap and then there is pure commercial garbage. It's much like country music, which is so reviled even though a lot of the old stuff is really good.
Textual
Profile Joined June 2014
Saudi Arabia57 Posts
June 20 2015 15:58 GMT
#24
On June 20 2015 18:51 EngrishTeacher wrote:
TL;DR: all my arguments are based around the complexity of music. More complex music offers a higher level of enjoyment with some effort and training, and also provides a lot more "re-listenability"


I tentatively agree. I'm musically illiterate, but I've spent some time with poetry and the idea of "re-listenability", or re-readability, certainly resonates.

A lot of people are dog-piling on how trite rap lyrics are. I agree, but I would be quick to also point out that the same is true, in general, of rock, pop, metal, and all the other popular music genres today; they clearly don't contain the complexity, nuance, or depth of great poems. That said, lyrics don't need to be great in order to be good - the production of songs today underlies the cultural role they play. The bad news is that the music is generally disposable - listen a couple times and then move on. The good news is there's always something new.

To get people to enjoy the arts, the key is to get them engaged young - at least according to studies done in Canada and America. People never exposed to an art form at a young age are very, very unlikely to appreciate it when they are older. So, if you want more interest in classical music, fund arts programs in schools.
benhopper151
Profile Joined June 2015
51 Posts
June 20 2015 16:24 GMT
#25
So elitist, its just sound.
Skynx
Profile Blog Joined January 2013
Turkey7150 Posts
June 20 2015 16:57 GMT
#26
[image loading]

User was warned for this post
"When seagulls follow the troller, it is because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea. Thank you very much" - King Cantona | STX 4 eva
GreenHorizons
Profile Blog Joined April 2011
United States23514 Posts
June 20 2015 17:33 GMT
#27
I pretty much only listen to electro (psytrance, some house, basically the 5% good stuff before the genre went mainstream), classical and metal with a few sparse songs from other genres.


No wonder they don't let you touch the music.

"People like to look at history and think 'If that was me back then, I would have...' We're living through history, and the truth is, whatever you are doing now is probably what you would have done then" "Scratch a Liberal..."
ShambhalaWar
Profile Joined August 2013
United States930 Posts
June 20 2015 18:47 GMT
#28
On June 20 2015 19:35 EngrishTeacher wrote:
Show nested quote +
On June 20 2015 19:28 Surth wrote:
lol

I guess what I'm trying to say is, there just might be some objectivity in what constitutes "good music", and in the end it's all about simply deriving pleasure vs. being overwhelmed by waves pure auditory ecstasy.


"Being overhwelmed by waves of pure auditory ecstasy" is simply another way of saying "deriving pleasure". Don't try to elevate your music to something that its not. And if you want to be overwhelmed by waves of pure sound, try Tim Hecker. or SunnO))).

---

I guess despite trying hard not to be elitist, I personally just value the complexity of music, and more importantly the training required to produce/appreciate such music

The training required to produce music is entirely irrelevant. the aura of the work of art is dead, yo, didn't you read Walter Benjamin?

---


In this one regard, I truly believe my aforementioned music genres are "better" in terms of their value in "re-listenability". I could appreciate a catch melody even though I might find the song to be terrible overall, but 1-2 listenings of your average hip-hop song is more than enough for me without an extensive break. In comparison, for more complex music, especially those that offer a ton of polyphony, I'm getting something different out of it almost every time I put on my headphones. The simplistic "emotional appeal" of popular music, IMO gets tiresome pretty fast even for your average listener.

Music always has "emotional appeal." That is in fact everything there is to music. If you don't listen to Bach for the emotion (of which there is plenty, which is why Bach is so good), there is something seriously wrong with you, classical training or not.


No, euphoria is a much stronger diction choice than pleasure.

Training required to produce music is VERY relevant, are you telling me you don't appreciate the skill level of good musicians?

Lastly, what I meant by "emotional appeal" was a direct reply to Soularion. Of course all music has emotional appeal, the difference lies with when you solely rely on eliciting an emotional response.


Anyway, way to ignore all my points and simply try to pick apart the weaker semantics in my post.


Let me start by saying that I agree with you, the technical difference between a classical cellist and even a great hip hop artist is still a great difference in virtuosity (imo). But I also think, you and I may not be giving the hip hop master nearly enough credit.

As far as virtuosity goes, its not really that appreciated in general by the population. There is much more support for the emotional appeal of music. Clearly people vote with their money and attention, and that is way rap and a lot of pop country/other music is at the top of the charts. Look at jazz music, it had its time and now it has past popular attention. I think its arguable jazz produced some of the greatest musicians of all time. Definitely on par technically with any classical artist. You can't evenly compare the two, but the raw understanding of music in both genres is deep. Like a language you cannot simply just "speak" it, you must learn and practice it to say something intelligent.

Rap music, hip hop, whatever you want to call it, is the product of a subculture. This culture has been extremely repressed in many ways, especially in the realm of socioeconomics. Most people in rap don't care about the violin because, who the fuck has 10,000 dollars to spend on an instrument. For that matter, in that same culture who has 40 dollars a week to pay for 1 hour with a teacher? How many teachers did have you had spoon feeding you lifetimes of study from great musicians so you could avoid many of the pitfalls of learning people experienced prior to you during their learning process?

In short, if you have no money, no training, and no cello what is the real statical percentage that you become the next yoyo ma (I think it's probably < .01). You see where I'm going with this? I could say a lot more, but I'm not that interested in trying to prove a point. Just try to have more of an open mind.

Check out "Resurrection" by Common Sense, specifically the song "I used to love her" (who had to change his name to "Common" cause someone else had that name before him). This song addresses your criticisms about hip hop, from the mouth of an artist in the genre. More impressive he wrote it in 1994.

Try rapping yourself and actually making a GOOD recording that people want to listen to and is virtuoso level. Maybe you can get some insight into the depth of this form of art.
ShambhalaWar
Profile Joined August 2013
United States930 Posts
June 20 2015 18:48 GMT
#29
On June 21 2015 01:57 Skynx wrote:
[image loading]


Omg, im not sure I understand this, but I've run into ninazerg and this made me smile/laugh.
JieXian
Profile Blog Joined August 2008
Malaysia4677 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-06-21 03:16:04
June 20 2015 19:16 GMT
#30
To start it let me say that I can read sheet music, learnt classical guitar for 7 years and I compose orchestral instrumental tracks and some electronic music. I completely understand where you're coming from if you've only been exposed to certain artists, because I don't enjoy many of them either.

You know that there can be a similar blog written about metal and electronic music right? Electronic "musicians " don't know how to play an instrument, they only press play. Metal "musicians" make a lot of noise, screaming and shouting isn't music but noise. Distorted guitar shredding is noise. Talking about sick things like death and Raping a limbless cadaver is NOT music. Etc.

On June 20 2015 20:13 helpman177 wrote:https://youtube.com/watch?v=ooOL4T-BAg0



Great video. There are already a lot of good suggestions here. You should try Eminem's Marshal Mathers LP and definitely the Eminem song featured in that video below, which happens to be one of my favorite rap songs:



Very important video to understand Eminem's lyrics.


Timestamped interview about the work that goes into being Eminem




Symphonic music is hard and complex but they don't use language (Opera aside, I haven't listened to much opera but the ones I've listened to and understood like Carmen are shallow anyway.). There is definitely a play of rhythm and synchopation involved in rap.



On June 20 2015 18:51 EngrishTeacher wrote:
Edit: would be VERY interested in a correlational study that looks into basic music training (i'm talking about just being able to read sheet music and maybe mess around with entry-level pieces on an instrument) in relation to genres preferred. Obviously there are tons of other factors at play (culture, socio-economic status, etc.), but I'm willing to bet that more people would forgo your typical popular music for more complex ones with just a bit of training. It's a matter of "cheap pleasure" vs. a higher appreciation of the arts, and the 2 main reasons that most people are content with popular music is due to the huge obstacle in acquiring a music education, and the endless waves of new popular music that comes out daily in order to continuing fueling the instant auditory pleasure.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, there just might be some objectivity in what constitutes "good music", and in the end it's all about simply deriving pleasure vs. being overwhelmed by waves pure auditory ecstasy.

TL;DR: all my arguments are based around the complexity of music. More complex music offers a higher level of enjoyment with some effort and training, and also provides a lot more "re-listenability"


i have a friend who was a conductor for his school symphonic band, plays the trombone, knows every classical composer and doesn't listen to certain pieces because it's too popular or listen to Brahms because he thinks that Brahms is overrated etc etc

He loves the shittiest type of hip hop and rap that I don't like.

hahaha


PS: I used to look down on electronic music but it's actually UNIMAGINABLY complex. A classical composer would not be able to replicate a simple song like Animals. And definitely not scary monsters and nice sprites.

Hope you'll like it
Please send me a PM of any song you like that I most probably never heard of! I am looking for people to chat about writing and producing music | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noD-bsOcxuU |
Serpest
Profile Blog Joined February 2011
United States603 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-06-20 19:24:43
June 20 2015 19:24 GMT
#31
On June 20 2015 22:45 Bannt wrote:
Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.


Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Belts off, trousers down,
isn't life a scream. HAH~!
A person that attempts to diagnose themselves has a fool for a doctor and a bigger fool for a patient.
ninazerg
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United States7291 Posts
June 20 2015 20:40 GMT
#32
This is really bad thread comrade

Here's why!

I dislike Trance. It's not my cup of tea. I don't think the genre itself is worthless, because apparently, a lot of people like it for some reason. I don't know why. However, something bothers me.

I pretty much only listen to electro (psytrance, some house, basically the 5% good stuff before the genre went mainstream), classical and metal with a few sparse songs from other genres.


Not sure where the "5%" comes from, but I'm sure you went through some huge sample size and came up with that figure after a long, exhaustive research project for your local university. I can draw some interesting parallels between your figure and the figures attributed to hip-hop music. Many urban music scholars have isolated "good" rap music and "shit" rap music into two, distinct groups, and the sample of "good" rap music is nearly identical in percentile points to the percentage of electro music that you yourself have found to be "good". How coincidental is that shit?

"If two pregnant women get into a fist fight, it's like a mecha-battle between two unborn babies." - Fyodor Dostoevsky
Qwyn
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
United States2779 Posts
June 20 2015 22:33 GMT
#33
On June 20 2015 18:06 Soularion wrote:

- Mick Jenkins [#montreal, although he's not from here]



MICK JENKINS MAD REP! Drink mo water!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"Think of the hysteria following the realization that they consciously consume babies and raise the dead people from their graves" - N0
brickrd
Profile Blog Joined March 2014
United States4894 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-06-21 00:01:46
June 20 2015 23:41 GMT
#34
well it's pretty much been covered, but yeah, the debate over whether there's such a thing as objectively good music is completely pointless and asinine. even if you deftly and successfully manage to define a bunch of things you think are components of good/important/noble music (technical skill, complexity, etc.) at the end of your pompous bullshit you're still just saying "your enjoyment is worth less than mine because i'm thinking harder during mine" which, you know, makes you seem like an asshole who's trying to make people feel bad. also the mental gymnastics about "objectivity" in entertainment are lodged so firmly in your butthole that i can smell what you ate by reading your post

now that's not to say i don't understand the sentiment of detesting an entire genre and wanting to rant about what garbage it is. the way you feel about rap is the way i feel about dubstep, most types of metal and any variety of screamy/whiny rock made by misogynistic twentysomething white dudes. but there's really no escaping the fact that you're essentially trolling here - maybe trolling with a lowercase "t," but still absolutely trolling. if you weren't trying to draw attention and fire to your opinion you could have easily titled it something harmless like "my problems with rap/why i don't like rap/etc. etc." but hey, i'm not saying you're doing anything wrong. do whatever you want. it just makes you look a bit vitriolic and silly

logically speaking my issue with your rant is that a lot of your complaints against rap can be made just as effectively against massive swaths of music in other popular (and unpopular!) genres. are you going to tell me white trash rock music isn't full of rudimentary, repetitive songwriting and lyrics about women and drugs/alcohol? if you're going to argue that a "higher percentage" of rap has those characteristics i call bullshit unless you're going to show me some kind of actual study or analysis. otherwise you're just lazily repeating a stereotype, which is pretty poor stuff coming from such a self-styled musical aesthete

edit: also the dude trying to defend rap using eminem is making me fucking cringe lol. how long are people going to keep screaming about how lyrically/verbally proficient eminem is before they realize that they're just clinging out of nostalgia to shock horseshit they liked when they were 12? regardless of any debate about his lyrical chops his music and image and personality are so totally godawful and unredeemable
TL+ Member
rabidch
Profile Joined January 2010
United States20289 Posts
June 20 2015 23:41 GMT
#35
On June 21 2015 01:24 benhopper151 wrote:
So elitist, its just sound.

Sound is overrated. I prefer feeling electromagnetic frequencies that can't be perceived by normal people (aka people with bad taste) such as radio waves and infrared. It's sad that nobody truly understands the cosmic world we live in simply because they can't get it. Though, nothing gets me more baked than Gamma rays.
LiquidDota StaffOnly a true king can play the King.
Muffloe
Profile Joined December 2012
Sweden6061 Posts
June 20 2015 23:57 GMT
#36
On June 21 2015 01:24 benhopper151 wrote:
So elitist, its just sound.

As someone who went to music school, I don't know if I should find this offensive or not
puppykiller
Profile Blog Joined August 2009
United States3137 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-06-21 01:56:01
June 21 2015 01:54 GMT
#37
See you have made the mistake of taking that bit of theory about music that you have learned and then overextending it to make sweeping critiques of music you know nothing about.

Due to this thread you have been educated a little bit. However I wager that you are going to make the exact same mistake again and go on making sweeping assumptive judgments with the only change being that you will now consider a few more qualities in rap music as having value than you did originally when you made this thread.

My advice?
1. Stop applying your value criteria to things that were never even intended to suit it as a way to mentally masturbate yourself into feeling superior.
2. Remember that the music education that you were given is not handed out to the mainstream, that you are lucky to have it, and that it is pathetic to use the knowledge given to you as an excuse to hate on people that don't have it and probably don't even care to have it.
3. Not everything is a dick measuring contest. Minecraft is a great game.
Why would I play sctoo when I can play BW?
ninazerg
Profile Blog Joined October 2009
United States7291 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-06-21 02:00:34
June 21 2015 01:59 GMT
#38
On June 21 2015 01:57 Skynx wrote:
[image loading]


First of all, I'd like say happy birthday, from America to Turkey
Before this thread goes dry like jerky, I wanna say it's really starting to irk me
We have a fusion of delusional musing over music and confusing acute accusing
Like it's a huge thing, when we should be defusing instead of arguing over who's losing
This is an argument over the internet where too many minds choose to intersect
Like let's see who can win the bet: who can go longer before they screw their intellect?
Now the OP is like 'Woe is me', 'Rap is only retards attempting poetry'
When you know that shit is fully loaded dissing a whole genre openly
You say you like trance, while I like rap, so let's dance with verbosity
Let's slam on our keyboards and see who comes out with most potent cogency
Nah, let's skip that and talk facts, cut the fat, and if you wanna talk trash, cut the crap
Let's get our asses down to brass tacks before we decide to fuck with rap
You say only five percent of electro is good or something of the sorts
I'd say the same; ninety-five percent of rappers are straight-up just dorks
Talking about driving a porsche full of models into fucking five-star resorts
Cuz some whack album went diamond and a dope album went quartz
That's why Skrillex is wearing a Rolex and Iggy is wearing a Schwartz
It's like letting the worst players on the team be up first to play sports
Some people like visceral sound that just connects; love it, like it explicitly
Some people like scriptural sound that is complex; some like the simplicity
Now trance isn't my cup of tea, but I'd never say 'fuck you' to electronic sound
With the avant-garde layers and bass that makes the tectonics pound
But come on, learn to appreciate hip-hop music and give it affection
I hope you can do so upon more research and further reflection
cuz it's just culture; just another form of human expression
You can see it too if you just readjust your sense of perception
"If two pregnant women get into a fist fight, it's like a mecha-battle between two unborn babies." - Fyodor Dostoevsky
bookwyrm
Profile Joined March 2014
United States722 Posts
June 21 2015 02:13 GMT
#39
Subtle - The New White
si hortum in bibliotheca habes, deerit nihil
puppykiller
Profile Blog Joined August 2009
United States3137 Posts
June 21 2015 02:46 GMT
#40
To be honest the obvious synopsis of why he's donning and not quashing hopsin in his comments
is probs cuz of hopsin's admonishment of pop genres.

From what people posted. he will focus, on the most clicked. "underground" poet spit. motion pic,
over which. he can hold his glimpse, zone in then, wonder loud "holy shit, so this is, fully rich,
must turn down, moby dick.
Why would I play sctoo when I can play BW?
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