beanytuesday

The Rap Battle (Director's Cut)

Added 2022-11-29 18:01:02 +0000 UTC

Sometimes, when you’re in the game of making comedy generalizations, you gotta kinda take a swing, not in the dark, per se, but in low-light. I am not a particularly big rap guy (I like Kendrick, I like some Kid Cudi, I like Jpegmafia, for hairline reasons) but I am well enough aware of the general culture to know that at some point, people stopped making albums called like “Peanut Butter N’ Thuggin” that featured an insanely grainy photo of four dudes in gigantic clothing flipping off the camera, and started making albums called like “Boy Velvet” that are just a shot of some dude’s torso covered in glitter. And maybe it’s not even a guy gay doing it! Real emphasis on the maybe here, because again, I really don’t listen to Frank Ocean or Brockhampton or Tyler The Creator or (ugh) Little Nas X or any of the other dudes this comic is making a gestalt of. Perhaps I should.

One facet about nu-rap that I didn’t get to include here, which feels true (regardless of whether or not it actually is) is that there is an increase in openness and vulnerability, about mental health and sexuality, sure, but even in a broader sense. Who’s gonna be the zoomer softboi rapper to lift their shirt onstage to reveal not a gat, but a colostomy bag, and be consequently rewarded for their troubles with a custom-made Balenciaga version that they can rock during the next Met Gala? Capitalism with a human face, people! This has to have happened in some degree, right? This doesn’t feel like something my brain just conjured. Was there an amputee rapper that got a Gucci leg or something? Every single member of Brockhampton taking a synchronized hit of their Supreme inhalers? Whatever…