Boles 1

Dylan Boles
Malcolm Campbell
UWRT 1101-011
September 10, 2014
About The Money: An Analysis of a Rap Song that is All about Money
Listen to a majority of rap songs out there today, whether it's underground, or
mainstream. What will you find? A whole bunch of vulgarity and lyrics about drugs, women
and money. The rap game is changing, less and less albums are being sold and now all the good
music can be found on mix tapes. Artists are starting to overshadow their own album releases by
dropping their better songs onto mix tapes, which perfectly launch them into stardom. Artists are
using their mix tapes like an advertisement to an upcoming album, but they're releasing the better
music onto their mix tapes. Rappers are using this technic sound to purposely hype people up
about the upcoming album hoping that they will sell more copies. This genre analysis focuses on
the fact that rap music is changing from telling stories and rapping about their real lives, to
rapping about what people want to hear involving the "dope game and trap house".
Identifying the Genre, Audience & Purpose
I bought the song About the Money by T.I. (feat. Young
Thug) to get more of an understanding of how rappers exploit
themselves to the public especially with their talk of money. Its'
YouTube video alone has received over sixteen million views, and
the song was just released in June of this year. No telling the

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countless amount of money that he has actually made off of this song. The song shows us that
rappers are here more for the paycheck and not the entertainment. Rappers and so called artists
reach their audience and these levels of entertainment by doing live performances, releases their
music electronically for downloads and streaming, and they also release on CD's. Although, not
many people listen to CD's in our generation, artist's money mainly comes from online purchases
and downloads from sources like iTunes. These rappers best achieve their purpose of making
money by giving their specific audience what they want to hear. The conventions these rappers
bestow upon their audience would definitely have to be comedy, suspense, the occasional horror
depending on your preference, and rarely might you even find some love. Their audience for this
type of music would be the younger generations who can keep up with the fast paced beats and
word play of rap music, which just happens to be a few of rap's conventions. A few more for
example would be: the well thought out rhyme scheme, intense speed of their lyrics, and a catchy
high tempo beat. I wouldn't expect to see an old man walking down the street bumping "About
the Money". In this case it's a song all about money, and come on who doesn't love money.
Social and Cultural Context
What makes this song stand out from other songs of its
genre is that this song focuses on money and not on sex or
drugs. You will hear talk of drugs in the song if you listen
closely, but that is not the main focal point of this song.
Culturally this song is the epitome of rap music. Rap music has
always revolved around money, and to them if you aren't a
heavy spender or you arent coming to them with money then, they want nothing to do with you
(Just like in this song About the Money). This song specifically says "If it ain't about the money

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don't be blowing me up cause I ain't getting up no use in you ringing my line stop wasting
my time." Which is directly saying that if you aren't bringing money to the table or making them
money in some type of way, then they don't want to talk to you. From a social point of view this
song is about money and that is exactly how these artists socialize. Money doesn't revolve
around them, they revolve around the money.
Switching the Genre From: Rap to R&B
The purpose of rap music is to hype up the listeners and give them a hardcore up beat
song about what the rich life and street life can be like. Its main purpose is to gain listener,
which gains the rappers more money. R&B on the other hand is a slower always softer version
of rap that focuses mainly on love and gives you sort of a sweet melody in a slowed down rap
form. This genre of R&B focuses more on communication with its listeners and gives most of
them something that can relate and this relation happens to be love.
Two huge differences between these two genres are
how the music interacts with its intended audience and what
the main focal points of each genre are all about. For example,
if you're a poetic softhearted person not into drugs and the
street and more into things such as love, then R&B is
definitely more along your alley. On the other hand, if a soft
mushy slow paced song about love is not what you want to hear and you would rather hear about
violence and the street life of drugs, sex, and money, then rap music is what you need to be
listening to.
While both genres get their points across whether it's just for money or to actually make a
connection with their audience, both are being achieved by the style of music that they produce.

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Although these two genres seem like they are remotely different in context and forms of
communication, just by listening you will begin to find out that the songs are not very different
in terms of how they stimulate our minds. You might even stumble across an artist named Drake
that finds his rhythm in both genres of music. While these genres have their easily
distinguishable differences, by listening you will soon come across the fact that they are all too
similar.

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Chorus
If it ain't about the money.
Don't be blowin' me up, man I ain't gettin' up.
If it ain't about the money.
Ain't no use in you ringin' my line, stop wastin' my time.
If it ain't about the money.
Nah I can't even hear what you say, I ain't finna do shit.
If it ain't about the money.
Bitch, you can miss me with it, bitch miss me with it.
Turn it!

My Synopsis
While it may not seem like this is a decent song for anyone to be listening to, it is the
epitome of rap music today and that is why I chose it. It's mainly slang put together with a
rhythm to produce something to entertain an audience. Rappers could put out a song about
basically anything and it's going to become a hit regardless with the type of listeners they have
today. It's all about making money and keeping the audience entertained, clearly not much effort
put into the lyrics of the music. All the effort is "wasted" on producing a good beat to give us
something to bob our head's to.

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Peer Review
Bianca- you have a good genre comparison and possibly adding lyrics of a song or artist quotes
can express more the conventions of Rap music than R&B music. Keep in mind that you will
have to change the conventions in order to have them as a similar genre. Re-phrase what you
mean in some sentences because they seem to just run-on. Try to keep the concept simple about
rappers and how they started their music career.
Bianca- better analysis of rap music and R&B! I liked how you included the lyrics to express the
context of rap music. You had small grammatical and punctual errors but I corrected them for
you. Good use of modern rap music changes, that goes to show the evolution from the start of
rap music. The use of R&B to contrast the audience was perfect since they are completely
different. Think about adding more R&B artist or the purpose behind R&B music like you did
with rap music.