
Singing competition shows still do huge numbers, but they don’t produce big stars anymore.
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I liked seeing Twista trying to figure out how to react to a white kid with makeup, pink hair, and a baby doll’s head dangling from his belt.) It’s a messy, chaotic artform, and you can’t really judge a rapper based on something as televisual as a quick nightclub performance.īut pop stardom is just as hard to figure out. ( Rhythm + Flow does what it can with this. The genre depends on word of mouth, on online buzz, on the right video showing up in your feed at the right moment. Can’t-miss rap prospects miss all the time. Rappers find fame through some mysterious combination of charisma, virality, backstory, timing, and luck. It doesn’t always stick by Netflix production schedules.Īnd that is, in effect, the problem with the entire concept of the rap-competition show. Cardi asks Cakes whether he’s ready for the mental weight of being the first prominent gay rapper, which just goes to show that this show was taped a while back, before the Lil Nas X summer happened. The New York judges clearly don’t know who Cakes is, and they’re both confused and impressed, which is exactly how I’d expect Fat Joe and Jadakiss to respond to Cakes Da Killa. The Chicago judges all receive Sasha warmly, as a respected peer. The contestants who intrigue me the most are the ones I already know: New York club rapper Cakes Da Killa, Chicago drill veteran Sasha Go Hard. If you’re half-watching Rhythm + Flow in the background while you go about your day, the show dissolves into an endless parade of sad life tales and blurry, out-of-breath verses. But this isn’t a singing show, and those little moments are never enough for anyone to really stand out in any way. They all get moments to rap in clubs for the judges, and a few of them get backstory video packages. She is delightful.)Īt this point, it’s too early to tell whether any of the contestants are actually any good or not. It’s fun when Cardi sends potential contestants packing: “Am I gonna be thinking about you while I’m home, getting fucked? No.” (Cardi, who has reality-TV experience of her own, is an absolute master at this. I spent a lot of time reading the dictionary.”) It’s fun when they hang out with peers in their respective hometowns, or when they thoughtfully break down what all these newer rappers are doing right or wrong. knows so many “fancy words.” (“I’ve been to prison, Cardi. It’s fun when they’re all in a car together, discussing how T.I. In any case, they’re all extremely fun to watch. The show would be better if all three judges were there for all the audition rounds, but I’m sure Netflix had to sort out some kind of byzantine contract situation to get any of them at all. Rhythm + Flow, at least thus far, is perfectly watchable reality TV. (The second chunk of episodes went up this morning, but I’m writing this on Tuesday afternoon.) I haven’t yet seen how things look when the show gets to assessing the actual talent levels of the people it’s rounded up. Then the three judges all go to their hometowns to team up with local guest judges, and come up with more potential candidates. All three judges meet up in LA, along with tremendously entertaining guest judge Snoop Dogg, for the pilot. The first four episodes all capture audition rounds.

It’s broken its first season up into four-episode chunks, and it’s posting them once a week. Netflix usually dumps entire seasons of its shows online at at time, but it’s trying something with this one, attempting to replicate some version of the week-to-week magic of reality TV. The late Eyedea, already on his way to indie-rap infamy, won it amidst some absurd technical problems. In 2000, HBO broadcast the Blaze Battle, a one-night tournament-type show.

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As far as I know, the first of these shows came from the same year that Survivor debuted in the US - the earliest days of reality TV as we know it. The contestants from Celebrity Rap Superstar were already famous, but most of our past rap-competition shows have at least ostensibly been about finding potential rap stars, diamonds in the rough. I’m not sure what the point of it was, other than maybe to fill a hole in MTV’s schedule.Ĭelebrity Rap Superstar is one of the weirder reality-show rap competitions, but it’s not the only one. But the show itself was grating and loudly stupid and borderline unwatchable. Actual rap legends served as coaches: Too Short, Redman, Kurupt, eventual winning coach MC Lyte. (It would’ve been fucking ridiculous if they’d brought me in to judge, and I’m glad they didn’t.) Kevin Hart hosted the show. There was a surprising level of starpower involved in Celebrity Rap Superstar.
