Music versus Lyrics

[St Leo]

Music, as Beethoven would attest, is the more important of the two.

[MRT144]

im musician so id side with music

[Wraith]

--"I mainly listen to rap and the best rappers can have their accapellas stand alone."

I really hope you're kidding here, especially with that sample you gave, but I'm pretty sure you're not. Oh well.
Explains your stance on lyrics, at least. You've just got no taste

Wraith
"Of course the music is a great difficulty. You see, if one plays good music, people don't listen, and if one plays bad music people don't talk."
-- Oscar Wilde

[Buck Birdseed]

Boddies, shouldn't you be asking Albert? As he quite rightly points out most of the hip-hop I listen to has little or no value to the rapping beyond providing a focus and contrast to beats. Almost every strand of Hip-Hop that's caught my fancy, from Old-School to Dance-Rap, is marked by a distinct lack of artistic ambition in the vocals. There's probably some music out there that manages to combine both skilled rapping and excellent beats, but I've yet to find it.

Hey, Albert, maybe you should give Dancehall Rap a shot? Admittedly I'm no great judge of rapping ability as that is not really my main focus when listening to music, but certainly the Jamaicans have a tendency to combine social conciousness lyrics with excellent beats. Of course, you'd have to penetrate the heavy local patois and the toasting styles that are quite different from american Rap, but the two have cross-influenced enough over the years to have many touching points.

[Buck Birdseed]

Oh, and Boddies, your astoundingly pseudy lyric ably illustrates why Rock musicians should never have a go at poetry.

[RGBVideo]

Music.

[Provost Harrison]

It relies on a combination of the two, depends on the voice or the music...so I couldn't say, I would say I am more inclined towards the music though...

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Music, dammit.

[Footie Mad]

Music can be good without dealing with issues in society or having a serious message. Lyrics have a place when you have something to say not just to use them as filler for the music.

[Al B. Sure!]

Wraith:

Don't worry... that Ghostface Killah excerpt is not to be taken seriously. It's just an interesting song because it's about cartoon characters coming to life... thats just a weird fun song. It's something that makes the listener take notice but it aint a good song by any means.


Iain:

Listen to I Used to Love Her by Common. The song is a metaphor about rap music. You might actually like what he's talking about because he comes at fake gangsterism and what not, and does it pretty damn cleverly.


thanks

[Al B. Sure!]

and Buck... I don't know. I always found it hard to understand accents so I'm going to have problems with Jamaican dancehall... but I saw something showcased on Kazaa... Barrington Levy or something featuring Snoop Dogg... I might take a look at that


thanks

[Buck Birdseed]

Any Barrington Levy track is going to be at least half a decade old, and probably run accross an old-fashioned bouncy reggae beat. You might wanna download something more recent- I'm not a great expert at picking out vocal prowess, but I've always found "Man Ah Bad Man" by TOK feat. Bounty Killer to be excellent from that perspective. A good alternative would be Sizzla's "Ghetto Revolution", which combines old-style rootsey and modern beats to great effect, with a stronger social conciousness in the lyrics.

[SlowwHand]

Why do you mo-rons insist on saying "music" ?
And Buck, why do you not correct them?

Lyrics and/or instrumentation make MUSIC.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

So humming isn't music? Or is that "instrumentation"?

[SlowwHand]

Just like a kazoo, or mouth harp, it's instumentation.