No other new rapper gives me the kind of insight into rhyming that I need to go forward with this project than Earl Sweatshirt. He’s already mastered assonance with the low syllable per word average that makes for a compelling listen. More than anything, his rhyming on the song ‘Earl’ helped me develop a thing I’m going to call Step Theory. The idea behind it is, multi-syllabic rhyming sounds a lot better when it’s not mechanically done in a Endrhyme+Endrhyme boring fashion but rather with like sounding vowels used sporadically (assonance) to create a nice overall sound. See the first few bars from ‘Earl’:
“Yo, I’m a hot and bothered astronaut crashin’ while
Jackin’ off to bufferin’ vids of Asher Roth eatin’ apple sauce
Sent to Earth to poke Catholics in the ass with saws
And knock blunt ashes into their caskets and laugh it off”
He’s using the assonance of certain words to build the overall rhyme scheme. Peep this infographic I made:
With the new STEPS on www.rapmetrics.com the goal is to acheive the same kind of rhyme building idea.
So, let’s build using Steps on the rhyme dictionary. Remember Earl went Hot –> Bothered –> Astronaut. Because rapmetrics works on giving randomized fresh results, we can see where the HOT rhyme can take us using steps.
1. First we search for words that rhyme with HOT:
2. Then we Press “Step 1” to get a 2-syllable word that builds on the HOT sound:
3. Then we press “STEP 2” to give a 3-syllable continuous rhyme scheme (like Earl’s Astronaut).
There we go! We just built a cool rhyme scheme that goes Hot –> Orphaned –> Properties!
EDIT: Jus realized my infographic is kind of fucked up but I’m not fixing it. You get the idea.
RapMETRICS 
How does ‘orphaned’ rhyme with ‘hot’ or ‘properties’?
Agreed. “Orphaned” does not rhyme unless you pronounce it “aww-fin”. There should be an option to control the degree of accents and slurred pronunciations that are used, have a “Perfect Rhyme” setting, a “Slant Rhyme” setting, and “Accents” setting… just an idea
It’s the next step of rM!
Talk to me when any of these guys’ songs mean anything. They need to grow the fuck up.
He wrote that when he was 15-16 dickhead.
He also wrote, when he was 16:
“Product of popped rubbers and pops who did not love us
So when I leave leave home keep my heart in the top cupboard”
Earl’s only meaningless if you’re invested in not seeing it.
Nas was 19 when he wrote Illmatic. But yeah. If they came out back in 99/00′, I would have probably loved them along with Em and DMX at the time. But yeah, it’s obvious these guys were raised on horrorcore/violent rap along with being the awkward kids that were made fun of and got the shit beat out of them in high school.
Tyler and Earl are pretty talented, I don’t know about the rest though. I’m not jumping on the bandwagon that they’re so fantastically esoteric because people like DOOM, Del the Funky Homosapien, Aesop Rock, Kool Keith, etc. have them beat by over a decade(s).
Ha, my bad guys. My above comment was obviously dickish and on a whim, so for that I apologize. I’d like to comment on this blog in the future without looking like a dipshit, but I suppose that isn’t up to me anymore.
My feelings on OFWGKTA echo Malik’s more than my own “grow the fuck up” attitude above. Tyler and Earl are ridiculously talented. Denying that would be wrong. I think what I meant to say was ‘I’ll probably like them a lot better if they do grow up.’ Hopefully they don’t fuck with the sound to hook the (very) few like me though. Maybe I just need a few more listens.
It might be my inclination to hate anything hipster, though. I always try to like it though. I try. I do.
I should clarify: I don’t hate anything hipster just for being in. I hate hipsters.
holy fuck what do this mean
“Product of popped rubbers and pops who did not love us
So when I leave leave home keep
*my heart in the top cupboard*”
He’s not carrying emotions with him. He’s cold as ice.
Earl’s a fucking ASSassin. His nihilist technical wizardry is exactly what I want out of my rap. FREE EARL!
The deep, underlying sadness of Tyler and Earl’s music specifically is the fact that these are intelligent kids that would be held as such if they had dads, but instead, they act out and have some emotional issues and everybody acts like they’re menaces. If you look OFWGKTA’s rapping as a singular universe, the point of Tyler and Earl’s music is that, deep down, they’re still kids dealing with something that doesn’t make sense to them. So what they’re saying is, “Nobody wants me, so why the fuck should I want anybody else?” Literally, that means, “We rap about rape because we’re hurting deep down and this is the only way it makes sense to us to stay sane, because if we acted like everybody else, we’d be lying.” That’s what that line means.
He also wrote:
I’m half privileged, think white and have nigger lips
A tad different, mad smart, act ignorant
Shit, I’ll pass the class when my dad starts giving shits
But as long as our relationship is turdless
I’mma keep burning rubber and fucking these beats with burnt dick
[…] in rhyme structure. This is my favorite rhyme scheme I think. It’s the same one Earl Sweatshirt opens with. Sonically, it’s really versatile and many words in the English language abide to the […]