In 2013 Kanye said “Rap the new rock and roll” and he was right, rap was the front runner with music.

The artists, the albums, the songs everything was above what any other genre was doing.

Seven years has past and it feels as if hip hop has stagnated, streaming has made music more accessible but more forgettable. It feels like there’s no originality in the genre atm.

Personally, 2018 was the last time I was genuinely excited for rap albums, the past two years has been a bunch of nothing really. Funeral and EA were the only two albums this year I was looking forward to and only one of them came out good.

I really thought with the pandemic hip hop would blow up again with a lot of artists heading to the studio with the free time they had, opposite has happened where absolutely nothing of note has happened apart from WAP and I don’t think that’s the song which will save the stagnation.

I guess as this current year has been a frustrating year of everything standing still then music will do also but I feel rap is currently heading into a direction which will see other genres go above it.

Just wait for Kendrick

Guess you can blame social media for watering down society/culture/reality/creativity etc etc

SoundCloud era wrecked everything and streaming just lowered the attention span of the average listener.

S*** does seem to be getting better though just give it another year or two

Someone made the take that we're in the hair/glam metal stage of hip-hop and the thought hasn't left my mind since tbh

This website’s really starting to be made up of aging 2000’s kids being in denial that music changes huh

When it's gotten this bad...

Die Lit out now

Are we gonna get the rap version of extreme metal next then?

Goddamn this is the underground renaissance and you’re not looking for any of it

You would think the pandemic would inspire people to make amazing art but no. Im actually curious what's going on? Guess it's having the opposite effect

This is just the natural consequence of an ingrained need for any art you like to be popular too. When’s the last time you listened to a rapper on bandcamp with under 100 supporters?

I agree, rap has stagnated since 2018. Astroworld, Die Lit, DAMN, Kids See Ghosts were the last truly great rap albums

Another new music hate thread?

It is the new rock and roll. And now it’s dying just like rock. It’s in the punk rock phase of the early 2000s rn tbh

so much garbage keeps blowing up is the problem highly anticipated projects get delayed to hell then get changed and pumped thru so any filters that the final product is a shell of its original vision

Conway the machine - spurs 3 (feat. Westside gunn & Benny the butcher) out now

There’s plenty of good music outside of the mainstream you’re looking in the wrong areas, plus there’s countless artists who haven’t dropped anything this year. If you expect drake and lil baby to make forward thinking music you’re gonna be let down

Real question is why in the pandemic did you think it'd blow up if no one was goin outside anyway

and really you need to save your own stagnation. satiate your appetite for the sounds that you want by looking for them

waiting for whatever youre looking for to surface in popular music is just asking to be disappointed, further jading yourself in the process.

Trap happened

I have saved myself. I move onto other forms of entertainment, try to seek out new artists or stick to what I enjoy and keep it at that.

That doesn’t stop the fact that hip hop is going downwards