Tech N9ne/Rittz etc.

[CrashBand]

Elision, you are a sucker for being open-minded and all that, and you think these guys are the best. I wonder if you wanted to have a discussion/debate on why these guys are elite rappers/lyricists/emcees.

Or any one else can put in their two cents.

It kind of feels like this has been talked about before, but I want to get to the bottom of your thinking, and hopefully you can get understand my thinking.

[CrashBand]

Fuck a top 25. Do you think he's a great/good/ok/bad rapper? ...and why?

[Trimss]

Rittz is very different from Tech N9ne actually. His album was really good

[CrashBand]

It kind of feels like this has been talked about before

This. He's tried so many times and the people that disagree still disagree.

What are your views on it?

[The Shady Virus]

I would not consider myself a big fan or anything but I listen to and follow both of them. I have seen them both live as well (just went to Tech concert last week here in Raleigh...met Rittz a while back when he was opening for Yelawolf). I don't understand people's obsession with them though, most of their music is average. Just because they rhyme fast isn't enough for me. My interest gets lost when they just rap fast as shit and throw some chick on the hook and call it a day. It's not song writing when you just fill in the 16's on the beat with the same flow and vocals with weak hooks and no bridge or breakdown. I like hearing a little melody in my verses (Yela, Marshall, Kendrick, Krit, J Cole, Drake are all great song writers in my opinion and their songs show a lot more range), and if your going to rap double time don't do it the whole damn song (unless in a song like WWC where it's almost competitive). Most casual listeners are not into that shit. Change your flow up throughout a song...or at least through the album. A lot of their music is lacking substance or sounds repetitive. Neither of them have a lot of replay for me. I enjoy Rittz more than tech...I listen to Tech more for his features. Rittz album was good the first listen but got old very quickly.

Just my OPINION. We all have one so don't bash me for not dick riding.

[yoda you can call me]

Whilst Tech defintely has the most versatile flow i've heard, he lacks versatility in his writing. He needs to take a leaf out of Marshalls book. He's dope for what he does though
Rittz is another emcee that will be added to my list of dudes i need check out

[TonyTilt]

I'm a huge fan of both but I'm not really in the mood to type a whole lot to get my point across.

Rittz is fucking awesome and idk how you can think otherwise honestly. He has a damn near flawless flow on everything, he breaks down words and uses them in different ways. His album/couple mixtapes are all fire. He hasn't put out really anything that would give the opinion he's not a great artist.

Tech on the other hand is a different story that I don't even want to get into. I feel like you ether love him or hate him. Trex I kinda agree what you said about him. Some of his songs sound reeeeeeallly cheap.

[classthe_king]

tech n9ne isn't even a good rhymer and his flows are terrible to anyone that prefers smooth flows over a chaotic barrage of syllables being pounded into the beat over and over.

one of the worst rappers i've ever listened to.

[classthe_king]

tech n9ne isn't even a good rhymer and his flows are terrible to anyone that prefers smooth flows over a chaotic barrage of syllables being pounded into the beat over and over.

one of the worst rappers i've ever listened to.

I'm not disagreeing with you, but saying he is "terrible to anyone who prefers..." is a pretty weak thing to say, because that is literally the case for every single subjective thing in existence.

yeah exactly. and music is subjective so there's no right answer to anything blah blah blah

but some strange music fan act like tech n9ne is the holy grail of flows when his sound is really displeasing to a lot of people. Yeah it's interesting and different and nice in small doses but I'll take a nice and smooth 3 stacks flow any day of the week. When it comes to flows, more complex ≠ better

[CanadaPure]

I respect Tech N9ne for what he's done as an independent rapper; however, I find him to be incredibly one dimensional and boring musically. Everything that's come out recently from Tech has sounded exactly the same. Not to mention the non-sense verse just for the sake of keeping a particular pattern going. They talk about a polished turd still being a turd, but Tech pushes out his music at such a fast rate that we don't even get polished turds. Even if he slowed down with his albums, I'm not sure if he could put something out that would grab my attention enough to make me go out and actually purchase it.

The same style that grabbed peoples attention way back has unfortunately made him incredibly stagnant, and makes him come across as incredibly one dimensional, as I said.

Rittz I find pretty boring too, but if I want something relaxing I guess I could listen to some of his songs. I don't think he's as much of a Tech N9ne carbon copy like a lot of Strange Music sometimes seems to be at this point, but there's nothing about him that would make me want to go out and buy his album.

[dead prez]

Tech n9ne gets a bit too much hate. I don't like him by any sense but I could see why some would. If someone prioritizes flow over writing, I guess. Listening to him flow is akin to listening to a finely tuned death metal song or something.

[CrashBand]

who do i catch is my jam m8

thread was more aimed at elision i guess. wanna get to the bottom of why he calls certain rappres "lyrical juggernauts" and why he discredits others.

[dead prez]

I still find him beyond corny but not unlistenable. I like rappers that don't make sense the half the time or it's extremely hard to decipher their lyrics (Cam'ron, Ghostface, MF DOOM) but I guess that's different from straight up bad writing. lol

[Elision]

Elision, you are a sucker for being open-minded and all that, and you think these guys are the best. I wonder if you wanted to have a discussion/debate on why these guys are elite rappers/lyricists/emcees.

shut the fuck up with this discussion/debate shit. you don't want a debate, you want another public argument resulting in me vs 7 of you. pm me if you want a fair man-to-man discussion, until then i'm not going to participate in your anti-strange circlejerk.

I want to get to the bottom of your thinking

no, you don't.

hopefully you can get understand my thinking.

I understand thoroughly, only I respect your tastes and can grasp the concept of subjectivity. I can't listen to that whiney faggoty angsty emo shit for more than a track or two before getting sick. i listen to hiphop primarily for rhyme and rhythm, and if you can show me someone better at that than the artists I'm currently involved in, I will gladly migrate. until then people like tech and rittz are where to go if you're looking for what it is i'm looking for.

i cant still through 15 songs of that choppy rap.

see that's the thing it's about all i want to listen to usually

with every release since...probably Killer, his lyrics got shittier and shittier. It seemed like he stopped putting effort into his music

I have no idea what you're talking about. 6's & 7's, Something Else, and Strangeulation are all Killer + several more years of evolution. How do you see it any differently?

with him starting to speak in that caveman dialect with all the fragments he used annoyingly often, and he didn't seem like he could carry a solo album by himself. He needs 40 features per album now.

This is nothing new in the slightest.

He needs to make half of each album consist of shitty club/sex songs, presumably because they're so easy to make.

No according to him he's trying to have something on there for everybody. He prefers the more complicated technical writing.

Rittz isn't like Tech because he uses decent grammar. But most of his flows sound the same, so I don't listen to his album very often. I never looked at him like a great lyricist though, I just saw him as an entertaining rapper, which he still is.

How do you not consider Rittz a great lyricist? He's brilliant lyrically, you just gotta really listen because the dude can shove a novel into 16 bars.

Just because they rhyme fast isn't enough for me. My interest gets lost when they just rap fast as shit and throw some chick on the hook and call it a day.

It's extremely rare to see either of them just rap as fast as they can, in fact I can only think of one example of both of them doing so. Tech on Taking Online Orders and Rittz on What is Hiphop, aside from those two verses I've only ever heard them use speed as a method of fitting every syllable into the beat. If the beat were slower, they'd be slower. As for the constant use of female vocals I don't get that either, in fact I wish they did it more often.

It's not song writing when you just fill in the 16's on the beat with the same flow and vocals with weak hooks and no bridge or breakdown.

what? I've only ever caught tech using the same flow one time. here: http://youtu.be/2RjIuuZzRiU?t=8m25s / http://youtu.be/ScOUns5puio?t=1m41s

I like hearing a little melody in my verses (Yela, Marshall, Kendrick, Krit, J Cole, Drake are all great song writers in my opinion and their songs show a lot more range), and if your going to rap double time don't do it the whole damn song (unless in a song like WWC where it's almost competitive).

Show me one example of tech chopping all the way through a verse, midwest/worldwide choppers songs excluded. and as for rittz that's just how he prefers to rap, and he's arguably the best I've ever seen at it. as for melody, you do understand that tech essentially invented melodic rap right? he's the first to incorporate opera and hard rock into raw rap music, what more do you want?

Most casual listeners are not into that shit.

Most casual listeners aren't into good hiphop.

Change your flow up throughout a song...or at least through the album.

tech is the king of changing flows up. i've seen this guy cycle through 8 different flows in 1 verse. what is it that you want?

tech n9ne isn't even a good rhymer and his flows are terrible to anyone that prefers smooth flows over a chaotic barrage of syllables being pounded into the beat over and over.

one of the worst rappers i've ever listened to.

Yeah it's interesting and different and nice in small doses but I'll take a nice and smooth 3 stacks flow any day of the week.

tech and rittz do those flows too. want some links?

I find that little growl Tech N9ne does is so annoying.

I love it, especially live

With Rittz, I think he is good at what he does but what he does isn't very interesting to me.

What does he lack for you?

he's always stressing the same syllables at the end of his bars.

huh?

it just feels like him (and a lot of Strange) are just...gimmicky or plastic. Like Strange is a gateway label to get into rap

i don't even know where to start with this... what's the gimmick? where does it lack in realism so much that it feels plastic? especially in comparison to the mainstream! tech needed a label to get his much out through, so him and travis built one in 99. that's really as deep as it goes, it's not interscope here.

I respect Tech N9ne for what he's done as an independent rapper; however, I find him to be incredibly one dimensional and boring musically. Everything that's come out recently from Tech has sounded exactly the same.

See I just don't understand where you're coming from with this, tech is the most multi-dimensional artist I've ever seen in any field of art period. The dude is extremely versatile, it's how he got his name in fact, 9 = number of completion, he can do any style on queue. you say all his music (especially as of recent) sounds the exact same. what is a style you'd prefer to hear from him? because the fact is I promise you he's done it. hence why I don't understand you.

Not to mention the non-sense verse just for the sake of keeping a particular pattern going.

yep, he does do that. he seems pretty self-aware about it though.

I'm not sure if he could put something out that would grab my attention enough to make me go out and actually purchase it.

again, what would you like to hear from him specifically?

The same style that grabbed peoples attention way back has unfortunately made him incredibly stagnant, and makes him come across as incredibly one dimensional, as I said.

wait, he's using styles now that he used back then? what's an example?

Rittz I find pretty boring too, but if I want something relaxing I guess I could listen to some of his songs.

you're clearly unfamiliar with rittz's work and thus don't have sufficient perspective to speak on it. rittz has some chill tracks but for the most part his discography is very dark and intense.

a Tech N9ne carbon copy like a lot of Strange Music sometimes seems to be at this point

I'm done here, which wouldn't be the case if there was anything I could possibly do or say here that would effect anybody's opinion on this subject. Like I said, Crash, if you actually want talk then shoot me a pm, but I'm not playing this. I get you have friends here and stuff that you like to agree with things on and discuss the stuff you have in common, and that's awesome - But please understand that I don't have friends or family anywhere, so when you make a post like this at me, knowing that it'll cause me to wake up to some of the only people I interact with shitting all over one of the few things that brings me excitement and joy, and messages from people telling me how to approach this thread, it sucks dude. it just sucks and i'm starting to not feel welcome here lately, so yeah boohoo poor me whatever i just, look, i'm just letting you know it sucks a lot so that hopefully you won't do it to others. I mean sometimes rollefsen or wallace will chime in and say that they also like a song from strange and that's fucking awesome, i love that. geno used to also. but yes, I get that for the most part tech/rittz/strange is very disliked amongst real hiphop fans. you don't have to tell me. they probably are wack as fuck, which makes me twice as bad for enjoying any of it. but the fact is i do enjoy it very much, which i guess i'm embarrassed to say but yeah, there.

[CanadaPure]

See I just don't understand where you're coming from with this, tech is the most multi-dimensional artist I've ever seen in any field of art period. The dude is extremely versatile, it's how he got his name in fact, 9 = number of completion, he can do any style on queue. you say all his music (especially as of recent) sounds the exact same. what is a style you'd prefer to hear from him? because the fact is I promise you he's done it. hence why I don't understand you.

And I don't understand how you don't think that he's sounded exactly the same for at least the last 3-5 years. All the "styles" sound painfully similar, the content tends to be (though not always) empty to me, and the production has even been mind-numbingly similar (either that or just boring, I can't decide, though production is a lesser part for me).

yep, he does do that. he seems pretty self-aware about it though.

Being self-aware about something does not mean it's passable or good. I know lots of people who are self-aware about the fact that they are obese, that doesn't mean it's a good thing, and that excuse doesn't justify it. It's still something that sticks out sorely in his music for me. He's not the only rapper who does it either.

again, what would you like to hear from him specifically?

I'd like him to take his time an put out an album that is actually worth listening to instead of putting out 3,000 features, 1,500 EPs, and 1-2 albums every year. When you put out that much content, it all starts to blend together. I honestly think he's struggling to find anything meaningful to say. That's not to say all songs have to be meaningful, but Tech (particularly as of late) has come across as an incredibly empty artist.

wait, he's using styles now that he used back then? what's an example?

Yes, he is. I'm not talking about all the flows being the same. Don't confuse the two. He's still using the rapid fire delivery, at this point almost exclusively it seems (with few exceptions). I think there's a point where you start to rely on that to impress people more than the content of the song, that's what Tech has hit for me, because he hasn't really expanded past it.

you're clearly unfamiliar with rittz's work and thus don't have sufficient perspective to speak on it. rittz has some chill tracks but for the most part his discography is very dark and intense.

I've listened to White Jesus, After Mornin (I think), and The Life and Times of Jonny Valiant. I'm not sure what I'm missing, but I always appreciate your arrogance Elision. I just find Rittz to be boring, for the most part. I enjoy some of his music, but a lot of it is very forgettable. A lot of TR members would disagree with me on that, I know.