Beat Appreciation or Beat Biting? - Chris "Preach" Smith

Drake has released two tracks recently that have people buzzing, ‘Started From The Bottom’
and ‘5 AM in Toronto’ this week. Both records had good production, although in my honest opinion
‘5 AM In Toronto’ is better thanks to Boi 1-Da’s basslines. But these days, when a track blows up,
you are almost guaranteed that there’s going to be a slew of rappers rhyming over that same
beat. The question is, has it gotten completely out of hand?

The answer? Yes and no.

Hip-hop is an art form that from the very beginning, has used music from artists before them to
create records. From the park jams where crews toasted over break beats like ‘Apache’ by The
Invincible Bongo Band and ‘Ashley’s Roachclip’ by The Soul Searchers to sampling being the norm,
it’s always been present. You had Ice Cube with a major hit in ‘Jackin’ For Beats’, significant for
the fact that he was able to use all of these different beats to rhyme over on a major label release
with no pubilc pushback from that label. A far cry from Biz Markie getting slaughtered with those
sampling lawsuits back in the day. Another source point has to be the underground radio shows
like Stretch & Bobbito who would not only break new artists but have artists freestyle over any
of the hot instrumentals at that time. Scour all of their shows, along with those from Kool DJ Red
Alert and Kid Capri. Props also have to be given to the masters of blend tapes. I remember those
days of vendors up and down Jamaica Avenue with those tapes (shoutout to DJ Ron G!!), and 
all of the suave cats pushing Acura Legends with the gold rims ‘round 1993 had to have a blend
tape as an accessory. Funkmaster Flex even extended his empire that way. This was way before
we called such musical adventures ‘mashups’. Hearing an MC or crew go in over another beat was
easter egg status.  

These days though, some of that excitement is watered down more than an Incredible Hulk at
any major bar before 9 P.M. Because it’s now an established norm that whenever there is a hot
beat that captures the mainstream attention, you’re going to have other rappers put out their
own versions. And it seems to have only grown bigger in the past year and a half. Look at what
happened after ‘Started From The Bottom’. Thirty-six hours later, you had about 6 rappers do
a verse or two over that beat. Maybe one out of the 6 being decent. Some of these struggle 
rappers need to cease and desist with that tactic. Because it’s not as simple as the idea that 
they have that rhyming over the hot instrumental of the moment will make you hot. You can
get exposed real quick. There’s sites making names for themselves off of this, and instrumental
CD’s are all the rage, i.e. J.Armz and the ‘How To Be An MC’ series. But the drawback is the 
rise in struggle rappers, weedcarrier rappers deluding themselves and diluting the market. So
much so that established MC’s like Jean Grae and Bun B are outwardly against this practice. 
But, this will continue unless we get back to bolstering that fine line between beat appreciation
and straight up beat biting. Maybe it’ll happen after the 29th rhyme done over the beat from a
Fabolous track.