Taking Sides: Rap vs. Rock

Besides, how many rock artists are picking up a guitars in order to articulate the pleasures of their posh lifestyle? It's mostly lower- or middle-class kids as well. Their worldview -- including rage and anger, when applicable -- you can relate with and accept, but someone else's isn't valid, eh?

I don't understand how that point would work differently for rap and other pop genres. In my experience (which has nothing to do with rap), songwriting is almost always about making the next line rhyme all the time.

The bottom line is, and I haven't really been bothered to say this, but: your argument makes no sense and smacks of dad rock whining (not to mention it smacks of someone making a rather desperate attempt to rile people up, as you've so loved to do in the past, but it's amusing enough so we go on and pretend that's not what's occurring). As someone else previously pointed out: how does the rhyming thing make it differ from pop music or rock music? There are plenty of rap songs that don't feature nursery rhyme style lines, that don't scan the way you seem to believe they do, just as there are plenty of rock and pop songs that are nothing but Dr. Seuss writings. The attitude whinging still goes unanswered too: how does anger in rap and anger in rock differ? As was also previously pointed out, not too many rock artists are sitting and singing about how wonderful their lives are and how wonderful everyone around them is.

As I said, it's merely a different way to express the same sentiment, and your stereotyping of urban listeners borders, quite frankly, on blatant racism. But pass on some of the blunts you were talkin' about, I didn't mind that part. If only it was true.

I also don't believe hard work solved many people's problems. The correlation between hard work and success/prosperity seems to me a low one - a lot, if not most people who work hard all their lives are rewarded with an adequate standard of living and big side-orders of stress, fear and misery. I'm not saying there's a better way, and I'm not saying laziness gets you anywhere either but the quadruple-salary rewards of work are simply too unevenly distributed for me to embrace a simple work=unequivocal good outlook.

But more to the point, I listen to rap a fair bit and I simply don't recognise this lyrical world you're talking about. Possibly somebody who'd only heard "The Message" and "Gangsta's Paradise" might mistake the genre for one full of grim portraits of inner-city living and resentment at one's lot, but lyrically speaking most hip-hop today is a world beyond that. It's like saying all rock and roll is about fucking, except even less accurate.

Ironically, a big strain in hip-hop at the moment is dont-whine-to-me- I-worked-for-this rhymes (Puffy and Master P do a nice line in these, Jay-Z does much the same but more literarily). Their rags-to-riches stories are very very similar to some of your posts above.

and gentle readers , I do need to believe in something

BORN TO LOSE, LIVE TO WIN, OUT TO LUNCH

iF THERES EVA AN ILM PUB BRAWL - iM ROOTING FOR ALLY !!

You voted for a guy who loves hanging and guns, you yuppie fuckwit - well done !!

Musicians by nature are egotistical and lazy. Otherwise they'd have real jobs and not be singing about themselves. You've yet to answer the bloody question: how does what you're saying about rap make it different from any other form of music?

Get a grip. So you "lived in the ghetto" with the Latinos and Blacks. I AM Latino and I WAS on welfare. So get off it - quite frankly, I think you only flaunt that sort of thing if you're full of it anyhow. It is unfortunate that you are going for the wind up because it'd be such a fantastic thing if this was all someone's honest opinion. I couldn't say I'd love it but...it'd be much funnier that way. In a freaky way.

And hang on, which is it: are you old or young? Because if you are older, it contradicts something you already said...

What's more, Sterling and Tom anre both on the money about your preposterously narrow wiew of what rap does.

always a pleasure, sweetie...

Ah, but those school shootings, eh?…

Have you never heard _The Wall_ or seen the video for "Girls On Film"? You don't remember the minor media frenzy over "Suicide Blonde"? The negative press reaction to "Take The Skinheads Bowling"?

The fact that you can blithely say "rap is all about violence" makes me completely discount any argument you've made so far as that is blatantly untrue. Violence can be a part of rap, but it can also be a part of any genre. Hell, the last big hit the Dixie Chicks had was "Goodbye Earl". You're also missing the point that someone could be spending all of their time listening to Opus Akoben, Priest Da Nomad, Poem-Cees, Unspoken Heard, and other DC-area peace-and-love hip-hop artists and denounce all of rock as Satan-obsessed pit of slime and mysogeny based on DeathMetal.com. Your argument about rap being obsessed with itself is specious, as well, because rock music is also obsessed with itself, as Ally pointed out. If _any_ of the bands you've listed have _never_ written a song using the words "I", "me", "mine", or "myself", I will be shocked and stunned.

I'd also like to point out that:

- There's nothing inherently wrong with songs that state "I am the greatest".

- Queen's "We Are The Champions" and "We Will Rock You" are both wildly self-absorbed.

- A good 85% of Morrissey's lyrics are wildly self-absorbed.

Part of the point that I'm trying to make is that dismissing rap as a genre in general because of its most popular segment is as silly as holding up examples of violent lyrics in rock music and dismissing the entire genre as violent. This isn't even taking into account the near-obsession people had in the 80's with blaming bands like WASP, Iron Maiden, Megadeth, Slayer, etc for kids who formed suicide pacts, kidnapped and killed someone, or dabbled in Satanic worship. (If I wasn't at work, I'd see if I could scrounge up links for you.)

At any rate, there are entire collectives of people in the hip- hop community who are NOT about gunplay, bling-bling, hoes and bitches, and thug life. I mentioned those DC artists for a reason, although you can get the same type of thing from De La Soul, The Roots, A Tribe Called Quest, Bust Rhymes, Queen Latifah, Del Tha Funkee Homosapien, Black Eyed Peas, Digable Planets, Common, and Dead Prez.

I must say that by sweeping aside the hip-hoppers, headbangers, punks, and ravers, you seem to have dismissed the origins of a good 90% of the ILM readership... :)

Anyway, I think I see your point clearer now. I don't necessarily agree with it, but it seems much more rational than it did when I first started in on this thread.

Plus most rappers are evidently just movie stars waitin' to happen (see the dope, fresh faces in that pic). I say, cut out the middleman! Send them straight from the streets to the silver screen!

This makes it sound like music from another century. Oh wait...

I am going to go eat a bowl of sick and jab myself repeatedly in the ear with a rusty fork.

I favor Bowl of Sick, personally.

(Man, that would be a GREAT band name!)

Its like saying Red is better than blue, it makes absolutely no sense.

Are you seriously saying that it's wrong to have a favorite color?

Yeah, that's pretty tolerant, man...

Much like your internet posting, Sledge!

-- TOE-KNEE IM A PLAYER THAT YOU LOVE TO HATE,GOT UR GIRL SUCKIN DICK ON VIDEOTAPE

This may be the greatest thing I've ever read.

How is it that all the pro-rock people cite Slipknot as an exemplary rock band? It seems an odd choice, to say the least.

Elsewhere on the internet:

person 1: "Personnaly, I like rock more than rap, the only rap thing I really like is Run DMC, 'cause it's the only rap group that doesn't have those ghetto rimes that don't make sense or they make a very forced rime."

person 2: "Also, I forgot 2 very important rap bands:
Korn, love Coming Undone and Freak On A Leash."

person 3: "Korn is not a rap band."

person 4: "You're right, and you're wrong. Korn isn't a rap band, they're New Wave, which is a band that mixes rap and rock lyrics in their music. I'm not a huge fan of Korn, I'm just a fan of some of their songs."