Rappers are known to be wordy individuals. In the past, studies have been done on rap lyrics, but now a new study has been released by lyric site Musixmatch about which artists, across all genres, have the largest vocabularies. The study concluded four rappers lead that list -- Eminem, Jay Z, Tupac and Kanye West -- taking the title away from Bob Dylan, who many consider among the greatest songwriters of his generation.
The study took the 99 best-selling artists of all time minus Bruce Springsteen, Chicago, Def Leppard, Journey, The Beach Boys and The Doors (who do not license their music to Musixmatch). The 93 remaining artists were split up across 25 genres to try and have a better range of music.
The study looked at each artist's 100 most word-heavy songs and saw how many different words they used over those songs. Eminem topped the list at 8,818 words, while Jay Z came in just behind the Detroit rapper with 6,899. Tupac got third place with 6,569 and then Kanye West follows him at 5,069. Bob Dylan rounds out the top 5 just behind Yeezy with 4,883 words.
For all of the good, there are those who like to keep it very simple with their vocabulary. Kenny G is at the very bottom with 809 words, which isn't surprising at all. Bruno Mars, the Spice Girls and Lionel Richie rounded out the bottom four in the study.
This study only factored in the amount of unique words an artist said in a song, not the combinations or the actual message that may be contained within it. It isn't surprising to see rappers at the top of the list as hip-hop is a word-heavy genre, however this does vindicate, in way, some of the best (Tupac, Eminem and Jay Z) as lyricists.
Read the full study here.
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