Unforgivable

2y

tl:dr please

Lystra

2y

this is what i was finna say

the game is so much more like spread out and diverse. if nas came out today he would probably be as successful as griselda, if lupe came out now tbh niggas wouldnt even care

it feels like s*** is stale cus the mainstream is trash but the actual scene is very vibrant. it sucks tho cus now we dont envision blowing up the same way, cus its obvious now the game is to find a niche not to try to b the next drake

user

2y

rap as an art form is separate from rap as a commercial entity

nothing can really replace rap because Latin music or whatever takes it place commercially doesn’t fundamentally do the same thing that rap does (which is the same thing that makes some feel like rap has a “responsibility” it isn’t handling)

if you feel like rap is dying you should contribute to changing that in whatever way you can

Is what I took from it

user

2y

rap as an art form is separate from rap as a commercial entity

nothing can really replace rap because Latin music or whatever takes it place commercially doesn’t fundamentally do the same thing that rap does (which is the same thing that makes some feel like rap has a “responsibility” it isn’t handling)

if you feel like rap is dying you should contribute to changing that in whatever way you can

Is what I took from it

Chris M

2y

if your goal is/was to be the next drake....pal you f***ing up

Lystra

2y

this is what i was finna say

the game is so much more like spread out and diverse. if nas came out today he would probably be as successful as griselda, if lupe came out now tbh niggas wouldnt even care

it feels like s*** is stale cus the mainstream is trash but the actual scene is very vibrant. it sucks tho cus now we dont envision blowing up the same way, cus its obvious now the game is to find a niche not to try to b the next drake

paradise valley

2y

The writer of the post praises rap music as a pure form of artistic expression that can transport us to other worlds, challenge our beliefs, and make us feel validated. They argue that rap is a literary form that fulfills the promise of showing us other worlds that books made in grade school. They believe that rap is a perfected dual existence of literary and linguistic expression and that it can never die as a genre because it is a pure form that represents the pinnacle of human communication and understanding. The writer suggests that anything that replaces rap would have to come on the cresting wave of a change so monumental that we cannot currently visualize it.

Worldpremiere_

2y

In a way that fragmentation is a great tool but also a double edged sword

It's crazy going on TikTok and seeing all these dope ass artists get a following from barebones s***. It makes the culture of music feel more raw and alive as opposed to elusive.

. F*** it, Mainstream is dying and let it stay dead too. It will allow for more vibrancy at the cost of the hierarchical view of the game we have now

user

2y

rap as an art form is separate from rap as a commercial entity

nothing can really replace rap because Latin music or whatever takes it place commercially doesn’t fundamentally do the same thing that rap does (which is the same thing that makes some feel like rap has a “responsibility” it isn’t handling)

if you feel like rap is dying you should contribute to changing that in whatever way you can

Is what I took from it

babylon sherm

2y

Damn this is so much more effectively put, yeah that’s my intent to a T

Kurt Fiala CPA

2y

From my understanding rap I just a blip in the timeline of culture it's meant to die and look forward to what's next

BRAVE

2y

Opens up another discussion too: if we operate from the standpoint that hiphop has a unique ‘responsibility’, what is that and has it been lost?

user

2y

I don’t know if I personally believe it has a responsibility as much as it’s just a reflection of culture but I think that the problem is that we’re approaching a point (and have been approaching the point over the last 20 years in retrospect) that rap has gone from a reflection of conditions and POVs of urban America to everyone just reaching to be a caricature of what already works.

and while that may have been the case as far back as the early/mid 2000’s as we see from songs like hip hop by dead prez where they were complaining about similar s*** back then..it has completely gone to s*** since like 2018 to where now a good portion of aspiring young rap artists just straight up don’t even try to be themselves anymore, they’re just caricatures of the last thing they saw that worked that they feel like they can do. The Introspection, thought, creativity and originality that people may consider to be raps “responsibility” is not really rewarded the way it has been in the past even if the bullshit copycats were also there

babylon sherm

2y

I figured @Brave ’s picture was worth 1,000 words, so here’s some thoughts. Why is this it’s own thread? Seems too big. I’m selfish. A shout out and sincere thank you to Brave for giving me reason to think critically about what I enjoy. There is no TL;DR, you can just pick any one part and start mocking it.

As my world grows progressively colder and lonelier, I find that I burrow into rap. I think a lot of people do. It’s not necessarily for purposes of escape. Rap can reprimand and validate us simultaneously. Rap reminds us there’s vibrance and warmth and humanity in the world, and in the same breath chides us for forgetting that world’s fundamental coldness. Whether you had actually forgotten it is immaterial, as good advice in life is often something you already knew coming from a different mouth. Rap often gives us good advice. Rap often says, f*** em. When I write that rap invites us to spend time elsewhere, rap says that often it’s not anywhere different at all from where or what we live. More accurately, rap asks our consideration. We in turn are considering rap this week, what it is and what it was. I read an excellent interview today that posited something very simple before the interviewer even got to asking questions: rap is a literary form. And it got me thinking about the discourse that Brave started, and why it mattered to me if people thought rap was dying, beyond the immediate response of “well, because I like it a lot and don’t want it to die”.

Rap fulfills the promise of posters we saw in grade school: books can show us other worlds! Rap really does that s***. Rap transports us fully (Did you ever mouth a paragraph of a book to yourself in the mirror and feel anything except insane? Case in point). Rap often says: my circumstances are momentarily your circumstances, what you see is my vision; this world, whatever world it is, is ours. Rap’s fluid refractions of narrator and audience trust us implicitly to understand on unspoken levels when “we” are the subject of discussion or are instead co-mingling on the same plane as the speaker discussing. Or any other number of positions that can be held, as rap is infinite. Any attempt I make to impose a rule or structure on it is like mapping the invisible walls of a video game: oh, I know it has terms and limits. I just can’t see them, or communicate their makeup. It’s too f***ing big.

Rap can never die because it is a pure form. And that perfect form state is separate but not removed from its existences as a genre, a mode, an economy, a force in & of popular culture, etc. I won’t pretend to know any more than your average dolt about Plato, but we can all grasp the general idea of his theory that “for any conceivable thing or property there is a corresponding Form, a perfect example of that thing or property”. Is this true for all things? I would say not. But rap is that pure form, the perfected dual existence of literary and linguistic expression (In the same way that painting is the perfected dual existence of visual and linguistic expression tbh).

Feasibly, it could be replaced. But whatever replaced it would have to come in on the cresting wave of a change so monumental to human modes of communication and understanding that I don’t think any of us can visualize it. The equivalent of progressing from horse-drawn carriages to teleportation. Anything that came after rap that doesn’t do so is doomed. It will either operate through rap, or it can only supplant one aspect or facet of identity that rap holds. All rap is poetry but not all poetry is rap. Why? In the same way that all televisions are technically radios but not all radios are televisions. Because it’s an advancement and progression of form. Visually-transmitted entertainment as a form wasn’t changed, they just found other ways to deliver it to you. That form has not been advanced upon. It’s no disrespect to other forms of lyrical expression existing alongside rap, before rap, after rap, etc. to say that this form has been advanced by rap. Of course rap has influences. Of course it has a timeline. It has its own history and a place in human history, it was shaped by history and circumstance and individuals. I’m not saying it’s divine in nature, but it’s also bigger than we usually consider, I think. We dig up caves, find the remnants of markings left by humans, interpret them and in the end say “damn, they knew how to paint!”. Did the people know it as painting at the time? Maybe. Painting was waiting for them though. When we go on youtube and watch The Jubiliers “rap” in the 1940s, did they know it as rapping? They might have. Regardless, in their delivery, rhyme style, and tone they presaged highly recurring elements of an expressive form. A form that exists, not because it was born fully formed from any one individual or area, but because it was waiting for humanity to realize it, shape it, and utilize it.

This concept brings me great joy, because we can participate in a perfect form. This concept reframes fears that rap is dying. Is it not a recognition of rap’s immense power for some to admonish rap for it’s failure to advance society towards a morally valid ideal? Is it not an equal recognition of rap’s impossibly wide and inextricably human scope, for some to reply that rap’s capacity to encompass all degrees of human nature and the negativity that can pervade that nature, is not a failure of rap? We mourn what is important to us. We dread that an organic, perfect form has been bent into a spectacle, if not fully f***ed than partially. We dread that because all forms of artistic expression witnessed in our lifetimes have been subject to those same eroding forces of commodification. I won’t tell you not to worry; worry! That worry is healthy, it indicates the proper respect and heft being given to a truly important concept. But don’t move on. Rap has splintered into dozens and dozens of movements, and it will splinter into hundreds more before you die. The machines that grind expression into profit will always seize on the most popular and massively appealing of those movements. That won’t change, within rap or any other form, or any other part of our lives really. But give up on rap and be left in the dust at your own peril. Stick around and worry, and use that worry to push rap towards what you want it to be. Why shouldn’t it be exactly what you want it to be? Rap levels the field and allows us all a chance to speak the s*** we think people will connect with. Stake your claim, make rap a purely political tool. Make it a complete abstraction. Make it nonverbal, turn it inside out if you want to. But you’d look stupid saying you gave up on art, as stupid as saying culture is dead. There is a solid choice to be made: a slow loss of momentum and narrowing of possibilities, or the further sporulation of rap into space still unexplored,to encompass all that is still yet to be contemplated and considered

hadji

2y

great post. selling real estate on page 2. yeah it's not page 1 but it's still something you can pass on to your family with a smile on your face and a sense of pride. reach out at ktt2.com/messages

user

2y

I don’t know if I personally believe it has a responsibility as much as it’s just a reflection of culture but I think that the problem is that we’re approaching a point (and have been approaching the point over the last 20 years in retrospect) that rap has gone from a reflection of conditions and POVs of urban America to everyone just reaching to be a caricature of what already works.

and while that may have been the case as far back as the early/mid 2000’s as we see from songs like hip hop by dead prez where they were complaining about similar s*** back then..it has completely gone to s*** since like 2018 to where now a good portion of aspiring young rap artists just straight up don’t even try to be themselves anymore, they’re just caricatures of the last thing they saw that worked that they feel like they can do. The Introspection, thought, creativity and originality that people may consider to be raps “responsibility” is not really rewarded the way it has been in the past even if the bullshit copycats were also there