Can a white guy from the ghetto do good rap? Can a white guy rap? That's like asking if a black guy can do well in school.
Of course anyone can do anything. New Hip Hop is the way. It make take some time and practice, but a white boy, can use rhythm and rapper skills to create a great song or tell a great story.
The problem with white rappers, Eminem, Paul Wall, Bubba Sparxx, is that they have to have some background in the streets or the ghetto to rap about that subject. If they don't have it, they shouldn't rap about it just because they heard somewhere else.
Vanilla Ice gave the white rappers a hard setback. He did a popular song that wasn't true. He was a white rapper who had never experienced any kind of ghetto living and from then on, people didn't trust white rappers to be telling the real story.
Eminem was one of the first to truly talk about the tragedy of his life in a poor area. That mixed with the support of a Megastar black icon, Dr Dre, gave him the the crack in the door to be heard and respected.
The folly of many white rappers in the game nowadays is that they think if they grab a dictionary and rhyme words in a clever way, they got the skills to succeed. Just the opposite. It's about the experience and heat of the experience that makes a song great. It's the sharing of life when it's hard and overcoming the odds that make it great. The cleverness of wordplay is secondary. Really.
Ironically, "Old School rap" used be about storytelling and the party and adventure. It was used laugh instead of cry about the difficult situations. The Fat Boyz are a classic example. They told stories about breaking into the pizza store at night and demolishin' the supply.
Street credit isn't white or black or hispanic, it's life experiences written down and expressed through music. It doesn't t even have to be hip hop style music. It can be rock n roll, jazz, blues, pop or techno. The difference with hip hop is that the audience demands the stories be real.
Kanye West was a middle class black rapper who made $60,000 when he was in his teens. Do audiences need to hear about his "street credit"? If he was a white rapper he sure would ....we'll cover that subject later. But, for the record, "I ain't sayin; she's a gold digga, but she ain't messin' wit no broke N.....". He is makin, hits.
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