Record Sales and Digital Scales (ITS A GOOD READ!)

[mortuus est]

On why album sales and YouTube views aren't necessarily reliable barometers of hip-hop fandom in this era of gentrified taste and consolidated gatekeepers.

Hall of Game: Record Sales and Digital Scales | Features | Pitchfork

I'll post up some of the things that made me rub my chin hairs and squint my eyes

Twenty-one years ago, N.W.A.'s Efil4zaggin dethroned Paula Abdul's Spellbound from the top of the Billboard albums chart. It wasn't the first rap album to hit #1-- saccharine acts like MC Hammer, Vanilla Ice, and Tone Loc had been there before-- but it was definitely the first of its kind: A critically reviled and wholly nihilistic record that got very little radio play but still bullied its way into the charts through the sheer buying power of its listeners.

During the decade or so that followed, rap record sales were a reasonably accurate reflection of its core audience's taste (for better or worse). Sales had become a conduit for the interests of listeners who were historically underrepresented in the mainstream media. Even when the press and industry ignored grassroots stars-- usually of the regional or gangsta disposition-- the numbers spoke for themselves.

These days, rap album sales still dominate the conversation amongst the more dedicated fans of the genre. Major sites report first week numbers as if they're box scores, and fans violently hurl SoundScan data amongst one another and back @rappers via Twitter. A strong first-week outing can define the popular perception of an artist's relevance, a weak one can instantly destroy a career. The only problem is: Sales don't matter anymore. At all.

The commercially successful album-oriented rap artists aren't necessarily the ones with the most listeners, but the ones who are best able to rally their base to actually go out and buy their album. Support the artist is the mantra and, thus, the rappers whose music reflects the values of audiences with the most disposable income will forever win the SoundScan game. This is probably why white artists like Mac Miller and Macklemore (or black artists who have cultivated large and hyper-loyal white fanbases like Tech N9ne and Odd Future) are among the last rappers able to sell like gangbusters on an independent level. Or why milquetoast middle-class and -brow snapback rappers like J. Cole and Wale manage to move significantly more units to college kids than less-groomed, street-oriented counterparts like Waka Flocka and Yo Gotti do to their respective fanbases. [4] It's a gentrification of taste. Kids with disposable income on the outer perimeters of the culture are dictating its direction because they posses the income to displace the demands of the proverbial hood. (Which, again, isn't the end-all, be-all of hip-hop, but it is its birthplace.)

The "who" of rap record sales is dictated by the "where" of it as well. For many years, locally owned mom and pop stores were the hub for independent commerce, particularly for breaking and local artists. There would be no Cash Money without Peaches, no Sick Wid It without Leopold. This was the old model. A rapper could sell 50,000 records independently in their hometown and surrounding cities, a major label would come calling, and then they'd fanute that 50,000 into 500,000 or 5 million.

Master P's No Limit takeover could not happen in 2012.

Without the natural selection of hip-hop sales, it's become almost impossible for a middle-tier rap artist-- particularly one whose music caters to the streets, clubs, and/or teens-- to ascend to its upper tier without the explicit cosignature of existing upper-tier rap artists. Instead, the industry and, especially, the rappers who caught the last windfall of real egalitarian record-sales money and are somehow still standing-- Jay, Wayne, Kanye, Rick Ross-- have become the genre's sole gatekeepers, the liaisons to the mainstream audience that is still throwing money at artists.

Master P's No Limit takeover could not happen in 2012. He might silently make tens of thousands off of phoned-in guest spots and club dates on the modern day chitlin circuit but he wouldn't ever be able to turn this hustle into a multi-million-dollar empire. He'd never be able to buy his way into the national market without the hard sales data to quantify his success. And even if he did somehow manage to get in, he'd have a hard time justifying the deal or turning a major profit because most of his fans would just be racking up pageviews on Worldstar.

In much the same way, the actual creation of the retail album often feels like an act of tokenism. Outside of a handful of conscientious album-oriented acts, most major label rap albums feel like they exist solely as an excuse to celebrate a victory lap when their fans support them.

[4] In some cases the word "lyrical" has become a shorthand for "well spoken/educated" and is used to etch the line into this class divide.

[5] Most still-thriving, independently owned music stores are capital-I Indie Music stores and as much as the Indie media pays attention to urban music-- the rate of return on click throughs is enormous-- Indie retail frequently remains indifferent to it.

[6] It's worth noting that she was at least partially a victim of product placement as well. For some bizarre reason physical copies of her Something About Kreay were exclusively made available at the mall goth catering chain Hot Topic.

 

[mortuus est]

bump

 

[Mac Casper]

It says a lot when someone feels the average music listener needs a whole article filled with nothing but common sense

 

[RhymesWell]

Great read

 

[Harry B]

I don't know if the article was good or bad, seems like they were saying 1+1 = 2 in a nicer way.
Okay article, a C-.

Or why milquetoast middle-class and -brow snapback rappers like J. Cole and Wale manage to move significantly more units to college kids

How they gonna throw in Cole as a snapback or middle-class rapper though.
And Wale as "milquetoast", Cole has got that a lot but wale? From a white person at that...