SFW Rap

August 17, 2013 11:43 AM

I like to rap, and I really like to rap at work. However the silly, popular, well-known verses I've memorized are getting a little stale and I'd like to learn some more. My key requirement is that they can't be misogynistic, cussy, or overly tasteless. What are the catchiest popular rap verses that are safe for work?

I'm not much of a rap aficionado; most of the verses I know are either from way back in the day or Girl Talk albums, so I've basically reached the limits of my rap knowledge. Some exemplars from my small (but popular) oeuvre:

- Ice Ice Baby
- Bust A Move
- I Wish
- First of the Month (A surprising amount of blurbity-blur-blurb flubbing goes a long way with this one.)
- Good Day

Doesn't have to be the whole song; if a particular verse stands out (or is the only part of the song that isn't fouled up) please let me know.

posted by carsonb to Media & Arts (30 answers total)

Maybe it's time for something a little nerdier:
Baba Brinkman
MC Lars
Professor Elemental

Bonus points for being able to recite all of Performance, Feedback, Revision.
posted by Katemonkey at 11:50 AM on August 17, 2013

I don't have a direct answer, but here's a similar question from just a couple days ago that might give you ideas...

Good Rap with Minimal Swears
posted by zyxwvut at 11:58 AM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

Beginning at 5:10 of Janelle Monae and Eryka Badu's Q.U.E.E.N.

Lyrics

(The whole song is great and unsweary, but the whole song is not rap.)
posted by rtha at 12:10 PM on August 17, 2013

Macklemore! You can do the radio-friendly versions of his songs.
posted by lunasol at 12:15 PM on August 17, 2013 [3 favorites]

Best answer: There's a part in "Rapper's Delight" that's about going to a friend's house to eat and the food just ain't no good. SFW and hilarious.
posted by Metroid Baby at 12:20 PM on August 17, 2013 [3 favorites]

Best answer: You're in need of Chubb Rock's "Treat 'Em Right"!

Always says hello 'cause I'm a modest fellow
Never try to play a super star that's mellow
'Cause if these kids don't go buy our records
We'll be has-beens and plus naked
So we owe them, so pull out your pen
Sign an autograph, you might make a new friend
So just get your boys and bring the noise and just swing it
And party people in the house, sing it

Kid 'n Play are also great for positive stuff, as in "Rollin' With Kid 'n Play."
posted by dayintoday at 12:21 PM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

Or revisit the original (and very clean) rappers, Gilbert & Sullivan:

I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.

I'm very good at integral and differential calculus;
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

I know our mythic history, King Arthur's and Sir Caradoc's;
I answer hard acrostics, I've a pretty taste for paradox,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,
In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous;
I can tell undoubted Raphaels from Gerard Dows and Zoffanies,
I know the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes!
Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore,
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.

Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform,
And tell you ev'ry detail of Caractacus's uniform:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.

In fact, when I know what is meant by "mamelon" and "ravelin",
When I can tell at sight a Mauser rifle from a Javelin,
When such affairs as sorties and surprises I'm more wary at,
And when I know precisely what is meant by "commissariat"
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern gunnery,
When I know more of tactics than a novice in a nunnery
In short, when I've a smattering of elemental strategy
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee.

For my military knowledge, though I'm plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century;
But still, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
posted by a humble nudibranch at 12:25 PM on August 17, 2013 [8 favorites]

Consider some Jurassic 5.
posted by demiurge at 12:33 PM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

A Humble Nudibranch has the right idea. Rap is a style. Rap is a certain method of singin/speaking in rhythm. Many songs or poems could easily be turned into a rap song. Take anything you like that's appropriate and sing it in the rap cadence.

That in itself can be fun. Turning some classic song into a rap version can be intriguing. The Eagle's "Take it easy" is one example of a song easily turned into a rap but any song with strong rhyming will work
posted by 2manyusernames at 12:42 PM on August 17, 2013

Response by poster: Consider some Jurassic 5.

Rap is a style.

Thank you, and I'll be sure to appreciate your specific recommendations.
posted by carsonb at 12:49 PM on August 17, 2013

Best answer: The Beastie Boys' "Sabotage" has one f-bomb (which could be replaced with another two-syllable word), but is otherwise clean and fun.

Run-DMC's "Christmas in Hollis" is pretty great.
posted by epj at 12:59 PM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Ooh, how about Kurtis Blow's "The Breaks"? Going "break it up, break it up, break it up, breakdown" on repeat is fun.
posted by dayintoday at 1:03 PM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

Best answer: This is likely in your orbit if not your repertoire already, and I'm totally outing myself as an old dude, but Nation of Millions has so many great tracks, a number of which begin with words or phrases that come up in normal conversation, making great lead-ins.

Someone uses the word "bass" or "base", then you bring the noise.

Start a sentence with "I got a letter..." You finish it with "from the government the other day..."

Someone says "here's what I want you to do...", or waxes lyrical about whatever is the hot new thing? Suggest that they refrain from believing the hype.
posted by dersins at 1:07 PM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

I will try to make up some specific answers, but for the moment I am going to point you to my (somewhat) similar question from the other day.
posted by Going To Maine at 1:11 PM on August 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Duh: Fresh Prince theme!
posted by too bad you're not me at 1:15 PM on August 17, 2013 [2 favorites]

I can't stop coming back to this question! I totally forgot Black Sheep "The Choice Is Yours." The break is great, though in the regular verses note that the song does mention "hoes."

Engine, Engine, Number Nine
On the New York transit line
If my train goes off the track
Pick it up! Pick it up! Pick it up!...

posted by dayintoday at 1:43 PM on August 17, 2013

Oh, is this where I admit that my husband and I have memorized the Big Sean verse from Justin Bieber's "As Long as You Love Me"? And that it is swear-free and great fun?

It's not misogynistic or sexy, but it is sort of swoony, in a couple's-therapy way that I find hilarious.
posted by purpleclover at 1:44 PM on August 17, 2013

Best answer: "It's Tricky" by Run-DMC! It's cuss-free, explicitly anti-drug, and hilariously humble-braggy (apparently, their lives are tough because everybody thinks rap is easy but it's actually super hard).

I'm not braggin', people naggin' 'cause they think I'm a star
Always tearin' what I'm wearin', I think they're goin' too far . . .
I'm not lyin', girls be cryin' 'cause I'm on TV
They even bother my poor father 'cause he's down with me!
posted by honey wheat at 3:16 PM on August 17, 2013 [4 favorites]

Best answer: The ultimate SFW video (skip to 3.45 if you are impatient)
posted by saucysault at 5:48 PM on August 17, 2013

You need to go old school, to the source material. You need to get into Nipsey Russell.
posted by reenum at 7:22 PM on August 17, 2013

1 - buy more, save more, we're your savior.
2 - follow me now see? see I be rockin.
3 - feel. fan. tab. u. lous.
4 - come get lost within what I felt.
5 - who be first to catch this Beat Down?
6 - can you dig that?
7 - light em up...blow em out.
8 - if I sound doper, take it personal.
9 - poison slang
posted by cashman at 9:04 PM on August 17, 2013

Way to misread the question. Sorry!
posted by cashman at 9:59 PM on August 17, 2013

Best answer: From DJ Yoda's How To Cut & Paste - Mix Tape Volume 2, I recommend Ill Culinary Behaviour, totally sfw and lyrics that will stick in your head!
posted by ellieBOA at 1:35 AM on August 18, 2013

Jay-Z's verse from Mariah Carey's Heartbreaker is pretty fly and super fun to rap.
posted by elmer benson at 6:17 AM on August 18, 2013

Best answer: Oh man, Tom Tom Club's Genius of Love is super fun to rap, too.
posted by elmer benson at 6:21 AM on August 18, 2013

Best answer: Anything by the Beastie Boys especially after Hello Nasty. After the 80's and eventually through the 90's they give up on the tasteless stuff, the misogynism, and eventually the pot references.

Intergalactic
Body Movin
etc.
posted by bleep at 11:39 AM on August 18, 2013

Most probably not all of Big Daddy Kane's "I Get the Job Done" would be ok, but the bit at the end is probably about the most work-safe (work-appropriate, even) thing I can think of:

Hmmmmmmmmmmm, now what's a title to fit me?
A champ like Tyson? A captain like Kirk?
No: employee of the month, 'cause, yo, I do work.

Also, the rap from Blondie's "Rapture" is pretty funny and harmless.
posted by mon-ma-tron at 4:23 PM on August 18, 2013

Ages ago, I discovered the Cookin' with gas rap when listening to a Cut Chemist/DJ Shadow mix. It might do what you need.
posted by Going To Maine at 4:41 PM on August 18, 2013

Special Ed's I'm The Magnificent.
posted by 1smartcookie at 10:18 PM on August 19, 2013

Response by poster: Bird is the Word!
posted by carsonb at 11:13 PM on January 22, 2014