How to leave space for others
I
By Corbie Hill
make my living with words, and that’s what rap is—words—but I can’t freestyle. I nerd out on the linguistic intricacies, the staggering poetry and ironclad rhetoric, the references-within-references-within-references of billy woods and Jean Grae and Quelle Chris and Open Mike Eagle; of Q-Tip and GZA and MF Doom and Andre 3000. But I can’t freestyle. If I tried,
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I’d be like Jemaine Clement in Flight of the Conchords, spitting exactly two lines (“I am the hip-hop-opotamus / my lyrics are bottomless”) and then staring dumbly, mouth hanging open, completely out of ideas as the beat moves on without me. Rapping is hard, and rapping well is even harder. I can’t freestyle, but I know how to improvise.
