Results for “craft/skill as subject matter”

Songs

Dwyck

Gang Starr

"DWYCK" is a loose, celebratory posse cut where Gang Starr cedes most of the mic to guest MCs Nice & Smooth, trading dense…

braggadocio musical camaraderie craft/skill as subject matter

Nothing Even Matters

Lauryn Hill

A duet-style love song (with D'Angelo) that uses the phrase 'nothing even matters' as both a declaration of romantic devotion…

romantic obsession loss of perspective devotion vs. dependency

Nothing Else Matters

Phoebe Bridgers

This is a cover, not an original composition, so the critical interest lies in interpretation rather than authorship: Phoebe…

devotion autonomy from outside judgment intimacy

Hit It Run

Run-DMC

A boast-driven b-boy anthem in which D.M.C. asserts lineage, dominance, and craft over Jam Master Jay's stripped-down beats. The…

braggadocio hip-hop lineage and authenticity self-naming/identity

Award Tour

A Tribe Called Quest

A victory-lap travelogue disguised as a posse cut, where the pleasure of touring the world with a hip-hop crew becomes the whole…

hip-hop craft and lineage global travel and touring life authenticity vs. imitation

Hollis Crew (Krush-Groove 2)

Run-DMC

An early foundational Run-DMC record built almost entirely around boasting: each MC takes a turn establishing his name, his…

braggadocio and self-mythologizing identity and naming hip-hop lineage/crew loyalty

Hip Hop

Mos Def

Mos Def treats hip hop as both craft and condition -- a language, a livelihood, and a lens on Black American history that he…

artistic craft and discipline Black lineage and history music industry exploitation

The Next Movement

The Roots

A pure showcase track built on DJ-style hype-man calls and dense, boastful verses from Black Thought, "The Next Movement" is…

self-mythologizing lyrical craft as spectacle community/call-and-response

Paid In Full

Eric B.

This is the title track and origin document of hip-hop's most sampled record, a first-person account of a hustler talking…

hustling and survival redemption through legitimate work the music industry as a means of escape

Hands

Four Tet

"Hands" is an instrumental piece built from folktronica textures — plucked strings, hand percussion, and looping samples — that…

craft and manual labor repetition as meditation organic vs. electronic texture

Royalty

Gang Starr

A late-90s Gang Starr track that pairs Guru's understated boasting with an R&B hook from K-Ci and JoJo, framing self-respect and…

self-respect and dignity black excellence/regality authenticity vs. commercialism

What They Do

The Roots

A mid-90s Roots track built around a single defiant refrain, positioning the group's artistic integrity against a hip-hop…

authenticity vs. commercialism artistic integrity hip-hop lineage and craft

Steve Biko (Stir It Up)

A Tribe Called Quest

A three-MC posse cut built almost entirely from boasts, wordplay, and Queens pride, borrowing the name and instrumental cue of…

hip-hop bravado and lyrical skill group identity and borough pride fleeting social consciousness

Rhymes Like Dimes

MF DOOM

A dense, boastful showcase track in which DOOM treats rap itself as street-level commerce, comparing his rhymes to cheap…

rap-as-commerce braggadocio and craft irreverent wordplay

You Are My Sunshine

Johnny Cash

This is Johnny Cash's stripped-down take on the standard "You Are My Sunshine," but the version on Unearthed leaves the tape…

heartbreak and loss irony of the title versus the lyric the mechanics of recording

Keep the Beat

Eric B.

This track is Rakim's rare romantic showcase, built on a conceit that fuses music-making with lovemaking so thoroughly that the…

music as seduction control and rhythm stamina and endurance

Anji

Simon Jäger

Anji is a solo acoustic guitar instrumental built on a rolling fingerpicked pattern, adapted by Paul Simon from a piece written…

virtuosity folk-revival lineage interiority

Breakadawn

De La Soul

A loose, free-associative posse-cut style track from De La Soul's most abstract album, built on stream-of-consciousness wordplay…

identity and origin hip-hop lineage and Native Tongues affiliation industry skepticism

The Fish (Schindleria Praematurus)

Yes

This is less a song with lyrics than a title chanted over what is essentially an instrumental showcase, built around the Latin…

scale and smallness naming and taxonomy sound as texture

All Caps

Madvillain

A pure showcase of technical rap virtuosity built almost entirely on internal rhyme chains and boastful non-sequiturs, "All…

braggadocio persona/mythmaking criminal alter-ego

Rhinestone Cowboy

Madvillain

This is a boast track built on the tension between DOOM's mythologized mask persona and the grubby realities of the rap grind.…

masked identity/anonymity the rap grind vs. glamour boasting and self-mythology

As the Rhyme Goes On

Eric B.

A dense, self-referential display of MC craft in which Rakim narrates his own performance as it happens, treating the rhyme…

self-reflexive artistry mic authority and lineage hip-hop as physical/mental control

Lyrics to Go

A Tribe Called Quest

A pure showcase track in which Q-Tip and Phife Dawg trade verses of boastful wordplay, with the title hook functioning less as a…

braggadocio craft and mastery of rhyme group identity and loyalty

Full Clip

Gang Starr

Full Clip is a boastful, aggressive posse-cut-style anthem in which Guru delivers a barrage of battle-rap threats, positioning…

braggadocio and dominance authenticity vs. imitation violence as metaphor for skill

Oh!

Sleater‐Kinney

A giddy, self-aware love song that keeps interrupting its own swooning with jolts of caution and self-mockery. Sleater-Kinney…

romantic infatuation self-control vs. surrender desire as destabilizing force

Listen!!!

Talib Kweli

A hyper-percussive showcase track built almost entirely around the command to "listen," using that word as both hook and thesis:…

attention and distraction authenticity vs. commercial rap self-assertion of skill

Rings

Aesop Rock

Aesop Rock revisits his abandoned career as a visual artist, tracing how technical devotion to drawing and painting curdled into…

creative identity and its loss depression and self-sabotage artistic craft and obsession

Getting In Tune

The Who

Pete Townshend uses the physical act of tuning an instrument as a metaphor for emotional and even spiritual connection,…

music as metaphor for intimacy authenticity versus performance spiritual/emotional alignment

Musical Massacre

Eric B.

A boastful battle-rap track built around fire and combustion imagery, where the MC positions himself as an unstoppable force who…

braggadocio competition/battle rap destruction as metaphor for skill

The Militia

Gang Starr

A posse cut assembled around a military conceit, with Guru, Big Shug, and Freddie Foxxx trading verses that frame elite lyricism…

lyrical supremacy crew loyalty and collective retaliation violence as metaphor for skill

Elevate Myself

Grandaddy

A songwriter's confession of exhaustion with the mechanics of making music for effect, paired with a plainer, almost desperate…

creative burnout self-loathing and self-forgiveness authenticity vs. craft

Mathematics

Mos Def

Mos Def builds a dense, statistics-driven indictment of American racial and economic injustice around the conceit of numbers,…

mass incarceration systemic racism economic inequality

Ruckus In B Minor

Wu‐Tang Clan

A posse-cut assembled around posthumous ODB vocals, stitched together with a repeated boast-chant and verses that mix…

legacy and seniority authenticity vs. commercialism posthumous presence

It Ain't Over Yet

Rodney Crowell

A weathered narrator takes stock of a life full of mistakes, near-collapses, and stubborn survival, addressing a longtime friend…

aging and mortality friendship as salvation self-deprecation and regret

Coffin Nails

MF DOOM

Coffin Nails is an instrumental beat from MF DOOM's Special Herbs series, the long-running set of production-only tracks he…

mortality vice and self-destruction underground hip-hop craft

Unravel

Björk

A brief, obsessively repeated lyric turns romantic anxiety into a small folk-tale: love as thread that comes loose during…

separation anxiety loss and impermanence of love fate versus renewal

Excursions

A Tribe Called Quest

Q-Tip opens The Low End Theory with a genealogy lesson, tracing hip-hop back through his father's love of bebop and framing rap…

lineage and continuation of Black music integrity versus phoniness time and history repeating

Discipline

Gang Starr

Guru builds a track around the idea of self-restraint, framing discipline as the thing separating impulse from action in matters…

self-restraint vs impulse sexual politics and mistrust hustler code and reputation

Treatment Bound

The Replacements

A shambling tour-van confessional in which The Replacements narrate their own dysfunction with wry resignation, treating…

self-sabotage touring exhaustion anti-professionalism

Everything Is Everything

Lauryn Hill

A meditation on cyclical change and self-determination that doubles as a virtuosic display of rap craft, this track pairs a…

cyclical change and renewal self-empowerment spiritual/religious syncretism