Sore throat...

Not to mention a sore jaw and sore tongue.

One of the sacrifices that comes with writing/performing speed rap is that, well, if you do it too much, the muscles in your mouth literally get tired.

It comes with the territory.

“Practice does not make perfect.  Practice makes permanent.”

-Dai Vernon

How true that is when it comes to speed rapping.  If you’re a speed rapper, you’ll know the following to be of utmost importance when writing lyrics:

• Syllable count.
• Streaming vs. bursting (I’ll get to these in a bit).
• The beat.

Ironically, the slower the BPM of a beat is, the easier it is to speed rap on it.  50-60bpm is ideal.  70-80 isn’t shabby, 90+ gets harder and harder.

This is, of course, if you rap in English.

I could go on and on about the the subject, but I’ll save some of it for a later post.  I think I might write up a series on speed rap and how to do it properly.

Getting back to my original point, when I practice speed-rap, there really is no room for error, only room for wasted time.  When I practice a line or a bar, it’s got to be CORRECT.  The more retries I have to do it, the harder it will get as I put more strain on my tongue, jaw muscles, and voice.

Here’s a couple examples of what it’s like to speed rap.  Go ahead.  Try em.

Streaming is a technique in which you rap at a steady pace, with no pauses.  Speed is not the focus, the aim here is to spit every word clearly.  This is sometimes easy, depending on how you do it.  Here are a few examples of streams from myself and other famous speed rappers:

• “You ready for the world, girl, come and go with me,
  
  I’ll touch you all over your body, baby don’t say no to me
  
  And every moment you controlling me, I’m loving the way you be holding me
  
  while I be listening to Jodeci.”
  
  (Twista, Slow Jamz)
• “How can I roll into Jacobs and purchase some diamonds with dough on the table?
  
  How can I floss in the party with Gin and Bacardi when I am not able?
  
  How can I live in a home with a Butler, 4 bedrooms and windows that gleam?
  
  And how can I take a trip out to the Florida Quays when I ain’t got the green?”
  
  (V Double O, Why Ain’t I Been Signed?)
• “You can tell me that I don’t be flowin and kickin it tight on the beat.
  
  They can hate on my rhymes till they die because I be the cause of defeat,
  
  Because everytime somebody wanna compete with me, strugglin mumblin lyrics pathetically,
  
  Losing to me’s eventually going to be their destiny.”
  
  (ND, Street Stories feat. Johnny Blaze)

Streams are hard for beginners generally because most people aren’t used to talking at such a steady rate for such a long period of time.  However, the opposite is true for more experienced speed rappers– it gets easy after a while, with lots of practice.

Bursts, on the other hand, are phrases that are usually short, and delivered rapidly one after the other, although as standalone items they’re very easy to say.  Go ahead and try to spit the following combos as fast as you can.  They roll right off the tongue:

• “Hit-em-up.”
• “Droppin-it-off.”
• “Trippin-you-up.”
• “Finna-react.”
• “Killin-it-hard.”

As you can see, these are all 3-4 syllables long.  They can be longer, but this is the ideal length for practice.  Rapping at a slow speed and throwing bursts in occasionally works best in songs with a higher BPM.  You can see examples of this in songs like Twista’s “The Come Thru,” and my own song “Got A Problem.” (I’ll be discussing this song soon!)

Getting  back to my original aim, which was to cry and complain about my throat at the moment.  It’s actually kinda nice just sitting here writing away and letting my throat and jaw muscles slowly recover.  I should do this more often.

Oh yes.  A few updates.

There is a slight possibility that the shooting date for my music video will be pushed back to November.

We just acquired some new camera equipment and need to make sure we know how to use it properly.  This shouldn’t be a problem for myself, since I’ve had some experience acting and whatnot, and definitely not an issue for my director, Joe Comstock, who’s currently a professor of Cinematography at the Academy of Arts.

However, we like to make sure we have our ducks in order before we make any moves, so for now we’re playing it safe.

I’m still working on more music than ever.  Tomorrow, I’ll be finished writing a small… erm… longish verse/remix, which I’ll record if there’s time.

Until then, stay beautiful, y’all.

-ND

• Monica Belucci
• Hello world!