DiamondGlove said:

Quote of the day

Oh Man, this is one of my favorite topics, along with the degradation of R&B and Hip-Hop.

They R actually related, because they both took a "downturn" at roughly the same time... early 2 mid '90s.

Of course, a generation before that, and we had even more diversity, and distinctive image.

PSA

In America, every 15 seconds a musician is snuffed out.

Our government isn't doing anything about it, and many feel powerless, but it only takes one person to make a difference.

Fight SHIT HOP DISEASE.

Tell people where they can go with all that hip hop bull.

Next time you come across one of these clowns, go across their face with a P-Funk record.

Brought to you by the African Methodist Baptist Lutheran Apostolic Church of Gawd and James Brown's good foot

So true. You totally understood what I was saying, broke it down even further, and are 100% correct. Great post.

Oh, I haven't forgot about those damn corporations. The shit hoppers are the puppets and the corporations are the ones pulling the strings. Hip hop was around before they got their hands on it, and some of it was even shit hop also, but it didn't dominate everything. When corporations saw there was a white audience who could bring in huge sales, they immediately saw that they could make much bigger profits than before because they could spend very little to make it. R&B artists or groups started getting signed to record deals less and less. Why spend more money to make their music and then it might not even crossover to a white audience either (the huge sales).

Then corporations started monopolizing radio to keep shit hop alive and make sure that anything else that might have slipped through the cracks on a small label, didn't get airplay. No airplay means no sales. No sales means it can't compete with shit hop and possibly drive it out of style. Then the labels would have to go back to spending more money to make music again.

No, I haven't forgot about those son of a bitches. Don't even get me started on them. Those dirty, shitty, motherfuckin', asshole, son of a bitchin' bastards.

vainandy said:

Well the corporation era is over!,the net has changed all the rules, and they are not making the money they used to.

Secondly, corporations never cared what they sold, the will sell whatever they can make a profit on, they are unbiased in this way.
IF people are buying hip-hop, they will get it to the market, if Prince type records were flying off the shelf, they would have lots of Prince type records on the market.
They dont care about the music, the type of music, only that it sells.
Thats ALWAYS been the case.

People fell for the BS as well.

The industry really got in people's heads.

Shit hop is a damn cult. That's what shit hop fans sound and act like generally.

They remind me of the Heaven's Gate leader.



You will wear Adidas and wait for the spaceship.


[Edited 4/30/08 15:32pm]

i never thought that when i got to be my parents age when i was a teenager, that i'd be complaining about the music that "those damn kids" are listening to today because it's too boring and conservative. but it's true. if i had a kid, i would ban hannah montana from our home - she'd have to hide such vile contraband in the jewel cases of the "father approved" betty davis and frank zappa CDs i bought her.

Image is one of those things that I have tried hard to put far behind talent and that's because:

(1) Fashion repeats itself...never throw anything away. All you have to do is look at a fashion magazine and see why the music industry is in the shitter. Nothing is original anymore so an artist's lack of an interesting image doesn't surprise or sadden me. This year, the 80s will make a comeback (look at Kanye West and Rhianna) and everyone will borrow 80s tracks to use as backgrounds on their newest album aka steaming pile of dog poo on CD, and a trend will form and kids who weren't alive during that decade will attach to it, worship it, and buy it.

(2) It's all about making money nowadays and many artists have gone to making their own clothing lines and thus using music videos as a double marketing tool: to sell their album and to sell their new fashion label or other business venture. Many of the clothes look like shit you can pick up at Wal-Mart except they don't come with Wal-Mart's slashed prices. It's a money game so when money comes into the picture, it unfortunately takes precedence over the music.


(3)Corporations run the show and not the artists. If something profitable isn't patented by one company, than every other company is going to get one just like it because it brings in the money. Most record labels aren't willing to be different and daring enough to heavily promote an artist that is not copying what is popular. It's a gamble that could result in lots of money lost and unfortunately, that's not something that many current record labels are willing to do. They want an artist who produces a sound that sells albums and an image that pushes those sales because it's what the majority of music listeners/buyers will be willing to financially fall behind. Point blank, if it isn't on Billboard's Top 100, then they aren't going to invest time and money into it. They don't want someone with a unique voice. They want someone who sounds like another label's popular, top-selling artist because that artist is making that label a shitload of cash. While record companies are far from dumb, many of the artists sit right next to stupid. They go in listening to the group of people hired as artist development and do what they are told...not realizing that the competitor label has one just like them, who has been out longer and has a huge fanbase already established.


(4)Sex sells even more now than in the past, so many female artists rely on looking like over-paid hookers to sell themselves to the public, because nowadays that's apparently considered cool and sexy. They just keep trying to outdo each other by being more half-dressed and outrageous than their rival and it just cheapens their image. I'm not going to pay to watch an over-paid (many times over-rated) stripper pretending to be an artist. Some videos are like soft core porn snippets. They just distract from how terrible the song is with it's borrowed beats and wack ass lyrics.

"What Happened to Image?" -- lust for money and many artist desperate need for public adoration, otherwise known as attention whore syndrome or AWS , is what happened. If an artist has something amazing to offer, musically and artistically, than what image they possess shouldn't really matter, but, sadly, it does and if the majority of the public wants to see shitty hip-poppers rocking their own fashion labels and making albums with borrowed beats on 90% of the record than that's what record labels will give them. The phrase, "Less is more" has taken over the music biz in more ways than one.

BTW, Great Topic Blaqueknight!

violetblues said:

The corporation era of the music industry isn't over until the Sony/BMG, Universial, The WB Music Group, & EMI are all filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy AND when media companies like Clear Channel Communications have nothing but talk radio on AM & FM.

The inherent problem with "image" as it relates to music is that if something is viewed as cutting edge, it becomes co-opted into the mainstream.

My earlier statements were not meant to indict a genre of music, but moreso the puppet masters who seek out "cool" and manipulate the image.

Appearance--

If you look at the punk styles of the 1970's in the UK or the US, the clothing and music was counter culture. It rebelled against the mainstream. Now you can go to Target and by the "punk" look as modeled by "punk-lite wanna bes" like Avril, Green Day and some of these other MTV/record company Pinocchio characters.

With hip hop, the artists were ahead of the curve in most cases in promoting their own products (clothing lines, CD's, etc). When the corporate powers that be recognize that the kids were wearing the what was street (from the Adidas of Run DMC to the most recent styles), they wanted a piece of the pie as well. This all leads to the blandness that is prevalent in the images. If something aestheticaly works well on one artist, why not put it on all artist to make them more punk or street?

violetblues said:

I disagree.Those artists have nothing to be ashamed of.They created an image,an identity for themselves.We can't say the same about most of today's artists.Many of them blend in with everyone else.They don't stand out.

A lot of artist and record labels seemingly chose not to opt for the larger than life personas that ran rampant in the industry during the 70's-90's due to being viewed as nothing more than gimmick or fad. While there are a few exceptions, the portrayal of an around-the-way type artist is generally viewed nowadays as more approachable/accessible.

Too bad that route can't be taken with their music, which when paired with a dull image, is just downright appalling.
[Edited 5/1/08 5:39am]

I agree that if another genre costs more to make than shit hop and starts outselling shit hop, they will drop shit hop and go with the next genre. It's true, they don't care what kind of music sells, as long as it sells.

However, if they can continue selling the cheapest made music possible to the public, it is in their best evil interests to keep everything else that is more expensively made out. With more expensively made music, they would still have profits, but these greedy bastards want mega profits regardless of the sound. The only thing they wouldn't mind overthrowing shit hop, would be acapella music with no instruments. They don't have a problem with someone simply sitting on a stool playing an accoustical guitar either with no other instruments around. I remember they were on that kick for a while also and getting folks all hyped up by stressing that "they can play" and hoping the public didn't notice how cheap it was to make it. And the fact that it was dull, well hell, they didn't care about that either.

BlaqueKnight said:

My bad....moving forward

BlaqueKnight said:

Precisely.

As an Hip Hop artist signed to a major label. I feel your pains! Hip hop artists are rarely signed now a days. They are few and far between. Crap rappers and using the phrase sh*t hop is very true. There was always the cash cow rapper without skills but a gimmick(Hammer, Ice Ice). Now it is easier to market a T-Pain than a Common. It is also easy to look like a T Pain. So a brilliant marketing guy who went to school for 8 years who is an "expert" says to the A&R "I was in the club and people were doing XYZ therefore we need an artist who is doing XYZ"
Let's compare Common to T Pain shall we -
Dress style
Common - Strange thirft store gear ( which in reality has become expensive)
T Pain - White T's, 'crispy' jeans, nike ( cheap to buy in fact they sell them at liqour stores)
Lyrical style
Common - Deep, introspective, thoughtful
T Pain - getting drunk in the club
Appearance
Common - healthy, fit, woman go crazy over dude
T Pain - Beer gut, strange looking

Now how is easy it to be a T-Pain? So you can hit a crowd who can easily look and act like T Pain. how many people can you market Common to? I like both artists but I grew up on Common. Common is grown folks music and ideals. T Pain is any drunk idiot willing buy a chick a drink. There you have it. As far as hip
hop. Rakim is considered in some circles( to me) the best emcee of all time. He has never seen the sales of TPain. Never will. So from a business stand point who would you put the money behind?

Keep in mind before the music software came about. You had to spend alot of time in the studio or a stage perfecting your craft. Now any hump with an ACER and backup hard drive can make a CD. Add myspace and youtube in the picture, the gates to hell have been left open.
[Edited 5/1/08 9:53am]

To answer the original post - there are plenty of people that are still "individual" about style and image in today's music

MJ, Andre 3000, Knarles Barkley, Ms. Badu, even Dru hill, Marilyn Manson etc.

There was definitly a shift away from flamboyance and wacky outfits in the 80's as to make artists and music (esp Hip Hop and R&B) more accesable to people. It kind of makes sense that women and young girls identify with Beyonce, Toni Braxton and Mary. They sing songs that speak to a certain demographic. R. Kelly speaks to a certain demographic. The image and clothes should go along with that package.

I don't think you'll see Madonna rock a pointed bra anytime again. It's old and a gimmic. TLC only wore condoms for one album.

Time has moved on.

WillieDynamite said:

I didn't say there weren't any; I even mentioned Erykah in my post. Its not a "gimmick" when an artist's creative expression is involved. I only mentioned the pointed bra as an example. Madonna has been the most consistently changing artist in recent music history. You can't nail Madonna's style with one thing. She always changes. That's not my point. Are you trying to allude that artists of the 70s and 80s didn't speak to their respective generations? If so, I suggest you look at concert ticket sales. You'll find that the artists that are selling the most are from said generations. I'd say that speaks volumes.
Its this pandering to egos that has been incorporated into society since the 90s that has also contributed to this mentality. The "I need to look and act like you for you to listen to me" mentality is all ego stroking the American public. A lot of hip-hop artists wear the same shit. As Dance mentioned, its to build a brand. That's because these fashionista ass fools would rather hock clothes than make music. Why? Because they kinda suck at making music. The primary interest with a lot of these so-called "artists" is money. Some of them use the music business to wash drug money, some use it as a stepping stone to other things, etc. Its not a new concept but it certainly seems more commonplace these days. I believe the expression is "going corporate". The music is homogenized. The imagery is homogenized, too. All so that some company can make more money off the shit they are selling. It ties into why you see less boutique clothing stores than you used to. You can go to the GAP and dress like Nelly, 50, Snoop, Diddy, Lil Wayne, Justin Timberlake, Chris Brown, T-Pian, Kanye, etc., etc., etc. Its all about "building a brand" to a lot of these artists, which means music is less of a concern to them than being a corporate model.
Since so much of it is homogenized, the originality is sucked out. Its sucked out of the music and the clothing. A lot of artists no longer express themselves creatively in music or in dress. Its not about being a clown but more about not looking like you just got off your day job and walked onto the stage or not having an identity that looks just like everyone else's "identity."
These fools are BORING these days - boring on stage, boring to listen to and boring to look at. I guess some of you have embraced and rationalized this. I'm sure the corporations backing them are very happy with you. Good little sheeple.

BlaqueKnight said:

I agree and challenge that same list ", 50, Snoop, Diddy, Lil Wayne, Justin Timberlake, Chris Brown, T-Pian, Kanye, etc., etc., etc" to WHAT HAPPENED TO SUBSTANCE?????

BlaqueKnight said:

Indeed. Its funny how the flava of the month artist/pop tart artist find it necessary to mimic artist that have been in the biz 20 years or more.

Absolutely correct. I always knew that the record labels and radio stations of the 1990s and today had their reasons for keeping everyone else out but you raised a point that I never even thought of. Clothing lines would definately have a lot to gain in controlling the music industry also by having musical acts to endorse their products and then have the labels and stations to back them up on the other end by keeping everyone else out.

You can't sell clothes to the average Joe if all the stars are wearing things like thigh high boots (Rick James), purple foil coats (Prince), pirate outfits (Lakeside), cod pieces (Cameo), etc. First of all, those type clothes are usually custom made for the artists and secondly, there wouldn't be enough of a demand for the clothing lines to make these clothes for the general public because the average Joe wouldn't have the guts to wear them. Any idiot can throw on a pair of jeans, T shirt, and a baseball cap.

What trips me out though, is that these kids will pay high dollar for a brand name of jeans that has the same look as jeans that come from Walmart except the expensive ones have a brand name on them. Hell, I need to go to Walmart, buy a lot of cheap jeans, sew a brand name on them, and sell them to these idiots.

The main problem nowadays is once a "look" sells, every label searches for that carbon copy. Not that they didnt do that back in the day, BUT, now you wont get one or two copies you'll get 50, and the problem is that the IMAGE usually sucks and isnt unique. I remember recently watching LIVE AID on Dvd, and seeing how Bands just didnt give a crap what they looked like, they went out and played their sets. Phil Collins didnt even shave that morning, he went out there onstage with a 5'o clock shadow, and a tshirt. Freddie Mercury had a beer on top of his piano and a wfie beater on. Nowaydays if this show happend, everyone would have their stylist, rehearsels, etc,,,Todays Image is whatever sells for the moment, to me thats not image, its playing a part.

WillieDynamite said:

All of those people are packaged acts. They have no style other than the style their marketing teams hand them.

Anyway, music stopped being a business a long ass time ago(except for classic artists). As soon as shit hop was king people stopped buying records and going to shows, but they still watched shit hop's every move and bought everything they talked about and featured in videos. Americans are crackish about SUVs because of shit hop.

When the suits really started to take over they saw this and also realized it was easier and more profitable to sell everything that exists on the back of a rapper than it was to get people to the shows or to buy the records. The suits started to develop different models as the public responded well to not only this nonmusic but other forms of cheap, easy, uninspired nonmusic and avatars.

And these artists that like to talk about how they're these great businessmen and set all this in motion are full of crap and playing the part they were handed. Half of these people can't read. Most of them have no clue how the business works or what they sign. Some artists do hustle their stuff, but not that many.

Their popularity/their music career is a ghost created by their labels and companies so they can be walking commercials. The suits make the deals and artists get tossed crumbs, and as someone else said some of these "artists" are really dealers or involved in other dirt(Akon)and that is the ONLY reason they're paid.
[Edited 5/2/08 20:57pm]

Yo Black Knight

I'm Not disagreeing with you. I just was explaining why the change came about and also that there are decent artistic acts out there but you may have to search them out.


I do take offense to the sheep comment as I was in no way disagreeing with anyone and sometimes miss the pointed bra's and full-on male make-up of the 80's .

I live in Philly and trust me the true talent is out there, and you won't find it watching 106 and park.

WillieDynamite said:

"Sheeple" was meant to represent the American music buying public, not you directly. Music consumers today are sheep and many have embraced corporate model thinking willingly because their favorite artists also support it. Victims of mass ad campaigns and its almost inescapable.
Yeah, if you're in Philly, you already know what time it is. Half the good acts out there will never see the light of day in front of the American public. Its some great MySpace acts, though.

BlaqueKnight said:

The reason you hear alot of people argue today "that there are great artists you just have to search for them", the reason that argument didnt exist in the early days of music up until the later 80's was that MEDIA didnt own everything. As prince said one time all you had to do was look back to when MTV entered the scene, after a few years when they realized their power, and had spin-offs like Vh1 and BET, suddenly everyone jumped ship, sold out, sold their souls. Once that happend radio went the same way. There is NO RADIO today that is free to do what it wants to, remember back in the day when a DJ could flip a single and play the B side and that shit would chart, today a DJ is handed a list of 10 songs to jam down the SHEEP's throat, and thats the way it is. But blame as i have said before, goes all around, their are artists out there that could write their own ticket at this point, and im talking the Mariahs and Janets, but instead of changing the status quo they go along with it, and make us believe that they really had an URGE to work with TPAIN, give me a freaking break.

Labels, radio and video use to be the filter, but they no longer are a filter, they are a FUNNEL, passing what labels pay millions to get you to hear and then make you hear.