Kanye West Say He Didn’t Physically Write His Lyrics For First Four Albums

yeah he prolly recorded the lyrics on a dictaphone or on some model bust... Kanye is like that.. he has a swag from another world *swerrrvve*
tsk tsk..
 
And most times, it sounds like it.



Kanye could truly be one of the greats if he would come down off of his high horse and take his craft seriously, instead concentrating on doing things that make people think he's one of the greats.


So he freestyled most of his albums. Imagine what the lyrical content could be if he took the time to write the lyrics down.




Which is why none of these dudes is touching Eminem. Eminem perfects his lyrics like they were his PhD Dissertation.
 
j.troup said:
And most times, it sounds like it.



Kanye could truly be one of the greats if he would come down off of his high horse and take his craft seriously, instead concentrating on doing things that make people think he's one of the greats.


So he freestyled most of his albums. Imagine what the lyrical content could be if he took the time to write the lyrics down.




Which is why none of these dudes is touching Eminem. Eminem perfects his lyrics like they were his PhD Dissertation.
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And Ludacris would be next at number 2 on that list of people who go in when they write their lyrics. . .

You can tell that Kanye doesn't write. His flow is so unorganized. The only rappers I can think of that can freestyle with tight flow are Common, T.I. Blind Fury, and Andre 3000.

Freestylin to make songs is so overrated. Gucci Mane has been doing it since day one. I think Waka is doing it now. He is not even CLOSE to being a great lyricist but Kanye has to realize while is trying to be so "great" the class he is in is filling up with non-lyricists.
 
All these fools are doing is making my job as an audio engineer more of a pain in the ass. Just because they didn't write it on a pad doesnt mean its a freestyle. Cats that don't write come in go in the booth and vibe out to the beat start rapping to it then go back and listen to it and have you record and re-record the same damn 2-4 bars until they perfect it and punch-in as they go. The tough thing about this is if the rapper sucks they will have a hard time making it sound like it wasn't punched in a few bars at a time. I especially hate the ones that want to record a few bars then step out of the booth and walk around freestyling to themselves and go back in.

The problem with that is that now you have changed your positioning on the mic that is going to create a difference or worse yet your energy won't be the same as the previous bars. Fortunately, if you know what you are doing as an engineer you can correct all these problems before you start on your rough mix. But, its going to take alot of time and effort on your part that could have been saved if they just would have sat their ass down and wrote it! Since technically we are doing the same thing that you do on a pen and pad. Write some shit down, recite it back, realize how much it sucks, erase, and repeat until done. So anybody can record albums without writing it the shyt doesn't make you special at all.
 
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I don't understand what the hype about "I didn't write it down" is.

That doesn't make you a better emcee. It's the equivalent of reality show vs. sitcoms/dramas. Yeah you can drop some gems in a freestyle (or say something funny in a reality show)... but lyrics are consistently better when written and perfected (and sitcoms/dramas have significantly better content than reality shows).

The only thing I noticed that not writing down a verse will do... at least for me... is improve my flow. When I create the verse in my head... it feels more natural spittin it, b/c I haven't bound myself to a specific flow or specific words. So.. it feels more like "real talk".

The best of both worlds is performing your written in a more loose manner, so you have the best possible lyrics, w/ a "real talk" type of delivery.
 
Raven2t2 said:
All these fools are doing is making my job as an audio engineer more of a pain in the ass. Just because they didn't write it on a pad doesnt mean its a freestyle. Cats that don't write come in go in the booth and vibe out to the beat start rapping to it then go back and listen to it and have you record and re-record the same damn 2-4 bars until they perfect it and punch-in as they go. The tough thing about this is if the rapper sucks they will have a hard time making it sound like it wasn't punched in a few bars at a time. I especially hate the ones that want to record a few bars then step out of the booth and walk around freestyling to themselves and go back in.

The problem with that is that now you have changed your positioning on the mic that is going to create a difference or worse yet your energy won't be the same as the previous bars. Fortunately, if you know what you are doing as an engineer you can correct all these problems before you start on your rough mix. But, its going to take alot of time and effort on your part that could have been saved if they just would have sat their ass down and wrote it! Since technically we are doing the same thing that you do on a pen and pad. Write some shit down, recite it back, realize how much it sucks, erase, and repeat until done. So anybody can record albums without writing it the shyt doesn't make you special at all.
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STORY OF MY WHOLE DAMN LIFE!!!



And then you throw some weed and alcohol in the mix. It's gon be a long, long, LONG ASS NIGHT.



:-(
 
^Wow... that's crazy.


The few times when I've done it.... I get thge verse down in my head first, and THEN record. (And I record myself btw).

Going in & out of the booth is just a waste of time and energy. Too many people think they're superstars, when they're not even role players yet.
 
It makes the job harder as a AE yeah, but if the clock is ticking when that hour is up...I don't wanna hear shit when we stack up the damage. Slur them words, rerecord that... triple them verses all you want lol.
 
On some of the mixtapes that were put together of Kanye they had a few demo/rough cuts of songs. I can't remember which one's but their out there if I remember I'll post the names.

But in this song here if you skip to the 1:38 mark around where he starts the second verse you'll see how he did it.



To me it's kind of like brainstorming out loud. When I use to rap I would do the same thing but later go back and write to fill in the blanks.
 
I guess one can say that Jay was a real influence on Kanye. Talking about what Kanye's lyrics could be. What about if Jay wrote his lyrics? The new breed of
"MCs" think in order to get respect or be considered in the same breath of Jay-Z, they have to not write their lyrics. Not only Kanye, but Jay-Z and Lil'Wayne have no direction and talk about a wide variety of topics in their lyrics. All within a couple bars. They almost always NEVER stay on topic. Especially Lil'Wayne. MAYBE, just MAYBE it has to do with drugs and alcohol like Troup was saying. LOL! If you as a rapper have no attention span, why should I as a listener? Of course Kanye wasn't writing down his lyrics. That was Rhymefest's job. Lol! Maybe its a spontaneous, "spur of the moment" thing but this only contributes to the lack of lyricism we now hear today. Eminem is a great writer although his lyrical content (especially his earlier albums) throws me off.
 
Hmm that's believable, it's actually pretty easy to do...it's all about remembering things and recording....basically writing in your head and expressing it via recording.
 
The Light said:
I guess one can say that Jay was a real influence on Kanye. Talking about what Kanye's lyrics could be. What about if Jay wrote his lyrics? The new breed of
"MCs" think in order to get respect or be considered in the same breath of Jay-Z, they have to not write their lyrics. Not only Kanye, but Jay-Z and Lil'Wayne have no direction and talk about a wide variety of topics in their lyrics. All within a couple bars. They almost always NEVER stay on topic. Especially Lil'Wayne. MAYBE, just MAYBE it has to do with drugs and alcohol like Troup was saying. LOL! If you as a rapper have no attention span, why should I as a listener? Of course Kanye wasn't writing down his lyrics. That was Rhymefest's job. Lol! Maybe its a spontaneous, "spur of the moment" thing but this only contributes to the lack of lyricism we now hear today. Eminem is a great writer although his lyrical content (especially his earlier albums) throws me off.
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Nonsense.
Jay-Z has tons I mean TONS of verses where he's on topic the entire time, he isn't Wayne where he just strings together
a ton of punchlines (which can be dope) even then Wayne has various songs in his discography with topics and consistency throughout
the verses even before his evolution as a rapper from his hotboy days when he mainly used to write.
I can understand Wayne but as a Jay fan who listens to the dude regularly I gotta say you're pretty off with that comparison.

On topic :

There are benefits to freestyling and punchin in your bars just as there are benefits to simply writing.

Freestyling basically forces you to apply all of the basics of rapping at one time, you develope a natural feel
for flow and riding the beat this way, combine this with punching in, you can spit a couple bars, sit back think
on it then come back and do it again. Basically your recording becomes a scratchpad, you spit, memorize, rewind,
rap over it, get a feel for the beat and develope ideas in a way that's very organic. The downsides are if you haven't
got it all memorized and the file is deleted, the song is pretty much gone forever, it's much harder to do complex rhyme schemes
because if you're punching it in it's harder to hold all of those rhymes in your short term memory ( at least for me it is and I'm a guy
who can come up with some pretty damn complex freestyles)


Writing on the other hand is like being an actor you have to practice your performance until exhaustion, you can get
a ridiculous level of intricacy, you're able to think and focus on ideas more, but one thing it really requires is understanding the mechanics of
Rhyme Scheme and flow, you can't be a good writer if you don't understand the mechanics behind what you're doing when you freestyle or when you rap and string lines together period.
Once you start recording and having to stay on beat with a bunch of complex rhyme schemes, specific moods you're trying to convey etc.
The difficulty increases A LOT, the pay off is worth it in the end though.
I mean just look at Nas and Eminem, rappers who excel at the craft because of their mastery of the pen.

I personally like to write my verses because the level of control is unmatched, though I have been known to
freestyle whole verses and still blow away cats.

With that said I don't think punching in or freestylin his verses makes him lazy,
he's still a perfectionist and he's still crafted pretty damn amazing albums.
He's also obviously had ghost writers (Cons and Rhymefest being known ones).
 
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You can tell the difference in lyric quality between his first four until now. Kanye is an artist that has developed lyrically and will continue to develop lyrically even though I'm not a huge fan of the things he is doing now.
 
I don't know if they're freestyling per se...

I saw Ja Rule do the same thing, Nas said he did it, Big Daddy Kane said he did it way back...

I didn't read the article either...

BUT! what they would do is just record in spurts. Hell, I've done it, lol. One day I might kick 4 bars and the next day 2 and the next day 8... all recorded on a portable recorder. When I wanted to record the whole song, I just rhymed what I had recorded previously.

Nas and them didn't have the luxury of portable recorders I guess, he said he would actually go to the studio to record 2 bars.

After you get all of the bars recorded, you listen to the choppy song and learn it... after you learn it, you go and drop a final version.

If somebody tried to freestyle and entire song... I can't imagine it being any good.
 
they just stand front of the mic, record what comes to their head, line for line

writing is the same thing actually, the only difference is you write it down, kanye would record it, same thing actually but with going straight to booth you can be more creative and chillaxed so the lyrics could be better
 
Young Buck one of the only people I visually seen not write anything down. The rest have no proof. Even though it is nothing to brag about. A pencil and pad (erasing and changing ideas) is IMO better than recording line by line. Get the job done doing both though. But a dude gets no brownies for that shit. Most people that write verses in their head........act like they can't talk in interviews....like something is keeping them from talking fluently.....cough.....jayz......cough. But a person that can freestyle from the dome is a different story....and even better when they freestyle in real time and not slow it down and shit. That's props. Few people can do that....anybody can record one line..... and think of a line to rhyme.... and record it.
 
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