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Who favorited?The Industry Responds To Jay-Z's Death Of Autotune
by on June 9th, 2009
New York rappers Jay-Z and Nas now have one more thing in common. Both artists have caused an uproar in the industry with respective releases.
In 2006, Nas set the industry abuzz after declaring Hip Hop was dead. Three years later, his Brooklyn counterpart, has done the same with his latest release, Death Of Autotune.
The track, released late last week, takes aim at current industry trends--specifically auto tune. You can listen to it here.
After releasing the track, Jay called into Funkmaster Flex and Mister Cee at Hot 97's studios to explain that he's taking aim at artists who use Auto-Tune as a crutch.
He also compared the vocal enhancement usage by rappers to wearing throwback sports jerseys back in the day: Everybody started to wear them and they got played out.
"I think I said something important," he said, adding that he spoke out "only on the aspect of moving [the conversation] forward," and elaborated about who he was not going at.
"The guys who did it, did it great," he explained. "T-Pain, he does great melodies. If you listen to Kanye, great melodies. If you listen to [West's] 'Say You Will' or 'Heartless,' great melodies. [Lil Wayne and T-Pain's] 'Lollipop' was a fantastic melody. Everybody can't do it. Let them guys do it.
They got their little niche, let's move on. That's just my opinion. I don't know if everybody feels the same way."
This past Saturday, T-Pain joined Jay-Z at Summer Jam, showing his support for the track.
Hov's clarification didn't seem to please everyone however. Harlem, New York's DJ Webstar, who had a hit using Auto-Tune with his song "Dancing on Me," Tweeted about "D.O.A." and his thoughts on Jay.
"Who heard old ass Jay Z hating?"
The Harlem youngster who's also responsible for "Chicken Noodle Soup," is planning to release a diss record.
"I gotta go hard or go home! Releasing new song tomorrow stay tuned people! Nas Ether will be nothing compared to this JZ diss."
Ron Browz, who has also used auto-tune on a bevy of tracks, kept it a bit more political saying:
"Everyone's entitled to their own opinion. I make fun records that everyone sings along to and that's what I'm going to continue to do."
"I'm contributing to Hip Hop--when people thought Hip Hop was all quiet, I came with the record and brought fun back to the club. I don't think its a crutch, Hip Hop at the end of the day is fun. I took auto-tune to have some fun with it. When Snoop did it he was having fun with it, when Pain uses it, when 50 played around with it, Weezy, they were having fun with it.
That's like saying sampling is out, you can't sample anymore. No, sample is a part of Hip Hop--whatever you use to make dope records is a part of Hip Hop. At the end of the day, a hot record is a hot record and wack record is a wack record wether it uses auto tune or not."
Jim Jones also took aim at Jay on Twitter. "An old sucka, LOL," Jones Tweeted. "We back, and if he kilt Auto-Tune then we must be Easter, the resurrection, LOL."
Reply to this Article
All the artists dissing him suck. Jay killed it, and Jimmy, don’t try and bring it back. You have never been good, and in fact you only made a pretty good group worse. Dipset should reunite without you, they would be better.
Jay is just trying to bring that 90s hip-hop back and i commend him for it greatly. Mad propz to you Hov.
EMINEM BE GOAT
my only beef is that Snoop was the ONLY rapper off that list who cut a good record using the autotune. Kanye, even tho I’m a fan, stunk up the joint, 50 and Browze stunk up the joint, and Wayne was jus awkward…downright faggy if ya ask me
T-Pain can keep doin his thing, jus don’t file him under Hip-Hop is all I ask. he’s soul/funk/RnB if he’s anything at all.
as for Ron Browze, sampling is one thing, swagger jackin’s anotha. there’s more than one way to sample a record, there’s only 1 way to autotune. and when more than 1 artist follows suit with no original twist it’s swagger jackin
on sum serious stuff auto tune is getting really repetative and extremely annoying, just imagine every song on the radio being on autotune dats not hip hop dat would just be annoyin i believe if that were to happen they should make a radio station just for autotune created songs because it shouldnt b catagorized as hip hop.
if u were tryin to get the ppl to listen to ur music so u could get paid but they were too busy bumpin bullshit you’d have somethin to say about it too
if u were tryin to get the ppl to listen to ur music so u could get paid but they were too busy bumpin bullshit you’d have somethin to say about it too
if u were tryin to get the ppl to listen to ur music so u could get paid but they were too busy bumpin bullshit you’d have somethin to say about it too
And Jimmy took exception to that line about" yo pants r to tight" lol
and where’s cam and jim’s careers at now? 40k first week numbers?
“and even if jim aint doin to great in the rap game right now dont meen shit”
if jim jones bricking doesn’t mean shit, then neither does Hov’s age, dipshit. Music is not about age, this is not a goddamn sport.
There, i disagreed with your opinion. Am i an e-pussy still?
We hate Jones because he’s a fucking herb. He’s like a female the way he religiously hates on Jay-Z. Oh and has anyone mentioned is music is garbage? By the way, you have to get on before you fall off. He has never been hot. Even We fly high was fucking wack.
Get off dipset’s collective dick. It’s over.
I agree with the point of the song, but you can’t back-pedal and say it’s ok as long as only your friends do it. That’s like the CIA importing mad drugs into this country and then putting people in jail for selling them or doing the same thing.
Auto-tune is for people with no talent to try and make something that vocally sounds pleasing to the ear. How else do you think Cher got play on the radio and in the club scene in the late 90s?
Jim Jones is only using the Jay-Z formula: jump on the next trend as soon as it begins to gain popularity, act like the spokesman for it and then hate on it the minute you hear dissidence from the public to sound like a leader. I would respect Jay if he hated auto-tune from the beginning or if he just flat out said it was lame without the exceptions of the people he supports. I swear it feels like he’s practicing to run for office with the Republican Party. He’s just a trend-jumper that pretends to have an independent view of things, but in reality Jay would dress up like a woman if that was the new trend making the most money in hip-hop business.
As for the song, the first verse is dope (“This will offend my political connects”). The rest is just modern Jay, rambling and making little sense with maybe one or two nice rhymes to save face. Throw a few ad-libs saying “Hova” or something about his money and businesses and you have another turd that the sheeple eat right up. Until it gets lame after a month and he has to come out with a new record to conform the the newest trend that he will later speak out against. WHAT A LIVING LEGEND!
Jay will never be what he used to be, pretty sad