Lupe Fiasco “kendrick is not a top tier lyricist to me”

[spliz]

Writing overly complex metaphor heavy, lyrical miracle songs is not strong song writing. Kendrick writes better hooks than Lupe and his verses are strong while still being accessible. Lol at not being close. Kendrick's albums are better and composed of better songs how is Kendrick not even close in song writing to Lupe?

T&Y >> TPAB conceptually, musically and lyrically imo and aside from shyt like “Alright” on Kendrick album and maybe “Mural” or “Deliver” on Lupe album no one in the streets was really bumpin either one. I still to this day can’t see how someone can sit there and listen to TPAB and say its easier to listen to than T&Y. And to act like nikkas wasnt fukkin wit Food and Liquor and The Cool albums heavy is also lying. Schoolboy Q shyt gets more love on the streets than Kendricks in real life settings if nikkas wanna act like thats some type of barometer in songwriting.

 

[spliz]

Meh, Lasers is trash and the songs that Atlantic wanted to push were pop soft but they did numbers. The thing is tho, the songs that they wanted him to use would have blew up. Nothing on you and I believe Airplanes were Lupe's songs until he was like no, and they moved on and gave them to B.o.B.



Lupe was coming off of 2 highly rated and critically acclaimed albums with F&L and The Cool. Had he played the game with Atlantic and went along with that, who knows how big he is right now. But on the flip side... look at B.o.B's career since that? They basically made him their pop happy go lucky rapper for years and now when you hear his music it's clear that that shyt took a toll on him.



But he turned down signing with the Roc. Kendrick from what I can tell, has went with the flow and went along with whatever was put in front of him. I'm not knocking him about it, but just like you said... Lupe off of mixtapes had the likes of Jay-Z and Kanye wanted to work with him. Had Jay wanting to sign him. For Kendrick, he got on with TDE and then linked up with Dre... then he signed to Interscope. I don't know the details around what Atlantic was trying to get out of Lupe and I don't know what TDE and Interscope presented to Kendrick, but clearly Lupe went about doing things without relying on those co-signs. Lupe's been about his business since the jump, and he's stayed true to that... so while Kendrick hasn't dropped a dud, you nor I know the details around his deals with TDE and Interscope. I don't know how many people are getting a piece of Kendrick Lamar. That's what I mean by compromise.

Lupe wasn't willing to compromise his beliefs to just do whatever Atlantic wanted him to do. Interscope still having Kendrick on Taylor Swift songs and singing along online for cross promotion. Suge Knight also came out and said Kendrick is signed to one of the worst deals a star could be signed to when he was on Arsenio's show a few years ago.

So yeah, Interscope might be all for him putting out whatever he wants on his albums to an extent when they know they are caking more off him. There was a clear difference in the rollout to TPAB and DAMN tho, and there were clear direction changes made and just listening to that album it's clear that the label wanted him to drop something that would be more trendy and catchy than TPAB was.

All facts.

 

[Cadillac]

I think T&Y showed that Lupe is prolly a better songwriter than Kendrick when everything connects the right way. With no studio tricks. Dude made songs thats catchy musically and that connected on a different level all the way thru. From verses to hooks. It all meant something. U can tell he put time into that album on every level.

Agreed.

But u know agendas "Lu ain't been good since The Cool" aka no one told me to like T&Y

"Lu mad and jealous of Kendrick" aka I don't know shyt about this man. But my Stan urges making me look stupid to say some bs about him

Breh you already know nikkas been had this conversation before about Kendrick's lyrical ability where we really got down to brass tax and dissected that nikka bars, a lot of these folks in this thread going hard for Kendrick was not saying shyt in those threads

This is more of a anti-Lupe thread. Guarantee if this was said by the Coli's beloved idols Nas and Jay everyone would be agreeing

 

[Insensitive]

Not about to ever act like Kendrick is wack in any regard, but he ain’t even coming close to lupe. A better question is who the fug could actually beat lu with the bars. Not many if any

Elzhi
Ka
Los
Crooked I
Skyzoo
Royce Da 5'9"
The Black Opera (Both rappers in the Duo are stupidly nice...)
Killah Priest
Jay Elect
Ab-Soul
there's a couple I could think of off the top of my head that'd give
Lupe a run for his money any day of the week however on
The Coli Lupe is often treated like the only rapper who has bars
or tries to make "albums".

And if we move the criteria to bodies of work and not singular displays
of brilliance, Lupe gets moved further down IMO.
He isn't the only one to drop a good album or two or three since 2005.

***Adding in Roc Marciano

 

[spliz]

Elzhi
Ka
Los
Crooked I
Skyzoo
Royce Da 5'9"
The Black Opera (Both rappers in the Duo are stupidly nice...)
Killah Priest
Jay Elect
Ab-Soul
there's a couple I could think of off the top of my head that'd give
Lupe a run for his money any day of the week however on
The Coli Lupe is often treated like the only rapper who has bars
or tries to make "albums".

And if we move the criteria to bodies of work and not singular displays
of brilliance, Lupe gets moved further down IMO.
He isn't the only one to drop a good album or two or three since 2005.

How u gonna put KA and not Roc Marci bro? Lol. Reloaded is a modern day classic. And please dont bring up Jay Elec. nikka disqualified. Lol

 

[GoldenGlove]

Never seen either live cuz I don’t go to shows. I’ve seen videos of both and they both gave phenomenal performances

I've seen both of them live and Lupe easily is the better performer.

Kendrick's touring looks to take a toll on him physically because he's flying everywhere, so a lot of the times he just looks like he's out of it.

 

[spliz]

I've seen both of them live and Lupe easily is the better performer.

Kendrick's touring looks to take a toll on him physically because he's flying everywhere, so a lot of the times he just looks like he's out of it.

Kendrick’s performance when he’s on point is amazing bro. Easily one of the best performers of this new gen. Kendrick’s performance >>>>>> Drake.

 

[spliz]

Kendrick doesn’t deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as Nas, Hov, Pac, Cube and them.

Factory.

 

[Chip Skylark]

Meh, Lasers is trash and the songs that Atlantic wanted to push were pop soft but they did numbers. The thing is tho, the songs that they wanted him to use would have blew up. Nothing on you and I believe Airplanes were Lupe's songs until he was like no, and they moved on and gave them to B.o.B.



Lupe was coming off of 2 highly rated and critically acclaimed albums with F&L and The Cool. Had he played the game with Atlantic and went along with that, who knows how big he is right now. But on the flip side... look at B.o.B's career since that? They basically made him their pop happy go lucky rapper for years and now when you hear his music it's clear that that shyt took a toll on him.



But he turned down signing with the Roc. Kendrick from what I can tell, has went with the flow and went along with whatever was put in front of him. I'm not knocking him about it, but just like you said... Lupe off of mixtapes had the likes of Jay-Z and Kanye wanted to work with him. Had Jay wanting to sign him. For Kendrick, he got on with TDE and then linked up with Dre... then he signed to Interscope. I don't know the details around what Atlantic was trying to get out of Lupe and I don't know what TDE and Interscope presented to Kendrick, but clearly Lupe went about doing things without relying on those co-signs. Lupe's been about his business since the jump, and he's stayed true to that... so while Kendrick hasn't dropped a dud, you nor I know the details around his deals with TDE and Interscope. I don't know how many people are getting a piece of Kendrick Lamar. That's what I mean by compromise.

Lupe wasn't willing to compromise his beliefs to just do whatever Atlantic wanted him to do. Interscope still having Kendrick on Taylor Swift songs and singing along online for cross promotion. Suge Knight also came out and said Kendrick is signed to one of the worst deals a star could be signed to when he was on Arsenio's show a few years ago.

So yeah, Interscope might be all for him putting out whatever he wants on his albums to an extent when they know they are caking more off him. There was a clear difference in the rollout to TPAB and DAMN tho, and there were clear direction changes made and just listening to that album it's clear that the label wanted him to drop something that would be more trendy and catchy than TPAB was.

..

 

[GrindtooFilthy]

I would take ab-soul over kendrick

 

[spliz]

Nikka what streets?

 

[Left.A1]

T&Y >> TPAB conceptually, musically and lyrically imo and aside from shyt like “Alright” on Kendrick album and maybe “Mural” or “Deliver” on Lupe album no one in the streets was really bumpin either one. I still to this day can’t see how someone can sit there and listen to TPAB and say its easier to listen to than T&Y. And to act like nikkas wasnt fukkin wit Food and Liquor and The Cool albums heavy is also lying. Schoolboy Q shyt gets more love on the streets than Kendricks in real life settings if nikkas wanna act like thats some type of barometer in songwriting.

If you grew up a fan of funkadelic parliament the Ohio Players Bootsy amd then progressed into bro-soul etc it’s very easy to see why someone would call TPAB an easy listen musically .... can’t really see how that’s controversial


Being from California it’s not even a comparison to bring up how many cars I heard playing DAMN and LOUDLY vs any SchoolBoy project ..... that’s not even some shyt worth talking about honestly ...and I love Q’s music but c’mon my man let’s get real

 

[GoldenGlove]

Tbh I love lupe and this is one of my favorite tracks ...but lyrically this is not special and I don’t know why people regard it in that way ....the nostalgia of what he’s talking about in regards to his movie references is what I believe make people overly giddy about this record as oppose to any sort of lyrical excellence ...he’s not dropping heavy simi’s or ambitious metaphors the Entendres are sparse and thematically it’s a pretty linear retailing of preexisting storylines .... I will say his multi’s are definately dope and the concept is creative here but Kendrick could abosolutely make a song like this




Now with this one I will say that yeah Kendrick is probably not the rapper that is going to go into the Entendre realm as relentlessly or as effortlessly as Lupe that’s no doubt ....but if we agree to that there is no arguing that Lupe does NOT have the dexterity to make a Banger as infectious as humble

I think Next 2 It >>>>>>> Humble

Considering the lanes that they are in. That single was creative and relatable. Atlantic was just done with the dude by the time that came out. If J. Cole or Kendrick put out this song it would have blown up. Let's say he wrote that for an up and coming rapper with a backpack/hipster fanbase and that's their intro to them as an artist? It would have worked perfectly



This also is a great example of Lupe's song making ability. Not everything he drops is overly complex like dudes are trying to say in here.

 

[MarcP]

Kendrick is Lupe with way less complex metaphors, no obscure references that nikkas would never catch, and political opinions that mostly aligned directly with black people.

He's the safe version of Lupe.

 

[NoHalfWay]

Breh you already know nikkas been had this conversation before about Kendrick's lyrical ability where we really got down to brass tax and dissected that nikka bars, a lot of these folks in this thread going hard for Kendrick was not saying shyt in those threads

Like @Champion said people are attacking the messenger instead of listening to the message

Instead of debate it turned into another Stan war. Kendrick stans feelings got hurt now they’re attacking Lupe and Lupe stans got hurt so now they coming for Kendrick.

I’m Tryna make nikkas see the middle ground