Why would anyone choose this?
People that don't like rap music irk me. Whether it's because the borderline offensive, yet playful lyric or because its intense poetic and rhythmical fluctuations, I have come to love rap music. I started intensely getting into it as a freshman football jock who was forced out of his punk rock ways as he listened to the rap that was played in the locker room. It's not that I hadn't heard it before, but like many other people, I just dismissed it for brutish music that takes little to no talent.* Another thing happened to me that first year of high school that changed me forever; I had Mr. Kersey as a teacher. He often put up rap quotations on his white board to inspire creative thought and analysis based on them, but it also inspired me to start looking into rap music, because just like any other form of music, you must sift through the mud to get the gold. And so I did. The Beastie Boys' Solid Gold Hits was one of the first albums I had encountered and very quickly I had fallen in love with the obnoxious tones of Ad-Rock (Adam Horovitz), the wisdom of MCA (Adam Yauch), and the Micheal Diamond (Mike D) wildcard. It wasn't until I listened to a lot of rap music that I could listen to the Beastie Boys and understand the morals that they include in their music. I also have a tie to Judaism through my father, and though I was never raised to believe in any specific thing, Jews really intrigue me and I like everything that I read about them. It gets kind of weird sometimes. And the cool thing about the B-Boys is that because they include personal morals and whatnot throughout their music, I could trace it back to their Jewish culture and maybe even look into why MCA decided to convert to Buddhism. The Beastie Boys also produced music over a long period of time, so it's interesting to see how they grow and develop too and how their view points on things changed. I hope y'all like my paper.
*In retrospect, I would argue that it doesn't take much talent to bash an electric guitar and yell angry words about government and whatnot into the microphone either, but that's how I saw it
The poetic lyrical content of rap music is something truly extraordinary. Mike D doesn't get respect for nothing. Truly talented and gifted rappers spend as much time perfecting their craft as any other musicians from any genre would. It'll be interesting to see what you're able to find buried within the verses of the Beastie Boys.
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