Old Heads, how many of y'all accepted that today's hip hop had passed you by?

[a_list]

Shyt didnt pass me by, I accepted the fact that most of this shyt I hear is wack though....lol....

 

[rapmusic]

How could hiphop pass you by? Nobody is saying this to country music fans about Taylor Swift and her so called country music. As long as Jay Z makes music, hiphop will not pass me(us) by

 

[DOPEdweebz]

Theres always good hip hop if you're truly a fan of the art, its not hip hops fault you've been brainswashed to thinking whats only on MTV/radio and on the front page of forums is the only hip hop currently floating around.

 

[5th Letter]

I like a lot of the new dope artists that's who I check for. But for the most part I'm listening to mainly 90's music. I can't stand the wackness. People accept it because it bangs in the whip.

 

[mc317]

Lets see this generation

Trickin money/wifin hoes

Nuthugging slacks flourescent shoes=movement

Unlimited coon fukery on tv

90% music autotune and singin about a bitch

I wont no part of this fuckboi shit!!

 

[SupremeXXV]

Some of the music is hot, some of the music is shitty. Just avoid the bullshit and everything should be ok. On another note, this new generation is responsible for making skinny jeans an acceptable form of fashion in hiphop/rap, smh.

 

[waterproof]

30 years old aint old heads first of all they still puppies, mid 30's yeah u an old head in hip-hop years...

hip-hop have not passed me by and i except that the younger shit and those grown ass niggas like 2 chainz who cater to youngins just plain fuckin sucks, the music is wack and the urban radio hip-hop stations are wack also....

there's alot of grown hip-hop that's out there that i support

 

[konceptjones]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

 

[Kwan Dai]

I only judge Hip Hop as Nice or Whack. The time period doesn't matter. Is it unfortunate that the most popular MC's of today can't hold a candle to the MC's that came before them? Yes but such is life.

Ok, but what are the factors for determining "nice or wack"

cuz a lot of times yall base it on rapper A not sounding like rapper B (as you did w/ your question)

every human being is different & in turn every artist is (or should be), so one of the problems I see is yall expect artist to sound a certain way instead of accepting how they sound (wether you like it or not)

there are no rules to making music

Quality, consistency, creativity, and originality for starters. Sprinkle in some intelligence, integrity, and awareness then you have something.

That's ridiculous. I didn't mention anything about rapper A sounding like rapper B. Today's MC can't hold a candle to those before them because, they aren't original, don't focus on quality and more then likely are being told what to create.

Melle Mel didn't sound like Spoonie G. Grand Master Caz didn't sound like Moe Dee. Rakim didn't sound like KRS. Kane didn't sound like G-Rap. Nas didn't sound like Big. I could go on and on. But everyone these Pop, Trap rappers sound like the same Ol rehashed ish. The beats sounds the same. The flows sound the same. You even have engineers tweaking voices in the same pitch so, that dudes sound the same. So, I say to you. Stop engaging me because, while I enjoy healthy debate you are just annoying. I don't do well with folks that stand for nothing and think any type of BS should be put in the atmosphere.

There are rules to making music. That's why a person can actually major in Music at a college, university or school for Music.

 

[king hassan]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

I swear I hear this same sound in songs, it's a high hat and it goes, "tttt tttttt"

 

[OGClarenceBoddicker]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

I swear I hear this same sound in songs, it's a high hat and it goes, "tttt tttttt"

You mean the South's Boom Bap

Shit been a Southern staple since the 80s, only difference now is niggas aint got no choice but to recognize or notice it since no other region's sound is relevant

 

[Idiopathic Joker]

I grew up on 1990s westcoast gangsta rap. You would kinda know my opinion already. I bump the older artists if their new shit is good. Looking forward to that wc and daz album soon. I'll bump a new artists if its decent.

 

[Brian B.]

I only judge Hip Hop as Nice or Whack. The time period doesn't matter. Is it unfortunate that the most popular MC's of today can't hold a candle to the MC's that came before them? Yes but such is life.

Ok, but what are the factors for determining "nice or wack"

cuz a lot of times yall base it on rapper A not sounding like rapper B (as you did w/ your question)

every human being is different & in turn every artist is (or should be), so one of the problems I see is yall expect artist to sound a certain way instead of accepting how they sound (wether you like it or not)

there are no rules to making music

Quality, consistency, creativity, and originality for starters. Sprinkle in some intelligence, integrity, and awareness then you have something.

That's ridiculous. I didn't mention anything about rapper A sounding like rapper B. Today's MC can't hold a candle to those before them because, they aren't original, don't focus on quality and more then likely are being told what to create.

Melle Mel didn't sound like Spoonie G. Grand Master Caz didn't sound like Moe Dee. Rakim didn't sound like KRS. Kane didn't sound like G-Rap. Nas didn't sound like Big. I could go on and on. But everyone these Pop, Trap rappers sound like the same Ol rehashed ish. The beats sounds the same. The flows sound the same. You even have engineers tweaking voices in the same pitch so, that dudes sound the same. So, I say to you. Stop engaging me because, while I enjoy healthy debate you are just annoying. I don't do well with folks that stand for nothing and think any type of BS should be put in the atmosphere.

There are rules to making music. That's why a person can actually major in Music at a college, university or school for Music.

So are pop & trap rappers the only ones puttin out music or are yall jus focusing on them a lil too much?

Ice Cube told us over 20yrs ago to "TURN OFF THAT MUTHAFUCKIN RADIO" but most of yall didn't get the message & still complain about what radio plays til this day

& I'll say it again.. there are no rules to music, but if so what are they?

every verse must be 16 bars? every hook must be 8 bars w/ a bridge after the 2nd hook?

what are the rules to making music?

 

[konceptjones]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

I swear I hear this same sound in songs, it's a high hat and it goes, "tttt tttttt"

You mean the South's Boom Bap

Shit been a Southern staple since the 80s, only difference now is niggas aint got no choice but to recognize or notice it since no other region's sound is relevant

Naw bruh, just naw... That shit didn't appear out the south until the mid to late 90's. We listened to the shit from the south back in the late 80's and early 90's. Closest I can remember having anything like that was Lil Elt "Get The Gat", maybe Tim Smooth's shit but even then it wasn't too different from any other 808 driven shit from Beastie Boys, Run DMC, or especially Too $hort.

 

[Soloman_The_Wise]

I feel in a lose lose with this thread but let me entertain it in this way I see todays music as a evolutionary step away from HipHop. It has clear lineage to Hip Hop a lot of artist do it but it is not hipHop. It is like the seperation of Disco From R&B and Pop/Soft Rock. Disco contained many elements of the latters but was its own entity. I feel this Bastard child just needs a name. As to HipHop itself it still has New Legitimate children that spit the real over the last few years(Kendrick, Krit, Lupe to name a few) along with Vets that keep Grinding so it is still flowing regardless of whats its kids are doing...

 

[lamontbdc]

in terms of high hat yall talking bout this right? just making sure i'm not confused b/c this shit ain't no staple of southern hip hop in the 80s, and this isn't no boom bap

 

[OGClarenceBoddicker]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

I swear I hear this same sound in songs, it's a high hat and it goes, "tttt tttttt"

You mean the South's Boom Bap

Shit been a Southern staple since the 80s, only difference now is niggas aint got no choice but to recognize or notice it since no other region's sound is relevant

Naw bruh, just naw... That shit didn't appear out the south until the mid to late 90's. We listened to the shit from the south back in the late 80's and early 90's. Closest I can remember having anything like that was Lil Elt "Get The Gat", maybe Tim Smooth's shit but even then it wasn't too different from any other 808 driven shit from Beastie Boys, Run DMC, or especially Too $hort.

Dead at late 90s you disqualified yoself and im playin myself for even replyin but I will

DJ Spanish Fly, DJ Magic Mike, 2 Live Crew just to name a few from the late 80s. The shit been in Memphis, Miami, and New Orleans foreva, of course it wuddnt no swag, flex, finesse type attitude to run wit it like it is today but the tweets was still there.

The talk of "808's" these past couple of years since Lex Luger took off don confused me. I always interpreted "808's" to be basslines, not treble, most of you niggas refer to tweets and hi-hats as "808" I dont understand, so i'm lost right there.

Tweets and hi-hats, that doubled up sound. The shit come from Miami Bass, New Orleans Bounce, and Memphis Buck(ALL DUE RESPECT TO AFRIKA BAMBATTA/SHOW BOYZ DRAG RAP/RODNEY O AND JOE COOLEY, NIGGAS LAID THE BLUEPRINT)

You can hear the sound from just about any Southern rapper from any decade, it just aint all crazy sped up and definitely not sped the fuck up like it is today, even though Triple 6 had summa they shit crazy sped up like today since about 93-94

And Too Short dem my niggas but they aint have that bass waingin and wammin like Miami Bass artists

and beastie boys, mc shan, run dmc(sucker mcs is hand claps a sum shit) and them niggas sho aint have them tweets like Miami Bass

 

[king hassan]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

I swear I hear this same sound in songs, it's a high hat and it goes, "tttt tttttt"

You mean the South's Boom Bap

Shit been a Southern staple since the 80s, only difference now is niggas aint got no choice but to recognize or notice it since no other region's sound is relevant

My nigga, I lived in the Sip my last few years in high school. All this down south, east and west coast is a bunch of bullshit. IF a nigga can't recognize good music from any region he just a wack ass fuck nigga anyway. And no, that sound was not in all southern records homie, not at all

 

[OGClarenceBoddicker]

in terms of high hat yall talking bout this right? just making sure i'm not confused b/c this shit ain't no staple of southern hip hop in the 80s, and this isn't no boom bap

We talkin bout Rap music doe not Jazz a whateva that is

It would be ridiculous for a Hip Hop fan to NOT relate 808s and hi-hats to Southern Hip Hop

 

[konceptjones]

I look at the shit on a technical level since I was once an aspiring MC, I've DJ'ed, and currently an on-again-off-again producer.

The structure of today's rhymes is about as elementary as it gets without directly quoting Mother Goose. Listen to the shit that was on the radio from '88 to about '97 and compare it to the joints you hear today. I'd go so far as to say that a cat like Vanilla Ice could battle all of these rappers out today and would prolly slaughter 80% of them.

The over reliance on hooks, the simplifying of similes, rhyme patterns that don't change from one artist to the next (we used to think biting a style was wack in my day), to not even trying to find words that rhyme makes todays MC's skills sub-par at best. Punchlines are now a single word at the end of a mostly silent bar 'cause anything more would lose your audience's attention.

The mechanics if it all are just fucked up.

Production-wise, we moved away from sample-heavy joints, but what most tracks nowadays lack is structure and the soul that we had from those old joints. The tracks nowadays take center stage barely giving the MC a chance to breathe on his own. You have to struggle to hear the rapper over the instrumentals! Retarded high hat builds, synths drowning out everything, layered to the point where even they fight for space and the fact that most of these cats use the same presets on their tracks without even tweaking them makes for a bland, dull repetitive sonic sound scape that sorely lacks in creativity.

I know that, at one point, hip hop relied on the same ass samples (funky drummer, impeach the president, skull snaps, Nautilus, etc), but as a whole we moved away from that, or got far more creative in flippin those samples to the point where no two tracks that used the same sample sounded alike. This, sadly, is not the case these days. Most of the club anthems use the same drum patterns with very little variation in anything.

I don't like the current crop of rappers not because I don't understand it, I do... probably a lot better than most would ever admit. I don't like it because it just doesn't sound good. There's a few cats that show promise, I'll admit that, but those MC's are few and far between.

I swear I hear this same sound in songs, it's a high hat and it goes, "tttt tttttt"

You mean the South's Boom Bap

Shit been a Southern staple since the 80s, only difference now is niggas aint got no choice but to recognize or notice it since no other region's sound is relevant

Naw bruh, just naw... That shit didn't appear out the south until the mid to late 90's. We listened to the shit from the south back in the late 80's and early 90's. Closest I can remember having anything like that was Lil Elt "Get The Gat", maybe Tim Smooth's shit but even then it wasn't too different from any other 808 driven shit from Beastie Boys, Run DMC, or especially Too $hort.

Dead at late 90s you disqualified yoself and im playin myself for even replyin but I will

DJ Spanish Fly, DJ Magic Mike, 2 Live Crew just to name a few from the late 80s. The shit been in Memphis, Miami, and New Orleans foreva, of course it wuddnt no swag, flex, finesse type attitude to run wit it like it is today but the tweets was still there.

The style of music that was coming out of Miami and the rest of the south didn't have the rapid-fire hats like they do now, it's completely different due to the way it was programmed back then vs now. Go back and listen to old Magic Mike, DJ Laz, Dynamix II, Maggotron Crew, or DJ Fury, shit is a lot different than the shit you hear today.

The talk of "808's" these past couple of years since Lex Luger took off don confused me. I always interpreted "808's" to be basslines, not treble, most of you niggas refer to tweets and hi-hats as "808" I dont understand, so i'm lost right there.

We refer to the 808 as a complete instrument. This means the kick drum, snare, clap, hats, toms, sidestick, and the cowbell. All of those sounds make up the 808 and they're all instantly recognizable as such.

Tweets and hi-hats, that doubled up sound. The shit come from Miami Bass, New Orleans Bounce, and Memphis Buck(ALL DUE RESPECT TO AFRIKA BAMBATTA/SHOW BOYZ DRAG RAP/RODNEY O AND JOE COOLEY, NIGGAS LAID THE BLUEPRINT)

You still don't get it... It was all in use before there was ever such a thing as bounce or buck.

You can hear the sound from just about any Southern rapper from any decade, it just aint all crazy sped up and definitely not sped the fuck up like it is today, even though Triple 6 had summa they shit crazy sped up like today since about 93-94

^^^ These southern rappers from the 80's disagree with you.

and @ the bolded: That's what I'm talking about. Just because cats in the south used the 808 sounds themselves, does not mean the sound we're talking about originated there in the timeframe you're saying (the late 80's). The way it's done now started in the mid to late 90's. In the 80's, southern rappers were doing the same shit with the 808 that Rick Rubin was doing on Run DMC, LL Cool J, and Beastie Boy records.

And Too Short dem my niggas but they aint have that bass waingin and wammin like Miami Bass artists

and beastie boys, mc shan, run dmc(sucker mcs is hand claps a sum shit) and them niggas sho aint have them tweets like Miami Bass

have another listen.