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Saturday, May 29, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
Wanted
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Just Say No
It's been 2 months since I quit smoking and to commemorate this event I present to you this simple, yet probably the most effective, reason to quit smoking!
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Hip Hop 101
Rap Genius University: Rhyme Types
Rap is like poetry, except good. So the Rap Genius University series is our effort to teach you some stuff that you zoned out for during that English class where the poems were about Nature, Love, and Regret instead of Money, Cash, and Hoes. First topic — Rhyme Types.
Perfect Rhyme
A perfect rhyme is one in which the endings of words sound exactly the same. Perfect rhyme is the most basic kind, and was the dominant form of rhyme in the early days of rap. Now it is one of a variety of rhyme types, but is still widely used because of the strong connection it creates in lyrics, as in this verse from T.I.’s “Rubberband Man”:
Assonance
In assonance, words don’t have the same ending, but they share a vowel sound. The consonants surrounding the vowel sound are different, but the shared vowel sound links the words. Assonance is the most common form of rhyme in rap today because its looseness opens up many rhyming possibilities. Here’s some assonance from Jay-Z on “A Star is Born” — notice how the rhymes at the end of the lines are imperfect but work because of the shared vowel sound of “ay”:
Bending Words
Bending words are a variant on assonance, in which a rapper “bends” a word (pronounces it in an odd way) to create a shared vowel sound between two words that, when pronounced normally, have similar — but slightly different — vowel sounds. This is a common technique among southern rappers, who naturally pronounce words in a way that sounds “odd” to the Northern ear. Take this verse from Lil Wayne's “I’m Blooded”, where he pronounces “thing” (in reference to repping Bloods) as “thang”, so it rhymes with “gang”:
Yeah, been around the world, rep the same thing
Been around the world, its the same gang
Alliteration
In alliteration, words begin with the same letter or sound. Alliteration is a subtler form of connection between words than some other forms of rhyme, but it is sonically evocative and musical. 2Pac was one of the pioneers of alliteration in rap, and he uses it to especially powerful effect by choosing hard sounds like “puh” and “kuh” and “buh” and “duh” to make him sound tough. Cam'ron, another artist whose flow is both musical and tough, often uses alliteration. Both 2Pac and Cam are masters of the subtle alliterative art:
From To Live & Die in L.A.:
Blind to a broken man’s dream, a hard lesson
Court cases keep me guessin'
From Killa Cam:
Consonance
In consonance, words share the same consonant sound, but have different vowel sounds. Like alliteration, consonance is sonically evocative and musical. From Jay-Z’s “D'Evils”:
Multisyllable Rhyme
A multisyllable rhyme is a rhyme that is more than one syllable long. Multisyllable rhymes can use any of the types of rhymes in conjunction with one another. Multisyllable rhymes are popular in rap today because they allow for a lot of creativity in making linkages in the lyrics. For example:
From Eminem’s guest verse on “Renegade”:
From Kanye West’s “Through the Wire”:
Now that you know all the major rhyme types, look out for the next post from Rap Genius University about Rhyme Schema.
Stay in school kids!
Monday, May 17, 2010
Dart anyone?
we live!
Sunday, May 16, 2010
In the lab again
We recently picked up the Roland JUNO-G and now about to get into a session and really test this machine out.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
Video Cameras are our friends
Saturday, May 01, 2010
The Groove
Funksters and Funkettes the mothership is landing http://tinyurl.com/2dn6rpx !