179 - Rap and the Death of Storytelling pt1
Is there any way to prove, with data, that rap is straying from its storytelling roots? What about Country music? Or Rock? Are all music genres leaving storytelling behind?
In 2018 Kendrick Lamar became the first rapper in history to win a Pulitzer prize for writing, putting him on the same level as novelists like Harper Lee and Cormac McCarthy. His album DAMN was poetry and metaphor in motion, set to music. But even after proving how crucial storytelling is to rap, more rappers than ever are using a freestyling technique called “punching in” which is showing up to the studio and making up lyrics off the top of their heads.
Today’s question is: if the Kendrick method of storytelling results in Pulitzer-level lyrics, and punching in results in meaningless phrases strung together in loose themes…then why is punching in winning the rap game? And why are more and more rappers abandoning pen and paper altogether?
In this episode we’ll talk about the seismic shift occurring in music. A shift which started in rap, but quickly carried over into all musical genres. If you’ve ever suspected that new music is worse than the stuff you used to hear on the radio…you may be right. And it has less to do with getting older and hating on younger music, and a lot more to do with how we pay musicians and artists, and what kind of art we incentivise with our clicks.
Links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSgl95BEmd0&ab_channel=TheNewYorkTimes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoBCZYQBWdQ&ab_channel=VanityFair
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/01/old-music-killing-new-music/621339/
https://www.statsignificant.com/p/when-do-we-stop-finding-new-music
https://songexploder.net/dua-lipa https://www.newsweek.com/hip-hop-decline-music-billboard-1896490
https://www.theregreview.org/2024/05/30/stern-the-inequalities-of-digital-music-streaming/
https://hypebeast.com/2020/7/spotify-ceo-tells-musicians-to-work-harder-record-more-stop-complaining