When Lyricism is Songwriting

[Thorolf]

Spoken word as music is as old as music itself.

A lot of jazz songwriting is/was built up as a rubato verse, contrasted by a rhythmic refrain (most jazz standards, from Autumn Leaves to White Christmas, originally had this form, but now the refrains only remain).

The cabaret took this one step further with partly or wholly removing melody as well as rhythm in the rubato recitative.

Nowadays, this has flipped over, where the rhythm stays but the ‘melody’ in a traditional tonal sense is gone in rap (sometimes believed to be an acronym for Rhythmical American Poetry).

Writing musically interresting stuff with rhythmical words only, I find really difficult. Yet I can do it, and have indeed written some raps. Good rap can be immensely catchy, complicated, deep and fun!

People tend to get interrested when a serious music pro like me say I like rap, and ask for recommendations. The big problem is that no single artist lasts a whole album with raps that are both musically good, interresting, and well composed.

There is one notable exception to this, the album “The Re-Enforcement” (1993) by norwegian rap act “B. O. L. T. Warhead”.

Otherwize, I have to refer you to single tracks by e. g.
Public Enemy - album “Yo! Bum Rush The Show” (1987)
Rage Against The Machine - album “Rage Against The Machine” (1992)
Senser - album “Stacked Up” (1994)
Warlocks - album “Lyrical Marksmen” (1995)

etc. etc.

Anyone else interrested/having musical revelations from rap?

Regards