Does any genre matter any more besides hip hop?

cawacko said:
Interesting, I was unaware. Do you only listen to contemporary rappers or do you listen to '80's and '90's hip hop at all?
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I've tried a few 90's artists but I wasn't a huge fan.

One of the biggest draws of hip hop to me is synthesizers and electronic sounds. Honestly the main reason I got into this was because I discovered that electronic dance music really helped me be able to work. I quickly ran out of good indie synth pop bands though, and while I was initially super reluctant about rap due to stupid prejudices against it I had established as a child, it was almost inevitable I'd get drawn that way because that's where almost all the amazing modern electronic beats are.

Anyway synths. really only came back to the fore in the 10's, they unfortunately went out of style in the 90s and 00s. Even the classic Roland 808 was often discarded a lot in favor of more natural sounding drum beats or even real percussion, which I hate. I absolutely love the artificial 808 sound.

I couldn't make it more than a few songs into the Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. I tried Nas's Illmatic several times, and while I was eventually able to complete it and eventually did come to like his groove, again, I still prefer the electronic sound.

My absolute favorite artist is Kanye. Frank Ocean's Blonde though was sort of the bridge I took towards hip hop, his really mellow and thoughtful R&B style helped make me more able to accept and appreciate the rap parts. Honestly I think the first rap song I listened to ever and just thought at the end "Holy fuck that was absolutely beautiful" was his song "Nights".

Since then I've listened to Kendrick Lamar, Vince Staples, ASAP Rocky, Tyler the Creator, Chance the Rapper, Kid Cuidi, Pusha T (mostly his album Daytona, which was produced by Kanye, not a huge fan of Push's other work tbh but Daytona is Kanye at his best in terms of production). There's sort of a network effect when you start listening to hip hop due to all the features, you hear a featured artist on one track on one album and then go check out that artists work, that's how I discovered most of these. Currently going through Drake, I had ignored him initially because he has a shit reputation among hiphop heads, but he has some good sounding stuff even if it's not very thoughtful and it's super poppy in general.

I've absolutely listened to basically everything by Kanye as well as everything he's ever produced though.
 
Kacper said:
That is because R& B is pop by black people and white people who want to seem like they are black.
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Even some white artists who clearly draw heavy inspiration from the distinctive parts of R&B are usually referred to as pop. It's weird. There's also always been a huge cycle where corporations shove together a bunch of attractive white teens who then totally rip off R&B and get a thousand times the attention that any black artist would ever get making the same sounds. Although that's less in recent years.

Hip hop has been super resistant to this surprisingly. Like there are a few white rappers out there, but the only one that's generally respected is Eminem. Who is good but does clearly get much more attention than black artists of equal quality.

It was so annoying the other day I went over to a friends house and mentioned that I liked hip hop, and he decided to pull up youtube chromecast and show me all his hip hop stuff that he'd been getting into lately. Except every. Single. Artist. Was. White. Just a bunch of really mediocore b grade white rappers who thought that the genre was just about talking fast. Like bro do you expect me not to notice this? I can show where to find some actually good hip hop, just close your eyes first...
 
I think rock, especially classic rock, could make a comebakc. Greta van Fleet, a new band, are very promising. Eric Clapton is still producing and releasing albums. Granted, not many listen to Clapton these days, but this music still matters. It matters to me and over a million others on this planet :)
 
Global Nationalist said:
Even some white artists who clearly draw heavy inspiration from the distinctive parts of R&B are usually referred to as pop. It's weird. There's also always been a huge cycle where corporations shove together a bunch of attractive white teens who then totally rip off R&B and get a thousand times the attention that any black artist would ever get making the same sounds. Although that's less in recent years.

Hip hop has been super resistant to this surprisingly. Like there are a few white rappers out there, but the only one that's generally respected is Eminem. Who is good but does clearly get much more attention than black artists of equal quality.

It was so annoying the other day I went over to a friends house and mentioned that I liked hip hop, and he decided to pull up youtube chromecast and show me all his hip hop stuff that he'd been getting into lately. Except every. Single. Artist. Was. White. Just a bunch of really mediocore b grade white rappers who thought that the genre was just about talking fast. Like bro do you expect me not to notice this? I can show where to find some actually good hip hop, just close your eyes first...
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Isn't it cultural appropriation for white boyz to listen to rap?
 
laugh001 said:
I think rock, especially classic rock, could make a comebakc. Greta van Fleet, a new band, are very promising. Eric Clapton is still producing and releasing albums. Granted, not many listen to Clapton these days, but this music still matters. It matters to me and over a million others on this planet :)
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You're dying by the truckload too :)
 
If you want the answer to the OP, watch a couple of episodes of "Love and Hip Hop" (Bravo-couple of *‘different versions...lol‘...You'll become an instant fan, btw...be warned-you'll get hooked;)
 
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