Nah this forum is definitely filled with old nikkas who bring up yesteryear to shyt on young people
It’s a lot of goalpost moving on this forum when nikkas who claim to be abreast about music or current entertainment
Turn the conversation like Joe Budden
Many of you act like we weren’t kids and our parents felt the same way about 80s/90s culture
And truth be told a lot of shyt from our childhood was trash as fukk but nikkas deal in nostalgia instead of reflection
That’s why young cats say your post because of two things
We don’t educate the youngins like our aunts, uncles, gmas, pop pop because old nikkas still trying to compete instead of aging gracefully and taking pride in elder statesmen status
Young people say a lot of things to troll old nikkas to get a reaction
But this thecoli home “oh that’s different” Red ass nikkas
The issue is, rap as a genre has no baseline, barrier of entry or universal value set. Even among us, the vanguards of the culture, we cant agree on what makes a rapper "good".
For me:
flow (staying on beat, in the pocket),
diction (how clearly can I hear your raps?),
ear for beats (im a 90s hip hop head so jazzy, smooth beats are my go-to),
lyrics that can convey a range of emotions/experiences in a clear way (think BIggie on Skys the Limit),
diversity of subject matter, and a
diversity of production/song structure
authentic expression (what experiences are behind these words? Did you actually write it? what are you trying to convey?)
are the ingredients of what I consider "good rap"..but the consequence of my tastes means I just cannot get into guys like Future, Mac Dre, Playboy Carti, Detroit Rappers like Veeze/Babyface Ray.
On some level Rap is not supposed to be a very structured genre but reconciling that with having some level of gatekeeping (every art form/culture should gatekeep btw) is the problem.
