Anything but rap

[jdogric12]

I've noticed this in a lot of members' profile under music preferences. So I take it you all like free jazz, musique concrete, and Ghananian postal worker rhythms? Sorry, I don't know exactly why, but that kind of bugs me. Should I get off your lawn too? Discuss.

[kennyhowes]

Jumping on to follow the discussion.

[nattiep]

Actually I didn't update my thing. I like early 90's Gangsta Rap like N.W.A.

[sowhat]

I'd suggest, we may like or dislike (or include in "preferences list") something that we know well enough to — mmm — judge or whatever. What we don't is simply out of sight, and one can hardly say whether he/she likes, say, Chukchee tribal music until he/she makes acquaintance with. So, in my view, "Anything but rap" may actually mean "From what i've heard, the only thing i really dislike is rap, but i'm open for new suggestions".
Ah well, nevermind.

[winston]

Even though I don't say it in my profile and never have..............rap music is not something that I have ever liked. Quite simply put, it is a genre that I cannot relate to.

[collin]

I've noticed the attitude on a lot on guitar boards that, if there are no obvious guitars, it can't be good music...


Last I checked, there was only two kinds of music---good and bad (and even that's subjective).


I'm as fanatical about my Digable Planets, Tupac Shakur, Dr. Dre, Wu-Tang (ODB) and Jay Z. albums as I am about a lot of great classic rock, blues or jazz.

If it's honest and speaks the truth, I'm all ears.
If the artist is creating music for the sake of art and not selling albums, I'm all ears.
If the artist is continually pushing the boundaries of their craft instead of recycling old cliches, then I'm all ears.



That said, yes....there are some terrible Hip-Hop records and artists, but isn't it like that in any genre?

I also detect a fair amount of racial and/or socio-economoical status prejudice in people's disdain for Hip-Hop......but what else is new? It was the same story with Jazz 85 years ago and then R&B 65 years ago...etc etc. People are always going to hate on what they don't understand (or refuse to try understanding).

[kennyhowes]

Even though I don't say it in my profile and never have..............rap music is not something that I have ever liked. Quite simply put, it is a genre that I cannot relate to.

Which is 100% ok. The musical taste of the forum members aren't in question, or to be debated; I think what Jason's point might be is that rap might be taking a bit of heat when one says "anything but."

[jingle_jangle]

A lot of rap is a lot of *rap, to put it in terms that Brian will let slide. Just like every musical genre, and every form of expression that must bow to Mammon and commerce, human nature, freedom and political systems, eventually everything that opens our eyes and minds, spreads out. In doing so, it expands in quality in both directions, but in my observation, the quality bell curve generally becomes heavily-weighted toward the low end even as quantity increases geometrically.

OTOH, the early stuff (Flash, Sugar Hill, late '70s) still makes me pause and consider things. I remain a huge fan of the ill-fated Ice T project, "Body Count", which brought rap and metal together, and in doing so, forged some immensely thought-provoking, glandular, relevant and stirring music.

I see "rap" as being victim as well as hero. I see it as having its roots in the Lost Poets (Wake Up, Niggers!) and Gil Scott-Heron (The Revolution Will Not Be Televised), and I see it as awakening young minds to an expression of the disillusionment one feels when one is not Young, Gifted, and Black in a culture that values the valueless and downplays the emotional needs of everyone. I also see it as a victim of its own ability to communicate: taken over and exploited by those with twisted agendas.

We remain a society, complex, volatile, balanced on a razor edge between stability and chaos. For any medium with the power to communicate that rhythmic, tribal, spoken word music possesses, to ignore the responsibilities that that power carries with it, instead substituting private agendas and encouraging criminal and anti-social values, is where the tragedy resides. To me, it's not about music and expression and its forms, which are eternally locked into human DNA and thus subject to infinite variety. Instead, it's about direction, responsibility and control.

There's "good" rap, and "bad" rap, and the definitions of those two qualifiers are highly individual. A good universal definition would be to define how much any form of art or expression gives to a culture, and how much it takes away or destroys.

Cop Killer is more valid than My Heart Will Go On.

Why?

That's challenging to discuss!

[kennyhowes]

Cop Killer is more valid than My Heart Will Go On.

Why?

That's challenging to discuss!

A cheap joke to drive my point home - it seems a lot more folks list "anything but rap" than "anything but Celine Dion."

Carry on.

[kiramdear]

I think it's natural to like what we relate to, but it takes more effort and an artistic mind to differentiate between what we like and what we think is good and valuable. So maybe "anything but rap" is a bit of a lazy answer. Does it indicate intolerance of another culture? Maybe, or maybe not. An extended discussion might reveal the answer on a case by case basis.

If you'd asked my mother to answer the question she might have said "anything but Rock". She didn't hate anybody that I ever noticed but she found the music harsh and foreign to her sensibilities. Had she been an artist in her soul she might have answered differently.

[jingle_jangle]

it seems a lot more folks list "anything but rap" than "anything but Celine Dion."

Most folks tend to not like to look inside themselves, at least past the "Hallmark sentiments" level.

The most evolved people I have ever gotten to know, seem to regard music of any kind as background noise that is the purest expression of the sheer joy of life. They can listen to any kind of music for any period of time. It seems to neither irritate them, nor teach them anything they don't already know about life.

That's how I know I'm not evolved.

[collin]

Notice that most people who will state something like "anything but rap" probably couldn't name any rap songs or albums? That's a pretty broad category.

Cop Killer is more valid than My Heart Will Go On.

Why?

That's challenging to discuss!

Not too challenging, IMO.....Body Count posed a question and an answer in the same song.....Celion Dion was just "pure expression" (of a song she didn't even write).

To me, art that has the power to change minds and opinions easily trumps art of the sake of pure expression. Done!

[collin]

ps....I love this thread so far.

[cjj]

How many rap artists play Ricks?

[winston]

I have to confess the imagery of rap, the posturing in an aggressive manner, the lyrics that speak to problems of living life in large urban centers and the whole gangster attitude is a huge turn off for me.

Music is indeed art and I enjoy the tribal beat that is superimposed to convey the message. It is the message that I cannot relate to. My world does not involve violent behavior towards people because they are the wrong colour, or they wear the wrong clothes or bandanna.

I suspect that those who say anything but rap are in fact saying a whole lot against the genre, if you include Celine Dion or Yoko One in the mix of preferences ahead of rap.