Can/ which current MC's can become legends?
 

so i was watching some old episodes of DEHH (deadendhiphop) and i came across this (pretty good watch btw)

SO i m wondering if you guys see any current mc's being legends and why or why not?

Better not let Soulflower see this thread...

I think that Kanye West will be considered a legend in the genre, some might even argue that he already is. In more underground circles I think that Aesop Rock already holds the status of a legend and will hold that status in future years. It'll be interesting to see what the future holds for El-P, because I would say he's in the same boat as Ace, but with Run the Jewels he's broken into the mainstream so it's a possibility that he could be considered a legend in the eyes of the greater public in the future. He's definitely got all the qualifiers.

I agree with all of this, and I would add MF DOOM will/has become a definate legend with the quality of almost all of his output at a high extreme. And while it might be too early to say I'd say Joey Bada$$, Earl, and Danny Brown have fair chances too, but again probably to early to say for those guys.

MF Doom verses just get stuck in my head and i haven't seeked out much about the guy for that to happen :p:

More than just mindless hooks i feel he writes good quality verses and his delivery is incredible.
there's no need for alot of hype in his style yet it's not as monotone as capt murphy. it is just right.

So yeah, in my books he has the makings of a legend.

Definitely DOOM as well, he gets a lot of acclaim outside of the heads as well. In terms of current emcees I think that Ride will go down if only because of how controversial Death Grips is. I really hope he continues to make music since DG has 'broken up'. Imo it came a little late because their sound was getting a little repetitive, I think they should have stopped at Government Plates (one of their best imo and it would have been a great swan song). We'll see how Powers That B plays out and I imagine that the group could come together again after a hiatus and start pushing boundaries again.

On the note of DG it'd be cool if B L A C K I E gained legendary status but I think that's just wishful thinking.

I see where your coming with Earl But i think tyler will be a legend before Earl will be oh yea Kanye is already a legend in my eyes after dropping 3 EASY classic albums (college dropout, graduation and MBDTF)

can see Kendrick fitting this description

I personally i dont like kendrick but i cant disagree that he will be a legend if he stays consistent................ well nvm because nas is a legend and hes inconsistent as hell.

Also im kind of torn here. To be a legend you have to have a classic album. if your becoming a legend you have to have a potential classic album. But what if a rapper like Wrekonize shows up? i dont think by any means he will be a legend but IMO he does have a classic mixtape in the waiting room
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/JR8D_alsLSc/hqdefault.jpg

Which pop rap artists of today will be a legend?

NONE

Ok buddy.

I think the words legend and icon are terms that are thrown around to loosely. It takes much more to achieve those things imo.

I know, we've been through this many a time. I'm well aware of your impossibly high standards of defining what an icon or legend, but somehow not strict enough to let Janet Jackson in. We just have a fundamental disagreement on how to define a legend I guess. I think of people who make big waves in the music world and have good music behind it (because sometimes they don't, especially looking back at their contemporaries). That's why I consider them as potentially legendary in the musical world.

You'll notice in my post that I prefaced that both Aesop Rock and El-P will probably be considered legendary in underground circles. This doesn't make them legends in everyone's eyes because a lot of people haven't even heard of them, but I think that they've made enough of an impact to fit my criteria.

Make sure you make a note of this prediction so you can refer back to it 30 years from now.

But there really hasn't been any prolific mainstream rappers in recent years that has made "legendary" music, music that has broke cultural/racial barriers and has been groundbreaking for rap music. Everything that has been released in recent years has been done before.

People have said things like this for ages about every form of popular music and they've always turned out to be wrong.

Well if that is your opinion on Janet than all I can do is respect it although I don't agree. However, I don't see what that has to do with this thread. There have been some really great underground rappers, yes I agree with you on that.

However, to be a legend I think you have to make a significant impact on the genre itself as well as "the people." I think this happens when the music transcends and touches people. It so much deeper than just being a "good rapper" but to be fair I think this is the case for any genre.

I mostly hear this about 90's and 00's music.

IMO, innovation in popular music ended in the 80's, specifically late 80's.

Right, that's why all hip hop since then sounds exactly like Public Enemy and Big Daddy Kane.

speaking in generalizations gets you nowhere, though.

honestly i'm not as current on rap music cause i prefer 90's **** for the most part but i would have to say that i haven't heard any really groundbreaking artists in a while. i would have to say the last truly groundbreaking artist to me was lil wayne circa-2005 or so. since then there's been a few decent niche rappers that have emerged but nothing really revolutionary imo and nobody that seems obviously bound for legendary status. maybe kanye though i really haven't kept up with him much

Always?

Black Thought. From the moment I saw The Roots on second stage Lollapalooza you could feel there was something special about him and the group. I think he currently is legendary status. Out of the new crew, Mf Doom is definitely a trailblazer.

nah, just generally ;)

But that wasn't the last big thing for rap in the 80's. It was really gangsta rap that was the last innovative thing. That was hot in 88 and is still very much visible in today's scene. There are other areas of rap of course that are seen today and was seen in the 90's but none that I would call "innovative." Even the electronic/sampling was done in the 80's, political/social rap, party gimmick rap, etc. These topics/sounds were repeated in the 90s and currently, nothing new.

i would have to disagree

just saying gangsta rap is so generic, what are you talking about kool g rap or nwa? nwa gave rise to ice cube/g-funk style gangsta rap which mostly manifested in the early 90's. it had its roots in the late 80's with too $hort and all that but really it wasn't refined until dre/snoop/warren g/2pac/etc jumped on board.

where as you did have some gangsta rap on the east coast like maybe kool g or bdp but they sounded nothing like the later hardcore east coast stuff... bcc, wu tang, mobb deep, there's nothing innovative there? find me an album from the 80's that sounds anything like the infamous. or 36 chambers. or even ready to die or illmatic.

Like I said, these genres were conceived and birthed in the 80's. However, its very possible the other variations and influences of these genres in later years have been more creative OR just as creative but it still does not change that these genres were birthed in the 80's and I don't think gangsta rap was generic in the late 80's or even early 90's.

I think it was created to make a point...and it did but that is a WHOLE nother conversation....

and rap in general was birthed in the 70's... does that mean that 80's rap isn't innovative because they were expanding on an earlier tradition?

i'm saying you're painting with too broad a brush if you are going to say that kool g rap or nwa were no different from mobb deep or death row and that there was no innovation between those two eras.

in the late 80's they sketched the blueprint for what 90's rap would sound like. but they didn't start building till the release of the chronic.

No because there was still innovative things being contributed to rap and hip hop in the 80's.

Also, I was specifically referring to gangsta rap and the albums you used as examples when I was referring to these "genres" gangsta rap and the sub genres of gangsta rap that was what I was referring to not "rap music itself"


Lastly, as I mentioned in my previous posts I agree there probably were more creative experimentation in the 90s with certain concepts in rap BUT that still does not make it necessarily original or innovative especially when in the 80's it was already done even if it was on a basic level.

For example, "The Chronic" while good and made an impact in popularizing gangsta rap it is not innovative for the genre. How can this album be innovative when few years prior "Staight Outta Compton" innovated gangsta rap and influenced The Chronic.

You see my point?

Popularizing a genre and innovating something from scratch are two different things.

no, i really don't see your point. straight outta compton sounds nothing like the chronic. straight outta compton honestly sounds as much like public enemy as it does death row era g-funk. the style of production on the chronic was groundbreaking for its time and really marked a shift in the sound of west coast rap in general. so i don't get how you can say there's nothing original or innovative there. you're basically saying that taking a style and experimenting with it and tweaking it to turn it into a distinct sound is not innovation, when to me that is precisely what innovation means.

I am speaking in terms of creating gangsta rap.

The Chronic did not innovate "gangsta rap" it did not give birth to that genre, thats all I am saying.

I am not saying its not important or trying to take away from it.

oh. it sounds like you are unclear on what the term innovate means. maybe you're thinking of the term invent?

That is part of what it means but it sounds like you are unclear with what it means.

Something that is innovative is the first of its kind, its a new idea or something that has not been done before or seen.

While the Chronic might have been experimental and creative, it did not give birth to gangsta rap because gangsta rap was a genre that had already been innovated years prior. The Chronic simply popularized and enhanced the genre but it did not innovate gangsta rap.

lets see...

in·no·vate
verb
make changes in something established, especially by introducing new methods, ideas, or products.

the chronic didn't invent gangsta rap but it did mark a change in the sound. that's an innovation.

I brought up Janet because I think it's ridiculous that you consider her a legend but not Kanye. If you read what I said earlier I said that people would consider them to be great rappers as well as influence them to be creative within the genre. The reason that I brought up some rappers was because I liked them as well. That's why I didn't include Kendrick (did include Kanye but I did like Yeezus). I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you don't listen to any modern hip hop because you have such a hardcore bias against most modern music. I'd then say that you're out of your depth saying that no rap artist since the 80s has ever caused any changes whatsoever in one of the most popular genres in the US and UK because you don't seek any of the new stuff out under the premise that an album that didn't fall from your glorious years of innovation in hip hop.

If you don't think that Aesop Rock, El-P, Kanye West, and Death Grips had any effect at all in the hip hop world that would lead people to consider them legends (because they got touched by these artists or whichever new goalposts you have up right now), then have fun with your head in the sand. You can influence a genre without being 100% innovative, thousands of artists have done it. It's been said that bad artists copy art, good artists steal it. This can still make waves in the world of x genre because that artist took an idea and made it their own. Plus not everybody knows of the entire history of hip hop themselves so they might hear whatever artist and not know the influences within that music. Then the music touches them and THAT song is what causes them to change their style because they like that approach. Elvis, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and Michael Jackson are all great examples of this. They take an idea and make it their own, so much so that people consider them to be innovative. I bring up MJ because I know how you feel about him and hopefully you can look at this with less of a biased eye.

So if you think there are no legends today either own up to the hypocrisy of throwing around the term too loosely yourself or you can go ahead and stick your fingers in your ears and rant and tell me how wrong I am.

Okay so here are my receipts.


When I did a google search of various definitions of the word Innovative. This is what I found:

Innovative
: a new idea, device, or method

: the act or process of introducing new ideas, devices, or methods
Innovation - Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary

1. innovative - ahead of the times "the advanced teaching methods"; "had advanced views on the subject"; "a forward-looking corporation"; "is British industry innovative enough?"
forward-looking, advanced, modern

progressive - favoring or promoting progress; "progressive schools"
2. innovative - being or producing something like nothing done or experienced or created beforestylistically innovative works"; "innovative members of the artistic community"; "a mind so innovational, so original"

innovative - definition of innovative by The Free Dictionary

1(Of a product, idea, etc.) featuring new methods; advanced and original:
innovative designs
innovative ways to help unemployed people
MORE EXAMPLE SENTENCES
1.1(Of a person) introducing new ideas; original and creative in thinking:
an innovative thinker
innovative: definition of innovative in Oxford dictionary (American English) (US)



adjective
1.
tending to innovate, or introduce something new or different; characterized by innovation.
Innovative | Define Innovative at Dictionary.com


I am curious, where did you find this definition of "Innovative"

It is not accurate...

Really after the first guitar player no guitar player was never a guitar player who ever innovated anything afterwards. Everyone else was just ripping off the first guy.

i just typed in define: innovative into google. but honestly it really makes no difference since my definition is compatible with yours. in order to change something you have to do something new or original. it doesn't mean the entire thing is invented out of thin air but the innovation has to be somewhat new and fresh.

in the case of the chronic, the sound they introduced was new and fresh. straight outta compton was not g-funk. the chronic is a completely different type of rap music from staight outta compton. saying it's not innovative just cause gangsta rap had been done before is like saying straight outta compton wasn't innovative because politically/socially charged rap had been done before.

IMO your definition of innnovative implies innovation takes from something already established when something that is innovative is its OWN concept because its original. It doesn't take from anything

And I think an accurate definition does matter if your insisting I am unclear of what it means.

The Chronic is not a "different" type of rap.

It IS gangsta rap period.

It is artistic but that does not mean it is "original"

You seriously don't think that it's possible for there to be different levels of how innovative someone is? It's just one set standard? Yes what you describe is innovative, but so is what JWB describes. I have a question, how many hip hop/rap artists have you listened to that are from 2000 or later? Where are you coming from with your claims that none of them have ever done anything innovative in any shape or form?

And what artists do you consider innovative (can be within any genre)? Let's look at those with the same lens that you hold for modern music and prove how nothing can be innovative ever unless it came from Soulflower's designated time frame.

fine. then straigh outta compton isn't innovative because it was influenced by all sorts of previous hip hop. at the very least they didn't invent rap music so they took that from someone else thus not innovative. hell, hip hop in general isn't innovative cause it's always taken samples from older music to make the beats, if you want to use that standard.

it's g-funk

the chronic is gangsta rap. so is kool g rap. so is nwa. so is mobb deep. all 4 artists have completely different styles from one another and can't be lumped together by any criteria other than the fact that they all happen to feature lyrics which talk about the criminal lifestyle. who's to say that is the defining quality and not the production style or other stylistic elements of the music that don't specifically relate to the lyrical content?

even with the lyrical content rap was innovated drastically over the period of time from the late 80's to the late 90's. but i'm just pointing out that you can't pick one arbitrary criteria and say that so long as that still applies there's nothing new being presented.