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July 27, 2005

"Nerdcore:" Finally, Rap Music That Speaks To Me

I'd really wanted to talk about this on the show a little, but I ran out of time.

Is it a parody/hoax? It sure reads like one, but the links all seem to work. So it's either real or someone went to a little bit of trouble to provide internet evidence of the "nerdcore" rap phenemenon.

Anyway, it's pretty funny:

Tupac and Biggie, move over. A new hip-hop feud is brewing that glamorizes not guns and 'hos but Java and secure encryption algorithms.
While gangsta rap is seen as celebrating the violence and aggression that claimed two of its brightest stars, "geeksta" rap is a hip-hop genre celebrating coding skills and school grades.

See photosAlso dubbed "nerdcore," this branch of hip-hop is for geeks, by geeks. Geeksta rappers adopt the same combative verbal-assault stylings of their forerunners, but bust rhymes about elite script compiling and dope machine code.

The term was first coined in 2000 by nerdy New York rapper MC Frontalot in a track of the same name. Nerdcore now refers to artists waxing lyrical about topics as disparate as engineering and Lord of the Rings.

In recent months, the field has seen a growing number of releases from computer science labs, where egocentric grad students show off their Ph.D. credentials in tracks like "Have to Code" and "End of File."

"The stigma that was once attached to computer geeks and role-playing nerds is diminishing incredibly fast," said "digital gangster" Bryce Case Jr., aka ytcracker. "It has almost become trendy to have skills on a computer. Rather than guns and 'hos, I speak about DDOS attacks and camgirls."

The self-proclaimed "#1 greatest computer science gangsta rapper ever" is MC Plus+, a geeksta leading light whose moniker comes from the C++ programming language.

The Purdue University, Indiana, Ph.D. candidate and "CS pimp," whose album Algorhythms was recorded with pirated software, calls himself "the Tupac of the computer science world."

MC Plus+ rattles off lines like: "I'm encrypting shit like every single day; sending it across a network in a safe way; protecting messages to make my pay; if you hack me you're guilty under DMCA."

But Plus+'s flow is dissed on the opposite coast by geeksta peers like Dan Maynes-Aminzade, aka Monzy, a 25-year-old Minnesota-born Stanford grad student who recorded a dis track specifically to insult his rap rival.

"Our raps are filled with braggadocio, but instead of boasting about our bitches, blunts, Benzes or Benjamins, maybe we talk about our math skills or the efficiency of our code," Monzy said.

"Drama in the PhD," a nerdcore taunting rap.

Thanks to Jacob.

posted by Ace at 12:44 PM

Comments

what crap.

Posted by: tachyonshuggy on July 27, 2005 12:50 PM

crap as in "hoax" or crap as in bad rap?

It's not an actual hoax. It may be a GOOF, but it's not a pure hoax, because there really are nerdcore raps. I just listened to one.

Posted by: ace on July 27, 2005 01:02 PM

Yo, Yo, Yo,

Compile this, mothafu**er!

Posted by: BrewFan on July 27, 2005 01:07 PM

There's a guy named MC Chris that my brother listens to that fits the bill. Basically it's nerd rap in a an annoying squeaky voice. So yes, it's out there but I don't know how popular it is.

Posted by: Elric on July 27, 2005 01:10 PM

I'm thinking there is some programming potential here for G4. How about 'Pimp My Mainframe'? Any other ideas?

Posted by: BrewFan on July 27, 2005 01:17 PM

I thought the MP3 wasn't too bad. The kid gets some force behind his vocals he'll be alright.

Posted by: Silk on July 27, 2005 01:31 PM

Yeah, Silk's right. Needs less of a rote feel but that'll come with practice. It's got potential but it's no MC Hawking, not yet.

Posted by: Megan on July 27, 2005 01:36 PM

Last year, a buddy of mine actually paid good money (OK, I guess the cover was $5 or something) to see a touring rap act called Lord of the Rhymes. That's right: hobbit rap. With, I believe, Gandalf on the turntables. "Gondor's in the hooooouuuse!!"

Me, I'm thinking of starting up a law-geek rap act. My handle's going to be "C.D. Cal." and my friend from Chicago's going to be "N.D. Ill."

Posted by: Alex on July 27, 2005 01:41 PM

The artist formerly known as TC peE iP

Posted by: Dave in Texas on July 27, 2005 01:46 PM

None of them can hold a candle to MC Frontalot. Especially Indier Than Thou, Which MC Was That?, and Rappers We Crush featuring Kompressor (who wrote the delightful Adding Up Numbers).

Posted by: marc on July 27, 2005 02:58 PM

"I flip machine code like your momma dips pringles'....classic...

Musically, it seems pretty crap like most rap however.

Posted by: Ring on July 27, 2005 03:07 PM

I see how it is, Ace!

I emailed you about this like 3 months ago with the subject "Warning: Very nerdy!"...

I thought MC Plus+ was hysterical, but then again I'm a CS student and a computer geek.

That's cool... my feelings are only slightly hurt. :-P

Dave S

Posted by: Dave S on July 27, 2005 03:08 PM

Among MC Plus+'s finer lyrics...

I got mad ho's and I got mad bitches,
I'm coding in C, and I branch with switches.

And he has a song that is dedicated exclusively to insulting engineering students:

Purdue engineer, butt pirate bucaneer;
an ass pioneer with homo gear.

Good times.

Posted by: Dave S on July 27, 2005 03:13 PM

Rap is pure dogshit and needs to be ridiculed, badly. The only reason it has became so sucessful is that all you need is some chump from the ghetto with a mic and a boom box and you got all the ingredients for it. Record a few samples, shout some trash over them and wala, you got a rap album. No problems with 4-6 band members who must eat while recording and touring, no big production costs in time and money, and the risk is less too.

To anyone who was ever impressed by all the rhymes that seem so prodigious and clever, look at any Rhyming Dictionary in any bookstore for the words in any rap "song" that seem so clever and they're all right there. Probably in the same order, too.

Posted by: 72 ROUNDS on July 27, 2005 04:03 PM

Yo mofo! Check it out, check it out, bling bling & me got a date wi destiny. My ride, my 9, my crib and my ho, I pledge all these, even my blow! Cause it'll be Escalades and Cadillacs and Rodeo Drive, when I get outa' this ghetto, I'm leaving alive. So stupid mutha' fucka' stay outta my way, cause I'm rolling on through on the very same day ... they let me outta prison.

Posted by: 72 Bling Blings on July 27, 2005 04:46 PM

Geek Rap ...

like, Talking Heads and Tom-Tom Club?

The snake is swallowing its tail! End of days! End of days!!!!

/send SASE for free pamphlet

Posted by: Knemon on July 27, 2005 05:24 PM

Weird Al is such a genius, he pre-parodied this years ago with "All about the Pentiums":

You live in your momma's cellar
Downloading pictures of Sarah Michelle Gellar
Posting "Me too" like some brain-dead AOLer
You're as useless as jpegs to Helen Keller
I oughta do the world a favor and
cap you like Old Yeller

I beta-tested every operating system
Some I gave props to, others I dissed 'em

Posted by: Bob Hawkins on July 28, 2005 09:56 AM

Yeah but did Weird Al throw in a Djikstra reference? NO... he didn't.

Posted by: Dave S on July 28, 2005 11:52 AM

Hey Ace,
What is the song/group you play when you go to commercial break? I know you mentioned that the entrance song is from Dave Matthews Band. Just a query.

Posted by: Ziv Zulander on July 30, 2005 09:35 PM

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This is super-obscure and I only barely remember it. Given that, I'll give you the hint that it's by the Red Rocker.
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Good rickroll

What? Skeleton of the most famous Musketeer, D'Artagnan, possibly discovered in Dutch church closet.
Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
The Gascon nobleman inspired Alexandre Dumas's hero in "The Three Musketeers" in the 19th century, a character now known worldwide thanks to the novel and numerous film adaptations.
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Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
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Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
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The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
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In another passage, the ring is identified as a "ring of power."
I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

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