Put me on game. We're all old now. Name your top 5 songs of all time.

[PancakeBrah]

Share the wealth.

1. Built to Spill - Carry the Zero



2. Joanna Newsome - Only Skin



3. Black County, New Road - Basketball Shoes



4. Okkervil River - For Real



5. Binary Star - KGB

[Witty]

The KGB is a fucking amazing song and posting that kind of shit is one of the many reasons I will love you until I die.

Pancakebrah is God Tier for eternity.

Miss you my friend.

[PancakeBrah]

Originally Posted by Witty

The KGB is a fucking amazing song and posting that kind of shit is one of the many reasons I will love you until I die.

Pancakebrah is God Tier for eternity.

Miss you my friend.

Heart emoji.

To this day I think Elzhi's verse is the best delivery / scheme combo I've ever heard.

[Witty]

That's hard to disagree with.

I have tried and failed to decide the verse I think is the best ever but there are certain verses I won't argue against and that's definitely one of them.

[Witty]

Not remotely similar but I believe this also belongs in the conversation.

What Wayne does in this is really impressive. One of my favourite verses ever.

[PancakeBrah]

That's a good one. A few others that come to mind are Nas on Verbal Intercourse and Big Pun's whole mac scheme. You know.

[Witty]

Originally Posted by PancakeBrah

That's a good one. A few others that come to mind are Nas on Verbal Intercourse and Big Pun's whole mac scheme. You know.

Big L 7 minute freestyle.

Idk if it gets any better than that.

You can ignore Jay Z, he had a couple of moments but in general he seemed to be struggling.

[Witty]

[Witty]

Bone Thugz ft Biggie - Notorious Thugz has a very strong claim to being the best hip hop song ever. I'm not saying it is, I could think about it for days and I still wouldn't be sure enough to pick any song as the best ever. I think this definitely deserves to be in the conversation.

It's unbelievably good.

[oats]

lately I've been listening to and enjoying Blxst. good to hear from you, Pancake.

[PancakeBrah]

Originally Posted by Witty

The KGB is a fucking amazing song and posting that kind of shit is one of the many reasons I will love you until I die.

Pancakebrah is God Tier for eternity.

Miss you my friend.

Originally Posted by oats

lately I've been listening to and enjoying Blxst. good to hear from you, Pancake.

Dog if you don't drop a link I haven't the foggiest what you mean by Blxst.

After further review of my own music collection there are only 6 American poets: Joanna Newsome, Deadman, Will Sheff, Oats, Dylan, and Elzhi.

[PancakeBrah]

Originally Posted by Witty

Big L 7 minute freestyle.

Idk if it gets any better than that.

You can ignore Jay Z, he had a couple of moments but in general he seemed to be struggling.

Big L's style was very formative for me. Very good artist.

[oats]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7fbpOpG-wk

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KQcFyX5O6Rc

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=w2FBuW...Qgc29tZXRpbWVz

[Mike Wrecka]

Originally Posted by Witty

That's hard to disagree with.

I have tried and failed to decide the verse I think is the best ever but there are certain verses I won't argue against and that's definitely one of them.

Inspectah on Triumph

Capadonna on Winter Warz

Both have to be on any list of best verses ever

[sral]

Always loved Billy Bragg’s rendition of Tracks Of My Tears

[bare ryu]

earl sweatshirt on really doe is a legendary verse

[Answer]

I can give you like 100 lists and they'll all be wildly different. Sometimes my mood is more sad and depressing, other times I'm looking for stuff that's super high energy. It's really hard for me to compare a storytelling song like "Dance with the devil" to a song that's super hard and aggressive like "Set Trippin" by Casanova. Sometimes I care about a rapper's technical skill, but other times I just really like a song even if the artist isn't that great of a rapper. I think Casanova is a great example of someone who I don't think is a good rapper, but who made one of the best/hardest songs of all time. It's also hard to really compare a song I've listened to thousands of times since 2003 to a song that I just heard for the first time last month.

I'm just gonna go with the first 5 songs I can think of that I've listened to a lot, which I feel stick out as important to me for some reason. I'm also going to leave off any songs that I think most people know, e.g. Kanye's entire "College Dropout" album is probably the album I've played more than any other in history, but I assume most people know songs like "All Falls Down" and "Last Call"

I'm sticking to the theme of hip hop songs only. I might drop some more later

1. Royce Da 5'9 - Return of Malcolm. I was already a fan of Royce when this song came out, but this is the song that really elevated him to my #1 favorite rapper, and he still hasn't moved from that list. If anything, he's only created more separation between himself and everyone else.

NC is censoring part of the URL so I can't embed it. The mixtape version of this song uses a different beat, but this one is much better imo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4EZoNlCA

then add "CA" to the end of the URL above


but here's a different, similar song from Royce which is arguably just as good, if not better. I just heard this later down the road and it only further cemented his place:



2. Little Brother ft. Elzhi - Hiding Place. I encourage people to check out the entire album, "The Minstrel Show". 9th wonder is an incredible producer, the songs are all super fire, but I really added this to my list because it was my first introduction to Elzhi. IMO Elzhi's feature on the verse is one of the best examples of a feature on a song stealing the show since AZ on "Lifes a bitch".



3. Atmosphere - The Pill. I think this song is the first song that really sort of made me more aware of the idea of "melodic" rap. Another great song that I almost listed in this same vein of melodic rapping non-stop while just dropping introspective thoughts is "Peanutbutter Waffles" by Ryan Caraveo.



4. Chino XL - Wordsmith. I'd like to think I would've listed this song regardless of whether Chino passed away. I used to listen to this song on repeat all throughout high school in addition to the entire "Rip The Jacker" album by Canibus. I was already into rap battling, so Chino was one of very few people at the time that took ideas like wordplay and punches and put them into their actual music. This song was for sure a huge influence on my writing at the time and has always been a phenomenal song to me, not only because it's lyrically impressive, but also because I feel like it's just a genuinely dope song



5. DZK - The Great Below. I'm hoping that we've gotten to the point in 2024 where it's not corny to list internet rappers. Tbh I had never heard the NIN version of this song, so I always thought the entire song was him singing. But this is still an incredible song that helped me therapeutically as a youth




One last mention, which is one of the examples of someone who is tbh not a very good rapper from a technical standpoint, but I actually like his music because if I'm feeling sad/depressed, it's something that I find to be relatable, introspective, and poetic.

[Mike Wrecka]

Hipsters. I’m surrounded by hipsters here.

[Mike Wrecka]

My top five non hipster list

Da Mystery of Chessboxin - Wu Tang Clan


Halfway Thugs - Capone N Noreaga


Hell on Earth - Mobb Deep


Da Joint - EPMD


Glaciers of Ice - Raekwon

[John Dillinger]

Originally Posted by Mike Wrecka

Hipsters. I’m surrounded by hipsters here.

Some of us just like listening to music that wasn’t made in the 1990’s