Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary • Hacker News Board

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#171

Post by harryh » Sun, May 04, 2014, 10:40 PM UTC

loso wrote: post #158

I enjoyed reading this chart but I hope it doesn't reinforce the bias that some fans have that word complexity is the only way to tell if a rapper is good or not. There are several ways to judge the strength and weaknesses of a rapper. Complexity is one of them, flow is another. Story telling ability is also another very strong in indicator. The best rappers are able to bring a mix while some are just so strong in on…

To fully understand rap, we must first be fluent with its meter, rhyme, and figures of speech. Then ask two questions: One, how artfully has the objective of the song been rendered, and two, how important is that objective. Question one rates the song's perfection, question two rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining a song's greatest becomes a relatively simple matter.

If the song's score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the song yields the measure of its greatness.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#172

Post by simonster » Sun, May 04, 2014, 10:52 PM UTC

andreasvc wrote: post #136

simonster wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I missed that, even though it is very clearly spelled out (oops!). It makes the ordinal comparison valid (modulo noise), but it does not completely address the concern. If you have two artists, and artist 1 uses 5,000 unique words in 35,000 lyrics while artist 2 uses 10,000 unique words in 35,000 lyrics, artist 2's vocabulary may be substantially more than twice as large as artist 1's. It is unlikely that a lyri…

The problem you cite only exists if you explicitly want to estimate the underlying vocabulary of the writer. However, as a description of this particular corpus the vocabulary sizes are perfectly valid and exact rather than an estimate.

If we are really only interested in the number of unique words in the first 35,000 lyrics each of these artists have produced and not in what they say about the artists themselves or how the number generalizes to the rest of their body of work, then yes, the analysis is exact and perfect. I don't think that's really the goal, though. We are interested in drawing inferences about the artists and their work. As I say above, the rankings are correct modulo noise (there is noise, unless we wouldn't find it meaningful that these numbers could be different for different 35,000 word samples for the same artist and it is impossible that they could be different for the first 35,000 words due to causes unrelated to those that we are trying to measure), but the magnitudes of the differences could be pretty far off.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#173

Post by oakaz » Sun, May 04, 2014, 10:57 PM UTC

VeejayRampay wrote: post #127

oakaz wrote: post #119

Why Jedi Mind Tricks is not counted? He'd be the first in this list; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlZgiK6FiO0

Jedi Mind Tricks is not one person. It's two rappers (Vinnie Paz and Jus Allah).

It doesn't matter, they are still rappers and I bet they'd be one of the top

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#174

Post by pandler » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:11 PM UTC

seizethecheese wrote: post #124

Many here seem to be interpreting vocabulary size as a signal for quality. When it comes to rap I completely disagree. Firstly, the repetition is rap's main ingredient. I read an article a while ago where researchers found that listening to a spoken phrase that is looped activates the same part of the brain as music, which helps explain this phenomenon. Personally, if I want food for thought I read. Rap is not an int…

> Firstly, the repetition is rap's main ingredient.

Is it though? I don't dispute that sheer vocabulary size isn't a sign of quality, but that seems like a very ignorant generalization of rap.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#175

Post by joshschreuder » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:16 PM UTC

thegasman wrote: post #149

No mention of MF Doom? Metalface? Doom? Victor Vaughan? (All the same gentleman from LA)

MF DOOM is on there pretty much right on the Shakespeare line. It's not clear if it includes his work as Danger / Villain / etc.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#176

Post by pandler » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:17 PM UTC

habosa wrote: post #52

Not surprised to see Wu Tang at the top and Drake at the bottom. Started from the bottom ... still there.

Haha I was thinking that as you move left on the scale the more likely you are to see rappers that people tend to mock.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#177

Post by hatu » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:25 PM UTC

loso wrote: post #158

I enjoyed reading this chart but I hope it doesn't reinforce the bias that some fans have that word complexity is the only way to tell if a rapper is good or not. There are several ways to judge the strength and weaknesses of a rapper. Complexity is one of them, flow is another. Story telling ability is also another very strong in indicator. The best rappers are able to bring a mix while some are just so strong in on…

It's kind of like putting book authors in this kind of a list. Using more words and more complex ones doesn't really say anything about the quality of the writing. Pretty interesting data-set for fun though.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#178

Post by Totient » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:39 PM UTC

I wonder where things like classic rock / broadway musicals / opera / etc. fits on this spectrum.

I really appreciate including Shakespeare and Moby Dick on the spectrum, but I'd still like some more perspective. For that matter, I wonder how many unique words I use every day.

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#179

Post by Blahah » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:50 PM UTC

benihana wrote: post #12

I'd really like to see this broken down by established vocabulary and made up vocabulary. I think that would really start to show who were the best lyricists on both ends. Rappers with a lot of made up words might be on the far left, and rappers with a lot of unique words that aren't made up would be on the far right. Both sides of the scale would show rapping talent on different dimensions. Influential rappers like…

Would also be nice to see size of the corpus controlled for. What's the rate at which they use new words?

Re: Rappers, Sorted by Size of Vocabulary

#180

Post by dons » Sun, May 04, 2014, 11:53 PM UTC

randomdrake wrote: post #61

For those who aren't familiar with Aesop Rock, I'd invite you to give him a listen sometime. His earlier albums, in particular, have been very influential to me in many ways. Both in my artistic and professional careers. From comments on the conditions of the working man and the condition of feeling trapped in a "j-o-b"[1]: "Now we the American working population Hate the fact that eight hours a day Is wasted on chas…

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VNX4spGpIOc&feature=kp I'd recommend Aes' Zodiacpuncture for vocab speed and depth. He basically wins the ranking on that track alone.