• » Name: Meka Soul
• » Location: Los Angeles, CA
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	July 2007
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Slap-Boxing With Jesus

Rappers R N Danja

You’ll have to excuse my somewhat toned-down demeanor this time, as I’ve pretty much spent the past three days hibernating in my one room mansion. Sometimes staying away from the clusterfuck known as civilization tends to soften my mood. I guess I’m still salty that Pharoahe Monche’s latest album sold about 230 copies per state in his first week. Plus, I’ve been blasting that Jay Electronica joint found in my Southern blogging brother from another mother Opinion’s latest post. See aliya, we can play nice.

During the 4th of July I’d gotten into several conversations with my cousin throughout the day that touched on a variety of topics, from sports (trade Gilbert for Kobe), to politics (the Bush Administration is the most powerful gang out right now) to women (30 and over women is that crack. Sorry, Brill.) to our background (Nigeria stays losing) to music. While I’ll spare you the details of some of our more colorful banter, the most prevalent theme revolved around the poor sales record of great artists.

While it’s annoying to see so many no-hit wonders come and go quicker than Japan’s bullet trains, the reason they exist to this day is because the entire music game is a lot different than what it used to be. I don’t know if anybody’s noticed, but the entire music industry has taken a huge hit, not just hip-hop (although I think it’s taken the brunt of it). Record sales are down all across the board, and everybody’s trying to do whatever it takes to stay afloat. In that sense, it’s not surprising to see cats like T.I. pushing gas-guzzling vehicles. In his defense though, I’ve seen much worse. Damn, Chris.

As I’ve stated before, it’s frustrating to see genuinely talented artists otherwise fail miserably sales-wise. As much as I’d like to see them succeed, I already know it may never happen due to a variety of elements that are both in and out of their control. Whereas one may think that the lack of promotion lies solely on the label’s inability to properly promote their acts (as J-23 recently described to me how Jive’s underbosses pretty much Fat Manned Hell Hath No Fury), some of the blame can also be placed on the artist for their reluctance to promote their own shit.

With the advent of the digital sale, it’s now become easier for those who don’t want to sift through an entire album to grab their favorite song(s). This may have been a double-edged sword however, as now labels have actually signed acts to singles deals, making the lifespan of an artist even shorter than before, as well as causing former distributing powerhouses such as Tower Records to vanish. Can we really be pickle-faced at the industry for trying to force-feed us crap we won’t see within a year?

Rappers and fans alike can bitch and moan all day about missing that “real hip-hop,” but the fact is today’s scene is not going to change any time soon. “Real” music is out there, and they’re not that hard to find. I’m one to talk, though; I’ve only bought one album this year myself, and I have a spindle full of CD’s that house nothing but the MP3s I’ve “collected” over the years. But that’s just the contradictory nature of the business these days.

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