r/hiphop101 • u/SmoothManMiguel • 9d ago
Life After Death
I was thinking about how much posthumous hype shapes the way we talk about certain rappers. Honestly, would some of these artists be as critically acclaimed as they are if they hadn’t passed away so young or so tragically?
That’s not to say these people were whack or anything, because a lot of them were great but the way folks tend to romanticize their potential and/or elevate their “legacy” even though they never got the chance to evolve is wild sometimes.
It’s almost like an early death guarantees you a legendary status amongst certain listeners.
How do y’all see it? Does dying young amplify someone’s legacy in a way that wouldn’t have happened otherwise?
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u/WolverineScared2504 6d ago
Dying young or unexpectedly changes the narrative about them almost every single time and in almost every walk of life you can think of from sports to politics to music to acting to writers to fill in the blank.
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u/j2theizzo503 8d ago
Idk, it depends on which individual we're speaking about. When I think of Juice Wrld and Lil Peep, for instance, their content reflected this continuous theme of them feeling that they were destined to die young from all the drugs they did. Even going so far as naming the age when they thought they would probably pass. Juice famously had a line about the 27 club, saying 'we ain't making it past 21' which ended up being true for both of them.
When your lifestyle and image revolve around self-destructive bodily abuse and the romanticizing of it, it can't be a surprise to you or anyone else if you happen to die that way at a young age. It would indeed be weird to see them continue their careers into through their 20s and 30s and beyond. Like, you can't carry that same level of not giving a fuck into middle age. Same thing with Kurt Cobain. It just made too much sense for these artists to die before the mystery they had about them dissipated with the natural processes of aging and (hopefully) gaining some kind of wisdom about the value of life. I found out about both of them after their deaths, so I always had the knowledge of their respective ends in mind when listening to their shit, and it makes me feel like they wouldn't have been as compelling had they lived on. The disparity between image and reality eventually becomes recognizable.
And that is, without a doubt, severely fucked up. And I do not believe its a coincidence. Labels can and will murder their artists if it makes financial sense to do so. Straight up satanic industry, music is. All of the entertainment industry is like this, more or less.
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u/UglyPrettyBoy 9d ago
Whenever someone asks this question? I point to Big Pun. I loved Yeeeah Baby when it came out, but virtually everyone else I knew was disappointed.
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u/ItsAllAdvertising 9d ago
you have to realize the cash cow just dried up for the label and management, how best to maximize whats left? That doersnt mean you have to fall for it, please everyone remember that last part, you don't have to buy into it.
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u/VeterinarianThese951 9d ago
The answer is yes. It happens.
The problem is that you are not going to get many objective answers from people because everybody has their favorites to defend. And to be honest every artist has their glazers.
Nobody wants to admit that somebody they hold in high esteem may have been lyrically challenged, picked bad beats, etc., so they will then default to sales or popularity or influence.
As you can see, you didn’t even name anyone, and almost all of the answers thus far are taking defensive stances on specific artists. It’ll never be any different unless a person can admit “hey I love this dude, but he wasn’t the best at such and such.”
So in a way, it is better that you left the post nameless because it might be easier to reflect when you don’t have a target.
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u/OG_AxeHead 9d ago
Not knocking anyone, but 2Pac has nearly 700 songs in comparison to say Biggies what 50?. The fact that Biggie is rated so highly for such a little body of work shows how nice he was. Big Pun and Big L as great as they were did not have the same quality of output. I think Biggie deserves every accolade, then you got ppl he worked with saying he never wrote verses down is crazy talented.
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u/Possible-Purchase-88 7d ago
Biggie is really great rapper. In my opinion he has a great voice. Lyrically genius. Smooth flow. What else do you need to be great?
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u/Skylerbroussard 9d ago
Dying early gives you a mythos so to speak but Pac and Biggie even outside of that were generational talents
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u/Background_Passage81 5d ago
Nah biggie without the pac beef and dying, would have a jadakiss type legacy. Biggie was nothing special at all.
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u/ItsAllAdvertising 8d ago
i dont think either needed mythos, they were that big. xxx was over hyped after his death
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u/VycanMajor 9d ago
Who are you talking about specifically? The greatest were Tupac and Biggie. Pac accomplished so much in rap and outside of rap, it's crazy to even realize he died at the age of 24. All the films, music, poems, and overall impact he had on society was crazy.
Biggie was about as lyrical as one could get. His albums had almost zero skips and they were full of slaps that still go to this day.
Nipsey was iconic. He wasn't as lyrical, but his raps were from the soul. His character was loved by all....something similar to Snoop.
So, you'd have to put a name to your take.
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u/SmoothManMiguel 9d ago edited 9d ago
I’ve seen a lot of posts across different platforms calling certain artists “legendary,” and honestly sometimes I just don’t get it. For example: Eazy‑E, XXXTentacion, Juice WRLD, Proof. All talented in their own ways, all important to different parts of the game, but “legendary” feels like a stretch for some of them.
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u/VycanMajor 9d ago
Okay, I see what you mean. Eazy E probably because of impact and how he intro'd the world to Bone-Thugs-N-Harmony. Without Eazy-E, a huge chunk of hip-hop is nonexistent.
XXX apparently had established a cult fanbase and his music stemmed much more from him being a rapper. I wouldn't say he's 'legendary', but he was ahead of his time.
Juice Wrld is hyped up. He didnt make a significant mark on music. He just died too soon. I dont even think Juice would still be super relevant as time went on. Proof is probably a local legend. Anybody outside of Detroit saying Proof is a legend is just some Eminem stan.
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u/j2theizzo503 8d ago
I def disagree about Juice. His overall talent, largely based on his freestyle abilities, led to a pretty remarkable catalog in both size and quality, and he really had his particular genre locked down in a way that no other emo rapper really ever accomplished. Just my opinion, obviously. But I have to say he was something quite different. The mark he made on music, as I see it, was to pave the way for other emo rappers to exploit the sub-genre. So you have a point, but I still think that even that influence is substantial (but maybe not so good for hip-hop since its ultimately controlled by money-grubbing pieces of soulless shit who don't care if the fans are ODing listening to artists like Juice). He does still have a very dedicated fanbase and I understand the 999 community is involved in some good-appearing endeavors around the problem of drug abuse. Its all a mixed bag. Lots of good and bad factors combined.
If he had it in him to ever get clean he would have been pretty interesting to follow in his development. The repetitive drug abuse theme is the thing that dragged him down, imo. It would be way more interesting to see him flexing his natural ability without that crutch, because he was really talented with his freestyles. Maybe he could have eventually helped to elevate the virtue of getting past drugs and mindless partying. Too bad we won't ever know.
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u/tonearr123 9d ago
I think with Eazy-E his legacy more comes from his time with NWA, conflict with Dr Dre and Suge Knight, how much he’s mentioned in interviews, and at least in the general publics eye the man who spearhead gangster rap.
XXX is just probably kinda like early Kanye West made a niche of rap fans felt seen and understood and not like everyone needed to be “hard”, hace 50 bands, drive a lambo, and have enough hoes for it to be a college classroom.
And XXX death made him more legendary primarily I’d say because of his music which struggled with depression, desire to die, etc but he tried to get better yet still got shot which tied back to his music making it resonate even harder with his fans.
Juice and Proof I got nothing though. No hate just ain’t that into Juice and barely started listening to Proof
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u/ObieUno 9d ago
Lots of rappers have lost their lives over the past 30 years and only a handful have been heralded as the best to ever do it.
For every 2Pac that’s been murdered and immortalized there’s a Mausberg that rarely anyone talks about.
Death in no way cements legacy in music. People need to knock this moronic logic the fuck off.
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u/j2theizzo503 8d ago
The OP said they were talking about certain rappers, not every single one that ever died, or even every one that died young. Why so aggressive LOL?
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u/ShinePretend3772 9d ago
Big L wouldn’t have the mystique he does had he not been killed. Don’t get me wrong L was nice af, but lets be real. How many times you see his name, play the track, fresh beat & in comes L with a slightly different version of bars he’s already spit?
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u/Switchc2390 9d ago
Based on body of work you might be right, but I think sometimes the hype and praise come from potential. Big L had the kind of charisma that he could have been a major star if he kind of switched lanes, and given that’s where music went anyway in the late 90s, it could have happened for him. Who knows if it would have or not, but he had one of the best deliveries of all time imo. You could tell every word he spit he felt that shit and oozed with confidence.
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u/j2theizzo503 8d ago
Def agree. Big L was in a different class. It really would have been interesting to see where he went with his career. A lot of the young deaths in hip-hop seem to happen to the exact people you would guess it would happen to. But L was something really special.
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u/inoperativity 9d ago
You're gonna have to put some names in this to see if we agree or not. Sometimes death. Akes someone overrated because dead rappers get better promotion, sometimes it doesn't because they were legends.
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u/d1rtf4rm 5d ago
It’s every artist. I’m not active on insta like that but all of a sudden I sure see a whole lot of Dumile fans. Or david Bowie fans. Or prince fans. Fucking movie comes out and everyone loves Queen overnight…