Are We Entering Into The Era Of Wack Rappers?

With Yachty, Uzi, Carti, and Desiigner taking over the Billboards, there’s no denying that expectations for successful rap songs are changing.

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Lil Yachty a.k.a. Lil Boat is known by many names, but arguably the most interesting one is "the poster child for wack rappers.” In recent years, there’s been a flock of rappers being placed in the category of “wack,” their adversaries being the "conscious rapper," a label that artists such as Kendrick Lamar boast. The best way to explain this emergence is to backtrack to the history of R.A.P. or rhythm and poetry.

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Rap music was originally intended to be an oral tradition of story-telling. Rap, in its purest form, was black rhetoric placed over a beat. People were meant to feel the words that they were hearing. There was no such thing as the “conscious rapper” because all music was “conscious.” But when we start to hear lines like “all my b*****s come in pairs like b***s in my n*****k,” can we say that this oral tradition is still being upheld?

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Charlamagne’s interview with Yachty, which began the debate over his role as a wack rapper, has sparked a lot of questions. So much so that Pigeons and Planes asked New Yorkers what they thought about it in a video segment. The general sentiment seemed to be that, no, he does not make good music, but the youth still love him. He’s childish, which he conveys in his music, and in the fact that he is literally still in his teens.

Internet scans for what characterizes “wack rappers” suggest that it all comes down to lyricism. If the lyrics an artist produce are not appealing, or frankly aren't about anything at all, the rapper is considered wack. Furthermore, if a rapper is impossible to understand, or tends to mumble rap, they’re probably wack. These qualities are most definitely not new. Artists such as Soulja Boy and Lil Wayne received a lot of flack for their flows, so the question is, why are artists being revered for it now?

There are countless artists on the come-up similar to Lil Boat including: Lil Uzi, Playboi Carti, Desiigner, and more. So maybe this shift reflects an overall societal one.

In a world where meme humor is becoming the mainstream, we should probably expect music tastes to change as well. If that’s the case, are wack rappers becoming a danger to the culture, or are they just a consequence of our changing values for entertainment?