In the first, Busta is saying other rappers rhymes sound old in the second, he’s saying how his move to a new record label is like an American sports star’s. The classic line I point to is a Busta Rhymes line, from the song ” Get You Some”, which you can hear here.īusta, raps, “A lot of niggas shit sound dated, I’m like Shaq / the franchise player just got traded.” Note that the first part of the line has nothing to do with the second. For instance, take the idea “I am the best rapper ever.” You could say, “I am the best rapper ever”, but you could also say, “No one can spit it like me”, or, “I drop lines harder than you”, or “I’m not the next 2pac, I’m the first Tech n9ne.” The challenge for a good rapper, then, is to find that version of the idea that is able to rhyme the most, while still making sense.

There is an infinite number of ways to express the same idea. For instance, when Tech says the word “kinetic”, and decides to rhyme off it, he can only choose words that rhyme with that word. When a rapper says a word, and decides to rhyme off it, he has by the very nature of rhyming already greatly limited the number of words that are available to him. I talked about this a little in my Jean Grae post here, but there’s something I call the rhyme barrier that all rappers encounter when they try to make rhymes. You’ll note that there are a lot of rhymes in a short amount of time (kiNETIC you BET IT’s somethin’ movin’ your HEAD its proPHETIC, etc., where all of the lyrics are capitalized), The thing is, he’s making rhymes while still making sense. You can see the lyrics for the song I’m going to look at,”In My Head,” here.

I’m not as familiar with it as you are, but after hearing those songs you listed, I think I will definitely listen to more of his music. I gotta say, his music kinda doesn’t sound like anything I’ve heard.

I just got a chance to listen to Tech N9ne. *As seen on the Composer’s Corner super secret weekly newsletter…email to get the hook up *

Best tech n9ne songs