Chuck D Says "Rap Is Not Music"

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Sampling basically comes from the fact that rap music is not music. It's rap over music.

-Chuck D

 

http://www.publicenemy.com/index.php?page=page2&item=81

 

It's about time somebody had the nerve to say it, and a pioneer no less.

 

Edit: Whole quote:

 

Stay Free!: What are the origins of sampling in hip-hop?

 

Chuck D: Sampling basically comes from the fact that rap music is not music. It's rap over music. So vocals were used over records in the very beginning stages of hip-hop in the 0s to the early '80s. In the late 1980s, rappers were recording over live bands who were basically emulating the sounds off of the records. Eventually, you had synthesizers and samplers, which would take sounds that would then get arranged or looped, so rappers can still do their thing over it. The arrangement of sounds taken from recordings came around 1984 to 1989.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

That doesn't make him, or you, any less of an idiot.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

And GAWD, you took the quote out of context. Did you even read the whole interview? Stop making threads.

[Golgo 13 0]

Let's ignore him together, Inc.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Anyone read in music theory knows there is no true musicianship in a 4 bar loop. Chuck isn't going that far, but he doesn't have to.

 

There is a reason why soundclick.com is flooded with a billion preteen wiggers making rap music. And that is because, on the musical (not lyrical) end, it takes no talent.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Anyone unconvinced should take a look at this. Superproducer Rick Rock "produces" a $25,000, commercially successful beat for Fabolous - in 8 minutes.

 

http://www.rickrockbeats.com/beatsession.htm

 

Any disbeliever in reincarnation can certainly witness Bach born again here.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

And GAWD, you took the quote out of context. Did you even read the whole interview? Stop making threads.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Seconded. Really dumb thread.

 

Your idiotic misinterpretation aside, I don't care if Rick Rock or Rick Rubin or anybody can make a great beat in 8 minutes. They're exceptional at what they do. Time put into making a song doesn't automatically yield quality; the Beatles--and many other canonical rock acts--tossed off piles of great songs in the space of an afternoon.

 

If you want to see no talent, then watch BET sometime when they're playing really shitty videos from no-name rappers. Compare the beat to those to something off The Chronic. Or off any Outkast album. Or any Public Enemy album, since we're talking Chuck D. The shitty music on soundclick.com or mp3.com or any number of free distribution sites is shitty all-around; it's not like you've got wunderkinds making great beats and just rapping poorly. It's just as easy to make a shitty song on a guitar as it is to make a shitty backing beat for a rap track.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Your idiotic misinterpretation aside, I don't care if Rick Rock or Rick Rubin or anybody can make a great beat in 8 minutes.

Speaks volumes. The beat is a silly 2 bar loop, the composition of which was 2 chords. No talent involved, just haphazard pressing of keys. The fact that you would consider it "great" indicates exactly how easy you and the rest of the general public are to pacify.

 

Compare the beat to those to something off The Chronic.

 

And then compare The Chronic to the musical genius of Prince, or any other songwriter who is actually capable of writing sheet music. Take away the drum machines and their child-proof sequencers and force anyone of these "musicians" to actually do something, and you'd have a catastrophe. Please never again compare the Beatles to men who cannot even play keys.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Chuck is saying hip hop is a lyrical art form. You can infer that creating something musically valid was never the point. I "get it", and so should you.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Your idiotic misinterpretation aside, I don't care if Rick Rock or Rick Rubin or anybody can make a great beat in 8 minutes.

Speaks volumes. The beat is a silly 2 bar loop, the composition of which was 2 chords. No talent involved, just haphazard pressing of keys. The fact that you would consider it "great" indicates exactly how easy you and the rest of the general public are to pacify.

I didn't listen to the beat you were talking about it, so your wanking is pointless.

 

Also, as you might have guessed from the avatar, Prince is my favorite musician of all time, so you don't need to proselytize in his name. You might also remember that some of his best work, specifically stuff from the Dirty Mind through 1999 period, relies heavily on the sequencers and drum machines you so loathe. And what the hell is "If I Was Your Girlfriend" but a few drum and synth loops?

 

I also would put most of the beats on The Chronic on the same level as many great compositions by people like Prince or the Beatles. "Nuthin' but a 'G' Thang" and "Dre Day" in particular are perfect pop, far more than the simple loops you claim they are. Several layers of instruments, several changes, and a perfect sound for the attitude and sound of Snoop and Dre's raps. If you don't notice them, then I don't know what to tell you. Hip hop is undeniably a lyrical art form, but its best representatives wouldn't be worth half of what they are if not for the music behind them.

[snuffbox 0]

Dr. Dre, Kanye West, Blackalicious, The Roots, Saul Williams, etc...Its either music or you retarded.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Also, as you might have guessed from the avatar,

 

I have avatars turned off. Sigs as well. I come to message boards to read content.

 

Prince is my favorite musician of all time, so you don't need to proselytize in his name.  You might also remember that some of his best work, specifically stuff from the Dirty Mind through 1999 period, relies heavily on the sequencers and drum machines you so loathe.  And what the hell is "If I Was Your Girlfriend" but a few drum and synth loops?

 

Prince has also written "The Most Beautiful Girl in The World," an actual song. The man can catch your ear with pop banalities, and also can write (<----notice "write") an actual SONG, just as catchy, which actually, oh I don't know, changes tempo or contains a bridge. Prince can write a hit in hip hop, funk, pop, or R&B. Prince can engineer sounds with a synth from a flat waveform and not just drone on with factory stock. Prince can mix his own music down in such a way that it is unrecognizable to the original dry recording. The man has ACTUAL MUSICAL TALENT BESIDES LOOPING A CATCHY TUNE. There is your difference.

 

I also would put most of the beats on The Chronic on the same level as many great compositions by people like Prince or the Beatles. 

Please put the crack down.

 

"Nuthin' but a 'G' Thang" and "Dre Day" in particular are perfect pop, far more than the simple loops you claim they are.

Oh really? Sort of how the former is a sampled loop of "I wanna get freaky with you" with an TRS-808 drum machine behind it?

 

Several layers of instruments, several changes,

WHAT?? "Dre Day" is not only an interpolation of Not Just Knee Deep, it doesn't change at all. The track loops from beginning to end with a rez lead coming in and out at the choruses. That's not a change. That's crap.

 

Today's superproducers in hip hop have no other talent besides knowing a snappy melody when they hear one. And a good deal of soundclick rap is right on par with the hits on the radio (again we're talking musically, not lyrically) - precisely because it is just so damn easy for anyone to loop this cattle shit.

 

Chuck D understands that the track is a backdrop and you should too. When I do listen to hip hop, it's because of the lyrical offering, and I'll even nod my head to the beat. But I would never claim in a billion years that any true musicianship went into it.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

Aw shucks, Edwin beat me to the evisceration.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Oh and I forgot, the strings in the third verse of Dre Day meandering entirely off key to signify a build of some sort. Yeah, genius.

[Red Baron 0]

Wow.

 

How old are you? 13? 14?

 

So you don't like rap. Big whoop.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

You can have that most recent post if you want. The use of "The Most Beautiful Girl In The World" as an example of a great Prince song has kinda turned me off responding any further. Fuck, it's a good song, but every single song off the Four Big Albums except "Free" is better.

 

Except for this:

Oh really? Sort of how the former is a sampled loop of "I wanna get freaky with you" with an TRS-808 drum machine behind it?

I don't fucking care what it is or where it comes from. The track as mixed suits the lyrics and flow perfectly. The knowledge of a good hook and how to use it you deride is as much musicianship as "engineering a synth from a flat waveform" or whatever other technical stuff you want to spout. The method is rarely what matters. The product is. And when it's as good as the first big hits of g-funk, it's great.

 

If you still want to complain about that, direct your attention to a few of the people snuffbox mentions. And come on: are you really going to tell me that the tracks Organized Noise, Andre, and Big Boi whipped up for Outkast's "Spottieottiedopalicious," "Skew It On The Bar-B," and "Ms. Jackson" are worthless?

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

You jerk, "Free" is a good song.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

"Free" is the only song on 1999 I don't really like. And it's actually okay, but it totally doesn't fit on the album right, with all the long dancey jams. I'd probably like it better if it were slotted somewhere on Around the World in a Day or Parade. It came up on shuffle the other day and was pretty decent.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

Where do you rank Lovesexy in your personal Prince list.

[Hank Kingsley 0]

"Alphabet St." is fabulous. I've even come to embrace the rap in the middle.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

No, Cat, I really don't wanna hear you rap.

 

The 7" version of that song is easily top 5 material, though.

[Hank Kingsley 0]

C'mon, jerk your body like a horny pony would.

[B. Brian Brunzell 0]

Where do The Roots fit into his argument about Rap not being music/ and only being synthesized beats that take only EIGHT MINUTES?

[Nighthawk 0]

This fellow doesn't understand music because he doesn't understand art. Music is art, an extension of which is that it cannot be explained in a technical sense. First, understand that audio not being music is not synonomous with being bad or untalented. These songs demonstrate art in the face of simplicity, horror or literally nothing:

 

MF Doom "Hey!"

The Residents "Satisfaction"

Diamanda Galas Schrei X

Kid606 "Chart Topping Radio Hit"

 

and so on. Are these things music? To ask is missing the point. In the face of these extremes of musical expression, hip hop production should cease to be a line of questioning. It should be so painfully obvious that only a fool wouldn't understand it. Sic.

 

Also, art should not be measured by effort.

 

Lovesexy is slightly worse than The Black Album, which is my favorite Prince album. My favorite song on that album is "Bob George".

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Dr. Dre, Kanye West, Blackalicious, The Roots, Saul Williams, etc...Its either music or you retarded.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

http://s47.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2FB233V...RD172D6OJHBCYK5

 

I took the liberty of posting a Kanye West/Common instrumental. The actual substance to the beat is about 15 seconds long, but I left it looping in it's entirety so you could enjoy it further. Lets take a listen. We've got a kick drum, snare drum, closed hat, background noise sample, a bassline playing 3 notes total, and a sped up Alvin and the Chipmunk like sample at the end. That's 6 tracks total. Take a listen.

 

Like I said twice, the only talent which could go into this, was knowing that it catches the common ear. A retard is usually identified at smiling and nodding intensely to the most simple and worthless things. It's plain to see you're the retard.

[Guest Angora Jellyfish]

Milky being pedantic won't hide the fact that you're wrong. That's the great thing about art. Each and every piece of thoughtless junk is going to have at least one fan.

 

 

These songs demonstrate art in the face of simplicity, horror or literally nothing:

 

MF Doom "Hey!"

The Residents "Satisfaction"

Diamanda Galas Schrei X

Kid606 "Chart Topping Radio Hit"

 

No, they demonstrate that hip hop is a verbal artform and not a musical one. Strip away the vocals and what do we have? Trash.

 

 

and so on. Are these things music? To ask is missing the point.

 

Why do people attend Juliard? That's right, to develop actual, tangible talent. Theory is explained so that in the absence of audio, music can still be enjoyed. Technique is taught so that the instrument becomes more than just a simple drum machine, easily understood and effective in the hands of the brainless. Hip hop producers with actual talent I can count on one hand, and hip hop instrumentals which were made with actual musical understanding are fewer than that.

 

Why should anyone bother to learn their craft if randomized, imbecilic manure can be called "music" ? FOR CHRISTS SAKE THERE ISN'T ANY ACTUAL COMPOSITION GOING ON WITH RAP, they turn on the sequencer and record 3 second SNAPSHOTS of themselves.

 

There are 11 year olds on soundclick creating hip hop beats on the level of "How We Do," what does that tell you? If it tells you anything except rap is crap, you're not being honest.

[Murmuring Beast 0]

I agree with Angora.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Yeah, but you don't like anyone but Brian Wilson and the Doors.

 

As for Lovesexy: I dunno. "Alphabet Street" is awesome. I also really dig "Anna Stesia" and "Positivity." The high points are really high but like Around the World in a Day I remember the surrounding materials coming off kinda flat. I haven't listened to it in a while, so maybe I'll make that a project for today.

 

I would probably put it somewhere in the middle, maybe second tier--below Sign O' the Times, Dirty Mind, Purple Rain, and 1999, Parade, floating around Around the World in a Day, Controversy, and Diamonds and Pearls (which, despite a load of lousy New Jack Swing type stuff, has about half superb songs).

[Murmuring Beast 0]

Yeah, but you don't like anyone but Brian Wilson and the Doors.

 

Incorrect, but carry on anyway.

[Henry Spencer 0]

actual musical understanding