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\u201cI think a lot of people picture, like, modern rappers who really just, like, pen and paper in the studio, writing down their raps, figuring it out, scratching it out, changing it.\u201d \u201cYeah, no, we stopped writing a long time ago. Not many people write.\u201d \u201cBack in the day, when people were just using tape, you just had one take. So everybody had to be on point.\u201d \u201cThere used to be a time before the 24 track, for instance. If a singer went in, you had to sing that [expletive], top to bottom, baby. You had to have it figured out.\u201d \u201cMost music up until about 20 years ago was always recorded on tape. It\u2019s more of a process. It\u2019s a lot more laborious, a little bit more tedious.\u201d Rapping: \u201cThree strikes and we might just blast \u2014\u201d \u201cI\u2019ve watched Tupac giving a speech \u2014 \u2018Hey, we have two hours of studio time. Come here prepared.\u2019\u201d \u201cWe don\u2019t have time or the luxury to spend all of this time doing one song. We don\u2019t have it.\u201d \u201cFast forward a little bit. Word starts to spread mid-to-late 90s that Jay doesn\u2019t actually write any of his rhymes down.\u201d \u201cSo you literally come in the studio and then formulate sentences in your head?\u201d \u201cYeah.\u201d \u201cAnd then spit it to that beat?\u201d \u201cYeah.\u201d \u201cAnd you never write down the lyrics?\u201d \u201cNever.\u201d \u201cWhich leads to other rappers wanting to do the same thing.\u201d \u201cI found out that Jay wasn\u2019t writing. I didn\u2019t want to ever see a pen or paper, again, in my life.\u201d \u201cHe has class, first in the lunch line. My lunch ticket let me eat rappers at lunch time.\u201d \u201cWhat I know is, when you see your hero can jump seven feet, it makes you want to jump eight.\u201d \u201cIf it depends on me, 10 out of 10.\u201d \u201cYou\u2019re telling me, you\u2019re falling out of love with me.\u201d \u201cI came up at the trenches.\u201d \u201cThe problem is that not all of them are as great or as capable of doing it.\u201d \u201cYeah, turn me up in my ear.\u201d [rapping] \u201cThat\u2019s no pen, no pad. They\u2019re just going in and punching in.\u201d \u201cPunch in.\u201d \u201cPunch method.\u201d \u201cPunch and recording.\u201d \u201cPunching three more bars.\u201d \u201cI ain\u2019t never wrote raps. I just be ready.\u201d \u201cDo you write, or do you punch in?\u201d \u201cI punch in. I don\u2019t write.\u201d \u201cToday, ProTools is essentially, like, the pen and paper, and that\u2019s where it becomes this different type of art form.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s improvisational versus writing the stand-up piece. You know what I mean?\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s like freehand versus tracing.\u201d \u201cOh OK.\u201d \u201cKeep that part for me, just punch me in.\u201d \u201cThe artist might not really have the song written, but they\u2019re not necessarily freestyling in the traditional sense, where they\u2019re just going in and saying the first thing that comes to mind, and they\u2019re doing that for four minutes straight.\u201d \u201cPunching in, like saying one bar at a time.\u201d \u201cI\u2019ve got these racks that can\u2019t fold in the wallet. I\u2019m making deposits. \u201cDefinitely one line at a time.\u201d \u201cThat bar, and you said the bar out there, and you play it all together. It sounds like a whole sentence. \u201cThey\u2019re using punching in as a way to create their rhymes as opposed to a way to correct their rhymes. Yeah, I feel it\u2019s really just a generational thing.\u201d \u201cBut you don\u2019t think you could end up with something better if you sometimes wrote some stuff?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s just not for you?\u201d \u201cNo, [expletive] that.\u201d \u201cRap has grown. Rap has evolved, and there\u2019s always good and bad when it comes to evolution. What we\u2019re seeing is a lot of the same lane being explored over and over again.\u201d \u201cPeople think, oh, they just rap about this, or they\u2019re just rapping about, like, the easy rhyme scheme or the easy \u2014 but to be in a studio and write five songs a day, seven days a week about new topics and make it sound different, it\u2019s very, very impressive.\u201d \u201cIt is a sport. It is a sport to it.\u201d \u201cInstead of one song for a week, it\u2019s five songs a night, and you keep it pushing.\u201d \u201cNot that our artistry isn\u2019t appreciated, but it\u2019s more so like, all right, how fast are we getting this done?\u201d \u201cAnd I\u2019m just saying that the unprofessional rap culture is what I\u2019m a kid of. Guys were like, I\u2019m just a street cat, and I\u2019ll rap.\u201d [rapping] \u201cI jumped off the porch and bought me a gun.\u201d \u201cI just want people to know that, like, you\u2019re not Jay-Z, you\u2019re not a failure.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s about you, whether you\u2019re writing on a phone, a piece of paper, punching in, off the dome. It doesn\u2019t matter.\u201d \u201cRapping to me, coming from, like, how I feel right then and there. Like me writing down ain\u2019t going to be the same energy of me saying it.\u201d \u201cYou can\u2019t really hold your technique over a younger generation\u2019s head, right? Ultimately, it is about just getting the best end result.\u201d [rapping] \u201cI respect it all because it all takes work, and it all takes thought. Whether you\u2019re sitting over a pad or you got to spend four hours figuring it out, piecing it together, punching in, if the end, result moves people, and mostly, the art is worth it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n