Yo! NMD Raps: Tryna strike a chord and it's probably A-Minorrrrrrrr

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > No More Drake > Yo! NMD Raps: Tryna strike a chord and it's probably A-Minorrrrrrrr

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thathonkey: Jul 17, 2012

I just figured it out guys: to pimp a butterfly is like a take on to kill a mockingbird. Album jst clicked for me 10/10 best sound waves ever recorded

# ? Mar 19, 2015 23:35

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# ? Jun 2, 2024 04:37

IM DAY DAY IRL: Jul 11, 2003; Everything's fine.

Nothing to see here.

HorseRenoir posted:

Bronson leaked and it's really good so far

I heard there's an interlude therefor I deem it unlistenable trash. 9.1/10

# ? Mar 19, 2015 23:52

Professor Funk: Aug 4, 2008; WE ALL KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN

I am white and therefore I have the undeniable expertise to furnish a cogent criticism of Action Bronson's latest masterpiece, Mr. Wonderful

edit: also it's better than Yeezus

# ? Mar 19, 2015 23:53

Viginti: Feb 1, 2015

Imma wait for a supercut of the chorus' to play on my local commercial radio station. That's how music should be heard.

# ? Mar 19, 2015 23:54

Rageaholic: May 31, 2005; Old Town Road to EGOT

Quantum of Phallus posted:

Pac was the name of his sleigh

Oh my god

# ? Mar 19, 2015 23:57

Professor Funk: Aug 4, 2008; WE ALL KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN

But seriously Mr. Wonderful is flames so far

# ? Mar 20, 2015 00:01

Cole: Nov 24, 2004; DUNSON'D

THANKFUL FOR MY HITMAN

what's the beat that Flow goes over at 3 minutes in? I have heard it and I know it, but I can't think of it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5drcx1kSAc

# ? Mar 20, 2015 00:01

alansmithee: Jan 25, 2007; Goodness no, now that wouldn't do at all!

Enough of this soft, positive poo poo. I def be loving with the old memphis sound, and just got turned on to one of the classic underground tracks from that era, which is also fitting for much of the current discussion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2MigBnrqoI

also there's a new Gunplay song out and dude's still got it. Hopefully he stays...whatever he needs to stay to put out an actual full album

alansmithee fucked around with this message at 01:02 on Mar 20, 2015

# ? Mar 20, 2015 00:04

IM DAY DAY IRL: Jul 11, 2003; Everything's fine.

Nothing to see here.

I know a lot of people have criticized Kendrick for coming off as too try-hard-y with the funk angle but I'll be damned if Bronson hasn't done a surprisingly good job of adopting (OR APPROPRIATING?!?!?!?!?!?!) the blues/rock sound for a lot of the tracks off Mr. Wonderful. Turns out Easy Rider wasn't just a one-off throwback production and I'm glad.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 00:24

Gunder: May 22, 2003

Finally something I can listen to without feeling bad that i'm not enjoying it. Maybe Butterfly will eventually grow on me. Mr Wonderful I love at first listen.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 00:41

thathonkey: Jul 17, 2012

IM DAY DAY IRL posted:

I heard there's an interlude therefor I deem it unlistenable trash. 9.1/10

I heard there's only one interlude therefore i deem it aoty. 9.1/10

# ? Mar 20, 2015 00:56

7 RING SHRIMP: Oct 3, 2012

BREAKFAST
LUNCH
DINNER

How are they?

# ? Mar 20, 2015 01:05

Professor Funk: Aug 4, 2008; WE ALL KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN

Only in America might be my favorite Bronson track ever

"dawg your bitch looks like Eddie Griffin"

# ? Mar 20, 2015 01:15

Tolkien minority: Feb 14, 2012

this is pretty cliche but the more i listen to TPAB the more i like it. some of the songs are eh/kind of white noisy and the tupac interview is hilariously cringeworthy but i would say there are atleast as many songs i love as on gkmc. king kunta/u/complexion/blacker the berry are all pretty incredible. king kunta to alright is also pretty much perfect

edit: tho my favorite kendrick album is overly dedicated so what do i know

# ? Mar 20, 2015 01:19

Quantum of Phallus: Dec 27, 2010

EATIN SHRIMP posted:

BREAKFAST
LUNCH
DINNER
How are they?

i dunno cos they're not up on datpiff yet and it feels a bit weird buying 3 gucci tapes this late in the day. like surely by now they've used all the good verses.

e:
you can listen to them here http://www.stereogum.com/1788149/stream-gucci-mane-breakfast-lunch-dinner/mp3s/album-stream/

ee:

Quantum of Phallus fucked around with this message at 02:13 on Mar 20, 2015

# ? Mar 20, 2015 02:08

Professor Funk: Aug 4, 2008; WE ALL KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN

Rolling Stone's TPAB review is all kinds of awful

RS TPAB review posted:

Roll over Beethoven, tell Thomas Jefferson and his overseer Bull Connor the news: Kendrick Lamar and his jazzy guerrilla hands just mob-deeped the new Jim Crow, then stomped a mud hole out that rear end.

Yo! NMD Raps - Kendrick Lamar just mob-deeped the new Jim Crow

# ? Mar 20, 2015 02:14

Tolkien minority: Feb 14, 2012

^^^ what does that even mean

holy poo poo the cover to breakfast is amazing. this year has been a better one for mixtape covers than actual mixtapes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEJx5efw-Pw
:drat:

# ? Mar 20, 2015 02:17

Punkin Spunkin: Jan 1, 2010

Gunder posted:

Yo! NMD Raps - Finally something I can listen to without feeling bad that i'm not enjoying it

# ? Mar 20, 2015 02:43

SCOTLAND: Feb 26, 2004

New T-Pain

https://soundcloud.com/zekv/t-pain-did-it-anyway-explicit-free-download-2015-hnhh

# ? Mar 20, 2015 02:45

Cole: Nov 24, 2004; DUNSON'D

T-Pain is as annoying as Sean Paul.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 02:55

Besson: Apr 20, 2006; To the sun's savage brightness he exposed the dark and secret surface of his retinas, so that by burning the memory of vengeance might be preserved, and never perish.

Guys, think long and hard about Action Bronson and if it's really worth spending time listening to him.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 03:39

Professor Funk: Aug 4, 2008; WE ALL KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN

excuse you

edit: also did anyone post the new gunplay single?

http://2dopeboyz.com/2015/03/19/gunplay-tell-em-daddy/

Professor Funk fucked around with this message at 03:54 on Mar 20, 2015

# ? Mar 20, 2015 03:51

Henchman of Santa: Aug 21, 2010

Besson posted:

Guys, think long and hard about Action Bronson and if it's really worth spending time listening to him.

Hmmmmm ok I thought about it and I still find him highly enjoyable

# ? Mar 20, 2015 04:02

Punkin Spunkin: Jan 1, 2010

Henchman of Santa posted:

Hmmmmm ok I thought about it and I still find him highly enjoyable

He's no Kendrick Lamar though

# ? Mar 20, 2015 04:09

t a s t e: Sep 6, 2010

bronson needs to interview odb on a record before i take him seriously

# ? Mar 20, 2015 04:13

Besson: Apr 20, 2006; To the sun's savage brightness he exposed the dark and secret surface of his retinas, so that by burning the memory of vengeance might be preserved, and never perish.

Bronson has that same flow for every song, raps about the same bullshit.

He has a fine choice of beats (that Rare Chandeliers beat was great) but I think he is a very uninspiring MC.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 04:26

Bismack Billabongo: Oct 9, 2012; New Love Glow

You know who else had the same flow on every song? God.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 06:13

Tolkien minority: Feb 14, 2012

Anaranjado posted:

You know who else had the same flow on every song? God.

actually gucci switches up his flows more than pretty much every other rapper

# ? Mar 20, 2015 06:21

Bismack Billabongo: Oct 9, 2012; New Love Glow

The IWOP on the cover of his new tape is amazing. Free guwop 2015.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 06:23

Cool Buff Man: Jul 30, 2006; bitch

Professor Funk posted:

Rolling Stone's TPAB review is all kinds of awful

Yo! NMD Raps - Kendrick Lamar just mob-deeped the new Jim Crow

Great balls of fire, get Thomas Tibbs and Colonel Kregg on the horn and tell them to ring their bells because Kendrick Lamar has arrived with toots and jazz swirls to rival Beecher Stowe on her best old day.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 10:59

Antequek: May 30, 2014

Kendrick needs to make a song where he plays a pair of nike cortez feat. Nas as a gun and KRS-ONE as a Blunt

# ? Mar 20, 2015 11:34

Raffles: Dec 7, 2004

Just got around to that open mike eagle ep and it's good and i want to listen to it a lot more than tpab right now

# ? Mar 20, 2015 14:42

A Handed Missus: Aug 6, 2012

I want all the tracks on the next Kendrick album to just be Cartoon & Cereal.

10/10, very capacious

# ? Mar 20, 2015 14:42

Skeezy: Jul 3, 2007

What's with the voice Kendrick pulls on Free lol.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 14:46

monkeu: Jun 1, 2000; by Reene

Skeezy posted:

What's with the voice Kendrick pulls on Free lol.

I still can't stand the voice he does on backsteat freestyle and u. What the gently caress is that?

# ? Mar 20, 2015 14:48

A Handed Missus: Aug 6, 2012

Kendrick on Free is how I imagine Big Sean's voice should really sound.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 14:55

alansmithee: Jan 25, 2007; Goodness no, now that wouldn't do at all!

Raffles posted:

Just got around to that open mike eagle ep and it's good and i want to listen to it a lot more than tpab right now

Yeah it's a great compliment to Dark Comedy. Beats definitely a bit more experimental (I wish Split Pants in Detroit was longer). Also MC Paul Barman, who I didn't expect to hear from ever again.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 15:35

atrus50: Dec 24, 2008

polpotpotpotpotpot posted:

Future Monster

# ? Mar 20, 2015 16:05

bows1: May 16, 2004; Chill, whale, chill

More fodder for this thread : http://pitchfork.com/thepitch/704-on-kendrick-lamar-and-black-humanity/

Pitchfork posted:

It is said that depression is anger turned inward. And if that�s true, then the entirety of Black America suffers from a depression. The collective emotional toll of the violence and abuse of the last nearly 500 years shows up in a lot of ways. Sometimes outward, sometime inward. But always present. So much so that it takes an unusual amount of skill emotionally, spiritually, and mentally, just to show up as a normal adult, to survive growing up without destroying ourselves or anyone else. But then again to be angry at the world around us IS to destroy ourselves. For when we are even perceived as a threat, the response is swift, violent, and institutionally excused. If we are angry, then we are checked, but to remain silent is to eat our own flesh from the inside out. It is a maddening proposition. The only way to not go batshit crazy or unable to function is to become deeply powerful at living.
Kendrick Lamar is deeply powerful. He is deeply powerful because he can flow and flow is, in many ways, the magic ingredient that turns despair into hope, pain into action. As long as you can flow, you can do something. Just listen to the transition from the rueful mirror monologue of "u" to the exhilarating rapid fire of "Alright" on the new album To Pimp a Butterfly which dropped unexpectedly on Monday. Notice what it feels like to be riding that momentum, carried along by waves of harmony, nearly but not quite crashing, so soon after digging so deeply into the earth of your own despair. You will understand a little bit about why black people make music.
Kendrick makes the kind of music that can lead you to fight for your own survival. He is not a savior or a leader, as some have attempted to cast him. He is a man who can flow.
I don�t know Kendrick Lamar. This is important to say because in most articles about rappers the author tries to act like they know the guy. Like they�re homies. It must have something to do with the fact that hip-hop in its essence is a genre about localities. Communities. It�s about familiarity. "You already know what it is," the aphorism goes.
If I was a white guy, I would probably like this aspect of hip-hop the most. The idea that I can become an honorary member of blackness just by listening. Hip-hop makes that easy. The songs are readily available. The hood is explained to the uninitiated. No longer would I have to feel that the Blackness of Black People represents mystery or the unexplained. And if I was the kind of white guy who thought about the fact that Black people have experienced a sustained and relentless brutality in the name of protecting people like me, then I would seek reassurance from every black face I saw, every black voice that I heard, that we were cool. I would look to hip-hop to absolve me. To help me breathe. I would need to know "what it is" the way I need to make sure my dog, strong, sharp-toothed, and potentially dangerous, still looked to me as its trusted and unassailable human.
With Kendrick you don�t already know what it is. You can�t unless you�ve lived it. What he tells is honest and therefore entirely devoid of tropes. On the track "Momma", he lists all the things he knows about growing up poor and black in Compton and then admits that he doesn�t know poo poo. If he can admit that, it makes me wonder why so many music writers can�t.
Listening to To Pimp a Butterfly, I thought about genius (Kendrick has it) which, in turn, made me think of Kanye. Maybe because My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was the last time a hip-hop album so confessional and idiosyncratic was greeted on such a grand public scale, but, unlike Kanye, Kendrick cannot be dismissed, even if you wanted to.
Kanye gives people a chance to say "yeah, but." As in yeah he�s a genius, but he�s so full of himself. Yeah he�s good, but his fashion show was terrible. Yeah he�s good but he�s an rear end in a top hat. Yeah he�s good, but he was unbelievably rude to that pretty and innocent white girl that one time. This is Kanye�s shtick. He�s easy to not like. And by not liking him you immediately become "Get Off My Lawn" Grandpa. That�s part of what makes him so awesome. It�s also what keeps him from being as dangerous or compelling a symbol of black power as he might be. He�s a brilliant troll. But he�s still responding to the original post. If you want to you could feel justified in simply blocking him.
Kendrick, on the other hand, is not commenting on your post. He didn�t even read it. And he�s not rumored to be an rear end in a top hat. There are no secret stories of him beating women or throwing people out of windows. He doesn�t threaten record executives, come across as a goon. Nor does he assuage white guilt by preaching peace and unity and colorblindness and one love. Meaning, he doesn�t do any of the things that allow you to put comfortable limits on how seriously to take him. This is what makes him the most hopeful and threatening rapper of all.
To be honest and black is, by nature, to be a threat. To be honest and black and poor is to know deeply and personally how racism and capitalism works.

To be honest and black and poor and smart is to know who is at fault. To be honest and black and poor and smart and gifted is to know how to move others to action.
Kendrick cannot be easily dismissed.
Unlike other artists whose juxtaposition of hip-hop bluster with confessional vulnerability feels like shtick, Kendrick does not do performative honesty. Rather, he performs honestly. And expertly. Do not buy it when critics will inevitably try to sell you that his work is rough or unbridled, the magic work of a hood savant. It is precise and skilled, as perfect in technical execution as it is uninhibited in content. Butterfly is not the recording of a natural genius. It is the record of a working artist who has been visited by genius and who has a deep and earned mastery of his form.
It is not fake, it is not afraid, and it is not accidental. Kendrick�s hip-hop is not the hip-hop that allows white guys to breathe. He does not break off pieces of blackness as a hood souvenir that you can post on your wall or bump in your car in order to feel like it�s all good. He doesn�t even mention you at all. It is not about you. It is about him and his complete humanity. It is about the humanity of every other black person whose face is painted on the mural of this wall of sound. The question then becomes how hard and for how long will America continue to fight, deny, or ignore this humanity.
That is for you to decide when you are listening to his work in its completion. When you are alone with his words, do you hear them? Do you believe them? Or do you attempt to lump them together with whatever hackneyed and two-dimensional concept you have of "Compton?"
Rather than reviewing this album, let's review what we do with it.
Kendrick�s music cannot free us. But how we respond to Kendrick�s music just might.

# ? Mar 20, 2015 16:17

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# ? Jun 2, 2024 04:37

big business man: Sep 30, 2012

bows1 posted:

Kendrick�s music cannot free us. But how we respond to Kendrick�s music just might.

lmao

# ? Mar 20, 2015 16:40

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > No More Drake > Yo! NMD Raps: Tryna strike a chord and it's probably A-Minorrrrrrrr

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