At least in delivery, whether they wrote it or not, who was/is your favorite lyricist ever? And yes, there is a difference between a lyricist and a rapper. I've selected a few choices... KRS ONE Rakim Chuck D LL Tupac and a scarce few others get any mention at all in my conversations about lyricist superiority. If you've not had the chance to hear the first 3 on the list, do yourself a favor and get BDP's album "By All Means Necessary" & "Criminal Minded", Eric B. & Rakim's "Paid In Full," and at least Public Enemy's "It Takes A Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back" I don't hold to all of the views that these guys have and had, but they are the original ingenius flow artists.
Man, how can you exclude H-Town's finest: Scarface?! Especially since he's gone solo! His cd, The Untouchable was, to me, one of the best rap cds ever even though it was vastly overlooked outside of da Dirty Dirty. "Mary Jane" was one of the most underrated songs ever, imo. Can't wait for his upcoming cd, The Fix , to drop.....
Although I never had any of his albums, I have read many people that have sung the praises of Rakim. To tell you how dumb I am, I thought Rakim was the DJ and Eric B. was the rapper...lol.
Pharaoh Monch, Common, Eminem. Those are my top 3 in no particular order. Reason I like them, the lyrics arent "I'm pimpin my 20s rims on dubs and im chillin with ps2's in da back of my rolls royce cadillac pimped out hummer with the chiznain, platinum and silver with diamonds in it and iced out wrists on my escalade lincoln navigater with the b****es in da back of the benz" Also, I can actually hear every word they rap.
Tupac - Greatest of all time Chuck D KRS ONE ScarFace Andre 3000 & Big Boi Goodie Mob Paris Boots from the Coup Rocket River
too true... too true my man! that's why i don't like the cash money millionaires, or billionaires... or are they the trillionaires now? geez every song is about the pimped out rims! i'm sick and tired of it! i miss 80s and early 90s rap! get this showing off my bling bling, i got 24" rims on my benzo, i got an iced out necklace with a diamond encrusted picture of a diamond, if you don't got a bentley you ain't no big dog, cristal sippin', moet bathing, dipped in armani head to toe, boots made from bengalese tiger skin, i was like oh gracious, ass is bodacious, hip pop crap off of my radio!
ICE CUBE, without a doubt. Check out I wanna kill Sam for some great lyrics. The lyricist for Disposable Heroes was amazing (DH of HipHoprisy). Uh, I saw Biggie and Tupac etc on other posts. What is the difference between hip-hop and rap?
Cuck D - The greatest of all times. Most recently the lyricist on some of the stuff by Jurassic 5 is great.
Q-Tip. All popular rap from the past seven or so years has pretty much sucked in my opinion, with a couple exceptions. However, there are a lot of good rappers out there who just don't have the popularity.
Maybe not best, but I would say most versatile, has to be Mos Def. And I still contend that the greatest lyricists of all time can be found in the Jamaican dancehall scene.
Hmmmm, who is the greatest lyricist in hip-hop? Are you kidding me? That is like asking "who is the best musician in a jug band". LOL!
More great lyrics: check out "Never Seen A Man Cry" - Scarface and "Hand Of A Dead Body" - Scarface & Ice Cube
Errrr...who do you like, then? This way I can belittle your taste in music because I don't experience it enough to know any better... LOL Seriously, not to be an ass, but I think the people that dismiss hip hop as something that doesn't require talent really aren't into it, at least not beyond what is seen on MTV and all the bling bling videos, which are pretty crappy IMO. Elvis Presley ain't got no soul Chuck Berry is rock and roll You may dig on the Rolling Stones But they ain't come up with that sh*t on their own.
Eminem Pac Nas I think nomar brings up a good point about how everyone is getting sick of the whole "I have a Bently with dubs!" crap.
Prempeh, I just went to Tupac's greatest hits lyric's site, and I don't see any talent there. I do, however, see a classless thug spreading venom to young kids with his trashy vision of life outside of the law. This is not a slap at you or anybody who enjoys the lyrics, just my opinion.
