the game is all about image (see travis scott lil nas x billie ellish) over substance cause that is what sells in this twitter/instagram age.

drake and ye really brought mamba competitiveness that resulted in some amazing works

No offence but I don't think Juice is as good as them

He was like a family friendly Uzi + Post combo to me

Yeah you clearly don’t know what you’re talking about

ok tell me more than this

Those street rappers you’re over looking, like Melly, Gina and Future are the ones that are pushing not only the genre but music as a whole forward

Tyler and Kendrick are regressive regurgitating old works

I think you missed my whole point
I'll let you figure this one alone I know you can do it

People like The Weeknd (post BBTM) and Tyler are trying to recapture old moments or use as a crutch for bad music (Kendrick) but it never will be amount to the original

Drake or Future are trying to recreate new ones, that makes them clearly superior

The main reason I'm not reading the OP is there's no paragraph breaks

I feel that. Just feel you have to note that he did try when talking about Wayne doing the same s*** over and over again. Not everyone can be Kanye or Andre/Big Boi.

Late 90s and early 2000s got stale for a while too though. Everyone was looking for the next Pac til Kanye took over the game and shook everything up with the trilogy. He changed the game again with 808s. Shook everything up again with the great maximalist MBDTF. The genre needs a transcendent Artist to come in if we want some change. Kendrick is making great projects but idk if he’s opening doors like Kanye did. Might need one of these young cats to come in and drop some god level s***. Low key hoping Eternal Atake can be that but I kinda doubt it.

True but wasn't he the biggest name of them all? From an album where he just freestyled over emo beats.

Don't forget that Kanye, Jay and Em all blew up in their late 20's, whereas all the dudes I mentioned were extremely young.. by that age Ye was still rapping like a Big L copycat. Jay was Jaz-O's hypeman. Em was a random white dude in an underground Detroit rap group.

It even took Wayne several years to start making great and timeless music. Kendrick was K.Dot the MySpace skateboard dude.

So I'm just saying that those dudes were shaping up to be the leaders of the newschool in terms of commercial appeal and we can't really know if they would've made classic albums eventually. However, life is a funny mothafucka.. and they got replaced by, like, NBA Youngboy, Roddy Ricch and Lil Nas X?

(Kodak and Uzi still have a chance to make it tho, as unlikely as it seems atm..)

You're saying they're so young and had potential so they could be some of the greats... But since their music didn't show it then we couldn't even know.

I thought XXXTENTACION was talented and he had cool ideas and hits, but all of them are short, demo-ish songs. And he didn't make a great full album.

As for Juice he was the biggest and he made great hits (Lucid Dreams, Robbery, All Girls Are the Same) the problem is he released too much music and it all sounded samey. Also I don't think he was that unique musically. He could freestyle for sure tho.

Kodak Black is a good rapper occasionally drops hot bars, but he's too stupid and he keeps f***ing the money up, and he's controversial, that's why he's not a star now.

IMO Travis, Thug and Future are more fitting to be the big names even though they're from an earlier generation.

Now we have Roddy Ricch who sounds a bit like his peers but his music has a lot of heart so I like him. And he's turning into a big star.

Big hopes for Don Toliver too, I don't think he'll be top 3 but he's the best new rapper rn.

Kanye was obviously influenced by different types of genres and artists that came before him
This isn't even about doing anything new that hasn't been done before but just about the fact that if u want to be great you have to know your music and you have to know what came before your time instead of just following trends and what's hot at the moment cause by the time that trend is over best believe your ass is outta here as well
And you have to take ideas and be inspired by everything and mix it with your own ideas and bring it to your own world, that's what makes something great in my opinion
There's not one artist that hasn't been inspired by other artists, my whole point is that there's not many artists out there coming up who are inspired by different s*** and they just follow trends so the outcome of their music is just not very exciting, and those who do just don't get the proper recognition

I generally agree with your thoughts. Future and Thugger will most likely go down as hip hop greats.. they're already largely influential and the type of music that Thugger was making 5-6 years ago which sounded weird and goofy to the average consumer back then is what's topping the charts now. And ofc last year he finally benefited from years of hard work and did really well commercially.

Not sure about Travis yet but Rodeo will go down as a classic album for sure.

Tbh the fact that rappers blow up in their teens now is a gift and a curse.. it doesn't leave them a lot of room to work on their craft and really get on a masterful level of creation. History has also taught us that after the first couple years of fame, most rappers just get lazy/uninspired and fizzle out. So yeah, that s*** just isn't any good to us hip hop fans, not resulting in music that'll truly stand the test of time..

I wonder how much social media and a***ytics plays into this. Labels have the data on what people are liking, retweeting, and watching. The public sees how many people like and upvote s***, so they see it as good or hot and internalize it as such. Why should Drake take a risk when his albums keep getting more bland but more streams? Just keep making palatable music. All they need to do is pay Madonna to have some IG “influencer” do a dance challenge and it’s unconscious advertising for him.

Kendrick and maybe Cole bout to f*** the game up this year.

I also feel like S***Hampton producers boutta f*** s*** up too with their sounds.

Brockhampton have lost their appeal among the hip hop crowd after SAT 3.. I honestly keep forgetting that they're still a thing.

Yeah of course, they are nerds trying to disguise themselves as rappers but their production is still flames. I feel like they will drop some amazing singles (because of their sounds) this year and gain more attention, if that happens maybe their producers will start working with better artists and hopefully leave people like JOBA or that trash ass “conscious” rapper they have behind.

True.

Not saying Lil Nas X will end up like him, but I remember when Panda blew up and everyone gassed Desiigner like he overtook Future.

Now years later, Future is stronger than ever and Desiigner is cold af.

The biggest red flag is he blew up to his heights off an EP Single. He pretty much can't be more successful of a charting artist as he already is, so that might bleed into people's perceptions of his chart success if he doesn't continue to meet OTR standards.

this is facts

Too much trap

There's no competition so that's the reason they're so complacent

Trap is killing the genre, it’s so easy to make people don’t even try anymore, anybody with a good image can make that s*** and now it’s oversaturated.

We were lucky TDE, the mob , odd future, blog rappers and of trap artists came up all at the same time. That was a once in a life time generation.

We have people like slums now but that s*** is too left field

Believe it or not but they're bigger than ever

Sugar is their biggest hit yet

Sugar is peak pop music but it ain’t hip hop