rap this year....
- Thread starter Brian
- Start date
You ain't seen me much in UGK threads, have you?
There were a fair amount of guests on there, but none of them really outshined Pimp and Bun at all. They really were there as guests of UGK, not as spots the label insisted on them having to sell the album. The majority of the guests were Texas dudes, and that surprises me that you wouldn't be all for that... The worst guests were Talib, Dizzy Rascal, and SS will get mad at me for this, but KGR and BDK. They didn't belong on the album. Otherwise, it sounded very cohesive and it was an album easily comparable to any previous UGK release. To each his own of course, but this album doesn't really work as an example for your argument.
f'really? I'm suprised soulstrut didn't fall over itself trying to "clon"
It was more offensive than funny so the clowning probably became comtempt and disgust. Really though, I liked the song he was on but I have to skip when his verse starts because he is so terrible on my ears. Plus, after him, you get this extremely annoying 2 minute Pimpin' Ken rant. It is the worst consecutive 3 minutes on any UGK album ever. Heh.
Of course it's about me!!! I never said otherwise. In fact I said:
It's you that seems to keep wanting to transform what I said into a comment on the state of rap in 2007. Personally, rap is still my favorite genre of new music by a longshot. Personally, I think I'm oriented towards it just fine and don't need further instruction from you on the subject.
Thanks, though, for taking me on this condescending journey.
That was released in 2006. Very underappreciated album.
Only on SoulStrut--it was a pretty big record in the real world.
Sigh. If you guys would just listen to Project Pat, a lot of your concerns are addressed. Focused production, hardly any guest drops.
I MEAN HAVE YOU HEARD THE CHORUS TO 'BULLFROG YAY' ??
I MEAN HAVE YOU HEARD THE CHORUS TO 'BULLFROG YAY' ??
You ain't seen me much in UGK threads, have you?
There were a fair amount of guests on there, but none of them really outshined Pimp and Bun at all. They really were there as guests of UGK, not as spots the label insisted on them having to sell the album. The majority of the guests were Texas dudes, and that surprises me that you wouldn't be all for that... The worst guests were Talib, Dizzy Rascal, and SS will get mad at me for this, but KGR and BDK. They didn't belong on the album. Otherwise, it sounded very cohesive and it was an album easily comparable to any previous UGK release. To each his own of course, but this album doesn't really work as an example for your argument.
Which previous UGK release had so many guests on it, from Texas or otherwise?
And the singles from that album sure aren't representative of what core UGK fans expect out of them. The first one...it's bad enough to have Jazze Pha producing it, but to let him kick his own verse??? And while I love International Players Anthem, it has gotten exactly zero play on the radio down here...which shold tell you something about how it being at least somewhat of a mismatch.
Meanwhile, Bun B's Get Throwed and Pimp C's Pourin' Up persist as club staples.
I'm not sure I understand what that has to do with it, it still doesn't answer my question. Is that the sole reason you don't like the album? Because it has guests on it? Do you really feel like the gusts take away from the album?
Again, UGK chose to work with these folks, they said it themselves. This is not the major label forcing them to have names on their album. This was what UGK wanted. In fact, the b-side of the jazzy pha single is about as UGK as it gets. And that track had a video and everything. And all the "core UGK fans" I know loved the album and the singles. And yes, some of them are from Texas, Houston even, and they grew up there, didn't migrate there... The beauty of the album is that it maintains the UGK aesthetic with a good amount of Pimp C production and the same feel and swing of previous efforts, but it also expands a bit and includes the work of artists in their field that they respect and wanted to work with. It sounds to me like you expect cookie cutter UGK songs with no evolution in the sound. I like the idea that they tried to expand their sound and were successful in maintaining that UGK feel.
As per previous threads, club experieence does not really equal authnetication for an artist, especially not UGK. Their music is more car music than club music in general, so whether or not they have songs that are popular in the club is pretty irrelvent in the grand scheme of things as far as I'm concerned. I do like those songs a lot though. In fact, I thought Bun B's solo album was one of the best albums that's dropped in the last 3 or 4 years by any rap artist.
I didn't say that I don't like the album or don't recognize that it has quality material on it...I just don't find myself wanting to listen to the album all that much. And there are probably 10 other Texas rap albums that I keep in rotation over that one.
It's what UGK wanted after already doing the Bun B solo record (which was absolutely dragged down by too many guests IMO) and understanding that so many guests is what the label is always going to prescribe nowadays. Did UGK do a decent job selecting which guests would fill the assmued, if not overt label quota? I guess...but I'm still not into it.
And are you really trying to call me out as half-a-Texan? I "migrated" to Houston as a sophomore in high school. I graduated from a Texas high school. I graduated from a Texas college. I've lived in this state for 15 years now. I own a home here and I know people far beyond the tourist traps that I would say that even this particular UGK album assumes.
Car music and club music are synonomous down here in Texas. And to rule out the club experience when scrutinizing Texas rap is paramount to missing the yacht entirely. Basically, if your Texas rap song isn't played in clubs on the regular...it's simply not a classic song in any way that I can surmise. Maybe it's a good song, but not classic.
And to make the distinction, there is a big difference between a club that plays 50 Cent, Kanye, Jay-Z, etc and then slips in UGK's Stop n Go versus a club that plays Big Moe, Lil Keke, Fat Pat, Z-Ro, Lil O, Pimp C's Pourin' Up, and Bun B's Get Throwed, etc..
i dropped that a couple months ago and got crickets. (i played "murder" around last call and people were eating it up. san diego is weird.)
Pourin' Up was probably new to their ears and on top of that it fosters a promethazine-related vibe which might not be their cup of tea, while Murder is tried and true in every way.
Glad to hear you playing those songs in Diego though, that's for sure.
stop n go is kind of an anomaly on the ugk record. I'm w/ harvey that i prefer UGK being UGK but that UGK record really doesn't have that many guests on it - at least not that many that fuck w/ the original UGK formula. i mean ok ... you fastforward thru dizzee + pimpin ken, skip stop n go ... maybe you don't like lil jon on the original version of 'like that.' but what else on this record sounds like them 'pushing boundaries' (aka using current club sounds and sounding boring as a result)? I love the record, and mostly because it sounds so much like their other ones.
I agree w/ the new vs. tried and true point- but i think i was trying to say that if "Pourin' Up" is indeed a club staple, it's probably a regional thing-- and everyone was super shitfaced by the time I played "murder", which may have had something to do with the more positive reception, I would venture to say less than 50% of the people in the place (small venue) knew what/who it was.
but, yeah, I play that sort of thing from time to time. (I do get the gasface from time to time too.)
but, yeah, I play that sort of thing from time to time. (I do get the gasface from time to time too.)
You know, in the end my little crusade here isn't about Underground Kingz being a subpar album. It's more about people using it as some sort of Texas rap pass that's apparently supposed to cover up years of ignoring even more currently-pertinent-to-the-region artists that have srpung up since Ridin Dirty.
It's the same phenomenon that occured surrounding Scarface's The Fix. Far too many tend to put the safe bet on such a lofty pedestal that it gets kinda fratboy lame to me.
And while I know some of y'all just like the album honestly, and please believe me that I'm not tyring to step on that at all...I'm just proactively guarded like that.
