A Middle Class White Boy on the State of Hip Hop

Nas said in 2006 that hip hop is dead. He's right, in many senses. You have people like Drake and Lil Wayne making masses of money when they can't even rap. Somewhere along the line people forgot that flow was pivotal to rapping and everyone believes Kanye West when he says he's 'the voice of a generation' because he's the best available. Soulja Boy is actually allowed to release music and be successful to the utter confusion and derision of the grounded souls amongst us. Eminem has spent the last 10 years being a parody of his early brilliant self and spends more of his time speaking in stupid voices than thinking about what he's actually writing down. That said in the few times he actually puts the effort in you can tell he's far and above the rest of the rappers out there at the moment, see his collaboration with Drake, Kanye and Lil Wayne for this juxtaposition (Em starts at 4.57)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOEvBlNI-wc

He is the one redeeming feature of this song and it sums up what hip hop needs right now really. Kanye's been alright; The College Dropout is a great album but he's always been a better producer than rapper; the Dre of his generation, perhaps.

And talking about Dre, his latest album is a bit of an embarrassment to his earlier (also brilliant) self. The production as always is great, but 'I Need a Doctor' is basically 5 minutes of Eminem sucking Dre's dick and I'll be honest, the novelty's worn off that - he's been doing that since 'What's the Difference' in 2001. The way I see it we have another score of rappers coming out now and Odd Future seem to be leading the way with Tyler the Creator at the forefront. Again, the production's brilliant but his rapping lacks flow. Not as much as so many of the other half-arsed 90s imitations out there, but still enough for me to have not regained faith in 'the game' as of yet. Earl Sweatshirt, also of Odd Future, seems like some pretty good stuff but they're still all conforming to the mantra that flow is no longer important in hip hop, in rapping and that's just a stupid trend which needs to be countered.

Hopsin goes some of the way to doing this. I like Hopsin, his flow (as all of his Youtube videos will have comments suggesting) is exactly like a young Eminem. It's refreshing. Ill Mind of Hopsin 4 is great.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bULBnef6w6k&NR=1

But he has way too many half-rhymes and the production is lacking on his released material still. I'd like to see him team up with some good production and see what he's capable of. He's definitely refreshing though, against the stream of shite which is being churned out through the rusty cogs of 'the game', once with people like Dre, Pac and Biggie at the helm and now with Kanye sitting in there staring in the mirror at himself while everything goes to shit around him. The better rappers out there are now sidelined and even brilliant rappers like Nas struggle to get the attention that Soulja Boy could get by recording a shitty song about a sex manoeuvre in his own bedroom.

The golden 90s are gone and there's a worrying mantra around hip hop at the moment. When Lil Wayne is allowed to make music you know that everything's messed up and inverted. The better are getting older and their apprentices are all twats. It probably started with 50 Cent. When such a great rapper as Eminem signs 50 Cent to be his apprentice you know that shit's messed up.

I'll end with my favourite hip hop put down of all time. As much as I love Tupac, what 'you claim to be a playa but I fucked your wife' from Hit 'Em Up has in magnitude is usurped by the sheer genuine comedic value and skill of Masta Ace in his rhymes to Boogieman.

'You that little fish that I catch and throw back

Oh, and by the way - give 50 Cent his flow back.'