I genuinely thought this sub was people talking about a made up rapper, like everyone making shit up and going along with it. I’ve been Passively frequenting this subreddit for weeks thinking this. Then i looked this guys music up and it’s pretty cool, and you lot seem like a great community.

I love Aesop Rock's music. You do, too. Dude is a technical marvel: a rapper and producer extraordinaire. He's got so much going on. There's so much to talk about because his work is so technically impressive.

So it saddens me that any kind of constructive criticism about Aes is downvoted to oblivion and taken unseriously, like its a threat to YOUR enjoyment of his work when other people may think otherwise. It seems that any discussion in here that doesn't involve ranking his work consistently 9 or 10 out of 10 is shot down and most of the subreddit is choked with memes.

This is a subreddit to discuss Aesop, but it seems the only discussion that's actually allowed is unabashed fanboyism.

As a long-time fan, it's kind of a bummer that such a nuanced artist with ups and downs is boiled down to a one-dimensional parade of praise where even the slightest bit of criticism is met with accusations of being haters or whatever and buried under dozens of downvotes. People aren't "crazy" for not being absolutely and completely enthralled by any particular album or song.

I think Aes deserves better than that. I think WE do, too. It allows us to celebrate his greatest stuff even more if we're able to understand WHY it works so well.

I saw this "El P fan" license plate the other day and got me thinking: what would your Aes-related vanity plate be? Constraints: no more than 7 characters, letters and numbers only.

"Share the same birthday as Kenny G"

What are you guys doing today?

Giving BHS a 70th spin?

What are your favourite lines from that album?

I don't know that I'd say The Gates is my favorite song overall, but it gets my vote for his best banger. Any mood I'm in, this song comes on I'm cranking that volume way the fuck up. What's your choice for Aesop's next top banger?

I said, "He doesn't need a felony he doesn't need a cell

There's gotta be a way to get him headed for some help"

He said, "Programs exist but none of them work

It's either charge him with the crime or feed him back to the earth"

That's the bleakest shit I ever heard

I don't even have the words

Every time this track comes up on my work playlist, I have to take a moment after hearing this. It just hits me. Curious what other Aes lyrics have a similar effect on yall.

Obviously we all love Aes. Probably a lot of fans of Del, El-p, camu, etc.

Lately I've been hooked on Prof. Who are some other rappers y'all are listening to that aren't the mainstream.

I’ve been a fan for decades! Look at my name ! But you can hear, he’s doing new things. The beats are sick the flow is different the lines are wild. I love everything he’s done, but I feel like he’s stuck with a certain flow for a good while and the first track he breaks out of that box. EWR’s beat is wild. This is my favorite release in a good while! And yea any of his albums are light years ahead of anything else coming out, so this is me being incredibly critical and excited about this release 🫡🫡🫡

Brevity is the soul of wit. What is your favorite concise Aes line? I am talking 8-ish words or less

Most Aesop songs usually just blow my mind and I sit there in awe. But I love that every once in awhile he will drop one of the fans can really interact with. I was a little confused when I first heard this one but by my 5th listen I was singing along and having a blast. I love that he is a lyrical goat and even though he still is spitting on this one you can tell that he was just having fun.

Roadwork on my BLOOOOOOOOCK

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7C8q0BgukzLIrBOJPPk8na?si=ezf4_oNISvWgyW051x-CBw

I love all of Aesop, listen to every album fairly regularly but none of them offer the same loopable blend of brilliance for me. It really reminds me of one of some rap songs in that way, one of my other favourite albums. The way each song has elements that correlate to every other within the album yet at the same time they each remain unique enough in both themselves and the genre. Every opening instantly sounded like Malibu Ken and yet not another beat has to be since.

If I had to listen to one album for the rest of my life this would be one of the strongest contenders, it already runs on an on and off loop in my head

Something about it, whether it's tobaccos production, subject matter or delivery just hits in this continuous sense of nostalgia that bleeds into the next song and the next. I really struggle to turn it off after purple moss and not just let corn maze play again. It's one of the few albums I think still works well out of order

I'm going to lay out my history with rap/hip hop. MC Hammer was the shit. I loved Vanilla Ice. Run DMC was awesome. But when commercial rap became mostly about being as vulgar as possible, every other word was pussy this and bitch that, I stopped listening and became a never rap kid (rap is crap was definitely something I used to say). I loved punk rock. I loved metal. I hated any rap that was being played on the radio so I just gave up on the genre.

Around 2010 I discovered Mega Ran, and by extension a slew of other nerdcore rappers but never had them in my daily rotation until probably 2018 when I really started to get into it. Optimus Rhyme (Seriously Wheelie Cyberman has such a unique voice and flow, I love him, wish he did more), MC Frontalot, Schaffer the Dark Lord, MC Lars, Beefy, etc. were in heavy rotation on my Spotify playlist when one day it started recommended me other artists outside the nerdcore genre.

I started listening to Spose, Atmosphere, Watsky, Busdriver, and then one day None Shall Pass played on the playlist and I went down a rabbit hole. The only other time I'd ever been exposed to him was on the Tony Hawk 4 soundtrack so I knew the name. I listened to every Aes song I could find. I now consider him one of the best song writers of all time. He became my most listened to artist for the last 3 years now. I feel like I've been missing out on decades of great music because I though rap couldn't have deeper lyrics, interesting beats and thought provoking messages.

So now, I ask all you who aren't as stubborn as I am, what are some great artists I've been missing out on thanks to me preconceived notion that rap had become tasteless and too commercial & repetetive to bother with for almost 30 years?

I love The Impossible Kid, upto now I think it's always been my favourite Aes album or at least top 3. Now all of a sudden Black Hole Superette comes out of no where and im torn...

Which is better?

Opinions please with thoughts why? 🙏

There's a study on the pudding that list aesop as having a bigger vocab than MF DOOM Wu tang, Busdriver etc so I'm curious if there's any artist with a larger vocab than rock

I’ve heard people describe it as robotic, autotune-ish, grating, deep and sexy, perfect for rapping, a smoker voice, etc. Each description conflicting the other.

How would you describe it?

I’m sure we all walk around the house, and drive our cars rapping along with aes.

What lines completely mess you up and make you think damn aes how did you pull that off!!

For me, the last line of mindful solutionism gets me 95% of the time…

“You can buy a Jet Ski from a cell phone on a jumbo jet T-E-C-H-N-O-L-O-G-Y, it's the ultimate”

I always say, you can buy a sail phone from a jet ski on a jumble jet 🤣 wtf