Why is EPMDs influence on Hip Hop so slept on?

[sporticus]

Because EPMD came thru at a time when it was like a badge of honor not to have a big pop hit. So they never did. So they never get brought up in the way other groups since then have.

 

[sporticus]

The beats were boring.

How dare you.

 

[Art Barr]

at being furious at 5 AM. Do you have a job or no? At least eat some breakfast before you stalk SirBiatch*


*stalking SirBiatch is not a job. No matter how many hours you put into it

Bih, with no life always mention someone stalking you.
Yet yo no life having ass has yet to show us.
You actually left the house to even experience the culture of hiphop in person.
While alternatively I was a head bussa in two provinces in your own country and I am from Chicago.

You need to stfu lil bih boi.
All cause I have so much of a life.
You are a not even as popular as me in your own country and your own province, lil sawft ass boi.


Art Barr

 

[Art Barr]

The beats were boring.

Arguably epmd have the best consistent trigger sample style beats in rap history.

We can do the dance and I know no one is seeing Erick sermon in that time period.

Not to mention, they have the actual soundtrack song associated song to defcomedy jam like Pete rock's shut em down pe remix, too.
Where that song is as closely related to being the it party jam as well.
So we can post the records if you wanna lose this discussion.


Art Barr

 

[Jerz-2]

Co-sign this thread....hall of fame duo here, my fave ever.

Also....ain't no denying that Erick Sermon's early funk beats were the types you would hear beating outta g-rides and hoopties all over the West Coast back then....not saying he created or even influenced G-Funk, but his music always had a West Coast sound to it. That Redman song OP posted above, "So Ruff" (always one of my faves)....like, I could imagine Y.G. rapping over that NOW. Sermon's beats have always had that funked out tinge to them...like he said, there's a reason EPMD are featured on what was supposed to be a West Coast compilation album.

and they were on Def Jam and if there's been two labels that have done a good job of preserving Hip Hop history and showcasing their former artists its Def Jam and Interscope (and the rights they have to priority, death row etc etc)

This is true. Most of their old artists still tour, too....even Foxy's bum ass was getting show money before she screwed it up.

As good as EPMD may have been I think their Achilles heel were lyrics. None of them really have any quotable verses. Just a style other people took and ran with

Thing is, there has to be proper context when judging lyricism from different eras. People can't judge 1992 lyrics from a 2017 standard. In that regard, for whatever someone doesn't consider quotable, in retrospect, conversely there were literally millions of people reciting every word of EPMD's joints back when they dropped....I think Erick got "Hip-hop Quotable" the month that "Rampage" dropped as a single....that speaks to the level of reverence given to that type of lyricism AT THE TIME....context is everything.

 

[Art Barr]

Co-sign this thread....hall of fame duo here, my fave ever.

Also....ain't no denying that Erick Sermon's early funk beats were the types you would hear beating outta g-rides and hoopties all over the West Coast back then....not saying he created or even influenced G-Funk, but his music always had a West Coast sound to it. That Redman song OP posted above, "So Ruff" (always one of my faves)....like, I could imagine Y.G. rapping over that NOW. Sermon's beats have always had that funked out tinge to them...like he said, there's a reason EPMD are featured on what was supposed to be a West Coast compilation album.



This is true. Most of their old artists still tour, too....even Foxy's bum ass was getting show money before she screwed it up.



Thing is, there has to be proper context when judging lyricism from different eras. People can't judge 1992 lyrics from a 2017 standard. In that regard, for whatever someone doesn't consider quotable, in retrospect, conversely there were literally millions of people reciting every word of EPMD's joints back when they dropped....I think Erick got "Hip-hop Quotable" the month that "Rampage" dropped as a single....that speaks to the level of reverence given to that type of lyricism AT THE TIME....context is everything.

Erick sermon verses on watch yo nuggets is godly, still to this day and red killed't it.



Sermon before he became a punch line based rapper was one of my favorite listens all the way to hitting switches twelve.
Somehow somewhere in the release of the first solo album from hitting switches he lost me rhyme wise forever then.
Yet when I was anticipating this album to drop when this dropped.

You could not tell me nuffin'



E fell off so hard going into that solo,...what happened.

Even his look at this point was the standard or that time.


Art Barr


Erick sermon truth be told is the best all time sampler of g funk too.

We can redo the thread so I can rebody nikkaz.
All cause nikkaz scared to do the dance in this thread.

The failure to compete is just a concede to the L.

 

[ReturnOfJudah]

Favorite east coast group of all time

 

[General Mills]

The beats were boring.

Negged.

 

[Roxx the King]

I gotta stop mentioning how I feel about those beats lol

 

[KilabeatZ]

That Hardcore Funk:

 

[Taadow]

EPMD - Strictly Business 1988 > Warren G - I Shot The Sheriff 1997

EPMD - You Gots To Chill 1988 > Every West Coast rapper who tried to freak it afterwards. Ice Cube, South Central Cartel and Biggie included.



EPMD - Please Listen To My Demo 1989 > Kriss Kross - Tonight 1995, Ice Cube - Record Company Pimpin 2000,



EPMD - Rampage 1990 = Cypress Hill - How I Could Just Kill A Man 1991

Do you realize that these EPMD songs sample some of the most famously recognized Black songs of all-time?

Somebody would've sampled these even if EPMD didn't...

 

[T.H.E. Goat]

Kriss kross was not a cultural group.
Their entire scope was to ripoff the highest selling base of biv10's ABC.

"Don't try to compare us to Another Bad Little Fad"

 

[Larry Lambo]

Anybody over the age of 35 has respect for EPMD and acknowledges their impact on the game in the late 80's early 90's.

They don't have the tracks that translated into the modern landscape like NWA and PE did, but at that time they were fairly close to those groups, and on par with LL/Salt n Pepa/BDP

Erick Sermon is a top 20 producer no matter how you cut it. Lyrics were decent but hurt them when it comes to revisiting the tracks now. You can see how much further advanced Redman was on the tracks they did together.

 

[Majestyx]

As good as EPMD may have been I think their Achilles heel were lyrics. None of them really have any quotable verses. Just a style other people took and ran with

PMD had bars.

I think the internal beef is why these dudes arent spoken of more.(and that eric sermon is a fukkin weirdo) EPMD is one of my favorite groups.

 

[Art Barr]

Do you realize that these EPMD songs sample some of the most famously recognized Black songs of all-time?

Somebody would've sampled these even if EPMD didn't...

They would not flip them as good as Erick sermon.
As a matter of fact,...if you go look up Erick sermon's actual workflow process to make these beats.
It is an actual wonder in technical know how.
that people would not readily do and why he succeeded.
Plus made better renditions of these productions than others did all time as well.

Like this nikka eq'd every drum individually and layered them or some wild unfathomable shyt.
That he was known to approach people for stealing his elements and rightfully so.
when you hear what he was doing to get this particular element of sound reworked.
for just small miniscle but highly needed and important portions of the work, that even though it is rap.
It works to understand and debunk the guru hof lyric of you can't own no loops it is how you hookem up and the rhyme style troop.
Followed by another all time quotable surrounded around the evolution of biting for the time and context of the period.

Now granted Erick sermon has been smashed on socially.
Which is a toxic mix of being involved with the Wendi Williams of all people and numerous rumors that leave a collection of !!??? above your head. Yet and still that possible social aloofness and highly ocd based behavior is why he was excellent as a producer.

I mean, people forget that rap made artist cool.
Yet the whole artistic quality of what rappers really are is lost until you look into the workflow process of someone in this era like Erick sermon. Which will give you a full scope of what type of idea of duality was lost in making rap the prison industrial sonic marketing ploy used by the government.

It was like basically taking the idea of Gil Scot heroin's impending doom to the black man content found in his prohibitive tale based music.
Then, Making the idea of that type of person and criminalizing them and then having said marketing replace the real ideals that actually were there previously. So Erick sermon fits into a time.
Where social constructs and the prison industrial economy more or less made things go awry in the black community..when the perception of artistry was stripped and made into another form.

Where a guy like Erick sermon is more or less a prisoner to situations out of his control and made to look a certain way.
Where he becomes so unapproachable by standard reputation. which could be welled in a lie. Where the braintrust of a guy this talented is lost in the prison industrial marketing of rap spiraling out of control and now fully worsening the general perspective of how black America is perceived.
When realistically everything of beauty is lost by such an erosive marketing technique being made to globally hurt an entire race of people as well.
So, this discussion has a lot of crazy elements.
That many will typically ignore or go unsaid.

Art Barr