Comparative Listening

Let's consider these lyrics from Public Enemy's quite fantastic 'She Watch Channel Zero?!'

Hey yo, lemme tell you a little som'in,
I'm'a take all your soaps, an' then I'm gonna hang 'em on a rope,
You know what I'm sayin'?

Here Public Enemy have used an absurd pun to describe just how much they don't like televised serial melodramas, or 'soaps' as they are otherwise called. Even with Flava Flav bouncing around, probably with a grandfather clock hanging from his neck, they manage to make inciteful social commentary.

Now consider these lyrics from Jay-Z's 'Empire State of Mind' featuring She lost her Keys:

I'm the new Sinatra, and... since I made it here,
I can make it anywhere, yea, they love me everywhere...

or perhaps

Shit, I made the Yankee hat more famous then a Yankee can...

Here Jay-Z informs us that we should build a temple to him and another to his celestial penis, because he is so awesome. This is why mainstream rap ain't that great anymore, I mean he even did an album with Linkin Park. Shit.

Here's a picture of Flava Flav though, which goes to show... Actually I'm not sure what if anything we can learn from Flava Flav.