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The crazy thing about rap

post #1 of 71
7/23/10 at 12:39pm
Thread Starter 
80% of a record's commercial success is about the production/beat, and has nothing to do with the rapper.
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post #2 of 71
7/23/10 at 12:41pm
And how many other rappers you can get to collab on your album. If you don't have jay-z, snoop, weezy, kanye, rick ross, t-pain, and luda on one track you aren't trying hard enough.
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post #3 of 71
7/23/10 at 12:46pm
...as long as the lyrics have something to do with drinking/partying/making it rain/etc.
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post #4 of 71
7/23/10 at 12:55pm
Thread Starter 
To clarify my stance: I like rap, at least some of it, but when I think about mega popular songs from the 90s like:

- Hypnotize
- California Love
- No Diggity
- etc.

They are all a function of their absolutely brilliantly catchy beats. Even when it comes to "quality rap", I love things like Cannibal Ox and Dr. Octo because of their incredible beats. They are awesome lyricists as well, but if it was just the lyrics over average beats, I'd like the songs a lot less.

And when it comes to mainstream rap, where let's be honest, the lyrics are sometimes lacking, it really does come down to the beat.

I should also qualify this by saying that obviously in the case of a well-established artist, the name alone is what sells the most (also why the collabs are done on albums). But assuming that two rappers have equal name recognition, the success of your career pretty much comes down to picking the right producer at the time.
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post #5 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:05pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MetroStyles View Post
To clarify my stance: I like rap, at least some of it, but when I think about mega popular songs from the 90s like:

- Hypnotize
- California Love
- No Diggity
- etc.

They are all a function of their absolutely brilliantly catchy beats. Even when it comes to "quality rap", I love things like Cannibal Ox and Dr. Octo because of their incredible beats. They are awesome lyricists as well, but if it was just the lyrics over average beats, I'd like the songs a lot less.

And when it comes to mainstream rap, where let's be honest, the lyrics are sometimes lacking, it really does come down to the beat.

I should also qualify this by saying that obviously in the case of a well-established artist, the name alone is what sells the most (also why the collabs are done on albums). But assuming that two rappers have equal name recognition, the success of your career pretty much comes down to picking the right producer at the time.

Agreed. But what's so crazy about this? This is how it's always been. Music that's aesthetically pleasing will always beat out music that isn't. If producers weren't important, you wouldn't have Just Blaze, Timbaland, Kanye (pre-College Dropout), etc. making millions. About a decade ago, Pharrell said that every Neptunes beat started at $75,000. If the lyricist were more important than the producer, a capella tracks would even sell as long as they had mind-blowing lyrics, and we know this isn't the case. One big knock against Nas being the greatest emcee of all is his lack of a ear for good beats from the middle of his career onward.
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post #6 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:11pm
Replace "beats" with "band" and you can make the same statement about any genre. If you view the rapper as the lead singer and the beats as the rest of the band, rap doesn't seem quite so unique.

Likewise, producers are incredibly important in other genres. Look at Ross Robinson and Nu Metal, for example, or the changes to Metallica's sound after they started working with Bob Rock.
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post #7 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:13pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MetroStyles View Post
80% of a record's commercial success is about the production/beat, and has nothing to do with the rapper.

definitely buy a bad rapper can kill a good beat. Listen to Nore on that Neptunes beat (forget the name of the song, the video has them in the desert somewhere).

Also, some rappers voice, "flow", goes a lot better with certain beats. Rick Ross is mediocre at best, and I am being generous, but he definitely makes "MC Hammer" and that other song of his that is played on the radio all the time. I find that the most memorable songs have a great beat, but also a great hook. Most rap songs/rappers have no ability to make good hooks, I think 50 cent is great at this, as is Dre. and the rappers he works with (Snoop/Eminem etc)
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post #8 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:17pm
^Beats will always carry the day man. Always.
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post #9 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:27pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by swaggerisaliability View Post
One big knock against Nas being the greatest emcee of all is his lack of a ear for good beats from the middle of his career onward.

Spot on..

There is a difference in rap between big room/club sound and headphone sound -- both have their purpose and sometimes when you can marry both into one track you have a certified classic. It's what makes Hip-Hop both so frustrating and so brilliant.
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post #10 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:35pm
Part of why I got really into techno and electronic was because I liked rap but hated any lyrics or actual rapping.
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post #11 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:47pm
Thread Starter 
BTW, to those that say this applies to all genres, I disagree.

Sure, the music is important in every case. However, in genres like rock/alt/indie the artist who is given the praise is the same one who writes the music. THERE IS NO DISCONNECT.

In rap (and in radio pop), the artist that sings/raps gets most of the fame, while someone else is writing/producing the beat. This is the disconnect. It is particularly obvious and non-meaningful for bad pop, because hey, we all knew these people had no talent in the first place, especially in the age of rampant auto-tune. It is less obvious with rappers because it isn't their "mad singing chops" that they are famous for but theoretically they are famous for their flow/rhymes. But in reality, this has almost nothing to do with success as long as they pass a certain bar of not sucking.
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post #12 of 71
7/23/10 at 1:48pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by swaggerisaliability View Post
One big knock against Nas being the greatest emcee of all is his lack of a ear for good beats from the middle of his career onward.

Too bad, the beats on his first album were out of this world (esp. "Ain't Hard to Tell").
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post #13 of 71
7/23/10 at 2:05pm
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post #14 of 71
7/23/10 at 2:15pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by MetroStyles View Post
BTW, to those that say this applies to all genres, I disagree.

Sure, the music is important in every case. However, in genres like rock/alt/indie the artist who is given the praise is the same one who writes the music. THERE IS NO DISCONNECT.

In rap (and in radio pop), the artist that sings/raps gets most of the fame, while someone else is writing/producing the beat. This is the disconnect. It is particularly obvious and non-meaningful for bad pop, because hey, we all knew these people had no talent in the first place, especially in the age of rampant auto-tune. It is less obvious with rappers because it isn't their "mad singing chops" that they are famous for but theoretically they are famous for their flow/rhymes. But in reality, this has almost nothing to do with success as long as they pass a certain bar of not sucking.

Not true. Take country music, for example. It's very common for country singers to release albums where they've written only a couple of songs, and their bands are basically interchangeable. No one knows who was in Garth Brooks' band because they were basically a bunch of studio musicians hired to go on the road with him. This is very much like what you describe with rap - Garth Brooks is just the singer. The songs are written by someone else, and the music is performed by a bunch of guys who receive no recognition.
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post #15 of 71
7/23/10 at 2:23pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrG View Post
Not true. Take country music, for example. It's very common for country singers to release albums where they've written only a couple of songs, and their bands are basically interchangeable. No one knows who was in Garth Brooks' band because they were basically a bunch of studio musicians hired to go on the road with him. This is very much like what you describe with rap - Garth Brooks is just the singer. The songs are written by someone else, and the music is performed by a bunch of guys who receive no recognition.

I'm not going to argue with you. Add country singers to the list of rappers/pop singers.

The primary contrast is with actual rock bands. Let's not get cute with exceptions.
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