NYers Talking about Jay Z on E40's level

[dubsmith_nz]

well, if the original poster is talkin about talent as far as a rapping goes, everyone i listed is a better rapper than jay-z...as far as impact on the game goes, e40 had a HUGE impact on the bay, and his impact extends way past that. he trademarked his own style of rap, while jay-z just bit others. jay-z didn't start trends and innovate, he bit and jacked his predecessors, and took it to the next level COMMERCIALLY...so yes, in terms of popularity and record sales, jay easiy takes the cake...but in terms of influence and rapping skills, e40 is better and more original...i have no problem if u prefer jay-z's music to e40's, they're two different styles, but i can definitely say i feel e40's ORIGINAL style over jay-z's BITTEN style.....

I never bought into the fact that Jay bites styles. Yeah he re-uses a lot of famous lines, but any head will know he's paying homage not just biting. Show me where Jay sounds like Big L? Biggie? As I mentioned earlier if you listen to each of his albums he has a different flow on every one. Who was he biting on "The Blueprint"? "The Black Album"? etc etc. Jay was a trend setter, he is the one who put on Kanye and Blaze and made that whole soul sample style relevant. I have to admit on BP3 he got everyone who was hot in the game, but he brought them into his world.

E-40 changed the rap game in the bay, Jay Z changed the rap game in the world. The original questions was is E-40 on Jay Zs "Level", not about skill or success, but on his "level". Jay is at the very top of the game, E-40 is a few tiers down, as I mentioned earlier few can be compared to Jay Z, Em, Wayne, Kanye and that's about it at this moment in time.

[Sccit]

E-40 is an undeniable Hip-Hop legend and one of the pioneers but Jay-Z will go down in history as one of the Top 5 to ever do it...

in terms of popularity or in terms of quality? cuz in terms of quality, i can name 50 rappers better than jay-z off top.

50 rappers better than Jay-Z off top? C'mon now.

E-40 has never and will never come close to an album like The Blueprint or The Black Album. Hell, Reasonable Doubt shits all over E-40's career.

No offense to 40 Water, I love him, but this is one of the worst comparisons in rap one could ever make. Half of E-40's raps make no sense, and Jay-Z has continued to be likely the most consistent emcee of all time. He is 41 going on 42 years old and he will still shit on just about every emcee. Rappers get wack when they get older but pretty much the opposite happened with Jay-Z. He just dropped one of the year's best albums with Kanye.

E-40 is simply a rapper out for a hit. He's big in the club scene, but he's not a rapper that drops full-listenable concept albums, nor is he a rapper that has any kind of message other than being hyphy, silly, and partying.

dont get me wrong, i do think jay-z is a skiled rapper, and "reasonable doubt" is a classic (his best album)... he's just overrated as a muthafucka. he's not amongst the GOATs, there are tons of people who would go on the all-time great list ahead of him. as far as E40, i dunno if uve heard "In a Major Way" or "Hall of Game", but 40 has a long catalogue with classics, as well.. and he pretty much runs the bay area right now. so it's not unreasonable to put them in the same echelon. i, personally, would rather bump a dope 40 track over some jay-z, any day of the week.


rakim
nas
method man
brotha lynch
2pac
mac dre
tech n9ne
andre 3000
jayo felony
ice cube



there's 10 rappers better than jay-z, and it took me 10 seconds to type.


biggie
big pun
scarface
krs-1
big l
kurupt
wc
gza
rza
ghostface


10 more, took me another 10 seconds...i can keep goin and goin. bottom line, jay is not a top 5 rapper of all time...not by a long shot.

WC - no
GZA - no
RZA - no
Kurupt - no
Scarface - no
Jayo Felony - hell no
Mac Dre - RIP but absolutely not
Brotha Lynch - absolutely not
Method Man - dope, but has never EVER put out a good album.

You just have different tastes which is perfectly fine, but you can't compare artists that have only put out like 3-4 solo albums to someone with a catalog like Jay-Z's. And Kurupt from 2004-on can't hold a candle to Jay-Z (might I mention, Kurupt only has about 4-5 solo albums himself).

Not to mention most of the rappers you're naming have an incredible lack of depth as emcees.

i'm not talkin about who put out more albums, i'm talkin about who's the better rapper...biggie only has 3 albums (1 of which is posthumous), yet he's still considered the GOAT of the east coast...when it comes down to it, Jay-Z is a better business-man than he is a rapper. there are tons of rappers who are better, but simply dont have their heads on straight, so theyll never see the success jay-z saw. but u must learn to differentiate between rapping skills and business skills...PeACe

[Sccit]

And if you wanna talk about originality - 80% of the slang E-40 uses comes from Mac Shawn and you can ask E-40 that himself.

thats bay area slang, it started from the pimps...but forget the slang, his whole style of rapping, he pretty much invented that off-the-wall, bay area rap style...and how many muthafuckaz have u heard that were influenced by that style up until this very day? come on, to say u like jay better is 1 thing, but to deny e40's influence in rap is another.

[Sccit]

well, if the original poster is talkin about talent as far as a rapping goes, everyone i listed is a better rapper than jay-z...as far as impact on the game goes, e40 had a HUGE impact on the bay, and his impact extends way past that. he trademarked his own style of rap, while jay-z just bit others. jay-z didn't start trends and innovate, he bit and jacked his predecessors, and took it to the next level COMMERCIALLY...so yes, in terms of popularity and record sales, jay easiy takes the cake...but in terms of influence and rapping skills, e40 is better and more original...i have no problem if u prefer jay-z's music to e40's, they're two different styles, but i can definitely say i feel e40's ORIGINAL style over jay-z's BITTEN style.....

I never bought into the fact that Jay bites styles. Yeah he re-uses a lot of famous lines, but any head will know he's paying homage not just biting. Show me where Jay sounds like Big L? Biggie? As I mentioned earlier if you listen to each of his albums he has a different flow on every one. Who was he biting on "The Blueprint"? "The Black Album"? etc etc. Jay was a trend setter, he is the one who put on Kanye and Blaze and made that whole soul sample style relevant. I have to admit on BP3 he got everyone who was hot in the game, but he brought them into his world.

E-40 changed the rap game in the bay, Jay Z changed the rap game in the world. The original questions was is E-40 on Jay Zs "Level", not about skill or success, but on his "level". Jay is at the very top of the game, E-40 is a few tiers down, as I mentioned earlier few can be compared to Jay Z, Em, Wayne, Kanye and that's about it at this moment in time.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/RqScH2CfYTg" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/RqScH2CfYTg</a>

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/9dN3aS2Rxfs" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/9dN3aS2Rxfs</a>

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/mszKJxaFGJ8" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/mszKJxaFGJ8</a>


i understand in paying homage with 1 verse or so, but the dude has swagger jacked every1...snoop, 2pac, u name it. he is not a trend setter, he's a trend follower, and u'd be blind not 2 see it, homie.

[Jimmy H.]

Yup. People are really on the personal taste train when it comes to these ridicilous lists. Jay does his thing. You don't have to like the music but you can't knock the hustle. Fact is dude has a diverse catalog of dope music and as a much as we all want to pretend it's still the late 90's or earlier, Jay-Z had a huge influence on the last 10 years of music.

I never bought into the fact that Jay bites styles. Yeah he re-uses a lot of famous lines, but any head will know he's paying homage not just biting. Show me where Jay sounds like Big L? Biggie? As I mentioned earlier if you listen to each of his albums he has a different flow on every one. Who was he biting on "The Blueprint"? "The Black Album"? etc etc. Jay was a trend setter, he is the one who put on Kanye and Blaze and made that whole soul sample style relevant. I have to admit on BP3 he got everyone who was hot in the game, but he brought them into his world.

Exactly. People want to act like everything in today's popular culture (or the 90's) wasn't heavily influenced or directly borrowed from the things that came before. Hip-hop, in particular, is so ego-driven that all us listeners who grew up on it are basically brainwashed into believing that these dudes didn't get by on jacking hooks or song samples from old records. People trying to convince themselves that Jay-Z ain't a great emcee are like drunk people trying to tell the cops they ain't drunk when their bumpers folded into a damn tree.

[Enigma]

Swagger jacking would be if he patterned himself/his image/his style after these people and he flat out does not.

It's not like he's using those verses and trying to play those off as his own. Biggie and Eminem lines - does he really think there's any rap fans out there who don't know that he's spitting their lines? I've always thought it was paying homage. Do you really think Jay-Z is trying to pattern himself after Eminem by spitting that "success" line?

So I assume 2Pac was swagger jacking Method Man with "I came to bring the pain....", or Snoop Dogg is swagger jacking Rob Base with "I wanna rock right now..."

C'mon, you're pushing it. By no means do I listen to Biggie, Big L, or Eminem and think "Wow, Jay-Z really took these rappers' style" - I'm sorry.

[bouli77]

As i said earlier, I don't think E-40 is on Jay's level. However, whoever said 40 raps about nonsense and gets his slang from Mac Shawn needs to listen and never makes concept albums needs to check his facts.

40 is the reason why rappers are doing "Everyday i'm hustlin" type of songs these days, and if you don't believe me there's a video on youtube where Rick Ross thanks E-40 for setting up the "blueprint". Mr Flamboyant is basically "Hustlin'" 15 years in advance.

The revenue retrievin' series of album is a concept in itself. albums to grind to. at night, during daytime, etc.

you may think 40 raps nonsense and uses words just to sound clever/silly/whatever but dude has been acknowledged for spitting real stuff people can relate too. i wouldn't know cause I'm not engaged in the drug game nor related to it lol but I can safely say that songs he has made throughout his career like Drought Season, Scandalous, 1-Luv, The Story, Reasons, I hope I don't go back, etc. are deep songs.

:aybe 40 gets his slang from Mac Shawn, possibly (i have yet to see how though), but that doesn't take away his lyrical skills, and he couldn't have gotten that from Shawn since mac Shawn can't write for shit, he uses 100 different words in his lyrics when 40 uses probably 10x as much lol. also 40 is known for popularizing slang terms, not necessarily creating them. i think his reputation as slang creator is slightly overhyped. 40 didn't invent words like po-po, scrilla, playa hater, broccoli, but he surely popularized them. Filthy Phil created Playa Hater, Keak da Sneak create Fo Sheezy. However if it weren't for 40 and Too Short saying "we off the heezy for sheezy, I thought you theezy Ant Beezy" you wouldn't have Lil Wayne doing songs called "fo sheezy" or Chris Brown calling himself Chris Breezy lol. that's why I think 40 is an unsung rapper, dude has had some influence on some South artists, so when the South blew up the industry you could feel the impact E-40 had had on some of them. and as soon as the South hit it big, you had people all over the states, and the planet copying them.

[Sccit]

Yup. People are really on the personal taste train when it comes to these ridicilous lists. Jay does his thing. You don't have to like the music but you can't knock the hustle. Fact is dude has a diverse catalog of dope music and as a much as we all want to pretend it's still the late 90's or earlier, Jay-Z had a huge influence on the last 10 years of music.

I never bought into the fact that Jay bites styles. Yeah he re-uses a lot of famous lines, but any head will know he's paying homage not just biting. Show me where Jay sounds like Big L? Biggie? As I mentioned earlier if you listen to each of his albums he has a different flow on every one. Who was he biting on "The Blueprint"? "The Black Album"? etc etc. Jay was a trend setter, he is the one who put on Kanye and Blaze and made that whole soul sample style relevant. I have to admit on BP3 he got everyone who was hot in the game, but he brought them into his world.

Exactly. People want to act like everything in today's popular culture (or the 90's) wasn't heavily influenced or directly borrowed from the things that came before. Hip-hop, in particular, is so ego-driven that all us listeners who grew up on it are basically brainwashed into believing that these dudes didn't get by on jacking hooks or song samples from old records. People trying to convince themselves that Jay-Z ain't a great emcee are like drunk people trying to tell the cops they ain't drunk when their bumpers folded into a damn tree.

like i said, jay-z is a good rapper, he's just overrated. lots of rappers coulda made it as big as him with the right business ethics...dude is a business-man first, rapper second. thats why he's so big. as far as him being a biter, either way u chop it up, it's pretty obvious that jay is not comparable to e40 in a sense of patenting their own style. e40 is e40...jay-z is biggie, 2pac, big l, snoop, mobb deep, rakim, etc. he's sorta like game, the way he just takes elements from a bunch of other rappers and has no shame in it...honestly if game was a better business-man, he could do what jay is doing out here on the west coast. bottom line, jay-z is bigger than e40, but that doesnt make him the better rapper...as far as levels, it really depends on what the original poster is talkin about. popularity level, jay-z takes the cake. rappin level, i'd listen to e40 over jay-z any day. originality level, we dont even need to go there...shit, jay-z was even saying "off the heezy fasheezy" in his tracks, amongst other bay area slangs that e40 popularized. u wont hear e40 usin jay-z's lines LOL...that speaks for itself.

[Sccit]

Swagger jacking would be if he patterned himself/his image/his style after these people and he flat out does not.

It's not like he's using those verses and trying to play those off as his own. Biggie and Eminem lines - does he really think there's any rap fans out there who don't know that he's spitting their lines? I've always thought it was paying homage. Do you really think Jay-Z is trying to pattern himself after Eminem by spitting that "success" line?

So I assume 2Pac was swagger jacking Method Man with "I came to bring the pain....", or Snoop Dogg is swagger jacking Rob Base with "I wanna rock right now..."

C'mon, you're pushing it. By no means do I listen to Biggie, Big L, or Eminem and think "Wow, Jay-Z really took these rappers' style" - I'm sorry.

u really dont think he patterened himself after biggie? lmao...even on the new cd, he says "jordan, jackson, tyson, choose 1"...if jay-z didn't pattern himself after biggie, i aint sccit tha shit, and no rapper has ever patterned themselves after any rapper...thats straight bs, and u know it...i hope. i dont think he patterns himself after snoop and 2pac, but he obviously took certain elements from them, and even openly makes songs in their style..."h to the izzo, slim with the tilted brim" LOL. come on. "all i need in this life of sin, is me and my girlfriend"...like i said, it's cool to do for 1 track, maybe 2..but the guy is known for that. it's his steez.. amazing how u dont realize it.

[polepositon]

lmao. j and his pants to the ankels culo (spl chk) giving groupie boy pussy loving ass cant keep it real broads. smh. i dont know why you all are always saying that stuck in the 90ys crap...when those same rappers are still relevant even today. e40 rapped better than jay z then and now and its 2011 if u didnt get the memo. you all are clearly speaking on popularity and fame shit... not rap lyrics. lyrically e40 is better. point blank. i wouldnt even say j is the better buisness man either.. mr fed ex was shipping before and rappin. and thats a business. prolly even during. he also started pushing his own cds out his car if im not mistaken. and i dont even wanna hear bout j selling his nickle sacks for comparison. i say that to say this. he did all that on his own and created a huge name for himself. i get the feeling he dont even want the fame. just the paper. jay may know warren buffet but e40 knows santa clause damn it.

[Si-Chiggedy]

I find it a lot easier to listen to Jay

so it seems like jay-z is for the small-minded...

E-40 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Jay-Z there is no question about. Dude has still the most style!

[Black Excellence]

no disrespect to e40 but jay is past his level. 40's older music from 90 -2000 was dope though.