Excuse the slightly harsh tone of this post.

I recently came across a video titled “Death to Mumble Rap” and it was basically everything that I anticipated it would be: a posse of fast-rapping white guys (plus one black guy) saying a lot of stuff while simultaneously saying very little, and figuratively dunking on the hip-hop subgenre pejoratively known as “mumble rap.”

It reminded me of a video I saw last year with a similar “lyricist dislikes mumble rap” vibe, conveniently titled “Mumble Rapper vs. Lyricist.” The artist, a guy named Vin Jay, attempts to rap from the standpoint of both a SoundCloud rapper and a “traditional” lyricist.

For the most part, I hated both these snobbish displays of overt white saviorism.

“Mumble rap” itself is a controversial term that is frequently misused. Mumble rap isn’t so much a subgenre of hip-hop as it is a term used to invalidate new rappers and artists within the trap subgenre. The pejorative is most often used to describe rappers whose music is characterized by slurred or sluggish flows and repetitive/reductive lyrics. However, the term has also been used in recent years to describe anybody that doesn’t fit the mold of a “traditional” lyricist — whether their lyrics are actually unintelligible or not.

An inaccurate, inconsistently-used descriptor, the term “mumble rapper” is also a continuation of the long history of discrimination against the way Black people speak. The term “mumble” is almost never used outside of hip-hop — a Black-dominated genre. And when it’s used within hip-hop, it’s rarely ever in reference to non-Black rappers (besides maybe Lil Pump and Lil Xan). Hip-hop producer Cam O’bi made an interesting comment about the racial aspect of this delineation on Twitter a few years ago: “Nobody calls death metal ‘mumble rock.’”

You call Spanish/Spanglish music, “mumble” music? Or do you respect the fact that you don’t understand them?

A more clear example of this derision of Black speech can be seen through Seattle rapper Lil Mosey. Mosey, a member of the 2019 XXL Magazine Freshman Class and a rapper frequently disparaged for being a “mumble rapper,” was asked in an interview with Complex magazine about what he thinks about that label. His answer was very telling:

I wouldn’t consider myself a mumble rapper, because I don’t know what that is. But when I talk, I mumble. So it’s in my music because that’s how I talk…I tried to make myself be able to talk better than that and I couldn’t.

The musicsphere’s use of the term “mumble”, more often than not, ends up being an indictment on artists simply for the way that they speak.

And mind you, I’m not here to defend all “mumble rap,” or imply that it’s wrong to dislike rap that doesn’t align perfectly with “tradition.” I’m not a fan of many of the new-wave trapstars. I think some of it is derivative. I think Lil Pump’s career shouldn’t even exist. I think hip-hop needs less artists like Nav and Lil Xan. I think rap can also do without the increasing number of industry plants who market depression and drug-abuse as an “aesthetic” to suburban white teenagers.

But what I’m not going to do is pretend that “mumble rap” isn’t an essential — yes, essential — chapter of hip-hop’s history. “Mumbling” pioneers like Gucci Mane, Lil Wayne, and Future — whether we want to admit it or not — have shaped much of contemporary rap music and have contributed mightily to the zeitgeist that hip-hop has become. Un/intentionally, “mumblers” have engaged society in conversations about mental health and drug abuse as a coping mechanism, as well as illuminated the hypocrisy in the way we validate people’s struggles. Black “mumblers” have inspired dance crazes and cultural phenomena. Black “mumblers” regularly dictate fashion trends. Black “mumblers” have crafted songs worthy of national anthem status.

Almost none of this can be said of the corny, egotistical, lyrical-spiritual-miracle Eminem clones with savior complexes who feel that they need to “liberate” Black culture from the clutches of Auto-tune — and yes, this includes their Lord and Savior Slim Shady himself. Instead of respecting and growing along with the culture — the way the late Mac Miller did — they’ve resorted to finger-wagging over nauseating beat selections as they hold fast to the unfounded belief that “fast rapping” equates to “good rapping.” And ironically enough, they are often just as inessential and unoriginal as they claim the Black “mumblers” to be.