Rapper Lupe Fiasco And Vocalist Skylar Grey

Throughout the song, Tupac gives an inside look on the social problems affecting African-Americans and suggests possible solutions. In the first stanza of the song, Tupac first talks about how certain social issues are linked together; he makes a correlation between his skin color and being poor. Tupac says “I'm tired of bein' poor and even worse I'm black.” Then he explains how poverty causes crime by saying “My stomach hurts, so I'm lookin' for a purse to snatch.” And finally, he demonstrates the relationship between police brutality and race by saying “Cops give a damn about a negro? Pull the trigger, kill a nigga, he's a hero.”

The lyrics of a song often have no substance and a clear example would be any Britney Spears song. The lyrics of “All Falls Down” are very deep. They talk about the ideal situation in life; We should go to school, get a good job and make money to buy what we want. The lyrics then ask, what if this doesn’t happen? This is prevalent in the first verse. “She has no idea what she doing in college. That major that she majoring, it don’t make no money.” The song questions these everyday values because we focus so much on these things, we don’t realize there are more important things in life such as life itself. Even Kanye admits that he spent money at Jacob’s Jewellery store before he thought about a house. “I went to Jacob with

The song’s overall message is to emphasize the absurdity of belief that African-American people are predisposed to a criminal way of life due to their race, or, in other words - because of their DNA. The second line of the song goes “Loyalty, got royalty inside my DNA” (Lamar), where loyalty means being loyal to the African-American community, and royalty stays for the proud of being a representative of this community. In the next lines, Kendrick states that he is predisposed to violence and evil as they are encoded in his DNA: “Realness, I just kill shit ’cause it's in my DNA; I got dark, I got evil, that rot inside my DNA” (Lamar). Once again, it is needed to understand that these words are used with double meaning. Saying so, Lamar depicts the

This really illustrates how cell phone companies along with there contracts have underlying charges that are hidden to the consumer. Often people who buy or qualify for these phones often do not read the contract documents. This song incorporates a form of sarcasm subliminally set in the context.

In this song, Chance the Rapper states he wants to be an independent musician. He is sick and tired of today’s music industry treating music as a way to make money. Nowadays, almost all of the musicians are signed by record labels and forced to make music for the money purpose. However, Chance The Rapper wants to be a true artist and has entire freedom to follow his heart to make music just like his predecessors did decades ago. He respects to the old generation artists and the freedom of music creation, so he decides to be an independent musician and make this song to tell people that he won’t join any record label.

History has constantly brought upon leaders and individuals who stands up against the corrupt society he and many others face. Those “leaders” express their profound thoughts for both him and the many others that are too afraid to speak out. One of the most notorious writers in American history and is known for his transcendental ideals. However, today’s society lacks individuals who parallels with Whitman. Lupe Fiasco represents the Modern American voice speaking out against the degrading world society and does so by influencing the public through their appeal of music. He rejects and contrasts from the negative influences of the world and uses his music to contradict those who degrade our society. Born in the west side of Chicago

More often than naught protest music is often associated with war and politics and a little less with the social norms of the current society and culture. The most iconic artist that did challenge and changed the social norms was Elvis, even though at the time he was not aware of doing so.

Ludacris talks about the struggle in many verses in the song and uses the alliteration “hand-me down” to describe many things he had hand-me down. First was flip-flops and socks and he then rhymed that with drug dealers and rocks. Flip flops and socks are usual hand me downs but drug dealers and rocks create a gritty impactful message that allows the listener to recognize the struggle. Ludacris also makes a reference to a triple beam scale normally used to weigh out drugs with his lyrics “overall triple, overall beams”. Aside from explanations of the struggle, Ludacris raps lyrics that show he now has overcome the struggle and has a good time, primarily with girls. The song starts out with him talking about his cadillac and how clean it is, “Candy paint, Cadillac kills,” and also ends the song talking about an expensive range rover, “All black tinted up thugged out range,” showing he is very successful to have these cars. Another attribute to his success is Ludacris’s talk about his grill, “mouth full of platinum, mouth full of gold,” showing he can afford a grill of platinum or gold, no longer living the struggle. With success comes women as Ludacris doesn't fail to mention in his lyrics, “pretty ass clothes, pretty ass toes/ oh, how I love these pretty ass hoes,” and other suggestive lyrics throughout the

The opening track of the album is entitled “Wesley’s Theory.” Wesley, in this instance, is in reference to Wesley Snipes. Wesley Snipes is known for his income tax conviction which, when juxtaposed onto Lamar’s extended metaphor, makes him a pimped butterfly. The track divides each of the two verses into separate perspectives. The first verse is from the caterpillars perspective in the mindset of consumption, “I 'ma buy a brand new Caddy on fours/Trunk the hood up, two times, deuce-four/Platinum on everythin ', platinum on weddin ' ring/Married to the game.” The game being fame and fortune. The second perspective is capitalist America represented by Uncle Sam. Lamar states “I can see the

He explains on how violent his life was and how he had to survive. In the song he mentions “ The projects is full of bullets, the bodies is droppin” showing that where he

Through songs many people express their feelings of the world threw the words they have wrote. Many songs talk about civil rights of the people and how change should be an option. In the world we live in today we have social issues that people have to face such as: police brutality, racial profiling, discrimination etc. Through Kendrick Lamar, Public Enemy, The Game, Bebe Winans, and N.W.A they will use their voice as a weapon for change among all people. Music with a message thrives in a live setting, for obvious reasons, and many politically conscious musicians aim to channel the heightened emotions

This song implies that individual’s are violating the norms and values of society. They start the song with a verse that expresses

Lupe Fiasco was born in the crevice between the ghetto and the suburbs, his house on the border between them. His house was filled with modern art, books, music and culture, whereas the outside was right next door to a crack house, clustered with drug dealing and gang violence. Growing up in the hoods of Chicago around prostitutes, drug dealers, killers, and gangbangers, Lupe grew up juxtaposed as stated in an interview: “On the doorknob outside of our apartment, there was blood from some guy who got shot; but inside, there was National Geographic magazines and encyclopedias and a little library bookshelf situation. And we didn't have cable, so we didn't have the luxury of having our brains washed by MTV. We watched public television — cooking

The context and setting of this rap is American in the 1970’s. Historically, this period came after the Civil Rights Movement, during the start of the Nixon era. The Vietnam War was dividing the nation’s population into anti-war protestors and those that supported the war effort. It was an era of recession and continued change for minorities. One of the issues was enforced racial integration after the Civil Rights Movement, which many institutions had still not complied with. The struggle to find equality even after the movement was something African Americans at the time had to deal with. The support for the black power movement was one of many results of this struggle. The media and press largely did not report on the alienation that was still present. This was an inspiration for Scott-Heron and this song in particular.

Kendrick’s song expresses the continued struggle faced by African Americans in modern society. The first couple lines of his song truly display how he feels about the mistreatment of African Americans: