Rap+as+an+Art+Form

Rap.

Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap Rap.

It's everywhere. Whether it's on your overpriced IPod, your overpriced COD game, or in the credits of a disney movie that's trying //way too hard// to be cool, you can't deny it. Rap has saturated every aspect of mainstream culture with it's... saturadedness? I don't know. But it's everywhere. Including your radio. But some cranky old hipster turned his blaring punk-ambient-chiptune-dubshuffle down long enough to lift his left eyebrow as far as it could stretch and **dare** to ask, //Is rap really music?//

WHY YOU LITTLE-- Wait a minute.

That's a good question. Is rap really music?

Of course, there are always those who point at some genre and proudly declare it as noise or worse (though to be perfectly fair, I'm still not convinced that death metal is anything less than the hot-pocket farts of Satan's lesser-known cousin, James Frey, put through a distortion filter and marketed to people who don't need their ears, just to troll America). No one will deny, though, that rap is the most unique genre to emerge since Phillip Glass fell on a piano and millions of aspiring trend riders applauded. Therefore, it is reasonable to consider that that same uniqueness holds it back from truly meeting the standard requirements to be defined as 'music'.

Well if we're going to do this, we might as well know what music //is//. I'm looking at you, ICP fans.

Here's the Webster definition:

// 1. a **:** the science or art of ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination, and in temporal relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity //

Sounds simple enough.

So let's make a quick preliminary comparison between this definition and Rap.


 * **Ordering Tones/Sounds.** Check.
 * **Temporal Relationships.** Check. Whatever //temporal// means.
 * **Unity/Continuity.** Check.

(//Quick version: Does it have a bunch of sounds that go together? Yes.//)

So it seems to meet the dictionary definition of music. What's the problem? According to our friend, the Interwebs, there are quite a few. Let's take a look.

Ask a rapper to "sing" any song, just once...*
That's true, rappers don't sing. They rap.

Thanks for that.

=There is no melody (or quality!)*=

I assume this means that rap production tends to have a very repetitive melodic structure. And this is true, as much for rap as **//anything you've heard on the radio for the past thirty years//**. The four chords of pop music have been around since Journey decided not to stop believing. Early rap music sounded as unpolished as it did because rap was born and bred in rhythm. They beatboxed, they didn't hum a four-part chord progression. They knocked on tables, they didn't pluck a rubber band-cardboard guitar. If Steve Reich can make entire albums of stomping and clapping, then musicians can use their voices as percussion instruments instead of melodic ones. = = =(C)rap is neither music nor an art form. It's a slow but sure deterioration of America.**=

HAHAHAHA! Get it? Because the letters "r-a-p" are in the word "Crap"! That's so funny!

=Canned crap from rap flunkies who can't sing as they mutter away to a thumping beat - chattering a useless, deviant monologue of prose with an obligatory video of lecherous beauties fastened to the performer, and partying like there's no tomorrow.***=

This is from The Examiner, isn't it? Take it away.

But since people keep bringing it up, let's address the claim that the subject matter and public persona of most mainstream rap prove that the form itself is goofily simple-minded at best, and disgustingly primitive at worst, trying it's darnedest to bring about the end of the world as we know it.

Seriously?

No, you know what? That makes perfect sense. Therefore, all minimalism is just some lazy manchild playing two chords at a varying tempo, all YouTube videos consist of cats and their strange habits, and Mickey Rooney has only ever done over-the-top Asian black-face in his comedy. Thank you for enlightening me, Mr. Prismall. You have freed my soul.

Seriously, go listen to the Jokerr (No, that's not a typo) or that dude who made the "Smoking Weed with the President" video on YouTube. I don't support legalization, but that video's awesome.

I need to 'rap' this up (DO YOU GET IT? 'RAP' IS IN 'WRAP', YES?), so let me just say this about rap:

It is 1) Poetry without pretentiousness and 2) Lyrical music without word count limits. This is both a gift and a curse; a rapper can bypass the written and unwritten rules of poetry,

including

free

f o r m ,

and speak frankly while also using poetic tools and mechanisms, opening countless opportunities that weren't there before, and a depth to storytelling you can't get from a rock song of the same length. This same freedom means that someone who doesn't have a bit of talent has no high form of by-the-numbers composition he can fall back on, and so has to utilize rap's own form of by-the-numbers, which in this case is 'Gansta Rap' and the like. This lack of talent and depth also becomes far more exposed than it would for a hack rock singer, due to the simple fact that //there is no max word limit////,// which also means that there has come about a standard minimum word limit. It's simply a matter of 'fakes' in rap being easier to spot, which in and of itself is a good thing for fans.

So basically, yeah, Rap is music, in every sense of the word.

http://www.debate.org/opinions/did-americas-downfall-begin-when-rap-was-recognized-as-an-art-form http://ricochet.com/archives/is-rap-music/ http://www.collegenet.com/elect/app/app?service=external/Forum&sp=7480 http://www.wisegeek.org/what-is-rap-music.htm http://rappingmanual.com/3-reasons-why-rap-is-the-best-music-out-there/ http://hiphopandpolitics.com/2006/08/23/is-rap-actually-music-or-is-it-a-bad-influence/ http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1993/4/93.04.04.x.html http://www.wikihow.com/Appreciate-Rap-Music
 * http://www.debate.org/opinions/is-rap-music-real-music
 * http://www.examiner.com.au/story/1534381/rap-the-biggest-con-in-history-of-music/

(//Psst,// I'd also like to note that this is happening: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/eminems-total-slaughter-battle-rap-league-is-ready-to-rumble-20140428, and it's going to be the most awesomest thing ever. Ever.)