Little Brother Reunited at the Art of Cool Festival
Photo credit: Eric Waters for AOC
Photo Credit: Vickey Ford of Sneakshot for Okayplayer
The Little Brother rapper isn't the only one who disagrees with the recent article.
The New York Times recently published a piece crediting Drake with making singing rappers more commonplace in rap music.
Titled "Rappers Are Singers Now. Thank Drake.," writer Jon Caramanica argues that Drake "fundamentally rewrote the rules of what it meant to be a rapper in the 2010s," and credited the Canadian rapper's So Far Gone mixtape as "the arrival of new path: singing as rapping, rapping as singing, singing and rapping all woven together into one holistic whole."
Since being published, a number of people have reacted to the piece, including artists and celebrities like Phonte, R.A. the Rugged Man, and Ava DuVernay.
"The more you try to erase me, the more that I appear. (c)," Phonte wrote in response to the article on Twitter before speaking further on it in another tweet.
"I'm thankful to make a good living doing what I do and awards/accolades never meant much to me. But I refuse to let you motherfuckers rewrite history while the niggas who helped shape it are still breathing," he said.
Others came to Phonte's defense as well.
None— Richard Lawler (@Richard Lawler) 1574752750
Drake has spoken on Little Brother's influence on him, mainly early on in his career. The rap duo was featured on his song “Don’t U Have a Man,” and Phonte was featured on his song “Think Good Thoughts.”
Phonte recently spoke on the comparisons between him and Drake in response to a troll tweet that compared the former to the latter.
"...for our music to live on through artists like Drake, J. Cole, and Kendrick [Lamar], that’s crazy. People will try to put their expectations and issues onto you. People will say, man, that dude stole your style. You need to call him out," Phonte said.
“I just have to tell people constantly, look, I don’t want to be these ni**as. I’m good being me,” he added.
Source: New York Times
