hiphop - lyrics or production

Like you, I approach hip hip from a whitebread background (started way back when I was listening to tr*p h*p) and sort of reversed engineered my way to a little bit of hip hop. As with almost all music that I listen to that contains lyrics, I usually don't bother with lyrics at all, the primary reason being my inability to distinguish between those "good" and those "bad." Susbsequently, it's the production that attracts me to hip hop, e.g. the donwtempo tracks from Roots Manuva and Aesop Rock in which they emphasize the atmosphere, or the 19th century Gothic sensationalism of RZA's works (alluded to btw by Portishead's "Elysium," a veritable tribute to the RZArekta). I sort of abstract the rapping as a rhytmical component of the arrangement -- in a way, rapping becomes background music to the background music. Just to show that I apply this bias towards the production to all sorts of music, I usually only focus on the vocal melodies of singers; the only lyricist that I without hesitation point to as having a "way with words" is Corin Tucker.

To try to address your post, I think that rapping itself has a disadvantage to singing, in that its primary aesthetic is with rhythm whereas singing has rhythm and melody both (ignoring the words themselves for the nonce), and so the former in a manner of speaking has fewer dimensions. However, rap has an emphasis on wordplay and punnary much closer to that of poetry than does much singing nowadays. However, I think the linguistics of rapping is only the face of Voltron, whereas the production is its heart.

I'd say production over lyrics. Take for example the always talked about Jay-Z rekkid. Its a soulful album. Swizzle Sticks did an amazing job prodcuing that album as a whole. With a solid rock backround (i.e. sampling Bowie and the Doors), the album comes off as a solid rock record. Thats why Cannibal Ox is appealing to me as well. El-P totally destroyed it with those great beats. Funcrusher Plus works for me as well.

It's the music for me too. DJ Shadow means more to me than any number of rappers. Most of the others who make me buy a hip hop record are the makers of music rather than the voices - RZA, various turntablists. Sometimes it goes together happily, as in early LL Cool J, Eric B & Rakim, Public Enemy, Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince and nowadays most notably Eminem with Dre.

The production is a huge part of it for me, but I've become increasingly involved with the lyrics. Hiphop was kind of my gateway into actually caring about lyrics, which I mostly ignored before.

Sure, the voice is pretty much a rhythm instrument and is just part of the track in that sense, but since most hiphop is loop-based it becomes boring and monotonous very quickly if you ignore the lyrics (which are an essential part of what makes hip-hop what it is, of course). Still, unless it is an mc that really catches me sometimes I have to force myself to listen to the words and not just zone out with the track (which is why I like listening to hiphop on headphones walking around much better than at home, much greater concentration).

very much depends. jay z's lyrics are let's face it, appalling but the production is fantastic; while most 'conscious' rappers still seem to think it's 1974 musically. oh, and can you really use the expression Intelligent Dance Music without cringing?

to me both would be equally important in my enjoyment of hip-hop - granted shadow's 'entroducing' is a landmark record in terms of production but i can also get off on the fantastic lyrical word play displayed by the likes of latyrx, blackalicous, jurassic 5 et al.

the last two albums i've bought (aim & the herbaliser) have both been a case of producer with guest rappers and i find myself enjoying both the great production skills and instrumental tracks, but also the tracks featuring rappers.

besides, what about some of the great freestyle tracks where several mc's show off their verbal skills over a fairly basic hip hop break...

I enjoy "Endtroducing" but I can't say that I know of any ways that it might really be groundbreaking.

And Jay-Z's lyrics are fantastic.

Depends on the artist. F'rinstance, with, say, Aesop Rock or Jay-Z, lyrics assert themselves far more than the (not necessarily, and in these cases not at all, bad) quality of the production; but others (again, even those with whom the rapping is pretty good) stand out mostly in their production.

Excuse me, I should have stayed exclusively with the word 'rapping'; lyrics plus flow.

jay-z is a better rapper than 90% of whats been mentioned here so far. indie rap is about as fun as constipation.

how about outkast? great lyrics + production.

gift of gab and lyrics born could both get hova, c'mon now

Apples and oranges...definitely true in a sense, but it doesn't mean he doesn't have his own qualities, though.

I don't think I could really love a hiphop album that was great in one area and deficient in the other, as making them complementary is really the trick of it (favorite example=the Reflection Eternal album).

People get too fussy about lyrics in a "pen and paper" sort of literal way. It doesn't make the most sense when you're so heavily measuring the sound of a voice by the text. Underground rappers pride themselves upon this codified ideology of obtuse intricate lyricism, but a lot of them miss the point when they end up sounding like fancy-tongued drones without a personality. Measuring Jay-Z by this kind of stick is meaningless; he doesn't run in that hamster-wheel and he often comes off a lot nicer because of it.

I can give jay-z his respect, I was reacting to the statements 'he's better than 90%...' and 'indie rap fun as constipation' however the solesides fellas have it all as far as I'm concerned, the content, the voice and the delivery.

The R.E. album was real nice.

There have been albums where the MCing just wasn't there but I still think the album's classic because of the beats. Prime example is Group Home. I can enjoy Little dap and malachi for what they are, but, truth be told, they are weak on the mic. But those beats are soooooo tough! I always had a fantasy of Jeru getting the G.H. beats, cuz he got the short straw when they were splitting up Primo's new beats. Actually, Jeru is not really that strong and MC IMO. I saw a show of his where he was forgetting tons of his lyrics, etc. anyway....

two other examples of weak lyrics / good production: Cash Money & Marvelous, Mantronix "In Full Effect"

the fact that hiphop's white minority has been thoroughly bug up in this thread (shadow! necro! el-p!) implies something rather obvious to me.

it all depends on the beat a) beats that are just as effective as instrumentals
b) beats that are just there to provide rhythm for lyrical 'fireworks'
c) beats that are incomplete without the rapping/lyrical component
all above have examples to recommend them but c) produces the best rap songs to my ears

shit lyrics + excellent production = still quite good, in many cases very good.

amazing lyrics + awful production = unlistenable.

production wins.

but... another component of the lyrics is the delivery. if the delivery is really, really bad, even a record with good production becomes unlistenable. you might be able to make a case for delivery actually being part of the production though - it's all about the sounds rather than the text.

agreed. lyrics vs production is unrealistic anyway. if the question is production vs vocals, i give the edge to production simply because i dont want to hear accapella, but i'm almost as resistant to instrumental hiphop. in a vast majority of cases i'd feel the song is incomplete or dull missing either. what they're saying is of small consequence as compared to how they say it. if it's interesting, great. the lyrics v production argument seems to be borne out of the mc ego as individual/personality/teacher/poet (thus lyrics are the important part, solid production being the teaspoon of sugar). mc wanting to be more than another rhythmic component, taking his lyrics seriously whether the listener does or not.