Based on quality of their albums, it's between Kendrick and that Hitler fanboy.
JID and Little Simz are someone who could take the crown in the future.
JID and Little Simz are someone who could take the crown in the future.
Music Greatest living rapper?
- Thread starter Pickle85
- Start date
How the feck can anyone even mention kanye? He's in the top 10 of producers. Maybe.
This is like discussing algebra with geese.
This is like discussing algebra with geese.
Is he not a rapper?
What are we discussing then, who's the most technical? Who has better bars? I don't care about any of that if their material is mediocre.
Well rapping!? What 16 bars has Kanye ever dropped that anyone ever felt necessary to rewind and listen again?
I'm not going to defend Kanye "I like putin" West's bars. But I bet there's a few.
What I wanted to say though, is "The greatest living rapper" for me is someone who has the best catalogue. If Tonedeff can spit more words per second or Aesop Rock (who I like a lot) can use the most unique words in his songs, it means nothing for me in this context.
We are talking about rappers. That automatically eliminates Dr Dre. Chuck D is East Coast. Easy-E... Was very unique but really didn't have a career outside of NWA, so no
Personal preference of course, but the pinnacle of G-Funk was Snoop Dogg. And he ruled music from the Chronic until Doggystyle. The only rappers who had a comparable run in that space was Ice Cube from Amerikkka's Most Wanted to the Predator, and 2 Pac from MATW to his death...
In terms of influence, I'd say 2Pac > Snoop > Ice Cube... but this isn't firm.
Can't speak much on Ice-T. He's like a cop on Law and Order nowadays
Kanye's catalog is one of the best ever primarily because of the production and content, not because of Kanye's bars (which is what this thread primarily is about)
Not a fan of Kanye generally, but I listen to this track a lot. His flow and lyrics are pretty great here, 1st verse in particular, whereas I generally find his rapping tough to listen to.
well, he is a rapper and a producer.
you can be a technically brilliant rapper but if all your songs are shite then i'm not going to say you're a great rapper. maybe we're discussing different things though.
personally i don't have a problem with kanye's rapping.
Deck is great and hugely underrated. Big fan of what he's doing with Czarface right now, who have put out so much material in the last 10 years or so, and it mostly flies under the radar.
For me rapping is all about making the listener go: Woah, what did he just say? Play that again!
I don't care about their discographies at all. What was biggies "catalogue"? 2 Albums... yet no one would seriously ever claim he wasn't one of the greatest. Same business with Big L or Pun. I don't care for longevity or how many hits they had. You have to eclipse the brightest star at your best moment and Kanye isn't anywhere near.
He might be the best at being a pop star of everyone who ever rapped. I might give him that. (And no doubt about him having been among the best producers of his times, I don't doubt that, being one of the top 10 producers is a high honor in my mind)
(We don't need to go to Biggie, L, Pun lengths really, someone like Missy Elliot was a way better rapper too).
drake can rap?
A lot of Jay's best lines are stolen and the fact he decided to finally diss Nas at a time Nas took time off music to care for his dying mom was not a good look for Jay.
He clearly thought Nas wouldn't come back at him and couldn't handle it when he did hence crying on the radio when he lost a vote from his station.
I actually like Jay but he is what he is a very good rapper who went down the commercial route to sell more records and make a lot of money
keep 'em coming.Snoop has been Cuddly Snoop for so long since he distanced himself from Death Row, it’s easy to forget how savage his first records were. G’z and Hustlas on Doggystyle being a prime example, Snoop at his most fire. And I just discovered his early stuff isn’t on Spotify, wtf?
Surely Ryan B and Quincy P are up there too.
Always thought “Babel Rap” would make a sick name for an album. Instead of an album sleeve, each record could be covered with bubble wrap. Promotional.
He bought Death Row and its whole back catalogue, took all the early stuff off of streaming, was trying to sell them as nfts or something, its a cash grab from Snoop
Not sure where it leaves the smaller artists like Kurupt and Daz Dillinger though, The Chronic has come back onto streaming within the last 2 weeks without it being a Death Row release so im guessing they worked something out to get it back to Dre, its listed as ARY Inc via Interscope, ARY being Dre’s initials, not sure why he wouldn’t just drop it under the Aftermath umbrella though
He's a great lyricist, it's just now been lost by him probably being the biggest name to ever come out of rap/hip hop. It's meant him jumping on plenty of pop songs in the mainstream where he can do paint by numbers Snoop and keep his name relevant and make plenty of money. He's been a master of that from music to shows to adverts etc.
If you go back though he's shown how good of a lyricist he is. I wouldn't call him the best ever in that regard but let's not underrate him, lyrically he's proven himself. If you step away from mainstream Snoop as well he's actually put out some quality music over the last few years that just doesn't get much attention within the public eye.
Top 5 ever for me because of what he's accomplished and for how long he's done it. An insane amount of hits and played arguably the biggest part in West Coast music during the hottest period in rap history. Doggystyle to this day is still arguably the greatest hip hop record ever released, still one of the few albums with zero urge to skip any single track that flows from start to finish. He's sometimes overlook simply because of how huge he is in the public eye and the weed, television, pop mainstream etc but he's without a doubt up there as one of the greatest rappers ever.