So, if you've been following rap music for the last couple of years you'll notice that there has been a bit of a change. With the advent of artists like Future, Lil Uzi, and Lil Yachty (there are a bunch more), there is less of an emphasis on lyrics and more energy put towards the vibe and mood of the music. Nowadays it is essentially the producer that makes the song and the rapper that just does whatever to make the finished product. This usually consists of mumbling some nonsense rhymes and calling it a day. And if I'm being honest, it works. For me, songs like this do the job of supplying the vibe; which is usually of the turn up variety. But none of it will last. I won't claim to know the key to musical longevity, but there are a few things that I have noticed. First I'll start with why the trap music phase as a whole is dying
The trap music phase of rap is dying because there are simply too many people doing it. It resembles the rise and fall of hair bands. There's always a central city where it is being done. For hair metal it was L.A. For trap music its Atlanta. There's also too many people doing it. In the 80's thousands of people would go to L.A to form bands and try to make it somewhere. Most of them were shitty. Its the same now. There are a lot of shitty trap rappers. And both styles of music seem to have an essential connection with strippers. From what I understand, if your song hits the strip club in Atlanta and the strippers like it, its a guaranteed hit. There are a lot of similarities as you can see. If the similarities keep going, then we only have a few more years before some very emotional rap songs start becoming popular. Also, rappers are calling themselves rock stars for some reason
Another reason why this won't last is because a lot of these artists don't value the past. What I mean by that is that a lot of these up and coming rappers are convinced that what came before them should stay in the past. I remember an interview with Hot 97.7, or whatever the station is called, where they asked Lil Uzi to freestyle and he said he didn't want an "old head" beat. These artists claim that they are the future but realistically, the future always has roots in the past. You can't just jump up and claim that you're a new thing and forget all the people that laid the groundwork for you to even be doing what you do. Progress can't be mad without acknowledging the past, and a lot of these young rappers don't do that. And the trap scene is crawling with people like that. That kind of arrogance will undoubtedly kill the genre.
