– In this video, I'm gonnateach you how to freestyle rap.
With a full proof methodthat anyone can learn even if you can't rhyme.
(upbeat music) I'm Chris Turner.
I'm a professional stand up comedian and also happens to freestyle rap.
I'll take you through the basics, step by step and at the end of the video, I will tell you what Ibelieve is the secret to becoming a great freestyle rapper.
You might've seen some ofmy freestyles on YouTube or Reddit so if you'renot already subscribe, please do so you can enjoy those.
Quick note before we begin.
What I'm referring to is freestyle.
You might know as off the dome.
It just means a rap thatis made up in the moment rather than one written downand prepared in advance.
Some great freestylersinclude MC Supernatural, Wayne Brady, Harry Mack, King Los, Corey Charron, Abandoman so check out those guys, if you wanna get a tasteof some of the greats.
The term freestyle alsorefers to written raps that are performed over a random beat.
This can get a little confusing just know when I sayfreestyle in this video, I'm talking about ones thatare completely improvised.
Now that's all sorted, welcome.
Beginners you've come to the right place, I'm gonna teach you how to freestyle rap.
If you're more experienced, do stick around I'm gonna tell you some tips and hacks that will take your freestyleinto the next level, and I'll also point out mistakesthat a lot of people make.
(jazz music) I'm gonna assume that you love hip-hop.
You love rap and youlisten to a lot of it.
That's the first stepand it is the simplest.
Wait, to become a freestyle rapper, I just have to listen to rap? Yeah, it's like that jobwhere people got paid money to watch all the seasons of The Office.
Note, that I said rap not freestyle rap.
Listen to music that iswritten not improvised.
Great chefs can conjure up a meal out anything that's in thekitchen just by knowing what ingredients go together.
But they had to start outby learning the recipes.
That's not a great analogybut what I'm saying is, you shouldn't be trying to sound like other freestyle rappers.
You should be aiming to soundlike your raps are written.
When someone comments on my videos, saying fake, written, the audience are plants, this can't be possible, that is the highest praise you can give me.
People do not wannabelieve this is possible but it is and it is simplerthat you might think.
If you're just starting out, I know that level seemslike a long way off, but by listening to rap youare embedding in yourself are knowledge of rhythm, a feel for the beat, the knowledge of bar constructionand even a compendium, a library of rhymes that you can draw on when the time comes.
(upbeat music) I want you to practice with music.
Have a beat playingwhen you're freestyling.
Classic boom bap beats are between 80 and 95 beat per minute.
Now, that's a nice tempo but maybe it's a bit too fast for you when you're starting out rapping.
(upbeat music) Trap music is between 130and 150 beats per minute.
That sounds fast, but you'rejust gonna rap a half tempo.
(trap music) Use these beats, rap a half tempo.
The simplest way is to pick a beat you're already familiarwith from a song you know.
Find the instrumental online and just rap along to that.
If it feels too fast, that'sokay just pick a different one.
There is so many available on YouTube and all you have to do is start rapping.
I know this sounds dauntingand you might be thinking, how am I gonna rap when youhaven't taught me anything yet? Of course you're gonna do it.
You can talk.
Rapping is talking.
You just talk over the beat.
Tell me about your day, what you had for breakfast, whether you had to use your AK and this is gonna sound stupid.
But I don't care if you rhyme.
(trap music) I just want you to stick to the beat.
Talk while a beat plays.
Now, a rhyme might come up in your head and that's great.
You can fit it in butif it doesn't arrive, really, you don't need to worry.
If you keep doing it for long enough, eventually the rhymes will come.
I thought this guy saidhe could freestyle rap.
It's super basic.
It's just talking in time with music and three to four minutesmight seem like a long time to talk for and it is.
You might get stuck butkeep going, keep going.
Even if you repeat yourself, even if what you're sayingmakes no sense at all, I don't care just keep it up.
Keep up the flow forthe length of the beat so, apologies if you chosethe original 40 minutes and 46 seconds cut of rapper's delight.
This is gonna get yourbrain used to that beat.
Comfortable with the beat, whenI started rapping on stage, I used the same beat for every show.
You're not learning any lyrics so the least you can do is learn the beat.
Once you're comfortable, pick another.
Maybe a slightly higher tempo.
Once you're comfortable with that, pick another one et cetera.
The only way to get betterat something is to practice and I hate practicing, I hate it.
You're spending time outof your day to do something you suck at and that is not fun.
So this is what you do.
This is one of my favorite freestyle tips and one that a lot of people have told me really helped them learn.
You're gonna freestyle in the shower.
(upbeat music) depending on your levelof personal hygiene, this means you have aboutfive minutes everyday, or every two days, orhaving forbid once a week.
Fun fact, Queen Isabella ofSpain bathe twice in her life which is why she was such an awful rapper.
I'm Queen Isabella and I come from Spain, step to me, I'm gonna bring the.
(groans) You have five minutes everydaywhere you can practice.
Of course you can rap whileyou're walking the dog or washing your handsfor 20 seconds please.
But this is the perfect place.
People sing in the shower.
You're gonna rap in it.
Take your phone into the bathroom, play the beat and just go.
Talk about the day you have planned, talk about your immediatesurroundings, yeah.
You're gonna spit alot of bars about soap.
(upbeat music) if you have a mirror in your bathroom, that's gonna get steamed up so this is an easy thing you can do.
Draw a letter on the mirror, put a big A on there, pick a word that starts with that letter and start talking about that so, you're rapping about aardvarks.
Remember, I don't care if you're rhyming just talk to the beat about aardvarks.
When you run out of things to say, move on to another word thatbegins with that letter.
But here is what we come tosomething really important.
You should never run out of things to say.
And I'm gonna tell you how to do it.
(scratches) In this dramatic pause, I would like to share three quick hacks for moreexperienced freestylers to make your raps better.
Number one, use your strength.
If you have a great voice, emphasize that.
There are rappers, notnecessarily freestylers who don't sound like other rappers.
Giggs, Young Thug, Aitch.
Their voices sound so good, you would listen to them even if they suck.
If you sound interesting, different, lean on that.
If you're not great with lyrics but you've got good flow, emphasize that.
If you're funny, if you have punch lines, focus on those.
Number two, practice with other people.
Get involved with psyphers.
This will make you better.
Much faster than if youjust do it on your own.
You'll be forced to adaptand play off each other and it's an audience but onethat you know is friendly.
While I'm filming this, we're currently all socialdistancing and in isolation but you can still do it.
Jump on Discord, Zoom, rapover a beat with some friends you will get better.
Just a note, maybe don't combine this one with the rap in the shower, advice.
Unless you're reallyclose with your friends.
And number three, drugs.
I'm being serious.
You freestyle using your brain and Nootropics, brain pills for a lot of people helped them.
For me, they aid withmy short term recall, my general awareness and speed of thought.
These are the ones I use, I cycle on and off themand I find I perform better when I am taking them.
Of course, your mileage may vary but they do have a money back guarantee if you're not satisfied.
You can find out more usingthe link in the description and by using that to buy them, you'll be supporting me and this channel so I am very grateful and, is there anything else? Remember how I said you shouldn'trun out of things to say? (upbeat music) when I run workshops with people looking to become abetter freestyle rapper, the most common things that happens is I give them a word and a beat and I ask them to start talking over it.
And they run out of things to talk about within eight or 12 bars.
If I ask them to rhymewhile they're doing it, they run out even sooner because setting therule of it has to rhyme, obviously limits the numberof words you can possibly use.
Why does this happen? Without getting toopsychology 101 about it, there are two types of thinking play here.
Convergent thinkingand divergent thinking.
You don't need to worry yourselfabout the science of this, but when we're freestyle rapping, we want to think divergently.
This means we don't limit ourselves to the word we're rapping about.
We look around it for connections.
A quick example if someone asks you to rap about the sun, and you spent all that time focusing on the sun, prettysoon you're gonna run out of things to say.
But if you think divergently, that's letting yourself make connections from the word sun to allthe things around it.
Giving you so much more to rap about.
To take it one step further, you can use one of thesewords as a jumping off point to rap about other things.
Say you're rapping about the sun, and then you move on torapping about the moon.
Well you can use thatas a jumping off point and now there are so manymore things you can rap about by thinking divergently about the moon.
The lesson is not to focus too hard on what you are rapping about.
Rap about it, but also rap around it and when you're done, rap about something else.
That way, you can freestyle for longer and it was all still truly inspired by that initial suggestion.
In my live shows, aswell as my live streams which I do right here onYouTube so do subscribe so you don't miss out on those.
I take suggestions ofanything from the audience.
Sometimes things come upthat I've never even heard of or no very little about.
People ask me all the time ifI have a photographic memory or synesthesia or fromautistic, none of those.
The truth is even if you don'tknow much about something, you can still rap about itby thinking divergently.
A little bonus here, this type of thinking is the bases for creativity.
So it will help you come up with solutions and ideas for other areas of your life.
We're now most of theway through this video and you might be thinking, “Chris, you haven't taughtme how to rhyme yet.
” Which is true, so I'll tell you this and freestyling becomes a lot less scary when you hear them.
(upbeat music) It is easier to rhyme than not rhyme.
So please don't worry when doing raps 'cause your brain's very good at filling.
You know what should go there.
It might take a second to think of it but the more you practice freestyling, the quicker those links will become.
It's gaps by the way.
You should've got that by now.
If I'm writing a rap and I sit down and write the first line, then I need to find a rhymefor then end of the second one.
Just by knowing words Iwill find one eventually.
Those words are in your head.
The rhymes are already there.
And the more you practice, the closer they will come to the surface.
No need to sit down with the dictionary, no preparing rhymes, bylistening to hip-hop, you've already got thousandsof rhymes in your head already.
Remember how we're practicingby talking to a beat? That's because rhymes are tied to rhythm.
By forcing ourselves to getbetter at talking rhythmically, we are priming our brain to pick out and provide rhymes for us.
Also, pro-tip.
If someone ask you to rhyme supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, one you just need to rhyme ocious and two, they're a prick.
– Cheeky.
– I know it seems weird but do trust me, if you're forcing yourself to rhyme right from the very start, you're gonna have way more failures.
You're gonna get disheartenedand you're gonna give up.
I don't want that.
I want you to succeed.
So, don't worry about rhymes for now.
Eventually, they'll come.
(upbeat music) Cum.
(laughs) In a moment, I'm gonna give you my number one piece of advice.
But before I get too far ahead of myself, I wanna give you a quickword about thinking ahead.
People assume freestyle rappers are thinking several lines ahead of what they're currently saying.
When I ask the audience for suggestions, people think I'm preparingthe rap in my head right then.
That's not freestyling, that's writing and that's not fun for me.
Because for me, freestylingis about being present.
You have to exist in that moment.
I find if you think toomuch about your next line, you're gonna trip up andstumble over the line that you're currently on.
Great freestylers are not thinking ahead.
They are letting their mind flow freely from one thought and onto the next.
I'm not saying don'tset up a rhyme for a bar that you know it's gonna hit.
If you're rapping about communion wafers and you think of a greatrhyme for transubstantiation, you should go ahead and set that up but don't get too obsessed with this because you'll just findyourself filling time while you think aheadand missing opportunities that naturally present themselvesin the rap in the present.
That's getting intomore advanced territory and please do let me know in the comments if you want further explanations of topics I've discussed in this video or things about freestylingthat you would like covered in a future one.
Now, as promised it istime for the main secret and it is so simple.
Get a grill.
Gold, platinum, diamonds, the more bling the better.
No really, the number one secret to being able to freestyle, comfort.
(techno music) the best way to freestyleis to be comfortable while you are doing it.
Let me explain.
Most people are terrifiedof public speaking and that makes sense, it's an alien environment.
You're standing in frontof a crowd of people and you are the only personfacing the wrong way.
But when it comes totalking to your friends, you might be telling stories, jokes, making them laugh, you're not nervous.
And that's because in that environment, you are comfortable.
To become a great freestyle rapper, you need to develop this level of comfort.
And the process I'vetaught you in this video, all springs from and revolves around that one central concept.
We started out by talkingrather than rhyming.
Because talking is familiar to us.
It's comfortable.
We're talking over a beatthat we already like.
A beat that we already know, a beat that is alreadyin our muscle memory.
We're rapping with our friendrather than with strangers.
We're leaning in to our strengths, emphasizing aspects of us thatwe're more comfortable with.
And most of all, we'repracticing in the shower.
A place we've been thousandsof times in our life.
Except you Queen Isabella of Spain.
People talk about pushingus out of our comfort zone.
To do that, you needto establish one first.
Freestyle rap is already so fun out of people's comfort zones and that is one of the reasons why it's so exciting andit's one of the reasons why we love it.
When I started rapping in public, it was so scary, thereis no doubt about that.
I was nervous but nervesare just adrenaline and adrenaline, is your friend.
It helps you think quicker which improves your freestyles but you have to keep itunder control or you choke.
Shoulda worn your Crocs Marshall.
A big crowd is terrifyingand you can't shut them out because it's a freestyle thatyou have to engage with them you have to interact, that's what we do.
So I would tell myself.
That crowd is rooting for you.
They want you to succeed.
They want to be blown away.
They want to be on their feet.
And this help me get intoa more comfortable mindset.
Now, add to that the fact that I use the same beat to rap over, I wore the same clothes on stage.
Everything to make me ascomfortable as possible.
In one round of performances, I was closing the show witha really complex freestyle.
I would take childhoodmemories from the audience and weave them together into acohesive, coherent narrative.
It was a hard freestyle to pull off.
To make myself more comfortable, I brought a rug from theapartment I was renting and put it on the stage.
So when I was on that rug, Iknew I could do that freestyle.
If you watch me wrap, you'llnotice I introduce every rap with the same exact sentence.
Don't worry, it won't beanywhere near as atrociously, embarrassingly bad as you'reexpecting a privately educated, middle-class white boy to be.
(audience laughs) In the 18 years I've been doing this, I've done thousands of raps.
And that little mantrais one of my anchors.
It's one of the thingsthat keeps me comfortable.
The more comfortable you are, the closer you are to the flow state where your subconscious mind takes over and does all the hard work for you and makes your freestyles better.
But that's for another video where I will explain in more detail how you can take yourfreestyling to the next level so do subscribe so you don't miss out.
To recap, what are you gonna do? Listen to rap.
Practice to a beat.
Talk over that beat.
Do this everyday in the shower.
Talk around a topic as well as about it.
Don't worry about rhyming.
Don't get caught up thinking ahead.
And get comfortable.
That's it.
There are links and resources in the description of this video, including a link to checkout those little pills for your brain and pleasedo use the comments to ask me any questions you have about learning to freestyle.
Let me know how you're getting on, share tips with everyone else and if you have to, you can just text me.
Thank you so much for watching.
Now, go take a shower.
(upbeat music).
