• Welcome to the Internet Infidels Discussion Board.

Am I the only member of Talk Freethought who listens to hip hop?

 
 
 

Do you listen to hip-hop?

  • Total voters
    36
R

rousseau

Contributor
Joined
Jun 23, 2010
Messages
13,762
Is there anyone else out there?

I'm trying to figure out if I like 'Habits & Contradictions' or 'Good Kid M.A.A.D. City' more.
 
I'm a "sometimes" kind of listener. I'd say my favorite acts are KOS, Sound Assembly, Faithless. Mainstream hip hop, I've always loved the Beastie Boys and dig the sound of 50 Cent's voice. Not much for Gangsta Rap, though NWA did have its time with me.

Edit: I'm a complete neophyte in the various hip-hop genre's but wouldn't mind a tutorial.
 
Celldweller said:
I'm a "sometimes" kind of listener. I'd say my favorite acts are KOS, Sound Assembly, Faithless. Mainstream hip hop, I've always loved the Beastie Boys and dig the sound of 50 Cent's voice. Not much for Gangsta Rap, though NWA did have its time with me.

Edit: I'm a complete neophyte in the various hip-hop genre's but wouldn't mind a tutorial.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't call myself an expert either, over the years I've heard of the usual big names: Jay-Z, Nas, Notorious B.I.G., Outkast, etc. Then something happened in the past couple years and I started to get heavily into R&B, Soul, and Hip-Hop (I guess I got tired of listening to Bob Dylan, Velvet Underground, and their re-incarnations). For a while I had a handful of albums on my iPod, then one day I had the bright idea to look up a 'greatest hip-hop artists of all time' list. I ended up downloading and checking out a huge number of different artists and found what I like.

Turns out that a lot of the good hip-hop artists actually seem to be the big names, which stands in contrast to the indie scene (unless there's a whole amazing underground scene I'm missing out on). Anyway, I'm not familiar with any hip-hop sub-genres, but if you want to check out some good, recent artists, try Kendrick Lamar, Schoolboy Q, and Danny Brown, Kendrick being the biggest name of the three.
 
rousseau said:
Celldweller said:
I'm a "sometimes" kind of listener. I'd say my favorite acts are KOS, Sound Assembly, Faithless. Mainstream hip hop, I've always loved the Beastie Boys and dig the sound of 50 Cent's voice. Not much for Gangsta Rap, though NWA did have its time with me.

Edit: I'm a complete neophyte in the various hip-hop genre's but wouldn't mind a tutorial.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't call myself an expert either, over the years I've heard of the usual big names: Jay-Z, Nas, Notorious B.I.G., Outkast, etc. Then something happened in the past couple years and I started to get heavily into R&B, Soul, and Hip-Hop (I guess I got tired of listening to Bob Dylan, Velvet Underground, and their re-incarnations). For a while I had a handful of albums on my iPod, then one day I had the bright idea to look up a 'greatest hip-hop artists of all time' list. I ended up downloading and checking out a huge number of different artists and found what I like.

Turns out that a lot of the good hip-hop artists actually seem to be the big names, which stands in contrast to the indie scene (unless there's a whole amazing underground scene I'm missing out on). Anyway, I'm not familiar with any hip-hop sub-genres, but if you want to check out some good, recent artists, try Kendrick Lamar, Schoolboy Q, and Danny Brown, Kendrick being the biggest name of the three.
Click to expand...

Good point and I'll check out your recommendations.
 
Wu-Tang Clan ain't nothin to fuck with. MF Doom, Immortal Technique, and Run the Jewels are also pretty good in my opinion.
 
The distribution of answers seems about what I would expect for any other form of popular music.
 
The correct answer is "Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City", which Macklemore claimed to have robbed at the Grammys, but e all know that the Grammy judges don't know crap about hip hop anyway, so who really cared?

Anyway...I grew up in the inner city, in the 80s. Guru from Gang Starr used to sing in my church choir. I knew guys in the Almighty RSO. Even tried becoming a rapper myself. Thankfully those tapes have all been destroyed. But growing up, rap was pretty much the soundtrack of my youth, and that of my friends. So, I do agree somewhat with Dendrast that it's an age thing - in that I can easily recall not just Kendrick Lamar, Wale, and so on, but that first time I heard "Potholes in my Lawn", and PE song, and of course, local favorite "Don't Treat Your Girlie Like a Dog" by MC Spice. A bit too young to have bought anything from Skippy White's, but old enough to remember DJ Magnus on MIT's radio station...I think.
 
I've never owned any hip hop albums, but there have been songs that I've liked. Several of the works of Eminem, Bone Thugs & Harmony, and Insane Clown Posse, for instance. Between those three, the number of songs that I've enjoyed probably numbers higher than the number of Beatles songs that I've enjoyed, seeing as how I've also never owned any Beatles albums.

My father was a jazz/funk guitarist and my mother was a pop/r&b/jazz vocalist, but I never got into those genres. I never got into any of the genres typically associated with my race, and in fact grew up sort of resenting the association, and resenting the whole idea of "black" culture. Like I'm supposed to think/feel/act a certain way because of my phenotype. So growing up, I didn't experience the exotic/edgy appeal of hip-hop the way many of my fellow middle-class suburbanites did. These days hip hop doesn't bother me as much as it used to, and I take it on faith that there is more diversity among it than I'm aware of, but I lack the curiosity to proactively explore it.
 
I listen to a lot of hip-hop anymore. Of course, I have a pretty open mind about most types of music, but hip-hop is generally what I listen to right now. I got bored of Classic Rock, not much is happening in contemporary rock right now IMO, and while I find myself liking more niche genres of folk, bluegrass, jazz, or whatever alternative that's out there, I find hip-hop to be the most accessible for me right now because there's a wide array of stuff that I like and some artists are just damn good. Might I suggest you check out Labor Days by Aesop Rock...it's a pretty amazing album in general, though Aesop Rock is a bit more obscure than Kendrick Lamar or Schoolboy Q (that's Aesop Rock, not A$AP Rocky btw, fundamentally different artists). Also, if you like some older stuff as well there's always 36 Chambers by Wu-Tang (though you'll miss out on some of their best tracks, like Triumph or Reunited) or Illmatic by Nas (that is, if you haven't already).

- - - Updated - - -

Also, Jay-Z is probably the most overrated artist of all time. I really don't understand how that guy sells albums.
 
Anybody have thoughts on 'To Pimp a Butterfly'?

I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. It's ear-candy for sure, having some cool production in spots. I also think he pulled off the political / philosophical thing well, but I just don't seem to be able to get into it musically. Contrast it's flow with something like 'Doggystyle', and that's pretty much what I mean.
 
i like a certain kind of hip hop, but i don't know the name of the genre. bands: digable planets, de la soul, tribe called quest, dialated peoples, spearhead, blackalicious, etc - is that even a genre? yeah, it's hippy shit, i love it. smart hip hop. "'cause i'm cool like dat, cause i'm down like dat, cause i'm slick like dat, cause i'm black like dat."
 
Not willing to wade through the morass looking for a nugget or two. I'll give anything a try on recommendation. For better or worse, this is how I am with most music. I think it's a holdover of buying way too many albums as a kid with one, maybe two good songs on it. I shy away from hip-hop, metal, and country. I like jazz, bluegrass, and particularly Americana. And for whatever reason, I really like classical while eating. A discovery I made out west at Souplantation.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom