RapResearchLab

We brought Playtest: Practicum to the Kennedy Center, inviting prompt engineers to explore how AI is transforming creative culture. It’s a bold new model for how communities can question, shape, and co-create the future. 🎥 youtu.be/FDSKch4kQGA

My gold data sculpture Mapper’s Delight: Nas (2023) will be featured in Data Consciousness at @PrintCenterNY starting Sept 18. Excited to share this work + it’s also available here 👉 staplecrops.com/products/mappe…

Champagne Always Stains My Silk (2010) is an interactive visual history of Champagne brand mentions in hip-hop from 1980-2010. This data-visualization tells a nuanced story of a rapper’s relationship to the American dream.

Our founder and creative director Tahir Hemphill's work straddles art, technology and archival research. He synthesizes a hiphop framework into his current creative pursuits here at the Rap Research Lab, and beyond!

This semantic analysis of Drake songs looks at the linguistic data behind his body of work - which words he’s using, how he’s using them, and how often. We use this tool to analyze rap lyrics from over 800,000 songs in our Rap Almanac.

We're always finding new ways to use rap as an analytic tool in pedagogy, entertainment applications, art, and play. Whether its natural language processing analysis, 5G mapping, or memory labs, our team is dedicated to creating tools that playfully transform data engagement.

📢Exciting News! 🎉 We are thrilled to announce that writers at The New York Times used our Rap Almanac for their extensive research in creating this Hip Hop 50th Anniversary Story! 🎤🎶 🙌🏽 A huge shout-out to @mobrowne and NYT Special Projects: nytimes.com/interactive/20…?

As technology continues to develop, our ways of thinking and speaking shift too.

Considering the implications of a rap neural network with @mica students, our founder Tahir Hemphill shared metaphors for human life inspired by technology:

Our future demands new metaphors.

A live performance of "King Tim III," the first recorded rap song, from the disco album XII, at the Capital center in Landover, Maryland. youtube.com/watch?v=FZsBpx… #hiphop50

@HIMANSHU The Smedium is the Message

depressing if you wanna put out music you have to make all these little videos for social media and upload them 3-5 times a week or have a podcast or do all this other stuff that’s not music. i just wanna play a couple shows and hang out w my dog.

@Beyonce in 🇫🇷 Giving Lena Horne Glinda the Good Witch Vibes #BelieveInYourself

We are conducting creative research into the role our platforms play in the generation of form. By applying linguistic analysis techniques to our rap lyric data, we unveil and draw out the infinite intricate patterns concealed within hip-hop. #14KGold #datasculpture #HipHop50

@rapresearchlab and shit They got nothing to th #rapbot

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@rapresearchlab bottom for the screaming I don't know if you seen my control the people like a chance They got the first house bout what it ain't my face before she so hero My niggas still she said I feel around the #rapbot

@rapresearchlab to start to grown They know that my break of the darts the family shit You move like a few serviced cause I got a room screaming I got the comin straight to the flow They go in my love and ladies the #rapbot

@rapresearchlab same way to be the line I spend a door and collar but it was the streets And I love it moving and a broken the world And I don't know what you see the booth Snoop shit this is the streets you can start #rapbot