I felt that was true for a long time. There are a lot of sub-genres out there that don’t promote that kind of thing. Honestly, and this is probably me wearing a conspiracy theorist hat, a lot of hip-hop that essentially glorified a lot of horrible traits was just what a lot of old, rich white dudes figured would make them money.
Look into underground hip hop, there’s all sorts of awesome music of much higher caliber than mainstream rap/hip hop.
Mf Doom, Busdriver, Kool Keith (and his many many aliases), Aesop Rock (not ASAP Rocky or whatever), and I’m sure lots of newer stuff I’m not even familiar with. Digable Planets are pretty big and they’re good (and old, like me)
I’ve dabbled into some underground stuff. I like hopsin for one. I’ve heard of Mf Doom but couldn’t pick out a song.
For me it’s less the rapper themselves it’s what they’re rapping about.
I don’t like music I can’t relate to and I can’t relate to most rap songs. I’m not out here thuggin or poppin caps, doing drugs and fuckin bitches. I don’t even really want to do those things. So that erases almost half the damn genre out the gate.
I like certain rap songs like tech9’s Dysfunctional or Am I a Psycho or Eminem or NF’s stuff but for the most part I can’t stand most of it.
And the glorification of “thugging” is what I mean by raps negative impacts.
I don’t like music I can’t relate to and I can’t relate to most rap songs. I’m not out here thuggin or poppin caps, doing drugs and fuckin removed. I don’t even really want to do those things. So that erases almost half the damn genre out the gate.
I promise I’m not trying to spam you with stuff!
With that specific criticism in mind, I listen to what I listen to because of the lyrics for the most part, and I’m not into those things either. Here are some examples I’d recommend.
Some folks don’t like Atmosphere’s style much, but I’m recommending these to you because of their lyrics, specifically. (Personally I think these are both bangers though.)
(If you have them, put on some nice headphones. Esp for Brother Ali.)
I am not trying to make you “like” Rap, FYI. Folks like what they like.
I’m just trying to open a path to show you that how you described it in your prior comment does not describe most hip hop - even if it describes most hip hop you have heard. 🙂
I’ve had a hard time getting into Aesop Rock, but he comes up so often I should try again.
I have enjoyed most Busdriver that I’ve heard, but I admit I often have to look up his lyrics to understand them, and it’s probably discouraged me from exploring his catalog more than I have. My fave that I’ve heard of his is Much, partially because he slows it down a bit.
Digable Planets - I only knew them for The Rebirth of Slick for decades. Took a deeper look a couple years ago and was blown away. They are high on my list now. Love their sound. Good recommendation there!
I hear you on Busdriver, I tend to not listen to the words and just hear it as a sort of instrument so it doesn’t matter what he’s saying. But for those that do, I could see it being too much, same with Kool Keith.
I’ll check out Brother Ali, I’ve heard of him but not his music.
Yes unpopular, but your final sentence indicates a deep lack of understanding regarding the origins, purpose, and breadth of the genre.
You are welcome to your opinion, and I’m 100% sure that no one coming in like that is going to look any deeper. I’m just sharing my opinion that yours is uninformed and superficial.
Hey that’s fair. I’m not privy to a lot of the socioeconomic shit that took/takes place that led to the rise of rap and what I call ghetto culture.
I just think it’s been glorified to the point people who have no experience with ghetto culture outside of rap music start acting like they thugs n shit. Like “gangster” shit started happening everywhere with a shitload of people fully embracing not only the visual look but the “hustler” “gangster” lifestyle.
Also don’t mistake my ignorance for inability to learn. I’m willing to listen and learn about it all I just don’t think it’ll change my outlook on how it’s effected everyone everywhere negatively.
And you know maybe I’m wrong and I’m just upset things aren’t changing the way I want them to. In that case oh well I’ll live.
Well thank you for the response, which I admit I expected to not exist or to be rude. 🙂
I’m willing to listen and learn about it all I just don’t think it’ll change my outlook on how it’s effected everyone everywhere negatively.
I wasn’t going to push this on you, but this 4-part documentary literally takes the exact opposite stance and is a documentary regarding the formation and evolution of hip-hop. You don’t owe me anything, but if you are legit interested…
I believe it’s available on at least a couple different streaming services, as well as on the high seas.
Having watched it myself, please resist the temptation to skip around if you do give it a shot. There’s a through-line that will be less apparent if you watch it all chopped up, or skip past certain sections.
I just think it’s been glorified to the point people who have no experience with ghetto culture outside of rap music start acting like they thugs n shit. Like “gangster” shit started happening everywhere with a shitload of people fully embracing not only the visual look but the “hustler” “gangster” lifestyle.
This very thing is discussed at one point, FWIW. 🙂
And you know maybe I’m wrong and I’m just upset things aren’t changing the way I want them to.
I’m about the whitest looking person you could imagine, and I’m in my mid-late 50s. I grew up with a good dose of privilege, but (fortunately?) was thrust into situations through early to mid adulthood that forced me to step outside my comfort zone quite a bit. I look like I should be walking around with a maga hat and intimidating voters with my open-carry firearms, not pseudo-anonymously trying to convince a stranger to give hip hop another chance.
A lot of things haven’t progressed the way I expected them to, either, and I am very familiar with how easy it is to misjudge things that are not within your lived experience.
Hip-Hop is a mirror of what is, not the progenitor of the nation’s problems. It sometimes looks like the progenitor to folks who haven’t previously experienced some of what it reflects in their own daily lives though, I think.
Personally, the only place I’m hearing voices raised about the issues I care about in modern music (and this could be my own narrow view) is within the subgenre of “conscious hip hop.”
You should watch Hip Hop Evolution on Netflix—or the first three/four seasons. Because it will tell you a lot. Like, your opinion generalizes so much that it’s really dancing on the line just this side of problematic.
I just think it’s been glorified to the point people who have no experience with ghetto culture outside of rap music start acting like they thugs n shit. Like “gangster” shit started happening everywhere with a shitload of people fully embracing not only the visual look but the “hustler” “gangster” lifestyle.
My perspective on this, is that the chicken came before the egg so to speak.
Rappers dont glorify these things anymore than metal bands singing about decipitating hundreds of people mean it; all art is fiction, we wont be calling a horror film writer a ‘glorification of violence’, we call it a fantasy, a reflection of reality; these people observe reality and reflect it in art.
Now, does some rap stray into reality? Sure, so does all art, unless we fully remove the human from art it will always involve a real person.
Voting for a liberal continues the cycle of underclass exploitation either way, id say the middle class cocaine user and the politican locking up millions of people into small prison cells for drug use has a much bigger hand in creating and perputating the cycle of violence that dominates liberal society in america.
To accent my point and show how the way you are thinking is a symptom of a moral panic, something that takes a few examples and inflates it into a wider group…
90% of drill artists banned from making music in the UK dont have a criminal record…85% of those banned without a criminal record are black.
Its the censoring of the mental production of black youths; the upper class do not want a culture based on anti-authoritianism to emerge.
Rap was important and had a clear goal; to inspire afroamerican people, kids to learn, to live their life and fight for their rights. to get up from the ghetto, to keep on going, make them see they aren’t alone, they have their backs by the community. (In the US)
this all was rather successfull.
but then, I don’t know what rap’s function is today. if there is any… so what you are saying, I can aggree with it, but I tend not to forget what was the original goal of this genre, and this is why I can’t completely dismiss rap.
Agreed wholeheartedly. And just to pile on another unpopular opinion: it all sounds like trash. Literally it’s not music. Just a repetitive beat while some douchebag talks fast at you.
Most rap sucks and it’s effects on mainstream media have had detrimental effects on society as a whole.
It literally just glorifies the ghetto lifestyle of being a piece of shit and acting like it’s the only way you can live life.
I get this is an unpopular opinion but 99% of the time I hear this take its just barely masked racism.
I felt that was true for a long time. There are a lot of sub-genres out there that don’t promote that kind of thing. Honestly, and this is probably me wearing a conspiracy theorist hat, a lot of hip-hop that essentially glorified a lot of horrible traits was just what a lot of old, rich white dudes figured would make them money.
Counter example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMwGT55A8k (sorry about the YT link, but that’s where I know this lives)
Arrested Development touches on that in at least a few of their recent songs. This is one that immediately springs to mind, but there are others:
Full lyrics here
Song here
do i have to tell you how this industry goes down
they wanna promote us as the lowest things around
stereotypical images of blacks all around
police beat us to the ground
do i have to tell you how this industry goes down
promote the thugs with the criminal sound
stereotypical images and white supremacist images of us never innocent it kills
kills, snitches and witnesses
i guess the business is exploit us sexually
but keep us intellectually primitive
sedate the sensitive
nullifying all their initiative
to ever unify, just relying on representatives
our english is now seen as this, opposite of geniuses
the truth is meaningless
they deliberately been deceiving us
…
Edit: Realized the lyrics site had a couple words wrong.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Song here
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://www.piped.video/watch?v=rhMwGT55A8k
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
its* effects.
Yup. Unpopular opinion indeed. Upvoted.
Look into underground hip hop, there’s all sorts of awesome music of much higher caliber than mainstream rap/hip hop.
Mf Doom, Busdriver, Kool Keith (and his many many aliases), Aesop Rock (not ASAP Rocky or whatever), and I’m sure lots of newer stuff I’m not even familiar with. Digable Planets are pretty big and they’re good (and old, like me)
.
I’ve dabbled into some underground stuff. I like hopsin for one. I’ve heard of Mf Doom but couldn’t pick out a song.
For me it’s less the rapper themselves it’s what they’re rapping about.
I don’t like music I can’t relate to and I can’t relate to most rap songs. I’m not out here thuggin or poppin caps, doing drugs and fuckin bitches. I don’t even really want to do those things. So that erases almost half the damn genre out the gate.
I like certain rap songs like tech9’s Dysfunctional or Am I a Psycho or Eminem or NF’s stuff but for the most part I can’t stand most of it.
And the glorification of “thugging” is what I mean by raps negative impacts.
I promise I’m not trying to spam you with stuff!
With that specific criticism in mind, I listen to what I listen to because of the lyrics for the most part, and I’m not into those things either. Here are some examples I’d recommend.
Some folks don’t like Atmosphere’s style much, but I’m recommending these to you because of their lyrics, specifically. (Personally I think these are both bangers though.)
(If you have them, put on some nice headphones. Esp for Brother Ali.)
A couple from Atmosphere:
Okay
Let me know what you want
Brother Ali has a couple that really speak to me too:
Can’t Take That Away
Uncle Sam Goddamn
I am not trying to make you “like” Rap, FYI. Folks like what they like.
I’m just trying to open a path to show you that how you described it in your prior comment does not describe most hip hop - even if it describes most hip hop you have heard. 🙂
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/CnkSW_J5Fww
https://piped.video/DOSUexERmhA
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
I’ve had a hard time getting into Aesop Rock, but he comes up so often I should try again.
I have enjoyed most Busdriver that I’ve heard, but I admit I often have to look up his lyrics to understand them, and it’s probably discouraged me from exploring his catalog more than I have. My fave that I’ve heard of his is Much, partially because he slows it down a bit.
Digable Planets - I only knew them for The Rebirth of Slick for decades. Took a deeper look a couple years ago and was blown away. They are high on my list now. Love their sound. Good recommendation there!
I’ve got to also recommend Brother Ali.
I hear you on Busdriver, I tend to not listen to the words and just hear it as a sort of instrument so it doesn’t matter what he’s saying. But for those that do, I could see it being too much, same with Kool Keith.
I’ll check out Brother Ali, I’ve heard of him but not his music.
IMO you are in for a treat. His voice is something else IMO and I love his style.
Here’s one of my favorites (fairly, ah, opinionated): Uncle Sam Goddamn
Also -
Can’t Take That Away (Just nice.)
(Also pretty opinionated:) Mourning in America
Listened to some yesterday and today, I dig it, thanks!
So glad you enjoyed it! 🙂
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Uncle Sam Goddamn
Can’t Take That Away
Mourning in America
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Much
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Yes unpopular, but your final sentence indicates a deep lack of understanding regarding the origins, purpose, and breadth of the genre.
You are welcome to your opinion, and I’m 100% sure that no one coming in like that is going to look any deeper. I’m just sharing my opinion that yours is uninformed and superficial.
Hey that’s fair. I’m not privy to a lot of the socioeconomic shit that took/takes place that led to the rise of rap and what I call ghetto culture.
I just think it’s been glorified to the point people who have no experience with ghetto culture outside of rap music start acting like they thugs n shit. Like “gangster” shit started happening everywhere with a shitload of people fully embracing not only the visual look but the “hustler” “gangster” lifestyle.
Also don’t mistake my ignorance for inability to learn. I’m willing to listen and learn about it all I just don’t think it’ll change my outlook on how it’s effected everyone everywhere negatively.
And you know maybe I’m wrong and I’m just upset things aren’t changing the way I want them to. In that case oh well I’ll live.
Well thank you for the response, which I admit I expected to not exist or to be rude. 🙂
I wasn’t going to push this on you, but this 4-part documentary literally takes the exact opposite stance and is a documentary regarding the formation and evolution of hip-hop. You don’t owe me anything, but if you are legit interested…
I believe it’s available on at least a couple different streaming services, as well as on the high seas.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt21872984/
Having watched it myself, please resist the temptation to skip around if you do give it a shot. There’s a through-line that will be less apparent if you watch it all chopped up, or skip past certain sections.
This very thing is discussed at one point, FWIW. 🙂
I’m about the whitest looking person you could imagine, and I’m in my mid-late 50s. I grew up with a good dose of privilege, but (fortunately?) was thrust into situations through early to mid adulthood that forced me to step outside my comfort zone quite a bit. I look like I should be walking around with a maga hat and intimidating voters with my open-carry firearms, not pseudo-anonymously trying to convince a stranger to give hip hop another chance.
A lot of things haven’t progressed the way I expected them to, either, and I am very familiar with how easy it is to misjudge things that are not within your lived experience.
Hip-Hop is a mirror of what is, not the progenitor of the nation’s problems. It sometimes looks like the progenitor to folks who haven’t previously experienced some of what it reflects in their own daily lives though, I think.
Personally, the only place I’m hearing voices raised about the issues I care about in modern music (and this could be my own narrow view) is within the subgenre of “conscious hip hop.”
You should watch Hip Hop Evolution on Netflix—or the first three/four seasons. Because it will tell you a lot. Like, your opinion generalizes so much that it’s really dancing on the line just this side of problematic.
My perspective on this, is that the chicken came before the egg so to speak.
Rappers dont glorify these things anymore than metal bands singing about decipitating hundreds of people mean it; all art is fiction, we wont be calling a horror film writer a ‘glorification of violence’, we call it a fantasy, a reflection of reality; these people observe reality and reflect it in art.
Now, does some rap stray into reality? Sure, so does all art, unless we fully remove the human from art it will always involve a real person.
Voting for a liberal continues the cycle of underclass exploitation either way, id say the middle class cocaine user and the politican locking up millions of people into small prison cells for drug use has a much bigger hand in creating and perputating the cycle of violence that dominates liberal society in america.
To accent my point and show how the way you are thinking is a symptom of a moral panic, something that takes a few examples and inflates it into a wider group…
90% of drill artists banned from making music in the UK dont have a criminal record…85% of those banned without a criminal record are black.
Its the censoring of the mental production of black youths; the upper class do not want a culture based on anti-authoritianism to emerge.
Truth.
Rap was important and had a clear goal; to inspire afroamerican people, kids to learn, to live their life and fight for their rights. to get up from the ghetto, to keep on going, make them see they aren’t alone, they have their backs by the community. (In the US)
this all was rather successfull.
but then, I don’t know what rap’s function is today. if there is any… so what you are saying, I can aggree with it, but I tend not to forget what was the original goal of this genre, and this is why I can’t completely dismiss rap.
You should look into conscious hip hop. Plenty of that kind of music still being made.
Agreed wholeheartedly. And just to pile on another unpopular opinion: it all sounds like trash. Literally it’s not music. Just a repetitive beat while some douchebag talks fast at you.