Aphex_Twin
Evergreen
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2002
- Messages
- 7,474
No style of music is crap, there are only crappy artists.
Is rap crap?
- Thread starter anarchywrksbest
- Start date
hawai_74
mac über alles
The current main stream rap in US is crap, the main stream rap in europe used to be better. But this style has influenced, in a good way, a lot of musicians.
If The Beastie Boys is rap, i like them very much.
If The Beastie Boys is rap, i like them very much.
Darkness
Shadow creature
It's not my thing really, 'cause I prefer rock/metal, but there are some pretty good rappers/rapsongs around...
Bozo Erectus
Master Baker
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2003
- Messages
- 22,389
Is rap crap?
Dont insult crap.
Dont insult crap.
A similiar thread is what brought me to OT, as I felt the need to defend rap. I don't feel like defending it now (I listen to rock and rap). However, to those who say rap is crap, I would like to know what type of music they listen to, and what makes it music, as opposed to rap.
Syterion
Voodoo Economist
IT'S NOT MUSIC UNLESS YOU PLAY AN INSTRUMENT!!!
This is so painstakingly obvious I cannot state it twice because it will be one of the most redundant things since the pre-emptive ban on gay marriage in Ohio.
This is so painstakingly obvious I cannot state it twice because it will be one of the most redundant things since the pre-emptive ban on gay marriage in Ohio.
Laughing Gull
charts, graphs, databases
So when I go and listen to Mozart on the radio, its not really music I'm hearing anymore.... because I'm not playing the Instrument? It was only music when it was first being played by Mozart in real life??
If no,
then Rap is still music because they sample pre-recorded music, and loop it to make the beat.
but they also use real snyths or bass guitars to make bass line.
Rap DJ's often use record players like instruments by finding a set of tones on a section of the record, and cut back and forth arcoss it making new tones and groups of sounds while alternating volume levels.
The hip-hop beats I write are all written on a snyth, and are in fact music.
thestonesfan
A Client of Ron Kuby
What about singing?
Laughing Gull
charts, graphs, databases
shockingly dim view, comming from you.
thestonesfan
A Client of Ron Kuby
I thought it was shockingly lucid, coming from him. 
Karl Lenin
Prince
John Cage has proved you wrong.
GrandAdmiral
Deity
First of all thats not true. Second of all there is no rule that bans the use of instruments in rap songs. There are songs that use instruments.
Rap is just as much music as metal. Maybe they don't use instruments as often but at least you can dance to it. When's the last time you saw anyone with an ounce of rhythm dance to metal?
toh6wy
Emperor
Rap is pretty boring usually, but I don't despise it. But I also think rap is one of the best forms of music to use if you want to parody something - especially if it's rap itself or something not normally considered "cool." 
Prime example: Weird Al.
Prime example: Weird Al.
toh6wy
Emperor
Not to stick up for rap or anything, but it seems that you've never heard of an a cappella choir - or techno, for that matter.
What kind of definition do you have for instrument anyway? Webster's defines an instrument as "A device used by a musician in producing music." Simply because it is a diode creating a tone rather than, say, a breath or a vibrating string doesn't change this definition one bit. The only difference between a sampler, a violin, a synthesizer, a guitar, and a cooking pot beat with a spoon is the technology used to create a specific tone. In other words, a sampler is just as much of an instrument as a guitar.
cgannon64
BOB DYLAN'S ROCKIN OUT!
I disagree. Some electronic stuff is damn good, and that may as well be an instrument in itself.
Its not music if its not musical.
Pontiuth Pilate
Republican Jesus!
shockingly dim view, comming from you...
I thought it was shockingly lucid, coming from him.
Thank you in the peanut gallery. The security guards will escort you to the exit.
Pre-recording synth chords, bass licks, and drumbeats and looping them over and over again ad nauseam [literally] is NOT a sign that some innovative kids have discovered a great new way to utilize technology to make "music". It's a sign that the dropouts never got past page 7 in their guitar chordbook and don't know any other way to write music.
People have been mistaking inept plagiarism for imagination since the beginning of time! Just look at country...
In my musical view of the world, synths have two niches: as piano replacement [chords+imaginative melody], or as chord touchup [doing for the band what the brass section does for the orchestra: acting as a highlighter to bring out selected passages].
Using synths only to pound chords, or even worse, using STRINGS just to moan out chord after chord in IMITATION of a synth, is an insult to these instruments! Strings can be used extremely imaginatively as backup [see "Eleanor Rigby"] and synths can make great music when used skilfully [see all of late 70's rock].
You know what the real problem with rap is? It's not that they can't write good lyrics or sing well once in a while. Hey, some are great singers. It's that they just CANNOT arrange to save their lives. This whole focus on the solo artist is great for selling lunchboxes... but rap proves that a solo artist can't carry anything off by himself. I haven't listened to early hip-hop, but I can imagine that the greatest differences between it and what passes for the same today is that the early movement had "bands" of artists cooperating on equitable levels, a greater focus on instrumentation and melody, and more varied chord structures. Am I right?
The same thing happened to rock by the way... Every style sells out or is bought out eventually.
I thought it was shockingly lucid, coming from him.
Thank you in the peanut gallery. The security guards will escort you to the exit.
Pre-recording synth chords, bass licks, and drumbeats and looping them over and over again ad nauseam [literally] is NOT a sign that some innovative kids have discovered a great new way to utilize technology to make "music". It's a sign that the dropouts never got past page 7 in their guitar chordbook and don't know any other way to write music.
People have been mistaking inept plagiarism for imagination since the beginning of time! Just look at country...
In my musical view of the world, synths have two niches: as piano replacement [chords+imaginative melody], or as chord touchup [doing for the band what the brass section does for the orchestra: acting as a highlighter to bring out selected passages].
Using synths only to pound chords, or even worse, using STRINGS just to moan out chord after chord in IMITATION of a synth, is an insult to these instruments! Strings can be used extremely imaginatively as backup [see "Eleanor Rigby"] and synths can make great music when used skilfully [see all of late 70's rock].
You know what the real problem with rap is? It's not that they can't write good lyrics or sing well once in a while. Hey, some are great singers. It's that they just CANNOT arrange to save their lives. This whole focus on the solo artist is great for selling lunchboxes... but rap proves that a solo artist can't carry anything off by himself. I haven't listened to early hip-hop, but I can imagine that the greatest differences between it and what passes for the same today is that the early movement had "bands" of artists cooperating on equitable levels, a greater focus on instrumentation and melody, and more varied chord structures. Am I right?
The same thing happened to rock by the way... Every style sells out or is bought out eventually.
Pontiuth Pilate
Republican Jesus!
Oh... techno is music, but it's marginal sometimes...
