Hip-Hop Thread Genre • Page 702

Woe what?

 

excuse me?!?

 

A group? A single? I NEED MORE INFO, DAMN IT

 

Single

 

Song is fucking amazing

 

Powerful fucking video too

 

LL Cool J Posts Emotional Verse Honoring George Floyd, Other Victims of Police Brutality

 

how do we get this website to be more engaged with Black music? Most Black artists get lumped into the Hip Hop or R&B threads, with mostly just the big names getting their own album threads. What can we do to shift the tide?

 

I was just thinking this last night.
Maybe make individual threads for more artists aside from the “big names”. Sometimes this thread can be overwhelming to new listeners.
More staff reviews of black music would be good too.

 

yeah, definitely get ahold of someone who specializes in that shit

 

I think making more threads is definitely a good place to start, something anyone can do themselves at least.

 

I just made one for the new Polo G album. I’ve been going through the recs from the past couple pages in here and listening to a lot. Good stuff :)

 

I don’t specialise in writing about hip-hop music but I’m more than open to it. Going to start spending more time in this thread and introducing myself to tons of music

 

I don’t think it’s going to happen personally. If you look at most end of the year lists on here that weren’t made by one of us you can clearly see that whatever “Black music” release is on there is only on there because it seems like the woke choice of the year, not because that person seriously engaged with “Black music” in that year.

Also remember that thread where the “staff” shared a list and NF was the only rapper on it and the discussion that followed? It was grim.

Maybe I’m too bitter.

 

Yeah having been on this website for like twelve years and just seeing what music most people around these parts talk about and have always talked about, it doesn’t seem likely. That being said, I’m going to make an effort to make more threads about hip hop artists that I would normally just post in here. I think if we all make a concentrated effort we can make a change but it won’t be easy.

 

Then again, Hip Hop has managed to become the most culturally dominant and then the most commercially dominant force of its kind in the world without these nerds. Part of me just wants to let them stew in their creatively bankrupt indie rock juices.

I also really don't think this thread is intimidating. Whenever someone comes in here to ask for recommendations we immediately provide diverse lists. We never made it hard for people to broaden their horizons. Also the R&B Thread is probably the most wholesome thread on this forum.

 

I don't think it will happen either. My fave album of last year was by an emo/punk album by a band with all black members(Proper) and it didn't gain any traction really outside of the emo thread. An individual thread was made, the people who loved it kept talking about it on this site, it went ignored. Feels like a losing battle convincing people to convince people to try something new when they'd rather just listen to Blink 182 or the 1975.

 

Another thought:

I think one of the problems with just opening threads is that whenever we do that, the album sometimes gets less traction even among us than it would if we posted our thoughts here, because the people in this thread don’t all listen to the same artists and sub genres. Our end year lists are often very different (which is a great thing btw). So, some of us are probably less likely to read stuff about certain albums in dedicated threads than we would be here, I think. That actually reduces the amount of people that listen to that album, because honestly I don’t think the number of “outsiders” that happen to be pulled in by dedicated threads will balance out that loss. I say this because some of us have always made some dedicated threads here and there and the only threads that ever got ANY “outsiders” to engage were those dedicated to albums that would have been on their radars anyway because they were the ones that already happened to be chosen by pop/indie rock leaning music sites.

A good example is Ruby Ibarra. I found out about her first because she’s the kind of artist I think I sometimes find out about a little earlier than other people and I started pushing her in this thread and a lot of people got into her. If I had tried to do it with a dedicated thread, I think I would have reached less people, even it I would have advertised the thread here. It was the ongoing discussion in this thread that got more and more people to listen over time.

I don’t say this to criticize anyone’s idea. It’s just something I’ve been thinking about. I could be wrong.

 

Speaking of Ruby, a new single came out in March:

 

I really try not to be a gatekeeper, especially for a genre as underrepresented as this one is on this site, but I definitely agree that a lot of the people throwing like one rap/r&b album on their year end list are definitely doing it because they know the optics if they don't. It's almost more offensive than just not including any honestly

Obviously people can listen to whatever they want to but people really shouldn't force themselves/pretend to like things they don't to impress people

I'm always more than happy to help people who are genuinely interested get into the genre though, I love recommending music to people

 

I really think it is. If they just don't include any, I'm more likely to simply assume that rap music or R&B generally do not align with their musical taste.

 

It's usually so easy to predict which one they'll pick too lol

 

Having only one hip hop album on a list with a bunch of pop punk bands is like saying only that one hip hop artist made an album as good as all those pop punk bands, which is a BAD look.

It's definitely better to not include any rather than a token hip hop album.