HIEUTHUHAI is fierce but technically weak.

HIEUTHUHAI returns with a song that bears many traces of underground hiphop, different from the songs he has released recently.

HIEUTHUHAI is rising rapidly. Through the program Brother say hi , Hieu owns a series of songs with high rankings on the trending list such as Ngo, Sao hang A, Walk ,... With the increased attention and fans, it is not difficult to understand why the number of mixed opinions about HIEUTHUHAI has also increased compared to before.

The peak of the controversy was when Hieu accepted to sit in the guest seat, on par with Thai VG and Justatee in round 2 of Rap Viet. Even though he did not directly participate in the scoring and elimination, many viewers still thought that placing him next to two big names in the hip hop world was excessive and unworthy. It can be said that after the successes and praise from Hi brother , this is the first time HIEUTHUHAI has had to receive so many negative comments.

And like many other underground rappers, HIEUTHUHAI's response was to "put on music". Presentation was released after the above controversies, and quickly climbed to the top of trending after only 1 day of release, proving his current top appeal in Vpop.

Strange to mainstream

For pop/mainstream artists, receiving criticism from the public is not uncommon. There are also cases of using music to respond (in Vpop, Phi Phuong Anh once released Butterfly of Deception to deal with criticism of their singing) but usually not directly, but implicitly so that the song can still reach the majority.

On the contrary, in the underground community, making music to “diss” each other is quite normal. Rap Viet has also had many famous names thanks to diss rap such as Hung Cao, Viet Dragon, or the famous names in the mainstream today Rhymastic or Bray also rose from this genre. In the middle of this year, the music battle between Richchoi and ICD - 2 “diss rap warriors” in the Northern rap community - also attracted great attention, the songs in this “battle” also entered the top trending.

Meanwhile, HIEUTHUHAI has never been a rapper familiar with this genre. Right from the beginning of his reputation in the underground community, he was known for his cheerful, light-hearted raps with a bit of flirting like Crab good Turn on the music , Sounds Like Love . As he moved mainstream, his two biggest hits were also Sleep alone good Can't get drunk - songs about love and also do not have many rap/hiphop elements. The general audience is familiar with this image of HIEUTHUHAI, so when he released Presentation is quite a surprise to those who have known him for a short time.

The release of Trinh is a surprise in a position like HIEUTHUHAI's current position.

LIVE Trinh , HIEUTHUHAI still collaborates with the familiar producer of the Gerdnang team, Kewtiie, but here Kewtiie has removed all the bright, easy-to-listen sounds that he usually makes for Hieu's music, and replaced them with the typical underground roughness and powerful bass that seems to want to blow away the opponent - things that listeners often see in rap diss. Presentation also 4 minutes and 35 seconds long - not too much in the rap diss genre but more than all the tracks on the album Everyone has to start somewhere. (with an average length of only about 3 minutes). That gives Hieu more space to develop his lyrics.

In Trinh , Hieu also exploited more of his rap/hiphop techniques, most notably the ability to rhyme 3 with phrases. “I'm so cool - Watching someone take a bath” . Kewtiie also put a transition in the middle of the song, switching from old school to trap, to help Hieu have the opportunity to change the flow.

HIEUTHUHAI's technology is still immature.

In the most prominent “battle” of the Vietnamese rap/hiphop world this year between Richchoi and ICD, both have taken this genre to a new level when instead of just making music to criticize, exploit the opponent’s weaknesses and flex themselves as usual, both also made very long tracks with a duration of over 6 minutes, the track release time is short but still ensures quality, using many metaphorical images with high damage. In particular, ICD also predicted the content that Richchoi would use in his song to release a response song just a few hours after Richchoi released the song.

Compared to the somewhat "bloody" battles in the underground world, Presentation HIEUTHUHAI's lyrics are quite gentle because first, he doesn't target any specific audience but "haters" in general, and second, HIEUTHUHAI still operates mainly in the mainstream market, it's difficult for him to use the same level of harshness in his lyrics as rappers in the "underground world".

Facing many obstacles, HIEUTHUHAI could not show much damage in Trinh.

However, due to many obstacles, HIEUTHUHAI's implementation of lyrics is not sharp. Because there is no specific target to criticize, what Hieu can respond to is mainly flexing about himself. But that is his weakness when the achievements he gives are mainly in the commercial aspect such as how much money he earns, how many shows he runs,... while opinions related to the level or "deservingness" of sitting on the same level as Thai VG and Justatee, Hieu has not been able to "break".

Rap technique in Presentation Hieu's style is also shown more in mainstream products, but to say that he is "high level" in rap/hiphop in general or diss rap in particular is not true. His flow has not changed much, his lyrics are not profound, and his delivery is still "gentle", not really fighting. Hieu's strongest moment in the song is when he uses "heavy" words to criticize the haters' comments as "brainy". The rest of the song is not really different from what he showed in Everyone has to start somewhere .

Presentation is a move that can be said to be successful for Hieu, as it both responded to negative comments and brought him new commercial success. However, to gain recognition in the diss rap genre, Presentation still haven't done it yet.

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