A Soundboard Designed For Rappers' Delight: A Q+A With The Creator of The Rap Board

Soundboards are a curious phenomenon of the Internet age, and nearly as old as the Internet itself. I’m not sure why, but there’s some sort of instantaneous gratification to clicking buttons and hearing crazy phrases from your favorite figures burst forth. It fondles some strange region of the creative part of your brain. They’re a throwback to the silly, mischievous days of prank calls and throwing toilet paper at houses. They’re adult Speak & Spells with a distinctly idiotic twist.

The Rap Board appeared this week, and it’s brilliant. All these tough, carefully manicured faces just staring at you. They’ve all got their own quirks and styles, but they all embody the kind of thin, glossy machismo that characterizes modern rap. That each face can be distilled to a scowl and a couple of one liners is possibly the best review/indictment of current rap as a whole. Long gone are the days of intricate rhymes and storytelling. Beats, rhymes and life has been replaced with scowls, tats and catch phrases. Laughs aside, The Rap Board—unintentionally or not—makes one depressing point: Rap, the moneyed part of the genre that deserves a capital ‘R’, in 2011 is really no different than pro wrestling. It’s a harsh thing to say, but spend some time clicking on those faces and try to argue. You can’t.

I emailed Louis-Philippe Riel, the Montreal native who created the site, to chat about rap, soundboards and the fleeting fame of single-purpose sites in this Internet era.

Who are you? DJ? Rap afficionado? Dude who likes catch phrases?

I’m an art director that lives in SF. I tried DJing and I suck at it. This website exists because I love design and rap and I wanted to mix both for a personal project.

How’d you pick the rappers?

I love rap and I think rappers’ ad-libs are a big part of rap. Almost every rapper has their own signature ad-lib. I picked my personal favorites and really what I could find. As you can see I’m more Ross, Waka, Gucci, Dipset, Cash/Young Money than A Tribe Called Quest , Black Sheep & Wu Tang. Who’s your favorite?

I think Rick Ross has the best ad-libs. But Waka, Gucci and Three-6-Mafia are also up there.

Where did you get the audio from?

That took a lot of time because I wanted to grab clean sound bites with no background music. So I usually have to find acapellas or if I’m lucky I can grab an intro, freestyle or interview that has the ad-lib I’m looking for.

Has anyone complained about the site?

No complaints from rappers yet. Don’t know if any of them saw the site… I think it’s closer to sampling than stealing. I don’t think they’ll lose sales because of this. Maybe they’ll get more sales…Maybe? I’m getting more complaints about putting Big Sean or Soulja Boi and there. Or selecting the wrong ad-lib for Vado. Or about not putting ATCQ or Wu Tang there. Getting everything is really difficult so I’ll try to update the site every week. I have a friend that will help me add some features that people have been asking for: Keystrokes and dragging and dropping the sounds to a timeline. iPhone app should launch soon and we’ll see if the buzz dies after that.

Is this your first soundboard? How about your first single-purpose site?

Yes, first soundboard site. I usually spend 5 minutes on them and forget they exist. I think people love them because they’re funny to use but also because it gives them control over their favorite tv shows/movies/etc. They can do whatever they want with the sounds.

Also, first single-serving website. I usually love them. Animals Being Dicks. Kim Jong Il Looking at Things. But the day after, everyone usually forgets about them. They are usually one-hit wonders and my website will probably become one…

Have you ever thought about doing a tribute corner to dead rappers, replete with candle GIFs?

Friends have suggested doing something special for Heavy D but I don’t know if it’s the right place to do it. I will definitely try to add more 2Pac, Biggie, Big L, Big Pun, etc…

So the real question: Why?

I love rap and I thought that having an encyclopedia of rap ad-libs could be fun. Rap ad-libs are something that, at some point, rap lovers will have an argument about. (What’s the best ad-lib ever? What rapper right now has the best ad-libs?) I coulnd’t find anything about it on the web (except weird rap message boards) and made it into a soundboard to make it more playful.