Hip Hop & Rap recommendations for Taters

Kanye West
Late Registration
Touch The Sky

Eminem
8 Mile Soundtrack
Lose Yourself

Eminem
The Eminem Show
Cleanin' Out My Closet

Lyrics Born
Later That Day
Bad Dreams

 Oh boy, here come the haters. That didn't take too long! As this is a thread dedicated to recomeding quality in a genre, I hope those who don't have anything positive to add, would mind not adding anything at all.  Thanks!

Not a perfect place to put stuff about streaming services, but Tidal is a great way to find new music, with no need to buy anything!  I just subscribed to Tidal & Roon.  All I can say is wow.  Great stuff!

Jet, I like your style.  You seem like a music lover that I could have a few drinks with.  If you're ever in Miami, let me know!

Excellent Response jetrexpro.

Taters, it looks like you didn't take my point to heart from the other thread that led to this thread.  I only suggested that you open your mind, and stop bashing stuff.  To suggest that a fan of a particular style of music shouldn't bother with a hi-fi system is plain silly.  Who only listens to one genre?  And who's to say that a particular style of music isn't worthy of a good system?  Do you think the recording studios set aside their $50,000 microphones & preamps and instead break out their smart phones to record hip hop?  

I do appreciate what you said above:
 "I will give the op credit by trying to have a civilized discussion about rap music or hip hop without without making me the bad guy. I do appreciate your effort in starting this thread."

I don't want you to be the bad guy, but your determination to bash and generalize is making you sound like a bad guy all on your own.  I am not a hip hop devotee, I really have eclectic tastes and hip hop is only a small percentage of the music I love, but I do love a good chunk of hip hop.

Look, I wanted to do two things here.  I wanted to stop hearing people bash and put things down, as that dumbs down the dialogue.  We all can do much better when we talk about ideas, and look to find the positive, rather than trash talk.  I wanted you to challenge your own notion that this music is garbage by trying to find one bit of it that you may be able to say, ok, that is not my go-to music, but that track or that album has merit.

If you decide this all is for naught, and we are all hip hop brain washees, and we don't know anything about music, that's fine, but I suggest you move on.  Stop thinking about hip hop as it is only making you upset.  Instead, I would hope you find more pleasure and positivity by exploring the genres that you do like, and perhaps looking deeper into the depths of those genres, and expand your music universe in a positive way.  That won't happen bashing genres that you dislike.

In my post on your other thread, I mentioned that I do not like modern mass market country.  Last year, my cousin invited me to go to the Tortuga Fest in Ft. Lauderdale.  This is a festival style concert for none other than modern mass market country, and you know what, I went!  I decided that it would be fun to see what it is all about, to see it in all of its glory, and not hearing it as background music at the stop light from someone else's car.  In the end, my feelings have not changed, but you will never see me starting numerous threads to bash it, or to suggest that the artists have no talent, or that the fans should not disgrace their hi-fi systems with it.

Lastly, if you didn't take a listen to any of the hip hop recommendations, give this one a try:

Us 3
Hand On The Torch
It's Like That

Ask yourself it this is worth a listen, for you or for anyone.  Maybe your son or nephew is into hip hop and never liked jazz.  Us 3 can be a great way to expand his musical tastes (or at least musical appreciations), and your own.   Its a fusion style hip hop that borrows quite a bit from jazz.  Great stuff.

Trash talking is bane, boring, and bullshit!

Life is too short. Look for the good stuff!

77jovian,

This is exactly what I was hoping for, to find people who may not find the genre in their play lists, but will have an open mind, and a bit of curiosity.  I agree, a lot of the lyrics in the genre are pretty base and vulgar, but not all.  Mos Def has a style that is fairly intense (and may not be for hip hop beginners), but his lyrics are not about gangsters and prostitutes at all.  His album "Black On Both Sides" is one of my all time favorites, and I recently bough the LP so I could play it on my higher quality analog front end over the digital.  Another group would be Digable Planets.  They focus on society at large, shy away from intense vulgarity, and use a lot of jazz and soul in their hip hop.

Boy oh boy Taters, you just don't get it.  I tried.  For some reason, you seem to prefer pointing out that other's preferences are poor rather than have any positive or meaningful discussion about music.  But, to each his own.

I found a t-shirt that you may like though!
Click This Link

Taters,

Ok, I'l hand it to you, you are being a good sport.  I am doing my best to be nice and even keeled, but that t-shirt recommendation was a tiny bit on the harsh side (though I find that t-shirt hilarious!).

There is a problem with your food analogy though.  With your analogy, you suggest that as a food lover, you are happy to discuss the best a particular cuisine has to offer.  Ruth's Chris is a steakhouse worth discussing; Sizzler is not.  You mention something similar about Mexican food - the best it has to offer is a worthy topic of discussion.  This is precisely what I am suggesting the entire time.  But the fault in your analogy is, that it explains how you are interested in discussing quality within a particular genre.  In the music sphere, especially with the subject at hand, hip hop, you refuse to accept that there is any quality to speak of within the entire genre.

If I were to adjust your food analogy to match what your postings on music are, it would look like this:

Steak houses are worthy of discussion, as are Italian and French restaurants, but Mexican is not worth talking about.  All Mexican food is garbage, and I won't even discuss it.

The millions of young people who don't want to talk about Cole Porter don't matter.  The people who come to this site, we are fans of music of a different level.  We like to discuss and dive deep into music.  We shouldn't say all Mexican food is garbage, even if we can't understand how anyone could appreciate those spice combinations and those god awful refrained beans.  Someone does appreciate it, and that is good enough reason not to belittle their preferences and suggest that the music is not even worthy of a fine sound system!

The other posters are right.  It may be a good idea to stop all the irrelevant posts about hip hop.  The manner of which you ask the questions you ask seems to simply seek support for your own point of view, calling for many to just agree and offer up the same bashing and name calling, not exactly a high brow discussion.

You don't have to like hip hop, but I would hope you can at least see the problem in your logic.  It is better to treat hip hop like a cuisine that you don't care for, but don't forget that many people enjoy that food, and within it, there are top chefs and greasy spoon hacks who make junk.

Good Luck,
Mark

Jet, you rock!  Nailed it again.

Taters, I agree, we shall stop going back and forth.  I have said all I can.  Please stop bashing, even if you don't like something, that will serve you well here in the Audiogon forums, and in the rest of life.

I think this can be a pretty much a case closed on this thread.

Thanks to the contributors, especially to Rzado, I had never listened to Eric B & Rakim before, and the tracks you suggested are great!

Now, on to listen to some classical while I work! 

Take Care All, 
Mark

PS,  excellent.  Love the Buddhist Monks.

Please have a look at my photography from a philanthropic medical expedition to the remote regions of Tibet:
http://www.marktomaras.com/tibet-gallery#1

enjoy!
- Mark