This is for all the people who don't think rap is poetry or music. I don't mean all the new people like T.I, Soulja Boy, or Lil Wayne, that is not really rap.
I think rap is poetry, I learned that poetry uses literary devices (Alliteration, rhyming, similies, metaphors and other literay devices). So I would like to know why you don't consider rap poetry/music.
This is the true rap. To the OP's question, rap is poetry in any form, either good or bad in taste. I've never liked it since the beggining, where they used to sing about how bad their life was and related things. Now it just got worse.
One has to make the distinction between rappers in it for the money and the fame, and true artists. One could say the same with any number of genres, in which people create meaningless 'music' and are just in it for the $.
Of course true rap is poetry, but there are so many out there hunting for fame and riches that people forget that.
I personally can't stand any modern rap for several reasons. 1) Because it just plain sounds bad to me, 2) Because most of it has terrible messages about how drugs and killing people is cool, and 3) Because people talk about rap "singers". You could possibly call it poetry, but unless the definition of singing has changed in the last five minutes, then no. For it to be singing, there has to be a variation in pitch, which rap is lacking. Calling rap singing is an insult to all the people who have real talent and strong voices.
