If the urban street slang employed by Hip Hop luminaries makes little or no sense to you, then head to Rap Genius. And to compliment their vast library of rap lyrics, they’ve compiled a list of how often keywords were used and when. I hadn’t really paid it any attention until this morning, when my old buddy Mr Trick posted an all too poignant visual reminder via Rap Stats on the relationship between DJs and rappers.
From my own personal point of view, the stuff we see in the charts is Rap, a derivative of Hip Hop that essentially strips out 3 of the 4 elements to leave Rap i.e. the most commercial and bankable element that has a face and a voice. DJs have become little more than props to most Rap megastars, and rolled out as nothing more than visual aids to legitimise themselves to the Hip Hop culture.
Need evidence? I put a few choice DJ related words into Rap Stats and got back some disturbing charts.
Keyword: DJ
Keyword: Turntable
Keyword: Technics
Keyword: CDJ
Keyword: MIDI
What do these Rap Stats tell us?
I don’t think they tell us anything that we didn’t already know to be honest. The first Hip Hop DJs used to provide the backing tracks for the rappers, a role that eventually saw them more in the studio than on stage. And now you don’t even have to be a DJ to be making beats — that is very much in the court of producers, many of whom probably only use a turntable to sample.
We shouldn’t read too much into this of course. For all we know, the rise of the MIDI and CDJ keywords could simply be rappers dissing people who use such things and not extolling the virtues of hot cues and sync. But the steady erosion of DJ and turntable from the rapper’s lyrical flow absolutely does remind us that while it was the DJ that built the foundation of what we generically call Hip Hop, their relevance in the modern Rap era is going the way of the mighty Technics.
Rap superstars and xfactor contestants, same thing init?
All credit to Darren Hemmings for the original idea.
should like to see something similar with social media references is twitter mentioned more than guns or instagram more than crack rocks
It’s even funnier if you put in the word “bling”. It’s like a financial market bubble.
Or try the words “knowledge” or “zulu” :)
words we dont hear anymore in rap:
Just leave it up to the cut professor
On the 2 turntables i’d say he’s nice
You never heard a DJ with cuts like these
He’s the one man band and he’s alright
DJ’s spinning on the wheels of steel like it ain’t no thing cause he is for real
Check out Mike Music on the funky scratch
Keep cuttin that beat DJ Scott, my man gettin’ down
He’s the king of the cuts on 2 turntables
Baddest DJ on 2 turntables
Scratch up the beat go off and go off
Give a little example how a DJ works
King Shameek in effect, on a DJs set, comming correct on stage rippin up wax
Jazzy Jazzy Jay make it funky
He’s DST,he’s on the set, so quick so fast
Cut it up Whiz
Joe Cooley give m a taste, of how you rock the bass, scratch the bass boy
Just a few examples of rappers backing up their DJs on songs, of how they used to show respect to their DJs.
Now we have turntablism as a result of the DJ being neglected in the industry. In the end the rapper is to blame. In how many Wu-Tang joints is DJing, graffiti, or breakin celebrated? None as far as im concerned, the needed to rap about some shaolin gimmicky bullshit rather than about true hiphop.
I’ve never thought about Wu-Tang joints not rapping about DJing, graffiti or Breakn’. Good point. However, unlike most Rap songs in 1993, the Wu-Tangs sound was fresh, new and promoted something other than violence. They used samples but not remixed 70’s or 80’s tracks. The DJ was the RZA and all the WU rappers gave him respect. After all, the RZA “invented DVS (Serato)” for crying out loud. :) The “Shaolin gimmicky” stuff was usually a metaphor to something going on in the streets that they experienced. Till this day, I can sit back and listen to the instrumental of “Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers).”
By the way, the DJ respect quotes you posted takes me back. Thanks for that.
RZA didn’t invent DVS, there is a true story about the guy who invented it (of course he was white, no disrespect but when it comes to high tech technology there are no black inventors)..a Japanese guy invented the 808, a white man invented the phonograph,a white man invented the synthesizer etc.. The almighty Technics turntable a Japanese creation..blacks use white man’s technology and with that technology the created hiphop music. thats a fact.
http://youtu.be/TXsYXMqw4Zc
http://who-invented-digital-vinyl.co.uk/
The “Replicator” was invented by Andre Rickli (the guy in the house with the Atari computer that RZA mentions).
I know. It’s a running DJ joke. That is why I put a :) smiling face in the original post. But who am I to question the RZA.
“no disrespect but when it comes to high tech technology there are no black inventors”
You obviously know very little about science. Do I really have to make you a list? Google is your friend. BTW- Didn’t Grandmaster Flash invent the headphone cue?
Could you be anymore of a Bigot?
Missed an important one: Serato + Traktor.
…which does rather underline the popularity of Serato in the Hip Hop world. And see how Traktor is picking up as Serato falls a little. Let’s see where this is in 5 years. At least Traktor rhymes with more words.
Turntablists had refused (and still do it) midi for scratching (even Ns7/V7 had a little success) for “be tricky” but they were ok with DVS technology.
I think DVS was successful due to the fact you could keep your regular gear against “bury artifact (ala magic the gathering cardplay) suited by Pioneer with the CDJ 1000 (even in DMC championship as sponsor in my country, Spain) creating a worst scar between HipHop “beReal” djs and technology.
We can discuss about if DVS are like controllers or about the words turntablism/controllerism themselves but the fact is clear “Technics never were cheap” and constrain new generations with what is Real (from the POV of the old/previous school) without the knoledge of the essence (why djs used technics? Why using technics is being respectable to HipHop Culture? Etc…) is a mistake.
“NY77 the coolest day in the hell” talks about 3 day blackout and how people stole the shops and how music culture (HipHop one of these but not the only) get profit of the situation.
“Scratch. The movie” show how any single dj who all of us consider masters of scratch (Qbert, Mix Master Mike, Craze…) reference as a source Grand Master Theodore and Herbie Hancock Rockit… But most of them focused in the technique pursuing the abstraction leaving the music (Rap/Hiphop as it was over these time) to grow meteoric careers (the superdj era) and created they own bubble world until C2C came and returned some music to the tablism…
Meanwhile kids grow up and must to decide in what invest they money and time. DVS were “more Real” than controllers but… Again the numbers and reality doesn’t match and you have Serato Dj (scratch and live words are painful to serato I think…) so…
In conclusion: HipHop came from Djing and Djing from to Dub (using a turntable to make music is near to the King Tubby use of gear) as other music/Culture like D&B, Dance… (Check about Ragga twins history) and NOWADAYS (without the “cliché” of being real from no other point than your OWN) the most near to Dub science applied to “Boombap” music is probably an Arduino instead of Technics turntable.
We are coming back walking straight ahead.
Check Rockit Live and you could see most of or actual Culture (and lost in the middle for “Real Keepers”) in one same scenario: turntable as instrument, keytar, automats (today doable with arduino and servos), video scratching (notice the effect applied by video editor every time GMT make a scratch in the beggining), lighting, drum synth…
http://youtu.be/TN5ltss0NMA
Maybe because I’m still a dreamer makes me continue developing an scratch decoder to turn any jog/platter into a full midi controller (without timecode involved) but what is REAL to me and respect with the Culture (Dub) is doing it against the system, so it will be open source and affordable to anybody.
Peace and Dub.
Mudo.
“What do these Rap Stats tell us?” Nothing that was not already in plain sight ?
im sorry but if rappers are using the words ‘cdj’ ‘midi’ ‘serato’ and ‘traktor’ then they are struggling for stuff to rap about
rapping about a cd deck, a word that describes a piece of hardware communicating with software and the 2 main manufacturers of DVS equipment is hardly gangsta.
could you imagine snoop and dre dropping any of them into nothin but a g thing, would sound hilarious