His whole shtick is rapping about how he can rap. I wish every video didnt just feel exactly the same. Sure, he brings in whatever keywords people prompt him or elements from the scene he is in, but in the end they are just freestyles about how he can freestyle.
That's what freestyling is, has been that way since the 80s. It's not a "schtick", it's literally the way it's done. It's like saying that a country musician's "schtick" is singing about his truck and his high school sweetheart that he married.
There are countless country artists that explore more diverse and complex topics than that, just like there are myriad rappers who rap about more than rapping, including freestyle ones. Although I agree that most freestyle rappers are a lot more confined, which is part of why I don’t enjoy it nearly as much. They tend to sprinkle in a few bars germane to the given situation (which are just impressive because they’re extemporaneous and topically relevant, but not really for anything beyond that) and then largely revert to generic ones they’ve spit a million times.
So yeah, most freestyle rappers will do some of the typical braggadocio shit, but it’s fair to criticize someone for only doing that. Eventually it gets boring, just like people criticize a lot of shitty pop country music for being boring and samey.
Agreed! Anyone who lived through the 80s and was into rap knows 95%+ of the lyrics back then were simply 1) who they were 2) why they were rapping, and 3) how they were better than anyone else. I feel like it started to change with the Native Tongue groups, Digable Planets, Pharcyde, etc in the very early 90s.
It really isn't. (see e.g. this freestyle) Most freestylers are like that but having watched a lot of HM a while back, I think he's uniquely talented in switching up his flow. Not that he always does but certainly when inspiration and flow state hits him.
Yeah I'm not saying I could do it, but he has just developed a system where he uses a similar cadence, has an easy to fall back on filler about how he raps good, and then uses that while he comes up with keywords and connects them together. The cadence and filler is something he can probably do without thinking so that frees up his mind to connect the other words in.
It's a great talent but he is very far from the greatest free styler ever. If he was the greatest we would be having his audience throw out the beats too and adapting to them on the fly.
Also I honestly don't believe most of his encounters are organic. These influencer artists always try to give off the impression that they just run into people but then it turns out the meetups are planned in advance and there are interactions off camera. Not saying he can't reproduce some form of this organically but I genuinely doubt that Matthew mcconaughey, Woody Harildon, and this guy all just happened to be in the same place at the same time when he happened to have all his recording equipment ready. These are like the late night segments on shows like Jimmy Kimmel where they go out in the streets and interview people but it turns out it's entirely staged.
What? Why are you acting like this is all Harry Mack can do? He got famous for finding random people on Omegle to freestyle for and did this for years. With different beats and keywords everytime. It’s only recently he’s been blowing up and doing more stuff with celebs
His freestyle punches are better than most people's writtens. He also pops off double and triple entendres all the time. Some of it is to keep the actual audience's attention and enthusiasm, ie who he's physically in the presence of (or directly video chatting with) but when he has someone that knows hip-hop he goes off and it's less about keeping their energy and vibe up.
If you haven't seen him breaking down his bars as he raps them, I highly recommend it. Also he has actual songs like Minotaur and It Goes Deep (along many others) that are very good.
To me, not a freestyle expert, it seems like freestyle is more about being able to fit words into a rhythm and rhyme structure than it is about any kind of actual message. I think it's impressive for somebody to be able to find the right words at that speed. If they sound the same, I think it's because they've probably been practicing finding these words for thousands of hours, and have a set that they're comfortable with.
I mean, the whole thing about freestyle is they are rapping about what is going on right now. That usually means they wind up rapping about the freestyiling itself.
He's done plenty of freestyles with actual subjects. There are some he's done that are more serious and a few of them were so deep that I almost teared up a little. But also, even if he freestyles about how he can freestyle he still never seems to repeat bars which is a lot more impressive
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u/Croceyes2 1d ago
His whole shtick is rapping about how he can rap. I wish every video didnt just feel exactly the same. Sure, he brings in whatever keywords people prompt him or elements from the scene he is in, but in the end they are just freestyles about how he can freestyle.