Complex: 25 things everyone thinks about about Hip Hop...but won't say.

[blackslash]

But imo alotta those songs u think is catchy..I think is trash..just cause its catchy dont mean its a good song...and just cause somethin isnt as catchy dont mean it is a bad song either..or vice versa..I think most if these pre built soundin ass overproduced songs dont take much..the most catchy part of these songs dont have shyt to do with the rapper alotta the time...see..in the past..the artist had to lead the beat and take the beat to a special place..now its the opposite...

Well thats ur perception

If the majority likes it and it sticks in their heads..the artist has succesfully made a good catchy song

And understand this... a single is supposed to be the sprinkle to ur album that reels people in to listen to the depth of your album(Not sayin singles cant be deep tho)

The Hook is the most important aspect of a single...if the hook latches on to the people then u got urself a hit and attention to you and your album

If not..the ppl will hardly fck with you..Thats just the way it is

Outside the hook there has to be something about you that relates to the people..a sort of connection..and with Kdot portraying the duality of man kinda like Pac did, it allows the people to feel him the way he does

Most other conscious rappers dnt do this...

 

[razassin]

I actually just had words with the Senior Editor over at Complex Magazine on Twitter about this very same thing.

If you care to see what the outcome was here you go:

Good to see you standin' up for the culture and havin' these fakkit muthafukkaz backtrackin'

 

[kt773]

where are you from? drug abuse been around way before hip hop

 

[Mac Casper]

This list is garbage, Complex is more garbage now than it's ever been

 

[KOTK]

Alcohol, tobacco and prescription drugs all have far bigger marketing budgets than a smoke dza album.

 

[Ze Pequeno]

where are you from? drug abuse been around way before hip hop

Can you read? my dude said hiphop does NOT promote drug abuse.
no one ever said they were the first to promote it, but saying that 60% of rappers don't encourage you to sip lean, smoke weed and pop Xan is a lie.

shyt even Snoop, Wu tang and Jayo Felony was promoting PCP.


where are you from?

 

[kt773]

Can you read? my dude said hiphop does NOT promote drug abuse.
no one ever said they were the first to promote it, but saying that 60% of rappers don't encourage you to sip lean, smoke weed and pop Xan is a lie.

shyt even Snoop, Wu tang and Jayo Felony was promoting PCP.


where are you from?

i didn't see that, i just knew where YOU was coming from especially with what you say in this reply i was right lol ...........im from chicago hoe.... anyway fam was replying to a post that said he doesn't see many rap albums that promote drug use, you do realize that rap music is a REFLECTION of our society and not the other way around

 

[Harry B]

The biggest problem with the list is that hiphop takes whats going on in the streets and puts in in the music not the other way around. Rappers are entertainers not fukking gods. The streets was in it's worst form when rap was all about edutainment and shyt like that. The whole list is simple minded besides a few points that were just common sense.

 

[stealthbomber]

5. The excessive use of "nikka" is incredibly awkward for white people.

White people already have an extremely schizophrenic relationship with rap music, at once fascinated by the form, and outside of it, often an intended audience but rarely acknowledged as such.

Nothing epitomizes this confusion like "the N-word," an epithet that helps mark rap music's territory as, fundamentally, a black American art form. It's a word designed to delineate audiences, to exclude and include, and as such plays with the listener's easy identification with the song's protagonist. None of which means that white kids can't like rap, or that white people can't enjoy it. But the taboo term's ever-present use in hip-hop is a constant reminder of white people's outsider position.

This doesn't mean that whites don't regularly ignore the word's verboten status, but it does mean that their interaction with hip-hop remains particularly fraught.

okay complex


but i actually agree with a lot of that list. especially about internet a&r's fukking up rap and people being judgemental because of nostalgic bias

 

[Harry B]

Is that more than movies?
There is even primetime series like weed, shyt.


Abd really, I don't think weed and the genre you listen to is very correlated.
All the white boys that listen to punk, indie pop and whatever the fukk smoke too. Rap has obviously been vocal about smoking weed, but let's not act like weed wasn't like beer in the 60s when almost no one was singing about it. And until this molly thing, drugs (excluding weed) drugs has always been a dirty thing in hiphop. Remember Ja Rule getting shytted on for being a x-head. (for some reason wu-bangers got a pass).

 

[yseJ]

shyt, the points about classics and nostalgia are shyt that we talk about here every day damn near. Conscious rap being corny, ghost producers, the "new generation" etc etc

conscious rap being corny is purely subjective opinion of whoever came up with that weak ass list.

and "a lot of classic old school hip hop sucks" is a fukking contradiction. cant be classic and sucking at the same time

the writer is an idiot who thinks HIS view on things is universally accepted.
but its not

this list is full of captain obvious statements that appear shocking only to either an imbecile or a child (oh my god ! do rappers really have ghostwriters and producers have ghostproducers ? I didnt know that ) or just subjective opinions that arent fukking facts

this list is ass.

 

[The_King_of_Everything]

I cant wait till Drake dies of aids

 

[Ze Pequeno]

i didn't see that, i just knew where YOU was coming from especially with what you say in this reply i was right lol ...........im from chicago hoe.... anyway fam was replying to a post that said he doesn't see many rap albums that promote drug use, you do realize that rap music is a REFLECTION of our society and not the other way around

7 yes, 9 no. I don't really see much, if any, rap that promotes drug abuse.

I'm 20 and around my age group i've seen more people gettin into smoking or at least tried it once since they started gettin into wiz and spitta.

nikka I was even about to try Lean after I played this song, Raps influence on society is underrated and powerful

 

[Torrential]

(cac)omplex magazine

 

[Tetris v2.0]

conscious rap being corny is purely subjective opinion of whoever came up with that weak ass list.

and "a lot of classic old school hip hop sucks" is a fukking contradiction. cant be classic and sucking at the same time

the writer is an idiot who thinks HIS view on things is universally accepted.
but its not

this list is full of captain obvious statements that appear shocking only to either an imbecile or a child (oh my god ! do rappers really have ghostwriters and producers have ghostproducers ? I didnt know that ) or just subjective opinions that arent fukking facts

this list is ass.

I didnt find it particularly mind-blowing or revelatory either. Most of it is actually pretty obvious. It just seems like a lot of people are really sensitive about hip-hop being criticized, and it coming from Complex (who have tons of questionable lists and bullshyt articles to begin with) doesnt help either.

Im sure we could all come up with lists of our own that would be similar to this list tho. We post on forums and openly rant and criticize everything, but the majority of media publications dont share their views as candidly. I see where Complex is coming from, but I also see why people could look at them as "toys"

Conscious rap, like anything else, is awesome when done right. But I think sometimes the message can be condescending and forced, like anything else. To me, conscious rap is great when its blended with narrative and/or personal experience. Being conscious for the sake of being conscious, lets face it, is pretty damn boring. "Gangsta" rap is naturally over-the-top and exaggerated, so its held to a different standard I think