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I'm thinking of rapping- Where do I start?

CorkMan

Not really becoming a full time MC (not yet anyway) but mainly for writing my own rhymes, how to put together your own flow and that stuff. Does anyone have any stuff, or know where to get stuff, on the elements of songwriting and all about becoming a MC? (flow, bars etc)

I'd really like to produce too, but this is what i'll go into first.

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Kristok

google it im sure theres millions of websites about this

Ay Cee

Regarding bars or beats a simple search on Google will help you there.
A basic bar in hip hop would be comprised of a kick and a snare. If you don't know what that is you better learn quick! So basically a bar would be "Kick - snare - kick - snare".

Generally speaking, a hip hop verse is comprised of 16 bars. A basic song would break down as 3 x 16 bar verses with 8 bar choruses.

Regarding flow/ song writing, no amount of reading is going to help you on this! The best thing to do is download some instrumentals and write your rhymes to them. Don't just write your rhymes on the bus and then expect to just lay them straight over the beat. It won't work and it sounds awful. Use the rhymes you wrote on the bus as a guideline. You're gonna have to change them to fit the beat.

Flow is just something you develop over time. I've been rapping for years now and I still find each song I write my flow improves. I've always been focused more on lyrical content than flow but I'm compromising on that to find a happy median.

When you do your first couple of songs don't put them on the net cos in all honesty they're gonna suck!!! It takes practice to get it right. If you can't take criticism - you are in the wrong game pal!!! With the net people can and will use fake names to take a pop at you. At the same time, don't put too much faith in people blowing smoke up your ass.

MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL!!! Be yourself! You're not from Brooklyn, don't sound like you are. You don't drink 40's, you don't pimp hoes so don't start ****e talking like you know all about that cos you don't! You're from Ireland, talk about what you know. People will relate to the music if it's real.

It's better to be a real nobody than a fake somebody!

Hope something I blabbered there helps.

CorkMan

Thanks for the info! Do ye know any good website about MCing?

Also, I saw this before, where a rapper writes lyrics at the start of a sentence and writes at the end of it straight away. Like in 8 Mile where it plays the making of Lose Yourself, it doesn't play the Eminem bars in total, it only plays like "palms are sweaty, moms spaghetti, he's nervous, on the service, crowd goes so loud", so is it helpful to build the foundation of a sentence first before building an entire one?

Ay Cee

I don't know any websites sorry. If you read something off a site all you are doing is learning the way someone else does it. People do things differently, what works for one person doesn't work for others. If you're just copying someone else you're not gonna develop your own style.

That's just the way 8 Mile was scored. The part you're hearing is just the parts Eminem emphasised for greater effect. This is common. You'll do it in certain parts of a song to give it depth. You just record a new layer and it sits "behind" the main vocals.

Fundamentally speaking the part of the sentence that rhymes is the last part. So the rest of the sentence is just a way of getting there. It's like a joke, the main part is the punchline the rest is done to get you there.

Executive Steve

just spend an awful long time getting the words out of your head...

it takes work, and you'll write an awful lot of rubbish before you come up with something thats "you".

be self critical, be harsh on yourself... do you have any mates who are into it too? its way more fun to have a few heads around you can jam with etc, makes it less of a chore imo...

if you find that stopping and writing stuff down wrecks your concentration go get a dictaphone - they rock!

avoid rhyming dictionaries, but cultivate a love of words. read books, read peotry read newspapers read websites. words are like butterflies - go grab a net and catch a few good ones so when the time comes to show off your collection you're coming correct.

always remember that hip hop mc-ing is about who you are and where you're from. if you can't make that interesting then you're not trying hard enough...

and that leads me onto Ay Cee's point - be true and sound like you come from the place where you come from - not new york compton or london.

Kristok

Ay Cee wrote:

MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL!!! Be yourself! You're not from Brooklyn, don't sound like you are. You don't drink 40's, you don't pimp hoes so don't start ****e talking like you know all about that cos you don't! You're from Ireland, talk about what you know. People will relate to the music if it's real.

Thats assuming he dosnt do all that down in cork, they bang hard down south mayne.

StevieG

Kristok wrote:

Thats assuming he dosnt do all that down in cork, they bang hard down south mayne.

Ha ha lol!:D

Corkman, it might be worth having a look at Cork website thegaff.net/forums
There's a producers/rappers section there with loads of rappers starting off and most are willing to offer advice etc
Best of Luck!

Ay Cee

Kristok wrote:

Thats assuming he dosnt do all that down in cork, they bang hard down south mayne.

Word! Shout to all the big dawgs down in "The Real Capital"

CorkMan

I've looked around and I can't find a single website on songwriting, or bulding bars, flow, building your music, etc.

Ay Cee

2 second search on google threw this up:
http://www.musicbizacademy.com/articles/songwritingtips.htm
http://www.flocabulary.com/freestylerap.html

dar83

http://media.putfile.com/Nelly-Da-Gamer--Sweet-Talk

Nelly, dont do it........ please...... think of the children!

Klimseven

^^^ that may quite possibly be the funniest thing I've ever heard in my life......I can't stand up.....I can't see......

Kristok

Ok so you now know how not to do it, where was that guy from he had the strangest accent he sorta sounded arab to me.

Ay Cee

I couldn't listen to all that! OMG!!!

Pen0s

http://www.b-boys.com/links.html

maybe this will help

i used to use this site and they had some really good stuff on helping with multi-rhyming inner rhyming and ish forums are changed now

http://homerecording.com/

site on mixing!

http://www.daveyd.com/

good website :P not helpful but still readable, u have to know where it came from to be a part of it (or something patronising like that

)

http://www.rhymezone.com/r/d?u=macknight

you put in the word and it gives u all the rhymes for it, writing just got easier!?!

hopefully some of that is of use to u!

Ay Cee

Davey D?! I used to live on that site about 8 years ago! Ah the memories

CorkMan

Thanks for the links!

Who is Nelly?

Ay Cee

Good. Keep thinking who's Nelly. Ye don't want to know

Pen0s

Ay Cee wrote:

Davey D?! I used to live on that site about 8 years ago! Ah the memories

every respectable net-cee needs to get addicted to davey d!

and nelly is popstar so never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever download her ****

dar83

CorkMan wrote:

Thanks for the links!

Who is Nelly?

Oh Nelly, you crack me up.......:v:

aphex™

Do us all a favour and don't start.

A rapper with a Cork accent!?!? What planet are you on?

The amount of people shaping around Ireland as if they're black gangsters living in LA is ridiculous.

If an Irish rapper turned up in America and started rapping they'd be shot within about 30 seconds or so. Alright?

I wonder what the likes of 50 Cent think of the ejits walking around Ireland as if they're in the Crips or something when they do a show here.

It must be like finding kids in Outer Mongolia walking around with Dublin accents and trying to be hard after watching a DVD of "Into the West".

dar83

aphex&#8482 wrote:

Do us all a favour and don't start.

A rapper with a Cork accent!?!? What planet are you on?

But if you listen to his first effort I linked to, you'd realise he's quite good (in a very bad way) at covering up his Cork accent. He puts the US tint on there, his true accent only slips out once, which is commendable......

:v:

Ay Cee

Are ye serious?

dar83

As a heart attack.

You guys should check out the GameFAQs boards, my mate tells me he's a small celebrity over there after posting his song and asking for constructive criticism of it on the Rap and Hip-Hop board.

God loves a trier, so fair player to him for that at least. Willing to put himself out there, even if he possibly shouldn't.

CorkMan

Thanks for the websites. Are there any more good website on it?

dar83

Hahahaha, Nelly. Whats with sending me "abusive" PM's?!

Seriously, dont even try that shít, cause I'm laughing so hard right now it's dangerous to my health.

spacecoyote

aphex&#8482 wrote:

I wonder what the likes of 50 Cent think of the ejits walking around Ireland as if they're in the Crips or something when they do a show here.

im sure 50 thinks nothing of it, he'll see the exact same wannabe white boys in the states. thats his core fan base, how else do you think he sold so many records!

seriously though, ignore any of the jibes at accents, just because you don't sound american doesn't mean you can't rap. if you do it with your own accent it'll sound a lot more natural.

Theres a few guys that post on here that stick links to their own music. have a listen to it, some of it is genuinely good hip-hop, might give a little more inspiration than the lame, cliched MTV generation hip-hop you'll hear on most radio stations

solskjaer20

XD, that Nelly.

As dar says he has legendry status on GameFAQs.....just mention his name on the Ireland Board.

Aye he does try to cover up the Cork accent a bit....but why? Cork is the best accent in Ireland.

Anyway......keep up the good work Nelly. >_>

Macca'87

You Mwessed Weet Mwee Nelly Of Gamefwaks!!!!

spacecoyote

dar83 wrote:

http://media.putfile.com/Nelly-Da-Gamer--Sweet-Talk

Nelly, dont do it........ please...... think of the children!

oh god, just listened to that for the first time. is it serious, or some dudes havina laugh? i was laughin so hard i almost threw up! someone playing with their fisherprice, my first rhyme kit!!!

NELLY IS A GENIUS