Chiddy Bang

I'm going to make a brief departure from my comfort zone on this one. If you can't tell I'm a big fan of laid back rock and bluegrass, and anything falling in between those two genres. I'd say if you looked through my iTunes, you'd find nearly 150 hours of music and you may have an hour's worth of rap. It's not that I don't enjoy rap, it's just hard to find rappers with something to say in the mold of Grandmaster Flash and NWA these days. Most of the rap songs these days are an auto tuned monstrosity compelling the listener to "get all the way turned up" or "teach me how to dougie." Certainly these songs have their time and place. That time and place just happens to be the basement of a party house at 2 am.

Chiddy Bang is okay though.

Chiddy Bang is fairly new to the rap game. It's made up of a pair of childhood friends from New York City. They bring an underground attitude to the table, even though their songs have been featured in national advertising campaigns. The lyrics lack the angst of a Tupac, the thoughtfulness of a Talib Kweli or Mos Def, and the word play of Lil' Wayne or the Game, but that's what's beautiful about it. It harkens back to the old days where people just rhymed about the things that meant something to them. There aren't any beefs or agendas, just well executed lyrics about everyday life. Chiddy Bang has a knack for sampling as evidenced by their song "The Opposite of Adults" which heavily samples from the song "Kids" by MGMT. However, this group didn't step into the classic pitfall of sampling: laziness. A lot of artists will simply take the bassline from someone else and attempt to pass it off as an original song. Chiddy Bang samples and makes it their own which is an admirable, if often unsung, trait of contemporary music.

I've picked out a couple of my favorite songs. I hope you enjoy.