Rap, Hip Hop, Grime, Drill - call it what you will

I have, what I believe, to be a pretty strong idea for a UP hip hop project involving war history.

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As much as I love Mos, Phaeroe completely murders that track. Most underrated MC of his era.

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Hello everyone so I’m not sure if I’m allowed to post this here but I started a SoundCloud a few weeks ago and I just uploaded a new mixtape today that I recorded last night. Like I’m just learning everything still I’ve only been doing it for a few months so I don’t really know what I’m doing yet with like proper mixing but I’m slowly learning

Anyway I hope you listen and like it :) My music is basically just my diary but through rap and the different characters that I’ve stolen and made my own

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The other day a Rapper from the hip-hop making forum that I post on completely out of the blue made a song like a entire rap song about me and my music world and he name dropped me in the last line of the song and I died ! It’s totally the best feeling ever like it made me feel like a rockstar . so Halle Berry is right it’s the best feeling on earth and I’m a nobody and it’s like made me so happy and hopeful so like I can imagine how awesome it would be if you were Halle Berry

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Kinda turbo-grunching, since I haven’t read this thread much further than this post, but for Shabazz Palaces fans, in Seattle and elsewhere (note the live YouTube stream mentioned at the end):

https://henryart.org/programs/the-engine-room-residencies-ishmael-butler

We are excited to welcome Ishmael Butler, of Shabazz Palaces and Digable Planets, for the second of three artist residencies to activate Gary Simmons: The Engine Room . Butler and collaborators will be bringing his brand of abstract and experimental songcraft to the Henry during the latter half of June.

We invite you to visit the gallery and experience Butler’s process while he is rehearsing, writing, and experimenting in the space. Due to our health and safety protocols, visitors are highly encouraged to sign up for a free timed ticket in advance. Walk-up tickets are very limited. Time spent in the gallery will be limited to maintain a safe occupancy.

In-gallery public residency date:

  • June 26, 1-5 PM

Live Performance Broadcast via the Henry’s YouTube page: July 3, 6 PM (PDT)

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Can’t see it in the title but it’s “Guess Who’s Back”?

Not a big Jay fan but this is one of Kanye’s best beats.

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Lol I literally had that cued up for your next response.

Doesn’t hold up as well as some of the other tracks off that album, IMO, but still one of the best comeback efforts ever.

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I let this thread slip. Gonna post single tracks for a while, as long as I remember.

Actually a double today, cause I love this track and I bet a bunch of ppl ITT haven’t heard it.

The first verse is the worst imo, other three are all good, second is my fave.

Such bars!

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Is no one talking about Kool Moe Dee’s report card? My god, I know I sound like a Boomer but the 90’s was the absolute greatest era ever for rap music. My god, Jay-Z was a borderline C student by the standards of the time. So many great artists practically tripping over each other.

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There was a weird dynamic in the 90’s where you had a whole lot of incredibly talented guys who weren’t raking in a lot of money, which rise to situations where there were would be 5-7 amazing rappers all together on one track. 90’s supergroup hip-hop tracks are maybe my favorite musical genre.

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A lot of genres go though an evolution where there are a smattering of highly influential but coarse early adopters, followed by a surge of extremely creative and talented types that realize the artistic potential of the genre, followed by a mass commercialization that swamps the “artistic” nature of the form with comparatively shallow stuff such that you have to do a bit more digging to find the hidden gems. This is a gross simplification of course but I think it fits the history of hip hop. I think that rap in the 90s was the period where you had the big wave of “second generation” artists that were really, really committed to the genre as art. People like the RZA were present as kids when rap was created as a genre and he dedicated his whole life to making creative hip hop. You can never recapture that magic where a genre has been around long enough to become a comfortable creative currency, but is still largely unexplored for it’s full artistic potential. That was where rap was at in the 1990s (and late 1980s, I suppose).

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I think there’s a kind of multiplier effect that happens when you have a bunch of talented people in the same physical space bouncing ideas off of one another. It’s like the School of Athens of the Solvay quantum physics conference. In my line of work, “hallway conversations” are a routine and celebrated thing: that’s where you’re just walking down the hall and you see some dude and you ask him spur-of-the-moment questions and you wind up bouncing ideas off each other. It would never happen by email or phone.

I think 90’s hip-hop was a bit like that. People running into each other and spontaneously producing creative stuff. I love this bit from the Ghetto Superstar wiki entry; a coked-out ODB wanders into your studio and you let him do a few bars. Pras would have never thought to call ODB up to put him on the track, but if he’s there, why not?

According to Pras, the song was originally intended to be a collaboration only between himself and Mya. Ol’ Dirty Bastard was in the same building, recording with Sunz of Man and mistakenly burst into the studio where Pras and Mya were setting up. Ol’ Dirty Bastard heard the song and asked to be part of it, to which Pras agreed.

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That first list is from liner notes in 1987.

The 2nd list is 20 years old.

Treach rated overall higher than the likes of Nas, Mos, and Black Thought is just silly.

List is extremely weighted towards commercial rappers. Ok Boomer would probably be appropriate.

jfc listen to the details on this one.

Been meaning to post more hip hop content ITT but it’s been long enough that I have to go back and look what I posted so I don’t just double up on stuff.

In the meantime here’s a drum’n’bass set with a live female MC, recorded from a live stream in New Zealand in mid 2020 when the country was in a lockdown.

The whole set is good but I particularly recommend the start through the 12 minute mark or so. You’ll see the MC start with straight up singing and progressively switch in and out of a more straight-up MC mode during the course of the set. Bear in mind that everything is freestyled. This lady’s name is in everyone’s consideration list for best drum’n’bass MC of all time.

You know how you have those friends who like good music but don’t “get” hip hop and you wish you could have them listen through your ears for 30 seconds so they get what sounds good about hip hop? That is me right now with this Youtube. I hope you get it. Go forth and feel the funk.