Hip Hop Is Not Dead, Just Diseased!

It is not a coincidence that the music industry is in a death roll, and choking on it's own puke. The RIAA wants to blame it all on piracy, counterfeiting and bootlegging. I do agree that a large part of the problem is piracy, but part of the problem lies within the infrastructure of the greedy major distribution companies that have pushed, fought and tied the hands of the interconnected companies to the business, the fake promotional companies that saw a means to earn "easy money" off of no good music, and music software companies that have made it much easier for these artists to record music that would have been totally ignored years ago. Their insane pursuit of profit has inspired the current business models out there, and the state of the business that promotes bad music only to stay afloat within their own individual businesses. The age of technology has placed the "physical" domain against the ropes and the "digital" domain has began to take over all sectors of the business, from radio airplay, to sales, to advertising, to recording. Just this year alone, digital sales will go beyond physical sales for the first time in the history of the music industry. Now the major distributors to keep up with faltering physical sales, want to lower the retail price of a cd, when they were the cause of raising prices in the first place.

There are more garbage rappers in the business today that believe they are "next", because they have a high play count on their My Space players, a huge following on Twitter, Face Book, and numerous other social networking sites, and the misconception that if they throw a million mixtapes out there, of other artists original or sampled (mostly not licensed) music tracks, that it will all spell S.U.C.C.E.S.S. Sorry, but all this not a rapper it makes! Just because your homies or your neighbors kids told you that you were tight, does not make you have talent. There is too much garbage out there! The same lines, the same hoe this, bitch this, trap this, floss this, swag this, bang this, fly this, fly that, auto tune gangsters! So before you knock me or this article, I've put in the work in 17 years of working at a major music distributor to know not only the infrastructure of the business, and as a buyer at this distributor, was bombarded weekly with tons of no good music from artists that couldn't even put a proper promotional package together, with a "one sheet', or any other pertinent information except they performed at a local show a million times.

A&R reps are not even considering those artists with a high count on their players, unless they have other music that has not been "burned out"! Ask around if you don't believe me.

You may even have that "elusive street cred" rappers seek, but that still does not make you a rapper, because you shot at, or was shot at! Too many followers and not enough leaders! Now Drake is on top, who probably wouldn't even be considered a few years back, while other auto tune mixtape gangsta rappers wonder why they can't get out of the "industry rut" they are in.

Now don't get it twisted, I do believe if done the right way, a mixtape can be a good promotional tool (in conjunction with a commercial release), but that is just it, a promotional tool, not your album! Then you want a million bloggers to post it on their blogs, and every hip hop mixtape website out there to put it up for sale, when more than likely none of the tracks were even licensed from the first original artist/producer that put it out. And the "Holy Grail" is thinking that by placing a video feed or music player (that automatically plays and clogs up that person's profile) on a million of your "followers" and "friends" pages on all the social networking sites you belong to, that you are promoting. That is not promoting, that is pissing people off! Especially other artists and producers that are promoting their own music.

If you currently are paying any fake promotional company (pay the legitimate companies with proven results) to post your music on their sites, and email blast your mix tape or original music to "their users", STOP! Most of them only want to charge you a fee to keep running their sites, and boost readership of their sites and blogs. If you are paying to perform at open mic nights or show cases, STOP! They only are charging you to keep their nights running and pay for advertising material that will largely end up on the ground any way.

Greedy major distributors and fake promotional companies (pushing mostly mixtapes and garbage rappers, vice good original music only to boost readership of their sites and blogs) have forced the hand of media, life style brand, and radio broadcasting companies to promote the mess that is out there now, and die or lose consumers. Look at what happened to smooth jazz/jazz stations across the country! Where are the true R&B artists these days? Why do you think a rapper like Drake has shine now, who does not have a "street" persona? Consumers want better music, simple and plain! Things are changing, but the change is too slow.