Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Nursery rhymes were political when they were first written! To me, that's what it's about: it's about using it to say something more than just what the story is.
It's very easy to think about rhymes and just usage of words that sound good but don't mean anything. Basically, I try to put into song the way people actually talk.
I have become their idol. Like, Busta Rhymes has called me twice to come to rap with him, and Big Daddy Kane and Eric B and Rakim, I made a trip to do things with them.
Rap - it's a childhood passion. Writing rhymes, it's something that I was doing before rap records even existed. And I will continue to write until I can't write anymore.
I used to make demo tapes with cats that rocked with Russell Simmons and people like that. The history goes so far back; I've always been really focused on writing dope rhymes.
Growing up with a name that rhymes with turkey - and jerky - was no great fun. But, as an adult, I tell you, being globally unique in the age of Google can be extremely helpful.
My lyrics are more country - what I love is the storytelling and the structure, how tight the rhymes can be. But pop melodies have always been intrinsically linked to my writing style.
Young people will tell you, if you're not prepared to write the most violent, the most misogynistic, the most horrible kinds of rhymes and scenarios, you are not going to get air play.
Like many modern poets, I tend to conceal rhymes by placing them in the middle of lines, and to avoid immediate alliteration and assonance in favor of echoes placed later in the poems.
I write a lot of rhymes, but I don't really end up using them a lot of times, and I end up just freestyling. I like to write music, though, more than I like to freestyle, to be honest.
Those who have heard me speak from time to time know that quite often I cite the observation of that great American author, Mark Twain, who said, history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.
If I write a book, it has to be so awesome. It has to be next level, to prove mysel. Just like if you are an athlete and you want to rap, you better bring the bars. Don't come in with nursery rhymes.
The real biographies of poets are like those of birds, almost identical - their data are in the way they sound. A poet's biography lies in his twists of language, in his meters, rhymes, and metaphors.
I write... sonnets... and writing sonnets is boring. You have to find rhymes; you have to write hendecasyllables; so after a while, I get bored and my drawer is overflowing with unfinished short poems.
My first rap name was Ralo. Because my first name is Carlos. I likened myself to what Busta Rhymes was doing when he first came out. And what Onyx did when they first came out - they reminded me of me.
I started studying in '85 and got knowledge of self and started spitting. What was going on was taking the understanding of what I was reading and applying it with my life and applying it with my rhymes.
I'm not saying I'm even half as talented or a quarter as talented as any of the people I'm inspired by, but if I hear a beat Busta Rhymes would absolutely kill, I'll use my voice to do a flow similar to his.
I'm not a sports person, but every now and then, I incorporate sports in my rhymes because I'm always grabbing from certain things and getting inspired by something whether I'm totally involved in it or not.
My writing process is consecutive, like, 'mad scientist' crazy. It's not totally writing something that rhymes or even writing a rap necessarily. Sometimes it's just writing down stuff that I'm going through.
Composers now just don't have the depth of inspiration for melody. Most of the lyrics of the pop songs you hear today are repetitious. They're almost nursery rhymes, as if written by children - which they are.
Toasting is basically what you call rapping. It came off of playing the beats at the parties, however it be. You find a space in the beat, and you have somebody live just basically saying rhymes over the beat.
I, like many annoying pedants, will wince when someone says 'less' when they should have said 'fewer.' But my 'poor' sounds like poo-ah, not pore; and my 'grass' rhymes with mass, not farce. What's wrong with that?
I'm more into beats than rhymes. I'm a huge fan of anything touched by the Neptunes. Dancing is kind of my thing. I go out with my friends as often as I can on the weekends, and I'm always drawn to girls with rhythm.
The monotony of a long heroic poem may often be pleasantly relieved by judicious interruptions in the perfect succession of rhymes, just as the metre may sometimes be adorned with occasional triplets and Alexandrines.
You're gonna get your traditional Busta Rhymes and Pharrell collabo. My man Focus from the Aftermath crew; Dr. Dre; the late, great J Dilla got work on the album. It's gonna be great - look forward to the new bang-out.
Usually, my rhymes are just in my head. I start off with a theme, and once I start rapping and writing and singing, the chorus and all that, it just starts flowing. Then it's done in about an hour! I write a lot of songs.
It's called 'I Wanna Thank You,' and I'm encouraging everybody out there to blog, Tweet, Facebook, anything about it. Let's sign a petition. The petition is called 'Busta Rhymes Make 'I Wanna Thank You' Your First Single.'
In the early '90s, when I really started to find my voice, I was reading a lot of books, and I was moved by the writers, like Chinua Achebe, and I wanted to be able to write rhymes that were as potent as what I was reading.
Lets be clear, Dolly Parton is a rapper. Somewhere before all the country, I don't know what happens up there in the mountains when you're growing up, but she has been spitting rhymes for a very long time - 50 years I'd say.
A lot of the younger kids now can rap, but they're scared of the crowd. Mastery of that stage is an MC. I don't know if you've seen any great MCs on stage but when you do it's like wow, this is more than the words to rhymes.
My parents both worked full-time flipping burgers at the local fast-food joint, and my grandmother looked after us. English was her second language, so instead of books, I learned spoken French nursery rhymes and curse words.
Everybody nowadays rhymes, but out of the people that really, really do it well, it's still a small community of artists. We all tend to be in the same circles - people like my Wu-Tang brothers, or Black Thought from The Roots.
'Rapper's Delight' came from the TV entertainment show 'Good Times,' but when the times called for a shift in the narrative, artists answered, covering brutal truths in their rhymes that were uncomfortable for society to confront.
Nearly all children have a feeling for rhythm in words, for the delicate pattern of nursery rhymes. Many adults have lost this feeling and, if they read verse at all, demand a far cruder music than that which they once appreciated.
I am concerned that there's a cavalier attitude to the Irish Peace Process. What poor memories some have; I remember only too well the bag searches, the bomb scares and deaths. As they say, history doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes.
Poetry carries its history within it, and it is oral in origin. Its transmission was oral. Its transmission today is still in part oral, because we become acquainted with poetry through nursery rhymes, which we hear before we can read.
Jay-Z is like a rap-savant, he doesn't have to write the rhymes down, he can create complex raps in his head. I mean he does memorize it, he just doesn't write it down on paper. He doesn't freestyle onto the track, it's all thought out.
I started writing rhymes first and then put it to the music. I figured out I could lock it to the beat better if I heard the music first. I like to get a lot of tracks, put the track up and let the music talk to me about what it's about.
It is not just shameful for a contemporary American poet to use rhymes, it is unthinkable. It seems banal to him; he fears banality worse than anything, and therefore, he uses free verse - though free verse is no guarantee against banality.
I've always had an ear for melodies, and they veer pop. My lyrics are more country - what I love is the storytelling and the structure, how tight the rhymes can be. But pop melodies have always been intrinsically linked to my writing style.
Emily Dickinson never developed. She remained loyal to her persona and to that same little metrical song that stood her in such good stead. She is a striking example of complexity within a simple package. Her rhymes are like bows on the package.
My approach to writing rhymes went hand in hand with the music. I'd try to make different rhythms with my rhymes on the track by tripping up patterns, using multi-syllable words, different syncopations. I'd try to be like a different instrument.
I recorded my first song at 15. But I started rhyming a few years before that. At first it was trading lyrics at school. We'd get in a circle in the playground with a beat-boxer and spit rhymes. Then it would turn into a big gathering after school.
I'm definitely inspired by Michael Jackson. I watch all his videos all the time. And Busta Rhymes, early Busta Rhymes - I really was inspired by him. He's really the reason why I started rapping. Because all his visuals. I loved his videos when I was younger.
Doing the Best I Can' is a sure fire hit. Incredibly commercial. But what could you say about it? Catchy and good to dance to. But 'Nothing Rhymes' is different. A much bigger risk but it was lyrics people could talk about. So that was the one to launch me on.
I'm a strong believer that you can build great companies in time of both greed and fear. But you have to be paying attention and operating under the right assumptions. You don't have to believe history repeats itself, but you should accept that history rhymes.
Now between the meanings of words and their sounds there is ordinarily no discoverable relation except one of accident; and it is therefore miraculous, to the mystic, when words which make sense can also make a uniform objective structure of accents and rhymes.
Bebop and hip-hop, in so many ways, they're connected. A lot of rappers remind me so much of bebop guys in terms of improvisation, beats and rhymes. My dream is to see hip-hop incorporated in education. You've got the youth of the world in the palm of your hand.
If you're a battle rapper on the block, the emcee battle challenger, not writing your rhymes could really hurt you. When you're an artist where maybe the focus is really the talent and the different things you bring to the game, I believe it's more understandable.
I was excited to play Lil' Kim and I wanted to do the role justice. I worked really hard on that role, whether it was performing the rhymes, studying the dialect, her swagger and her stage performances. I wanted people to see my range and stretch my wings as an actress.