h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=4K8OcWHCHjs

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=I7dVUjMv7Og

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9h6pcqC6wrI

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=UDCDrcZK4NE&feature=related

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=nMn2cCBwH18&feature=related

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgqd80026xU

Just a few examples of what I think makes hip-hop fantastic. Please feel free to add examples of what turns you onto hip-hop.

You might also want to say why you dont like hip-hop, but before you go trawling for counter examples of rap music just remeber that Ive heard them too.

I believe rap is an art, but I don't believe it is music. It is poetry, and like a lot of poetry, I don't like it.

Well I nicked the title thread from someone else and that's why its imprecise. Obviously rap isnt music in the classical sense but by the same token freeform Jazz shouldnt be clssed as music, which to my mind is an incorrect and deliberate way of denying a certain deignity to Hip-hop.

If it weren't for hip-hop I wouldn't have been able to do these brilliant overdubs.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=3l94S1yDJEE

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=pXYo8U0EJxU

This is far and away the best one I've seen though.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=21OH0wlkfbc

I can't say I'm a fan. Which is not surprising since it a lot of rap speaks to a life experience that is not mine. The protest/political stuff I see in much the same light as protest folk songs and the likes of Billy Bragg.

But as art, yes, I can see that.
As I've mentioned elsewhere recently it takes a lot to get me hooked on a film or TV programme, essentially it has to be something new and innovative with something to say.

Such a thing happened recently when I chanced across a rap/hiphop version of Dante's Inferno set in a modern council estate. It was captivating and worked really well. The quality of the artists was a major contributing factor, of course, but somehow using rap to tell the story really worked. Don't know why. And not sure who did it (can't find it on a quick google). Might have been on the Google TV channel.

Hmmm...

I tihnk stuff like J5 is really musical, Hip Hop is such a diverse sort of music it is hard to make sweeping statements about it as a "genre".... IMHO anyhoo.....

FB

Hip Hop's pretty cool, until you get ****heads like 50 Cent doing the equivalent of Harry Enfield's "I'm considerably richer than yaaaou" shtick.

Which is why I have an understanding of peoples' dislike of Hip-hop. Id dislike it if that was all there was to it. Which is sort of what this thread is about. Maybe I'll have a go at my very own Guide Entry...

Yup - it's generally at it's best when it's political. Public Enemy, NWA.

*But*...unfortunately it has to be acknowledged that Eminem is pretty damned good.

And it's definitely music as well as poetry.

I think "Fiddy" is to hip hop, what Busted are to punk rock.....

FB

I'm pretty much on the same level as what Ictoan posted above, it's just got nothing to do with the culture I've spent my life in - there are some examples of hip hop stuff I've liked over the years though.

I think there's great stuff in all categories of music/art and also crap too but generally my music collection is mostly made up of the hard rock type stuff and much less of other genres.

I do find it interesting how it has now made it all the way into the mainstream. For example a student of mine last year was leading a class in breakdancing down the university gym last year as a sort of keep fit class. This stunned me as I can remember the first outbreak of breakdance in about 1984ish (over here). How far away is a bunch of 19-year old girls doing it in formation in the gym to keep fit/lose weight from New York dance hip-hop/breakdance street culture is came from back then?

I could possibly have phrased that last sentence better couldn't I

you know that mind boggle thread you just posted Orcus? Well your post above just had the same effect on me

I find most rap/Hip Hop is speaking of life experiances I can't really associate with, or if it is about stuff I can associate with I struggle too much with the over empthesised accents to understand half of them.
Havin said which. Its definately music, in the same way free form jazz, acid jazz, fusion or any ohter type of music is... err music.
I find some hip hop songs work better than others; not entirley sure why; some seem over simple in musical arrangements and limited melady line, limited bass line, etc, yet for some Hip Hop songs the artists just get* that to work, and work well I t can...
Of course, on one level as its not opra and hs it contains lyrics its none of it proper music
Which... yeh... actually I tend to more and more move away from music with actual lyrics/words/singing in them, less it is opra.... Or some fo the spanish/flaminco stuff I listen to, which of course in all three cases, I don't understand the language anyhow
The main problem is, though, with most rap and Hip Hop, it needs more cowbell.

I think it would be good to see rap as a sub-set of hip-hop rather than a synonym. Sure it's key, but for me hip-hop is scratching + breakdancing + sampling + graffiti + rap. To see what can be done in hip-hop without the necessity of rap (even singing!) or the gangsta mentality I heartily recommend a search on the Ninja Tunes label.

Rap when healthily politically motivated (Chuck D had a lot of time for Louis Farrakhan, if I recall) is a great and wonderful thing. But it's become tediously it's-a-dog-eat-dog-world-and-I-will-eat-your-dog (or Dogg).

Sarah Jones - Your Revolution

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=VmaWDCH2tBg

Chris Rock - Black People v Ns

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=s7b2oCYgfik

This thread needs a_a_e in it.

Has anyone heard of a chap called Saul Williams? Now there is a true poet and artist.

This isn't a music video, just a visualisation, but the track is superb: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=6LEdGIcBheM.

Also recommended (Black Stacey):
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=kRsgavuG4sg

And finally (Our Father, a song about the breakdown of the family unit, which begins with a recording of Saul's father preaching at church):
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=nU-xmQoBrV8

I really didn't like hip-hop before I came across Saul's stuff. Now I'm looking into it more. Just steering clear of the aforementioned disgrace that is 50 Cent.

well, go on.. write a song like Mozart did?

DJ Krust featuring Saul Williams - Coded Language

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=HerpGwbLSM8

I tried to do an article describing everyone mentioned in this song (in the spirit of the Billy Idol project by B et al) but gave up half-way through.