– Editorial Written by Dave House
I remember walking into a record shop called Scratch Records (shouts to Big Dawg Pitbull Hot 97 DJ Bobby Trends) in my old hometown of Irvington, NJ with my homey DJ Kaleem (resident DJ out in the Los Angeles market) and seeing vinyl cover to “Who Got the Props” by Black Moon. Kaleem purchased the album strictly on the strength of the vinyl cover and rushed home to play the record on his SP 1200. Eventually the video for “Who Got the Props” would come on Video Music Box with the Honorable Ralph Mc Daniels and since then Black Moon expanded into what we know today as the Boot Camp Clique.
The reason why I had to write this is because when it came to the music, there was more to the actual experience of hearing the music back then. It was an experience on how we got the music; the trip to the store, to the rush home to hear the record. There are many ways to experience the debut or the recurrence of a record outside of just going to the record store after-school. There just needs to be more effort in the email blast we send and receive. The records we hear on radio have to actually fit the format of the AUDIENCE and not the ADVERTISERS. That’s why records released since Yung Joc “Its Going Down” have came and went. Even the so-called #1 Records on the charts. Here are some of the reasons why records aren’t catching on with the audience these days:
1. Same Tired Topic: You’re Rich. You got Haters. You got Guns. You got Girls. Defining the artist as one thing instead of a diversity of things.
2. Delusional: The artist is rich before the first video was shot and released. Gone are the days of seeing Nas wearing an Army Jacket lining in a “It Ain’t Hard to Tell” video. Fast-forward to 2012, “Shorty, Hey What’s Your Price” with Ginuwine should have been his break-out introductory single for Nastradamus, and we should have never received Illmatic according to todays standards.
3. The Record Labels: Gone are the days of record companies releasing the records you give them, these days they won’t approve a budget if it doesn’t fit the “George Jefferson” like standards of the budget approver from the label who’s still spending Guns & Roses money.
So How Do We Solve These Problems???
We have to realize music is becoming more of a niche-based market. All Artisst need to sign to “WI-FI Records”. If you have WI-FI, you have Distribution. If you have YouTube, you have Video. If you have Facebook or Twitter you have a CORE AUDIENCE. Then just do more hands-on campaigning. Stop waiting for the fans to come to you and you go to the fans. Schools, Barber-shops, Salons, Malls, I’ts not just the club where the delusional are gonna win.
Come on lets face it, chicks who act like they’re in high-school, fighting on Reality TV shows, have more of a buzz these days than a rapper who actually has talent. They are taking all the club appearance money that the rappers should be making in the same fashion that the rappers took all the acting gigs in the 90’s. Where’s “I Love New York” now? Where is Hoops now? Where’s the other chick with the fatty that was in the good homey Tony Yayo’s video for “Sensual Seduction” ? Quiet as a church mouse as ‘Pac would say.
Don’t let Hip Hop water itself down to JUST Reality TV, because just like yesterdays’ Reality Stars, Hip Hop will die right along with that same Reality TV Star who had a buzz for about 15 minutes. Let’s get back to WHY we like music. Let’s go back to WHY music is a part of the soundtrack of our daily operation. Lets bring it back to having options with our variety of music, verses being labeled as a hater if we don’t like what the masses are subscribing to.
It’s ok to not like Drake without being a hater, and it’s ok to like Drake if he spits a clever line or has a clever record, or a catalog of music that actually fits the format of YOUR Lifestyle. It’s ok to have options; Explore and Discover New Music and don’t just sit there waiting for a Label or Promoter to present an Artist to you.
All those who are caught saying “I didn’t know “such-and-such” had an album dropping, are the ones who never walked into a “Scratch Records”, saw something new, and purchased it just because you wanted to have what others didn’t. We as an audience have become so “sheep-ish”, that unless its right here in front of us, we are not even looking. And if what’s in front of you is chicks fighting and being dysfunctional on a cable network, then yes, how would you ever know that a hit record is in your Inbox or at the Record-shop, or even at Walmart.
Let’s do more on the strength of hearing Good Music. Music stops time and make you reflect on life. If you love life, lets get back to what helps us reflect it the best: Music.
#WHOOOOSHOUSE
Dave House, Founder of WHOOOOSHOUSE WORLDWIDE, LLC
Over 50 Million Records Sold/Over 100 Million Spins Detected
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