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There is definitely a story there... he's talking about the effects of imprisonment on himself, what he had to do to survive it and how it was driving him to insanity. Prison messes up your mind... you get used to stuff in there that's unspeakable outside of it. He's rapping about his real life. THAT'S the difference between a Bay song and the average NY song... you can hear the pain of the struggle in the lyrics. That's something Nas captured beautifully and poetically in the song One Love, but at the same time he himself hasn't lived it. Like goldenchild said, a lot of NY rappers who get put on are literally putting on an image... its profitable for them to project something they're not. The only NY rappers who were actually from the struggle of the streets they rapped about were the underground ones and a couple mainstream exceptions like Cam, Freeway and Shine.
What about Wu-Tang, KRS-One, Mobb Deep, Noreaga, M.O.P., etc
San Francisco has a deep Hip-Hop scene. Only if you're not a true Hip-hop, you would think the Bay Area has nothing to do with Hip-hop. Keep in mind that there are a lot of emcees in the Bay that have an East Coast feel to their music
However, to compare the Bay areas rap scene to Brooklyn's is just asinine.Brooklyn's Hip-hop scene goes all the way back to Hip-hop's infancy. Some of the greatest emcees are from the borough of Brooklyn.
The only decent rappers I can name from the Bay Area are Paris (whose inclusion is really pushing it in my opinion), E40, Souls of Mischief, and Del tha Funkee Homosapien.
Oh OK, my bad. I thought you meant that SF is the only place in the Bay with good emcees.
As far as Brooklyn goes, though, everybody knows that Brooklyn has dope emcees... Notorious BIG alone makes the case. It gets annoying though after awhile how overlooked we are on the East Coast... most East Coast heads' experience with Bay Area music is limited to Too $hort, Spice 1, E-40, (maybe) Mac Dre, and more recently Lil B. San Francisco alone has HUNDREDS of dope rappers that most East Coasters have never heard of. If you haven't already, I highly recommend you listen to San Quinn's The Rock: Pressure Makes Diamonds and From A Boy To A Man. Both are classic records that deserve to be heard everywhere but at this point have only really been heard in CA. Also highly recommended is The Jacka - The Jack Artist.
@goldenchild: Try to avoid posting rap videos because the mods want to keep this site PG-13.
I forgot about Too $hort, and for some reason I thought Spice 1 was from L.A.
Yet another East Coast hater. That song I posted won the Source Hip Hop quotable and he sold a quarter of million units of that record independently. What East Coast artist is doing that in 2011? None. What makes a rapper hot to you? The fact that their music is peddled by White owned record companies and applauded by know-it-all music critics who live on the nice side of town? What made San Francisco Hip Hop dope was that it spoke for the real struggle that was in the hood. A lot of our songs were audio documentaries of what life was like in the hood at one point in time. It was project poetry, not meaningless babble that sounds good to casual outsiders who never lived in poverty. Saying other people's struggle is "wack" is insulting to say the least. Also, Brooklyn has come wack in the past because rappers dealt with major record labels that didn't know how to market MC's. Case in point, when Jay-Z first came out in the late 80's he was wearing Hawaiian shirts making terrible songs with Jaz-O.
If you think this is great classic Hip Hop, you ARE A CLOWN!
More terrible Brooklyn pandering to the masses...
Lol, you posted Jaz-O's worst song, and everyone knows that GZA was just doing what the record label wanted him to do out of that time. GZA is damn near a legend & Jaz-O is actually a decent producer, although he still can't get over Jay-Z being more successful than him.
I was just saying that in jest, as I couldn't care less about your thoughts/opinion or anyone else's for that matter, about my borough (not city). In my mind Brooklyn is better than Manhattan (yes to me it is). I was playing around, hence the smiley. I thought Cali people were more laid back? Guess not.
Great you like The Bay and NYC could "never compare". You're right. /S
After all that is your opinion/preference which I stated is FINE in my post.
I grew up & Brooklyn, and it is most definitely not better than Manhattan. The nicest neighborhoods in Brooklyn (Park Slope, Williamsburg, Fort Greene, Brooklyn Heights, etc) are so because they're close to Manhattan & imitate Manhattan. Brooklyn's actually becoming pretty lame.
Bajan, I think this is a good thread despite weak attempts to compare bay area rap to Brooklyn Hip-hop. Lol
To add a serious point to this thread, I think both cities have epic architecture. Brownstones and victorian homes can be compared. I would love to live in either home.
I see some people here seriously trying to compare Bay Area hip hop with New York hip hop, let's see:
New York is home to: Biggie, Jay-Z, Nas, Wu-Tang, Big L, Big Pun, Juice Crew, Run-DMC, A Tribe Called Quest...
The Bay Area is home to... E40.
LOL.
The Bay is home to: E-40, Mac Dre, Hieroglyphics, The Coup, Too $hort, Spice 1, Andre Nickatina, Hobo Junction, Totally Insane, 3XKrazy, 415, Luniz, Dru Down, RBL Posse, IMP, 11/5, Ant Banks, Dangerous Crew, Links Crew...
Its not as one-sided as you think. In fact, the Bay was and is arguably the second largest scene in the country.
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Guess not. 
/S
