The current "rap" music that is today all over the charts and radio does not seem like true rap to me but instead just annoying garbage. I'm talking about what some would refer to as glam/mainstream rap such as the likes of Lil' John, 50 Cent, "Crunk", J-Kwon, and other so-called rap "musicians" who seem so popular today for reasons I just cannot understand. The beat to most of the songs is repetitive and the raps are just plain stupid. My cousins/roommates are constantly blaring this crap on their radio and sometimes I feel like smashing the damn thing because I hate that "music" so much.
For some reason today's rap strikes me as total trash but I can listen to older rap all day. Some of my favorite albums include 2Pac's All Eyez On Me, Ice Cube's very political material from the early '90s Rodney King Era, I especially love his signature song "It Was A Good Day", N.W.A's Staright Outta Compton, Dr. Dre's The Chronic, Snoop Dogg's first album Doggystyle, Notorious B.I.G.'s first alabum Ready To Die is just incredible, the raps, beats, and lyrics are sheer hip hop genius and the best East Coast rap has or had then to offer. I also love old-school rap like Public Enemy's "Fight the Power", De La Soul's "Me,Myself, & I".
If you ask me hip hop's golden era (late '80s - mid '90s) is long past and we are left today with basically talentless posers and idiots beating the life out of what used to be in my opinion, quite an innovative and respectful music art form that dealt seriously and realistically with America's urban social underclass.
Anyone else share my feelings on this?

Why do you assume there is something to "get" in today's rap?
???

Why do you assume there is something to "get" in today's rap?
???


when I listen to today's rap, I want to "get" a hammer and smash the CD's ;D

Anyone else share my feelings on this?


Yes. I feel this topic has been flogged incessantly to the point that it is past dead. Honestly, if you do not "get" it, and you don't like it, don't listen to it, but why should I have to hear you rant about it? Just because it is not to your liking doesn't mean that its fans can't appreciate it. To each his own. Live and let live. Lordy, it's bad enough seeing rants like this when they're in topics that started out as simple polls of taste, but to see a whole topic started around one? No wonder you didn't feel like posting it as a member!

it's because you're old!

this is the rap to end all raps
if you like rap then take a nap
i think rock is really cool
if you like rap then you're a fool
this is the rap to end all raps

I have no interest for rap today. I will not criticize anyone for listening, but I also won't go near any of it. I prefer older rap like NWA, Naughty by nature, Beasty Boys, Tupac, etc. Soon as puff Daddy came around, it all wen't down hill.

I have no interest for rap today. I will not criticize anyone for listening, but I also won't go near any of it. I prefer older rap like NWA, Naughty by nature, Beasty Boys, Tupac, etc. Soon as puff Daddy came around, it all wen't down hill.


I agree. I didn't really start paying attention to music until mid 1997, just when Puffy exploded on the scene and set the stage for today's glam rappers. How I wish I had gotten into music just a year earlier so I could have caught the last breath of rap's golden age.

[quote author=wһіѕ

People who listen to rap say they "hate" rock...

This is most likely becasue they haven't really heard rock.. Probably just this new "pop-punk" garbage...

Rap is so annoying now... One riff over and over that literally makes me feel ill... REALLY.

And then meaningless lyrics that all sound like they're coming from the same vocalist (and the same "hos" in the background)

sometimes I feel like smashing the damn thing


I destroyed a radio because the station played 3 rush songs back to back.
I hate rush.

I punched it until it didn't work anymore  :)

Thought I'd add that.

You have my sympathy.

The current "rap" music that is today all over the charts and radio does not seem like true rap to me but instead just annoying garbage. I'm talking about what some would refer to as glam/mainstream rap such as the likes of Lil' John, 50 Cent, "Crunk", J-Kwon, and other so-called rap "musicians" who seem so popular today for reasons I just cannot understand. The beat to most of the songs is repetitive and the raps are just plain stupid. My cousins/roommates are constantly blaring this crap on their radio and sometimes I feel like smashing the damn thing because I hate that "music" so much.
For some reason today's rap strikes me as total trash but I can listen to older rap all day. Some of my favorite albums include 2Pac's All Eyez On Me, Ice Cube's very political material from the early '90s Rodney King Era, I especially love his signature song "It Was A Good Day", N.W.A's Staright Outta Compton, Dr. Dre's The Chronic, Snoop Dogg's first album Doggystyle, Notorious B.I.G.'s first alabum Ready To Die is just incredible, the raps, beats, and lyrics are sheer hip hop genius and the best East Coast rap has or had then to offer. I also love old-school rap like Public Enemy's "Fight the Power", De La Soul's "Me,Myself, & I".
If you ask me hip hop's golden era (late '80s - mid '90s) is long past and we are left today with basically talentless posers and idiots beating the life out of what used to be in my opinion, quite an innovative and respectful music art form that dealt seriously and realistically with America's urban social underclass.
Anyone else share my feelings on this?


Anyone else share my feelings on this?

Don't worry.... You're not alone on this one....  ::)

Rap really lost its meaning after Tupac and Biggie were shot.  From Master P on, it's been all glam.  Even gangsta rap at least had something to say.

It's funny, but I thought hip-hop was at its low point in the mid to late 90s. I didn't really like the gangsta-rappers like Snoop, 2Pac and the Notorious B.I.G. I think its only in the 00s that hip hop has gotten good again with performers like Nelly, Outkast and the Black Eyed Peas. Outkast totally deserved to win the Grammy for best album in 2004.

To me, the best hip hop was that from the 80s and early 90s from people like Run DMC, Public Enemy, NWA and LL Cool J(although I admit there was lots of lame hip hop back then too, like MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice).

I dont really like rap but I won't critisize someone else for liking it(except the people who pretend to like it because everyone else does I will critisize them ;))

It's funny, but I thought hip-hop was at its low point in the mid to late 90s. I didn't really like the gangsta-rappers like Snoop, 2Pac and the Notorious B.I.G. I think its only in the 00s that hip hop has gotten good again with performers like Nelly, Outkast and the Black Eyed Peas. Outkast totally deserved to win the Grammy for best album in 2004.

To me, the best hip hop was that from the 80s and early 90s from people like Run DMC, Public Enemy, NWA and LL Cool J(although I admit there was lots of lame hip hop back then too, like MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice).


Hmmm, I disagree, but I think you're getting to something.  I hate gangsta rap, for the most art.  Snoop is good, 2pac is decent, Biggie Smalls sucks, but at least during the first two-thirds of the '90s there were some MCs who had things to say.  1993-1996 was the "mid school" of rap, it wasn't old school glory like 1986-1992, but it wasn't all glam.  Some of the gangsta rappers were simply portraying how life was on the streets in the late '80s and early '90s. 

Modern rap, that is that of the late 1990s and early '00s is almost all glam. Mind, there are some good artists: OutKast are good, Nelly is actually talented, as stupid as he is, and even Eminem is pretty good, but in general it's just really stupid.  I'd take Biggie over Lil' Wayne any day.

If you ask me hip hop's golden era (late '80s - mid '90s) is long past and we are left today with basically talentless posers and idiots beating the life out of what used to be in my opinion, quite an innovative and respectful music art form that dealt seriously and realistically with America's urban social underclass.
Anyone else share my feelings on this?

Agreed 110%.

Public Enemy?  Ice-T?  NWA?  Life in the ghetto's something to be overcome by force, risen above by skill and education, and survived (and loathed, even if you "win" the game of gang warfare) by one's battle-scarred wits, respectively.

Today's rappers?  Heh.  The ghetto - and the crime that goes along with it - is as good as it gets. 

Suffice it to say that the rap stars currently promoted by (presumably :) white RIAA industry executives - have done more to perpetuate the sterotype (and indeed, *realize and glorify* said stereotype)...  well, lemme just stop at saying that 50 Cent and his ilk have done more, and better, work for the Klan - than anything that ever crawled out of the Bayou.