Here Today... Gone To Hell!

Rap music faces alarming sales decline

NEKESA MUMBI MOODY -Associated Press -Feb 28, 2007



NEW YORK ? Maybe it was the umpteenth coke-dealing anthem or soft-porn music video. Perhaps it was the preening antics that some call reminiscent of Stepin Fetchit.

The turning point is hard to pinpoint. But after 30 years of growing popularity, rap music is now struggling with an alarming sales decline and growing criticism from within about the culture's negative effect on society.

Rap insider Chuck Creekmur, who runs the leading website Allhiphop.com, says he got a message from a friend recently ?asking me to hook her up with some Red Hot Chili Peppers because she said she's through with rap.A lot of people are sick of rap ... the negativity is just over the top now.?

The rapper Nas, considered one of the greats, challenged the condition of the art form when he titled his latest album Hip-Hop is Dead. It's at least ailing, according to recent statistics: Though music sales are down overall, rap sales slid a whopping 21 per cent from 2005 to 2006, and for the first time in 12 years no rap album was among the top 10 sellers of the year. A recent study by the Black Youth Project showed a majority of youth think rap has too many violent images. In a poll of black Americans last year, 50 per cent of respondents said hip-hop was a negative force in American society.

Nicole Duncan-Smith grew up on rap, worked in the rap industry for years and is married to a hip-hop producer. She still listens to rap, but says it no longer speaks to or for her. She wrote the children's book I Am Hip-Hop partly to create something positive about rap for young children, including her four-year-old daughter.

?I'm not removed from it, but I can't really tell the difference between Young Jeezy and Yung Joc. It's the same dumb stuff to me,? says Duncan-Smith, 33. ?I can't listen to that nonsense.... I can't listen to another black man talk about you don't come to the 'hood any more and ghetto revivals.... I'm from the 'hood. How can you tell me you want to revive it? How about you want to change it? Rejuvenate it??

Hip-hop also seems to be increasingly blamed for a variety of social ills. Studies have attempted to link it to everything from teen drug use to increased sexual activity among young girls.

Even the mayhem that broke out in Las Vegas during last week's NBA All-Star
Game was blamed on hip-hoppers. ?(NBA Commissioner) David Stern seriously
needs to consider moving the event out of the country for the next couple of
years in hopes that young, hip-hop hoodlums would find another event to
terrorize,? columnist Jason Whitlock, who is black, wrote on AOL.

While rap has been in essence pop music for years, and most rap consumers are white, some worry that the black community is suffering from hip-hop ? from the way America perceives blacks to the attitudes and images being adopted by black youth.

But the rapper David Banner derides the growing criticism as blacks joining
America's attack on young black men who are only reflecting the crushing
problems within their communities. Besides, he says, that's the kind of music
America wants to hear.?Look at the music that gets us popular ? Like a Pimp, Dope Boy Fresh,' he says, naming two of his hits.

?What makes it so difficult is to know that we need to be doing other things.
But the truth is at least us talking about what we're talking about, we can
bring certain things to the light,? he says. ?They want (black artists) to
shuck and jive, but they don't want us to tell the real story because they're
connected to it.?

Criticism of hip-hop is certainly nothing new ? it's as much a part of the culture as the beats and rhymes. Among the early accusations were that rap wasn't true music, its lyrics were too raw, its street message too polarizing. But they rarely came from the youthful audience itself, which was enraptured with genre that defined them as none other could.

?As people within the hip-hop generation get older, I think the criticism is
increasing,? says author Bakari Kitwana, who is currently part of a lecture
tour titled ?Does Hip-Hop Hate Women??

?There was a more of a tendency when we were younger to be more defensive of it,? he adds.

During her '90s crusade against rap's habit of degrading women, the late black activist C. Dolores Tucker certainly had few allies within the hip-hop community, or even among young black women. Backed by folks like conservative Republican William Bennett, Tucker was vilified within rap circles.

In retrospect, ?many of us weren't listening,? says Tracy Denean Sharpley-Whiting, a professor at Vanderbilt University and author of the new book Pimps Up, Ho's Down:Hip-Hop's Hold On Young Black Women.

?She was onto something, but most of us said, 'They're not calling me a bitch, they're not talking about me, they're talking about THOSE women.' But then it became clear that, you know what? Those women can be any women.?

One rap fan, Bryan Hunt, made the searing documentary Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes, which debuted on PBS this month. Hunt addresses the biggest criticisms of rap, from its treatment of women to the glorification of the gangsta lifestyle that has become the default posture for many of today's most popular rappers.

?I love hip-hop,? Hunt, 36, says in the documentary. ?I sometimes feel bad for criticizing hip-hop, but I want to get us men to take a look at ourselves.?

Even dances that may seem innocuous are not above the fray. Last summer,
as the Chicken Noodle Soup song and accompanying dance became a sensation, Baltimore Sun pop critic Rashod D. Ollison mused that the dance demonstrated in the video by young people stomping wildly from side to side ? was part of the growing minstrelization of rap music.

?The music, dances and images in the video are clearly reminiscent of the era
when pop culture reduced blacks to caricatures: lazy 'coons,' grinning
'pickaninnies,' sexually super-charged 'bucks,?' he wrote.

And then there's the criminal aspect that has long been a part of rap. In the
'70s, groups may have rapped about drug dealing and street violence, but rap
stars weren't the embodiment of criminals themselves. Today, the most popular and successful rappers boast about who has murdered more foes and rhyme about dealing drugs as breezily as other artists sing about love.

Creekmur says music labels have overfed the public on gangsta rap, obscuring artists who represent more positive and varied aspects of black life, like Talib Kweli, Common and Lupe Fiasco.

?It boils down to a complete lack of balance, and whenever there's a complete lack of balance people are going to reject it, whether it's positive or negative,? Creekmur says. Yet Banner says there's a reason why acts like KRS-One and Public Enemy don't sell any more. He recalled that even his own fans rebuffed positive songs he made ? like Cadillac on 22s, about staying way from street life ? in favour of songs like Like a Pimp.

?The American public had an opportunity to pick what they wanted from David Banner,? he says. ?I wish America would just be honest. America is sick.... America loves violence and sex.?

good, i hope it dies out and never returns (though what comes around goes around), lets hope rock n roll comes back around for another 20 years.

damn right  :)

Rock will always last, hip-hop is a limited genre.

I have nothing against rap, some of it was ok. A few years back I saw the up in Smoke tour DVD and was really impressed it was a good show.

   But Rap is getting old fast. It's all the same, all the rappers look alike (all wearing Basketball or football jerseys), all the videos look alike, the lyrics are the same nowadays, S-N-O-O-P coming to the N-Y-C straight from the C-A-L-I oh for christ's sake. Ride in my Benz with your Chanel and Louis Vuitton PULEEEEEEZE.



Everyones hour is up sometime, a few will survive. C-ya in fifteen years on the reunion tours

its just boring. same old beats, and silly people making "wooo" noises with "yeah" "yo" in the background too.

then some man rappin bout his ho's n bitches, and how ghetto he is.

BORING.

That's good news. For shizzle.

All the radio/tv friendly rap is just a joke anyway. One person likes it, and then it catches on, and all of a sudden it's the number one song on all those countdowns and it's the big thing. Then 2 weeks later, another song becomes popular. Like 50-cent. He was the big thing last year, I havent heard his name once this year except when people are making a joke.

very true words efish!  : ok:

They all have stupid ways of marketting themselves too

"phizzle bizzle feat twista mc" its always "featuring" some randomer.

Just as rock music did, rap has lost it's edge.  At one point it stood for something and spoke for a whole generation of people that were ingulfed in the middle of the music.  Now, like rock music, it has become contrived, watered down and pussified for the general masses.  Instead of having a person who is living the life they sing about...now it's all about showing off tons of jewelry and cars that you can't afford...and that's EVERY SINGLE RAP VIDEO.

Most of the old school rap artists had to sell themselves out to the new generation or face being left behind. 

When music stopped becoming a vocal platform about reality and in your face life, it became drivel and bland.

real rock music is slowly coming back, slowly...but surely!

Don't talk like that - rock music never left.? It's here still, it just isn't the 60s anymore.? Rock adapted and spread itself out into more specific genres. 

Rap will do the same I imagine.? It'll have to adapt or noone will care anymore.

50 Cent jokes?? I've got none...but this did make me smile:


 ;)

most people i know who listen to rap never buy cd's,   they just download and burn cds.

i suggest stop listening to the rap thats force fed to you and go find some of the lesser known acts. far more interesting and talented.

rock is just as bas as rap IMO.? For every Luipe Fiasco there is 100's of crappy commercial rappers talking about the same things. Another thing that makes me sick is that group little ricky. they are the hip hop equilevant to N'Snc. They took a salt and peppa song(lets talk about sex) which was origanlly about sex awareness, and basically flipped it around.? :rant:

the only new rappers i listen too are Luipe Fiasco, busdriver, and the saturday knights. Busdriver especialy is doing things different and thinking outside the bus. Hes got some crazy beats that nobody in the mainstream rap scene would even think about trying, because all they are thinking about is blending in. Check him out if you can

I hope all this rap and rn'b bullshit dies and never comes back.

I've had more than enough of it :yes:

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

Rap is in general (apart from stuff like the Pussycat Dolls etc) the lowest form of 'music' the world will ever know.  It's had its highlights and I even own a rap album (Ice T) but it's just such a muddy, overblown and essentially boring and repetitive genre with virtually no musical significance it has to die sometime.  All this talk about great beats is fine, but when I hear some great music I might sit up and take notice!  Somebody even tried to convince me once that you have to be a good bass player to make hip hop - yeah right.  Let it live underground like metal and maybe something might improve but I wouldn't hold my breath!

At least some people in this thread have some sense and realize this...  Rock fans should know better than anyone that you need to dig a little deeper to find the quality music these days.  I highly doubt any of the trash talkers have even listened to a song by Talib, Common or Lupe Fiasco because I hardly see how you could call it "reptitive" or filled with a bunch of "bling and hos".

What's being described in the article happens all the time, it happened with hair metal, it happened with grunge, it happened with nu-metal, and it's happening with gangster rap.  The quality of music in general is declining these days and mainstream rap is the most noticeable because it's been dominating the charts.  I will agree that it's a good thing that the music on the top of the charts is suffering declining sales, but I certainly won't use it as an excuse to bash the whole genre.  Just as Fall Out Boy doesn't represent rock music, Young Joc doesn't represent hip hop.

yeah all music is tired and old these days...its all shit peopel jsut want a single and dont really make art anymore

i dunno rap isnt really relivant anymore, the fire is gone, there is nothing else to say that already hasnt been covered in the genre...

The Roots
Murs
POS
K-OS... who is a modern Prince... sings, raps, plays most of the intruments on his tracks

All those I listed are good rap. 

And for the bass comment up there, the bass player from The Roots is sick, you won't hear it on the albums but live he can rip and their former bass/guitar Ben (he played both) now plays bass in Incubus. As for R&B, groups like the Isley Brothers, The Wailers and stuff have members that are just as and if not more skilled than rock groups. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean its not good. People like Flea and Les Claypool learned how to play bass from 70's funk and R&B.

theres a difference between parliament funkadelic and the shitty rap out there today, lol.

parliament rocked...funky style!

Jurassic 5 & Dizzie Rascal

both amazing live acts, and i love the studio cuts as well.

Oh I know but it's "R&B"...

and I agree there is a lot of shit music out there today in all genres. but people only know the mainstream hip hop of the world and don't realize there is good stuff.

i just generally dont enjoy watching a man talk fast with processed beats behind him, so most of it is all boring to me, its not rapping i have a problem with, its just the whole background, its boring.

i love bands like rage against the machine, they have interesting backing music.

this is a sign. Rap is dying :lmao: fucking finally thats all i got to say. With rap dying its a sign that 2007 is a year for Metal and a CHINESE DEMOCRACY :beer:

i love this lol Raps dying

rap is dying and i'm lovin' every minute of it
in there vids they had all the chicks
suckin on tits
blowin all the dicks
massage'n there clits

they all live in manshions and drive real fast cars
all those motha fuckas talk like they from mars
some of them chinese all got carzs
Goddamn thank God its dyin' shitty music all of it

heres mine-

W. AXL ROSE is back people and here to stay
even after CHINESE DEMOCRACY he will never go away
NOW CHINESE DEMOCRACY, what next nobody knows
all i know is that all the haters got to go
each and every song will be a hit
Guns'N'Roses has just begun and will never quit
so to all the hater you must admit
that W. Axl Rose is the greatest, he is da shit
the new album will be everything that is good
it will put shame to all the homies in the hood
all of todays music hurts my head
it all sucks so bad, it makes me wish i was dead
and i couldn't care less if you don't think my poem is cool
but you got to admit that G'n'R RULE


:peace:

Your right i didnt mean to pigeon-hole the whole genre of rock. Im just saying mainstream rock and rap are just as bad. All the good rock bands are harder to find.

Part of this probably just because it's been water-downed. Lots of pop is using hip-hop beats and style videos while still being "pop". And the hip-hop pop has stolen away some of the teenage white girls and there go record sales.

I hope it dies or at least changes, but more-so I want pop to fix itself.

Everything is just a phase with the kids these days...

So long......it's an ugly ride down. (Just ask Lita Ford, she still thinks Rock will one day make a comeback to the mainstream like the old days.)

Take a seat in the waiting room.

fuck rap/hip hop/r&b (whatever its all the same SHIT) im so glad its going down in sales

Rap sounds the same to me too.

Some new genre will probably take over, instead of rock. What that could be I don't know. If rock became 'the big thing' again that would be cool, but I don't think it will.

Word to your mother.

you can only rap about treating women like shit, telling people how rich you are, showing you have no morals, and you should kill police and smoke massive amounts of weed. Other than the weed issue, people are fed up with the negative shit.

Finally the Rap cycle is over. This doesn't mean that mainstream music will get better. Popular music will always be the worse.
Pop music is a lot better than last years, Nelly Furtado and Justin Timberlake lastest albums are very fun to listen, Timbaland is a good producer.
I can see rap getting poppier and "whiter" more and more, many people can't stand those agressive lyrics and visuals anymore.

Anyway, for me, the biggest genre this year will be Emo, unfortunately it's the new hype.

Leving the emo kids alone, I think 2007 will be a great year for music:

Chinese Democracy (hopefully)
NIN is more active than ever
Bjork's new album
RATM and Smashing Pumpkins reuniting.

Call me the alternative guy but these artits rule and will make this year one of the best years for music.

I'm also looking forward for the new Coheed and Cambria and Sebastian Bach.

id just love for there to be talented rock groups who do amazing huge stadium shows (which get put on youtube) like there were in the 80s and 90s.

I watch some of these shows and think "i wish i could have been there looks amazing"

instead today we are limited to small clubs for rock bands.

Sad to see so many stupid, close-minded people in here.
Really, it is.

just because they dont like rap and you do?

No, because they criticize a genre they seemingly know nothing about for all the wrong reasons.

Hip hop and rap is already spreading out. timberland producing Nelly fertado (or however its spelled) and Justin Timberlake is showing that pop and rap are merging.

Update: Dr. Dre is producing the next Backstreet boys LP.  :rofl:

Kill police, huh?  Id love for you to give some examples of this overwhelming police-killing trend in rap.  My guess is you barely make it past "Cop Killer," which is actually a rock song.  But give it a shot.

The truth is that while rap sales might be down at the moment, its spilled over to pop music so heavily that itd be foolish to pretend that its somehow dying.  I agree with many in this thread in that I hope sales do fall - Id rather trite, disposable, cynically commercial music (in all forms) wasnt rewarded with high sales.  However, I say that as somebody who loves the artform as much as I do traditional rock, not a clueless, hostile critic.  I understand if somebody doesnt get it or enjoy it, but the ignorant generalizing and bizarre anger displayed by many rock fans and some in this thread is just stupid. 

Its funny that one poster celebrated the "death" of rap by referencing Nine Inch Nails' new material when Trent Reznor has cited Public Enemy and the Bomb Squad as an influence on the new album.  I believe Dr. Dre contributed to The Fragile as well.  And Reznor just appeared on rapper/producer El-Ps new album, along with Mars Volta.  Then he celebrated Rage Against The Machines reunion...of course that band is heavily influenced by rap.  I remember a remix to Bjorks "Bachelorette" done by RZA from the Wu-Tang Clan.  And of course Axl has expressed his appreciation for rap. 

For those making these broad statements against rap, consider somebody viruently attacking rock and using Panic at the Disco, Hawthorne Heights, and whatever other lightweight MTV act that is successful at the moment as examples.  Instead of going on these thoughtless, irrationally emotional tirades against a form of music that you dont know or understand. 

This is the best fukin news iv ever heard! The world is seeing the light! This 'music' if u can call it that, has been plaguing our ears for to fukin long. Hopefully the talentless fucks have had there day. Its ridiculous, people who cant sing and cant play any intsruments having hits lol. Please let this shit die out!

Not that it's a trend, but "Fuck the police" by NWA springs to mind...
They even got trouble with the FBI because of that song. Not so much a trend though as a milestone in rap.

And by the way guys, for those of you who see rap dying out any time soon in terms of record sales; with Eminem, Dr. Dre and Kanye West's albums dropping this year i wouldn't get my hopes up. : ok: :beer:

i cant wait for bjork. one of my fav artists. and timbaland just happens to be on 4 tracks

well unless all these damn artists (minus eminem cause he actually is talented) piss off. rock aint gonna be coming back for a loooooong time.

id rather rock, than rap thanks, so i hope rap does die out, hopefully chav trends will piss off also.

if rap dies, emo will take over the mainstream. Its not going to go back to huge arena rock...at least not in the near future.

i think emo will fade out with the decade....(i hope)

Somebody that hates all rap except for Eminem?  Interesting.. ::)

Please explain what makes Eminem different.

How can you make this reply immediately after Booker's post?  It blows my mind.  I know you just popped in to chime in "it's not rap music, it's crap music", but fuck, at least try reading some of the other posts.

because his techniques arnt annoying, not every song he does has some random man going "yeah, oh oh oh, woo, word nigger" plus i like how he tries to be a bit more diverse. manson in a video of his song, defending him, had him onstage live, sampled aerosmith into one of his songs etc.

what does 'emo' stand for? ???

shit music. Dont give it a try, honestly it is the worst form of music to come out this decade.

This is amazing! Not long ago were you making similar generalizations about death metal, and when I corrected you, you totally ignored my reply (gee, I wonder why?). And now you're giving rap music the same treatment :no: I'd suggest taking a little break...


 :rofl: Now that's something quite unique indeed!

Look, I know you're just a kid, and maybe I should just try to ignore you, but it hurts my eyes to read that stuff you know... It hurts!!

i didnt reply to your post because

1. def leppard thread
2. the arguement would be ongoing
3. i found some interesting def leppard videos i wished to share

Death metal sucks.
And so does most forms of rap, like i said earlier, i have a problem with general mainstream rap, i also cited rage against the machine as a band i do enjoy alot who have rapping.

When has rock ever gone away?  You seem to like a load of bands that would classify themselves as rock.
Adding to the fact that Eminem really isn't all that great compared to someone like MF Doom.
But you wouldn't want to know about him because all commercially appreciable rap is terrible.

yeah, there is already a lot og backlash against it.

So youre saying that every other rapper has a random man going "yeah, oh oh oh..."? 

Heres Eminems latest video (http://youtube.com/watch?v=zuFj6vLLgD8).

Sounds like theres plenty of "yeah"-style ad-libs, even during his verse.  The word "nigga" (not "nigger"; I dont know if youre trying to be cute or really that clueless) is there, too.

No other rapper trys to be diverse?  No other rappers sample rock music? 

Like plenty of others here, youre willfully ignorant when it comes to this subject yet insist on spouting one asinine generalization after another.   Your exception for Eminem leads me to believe youve been influenced by the same mainstream pop-culture you seem to hate.  Or maybe theres another reason you find Eminem so palatable?

i dont actually listen to eminem, hes just tolerable compared to the rest of the shit.
And of all the songs ive heard by him on TV and radio, his lyrics seem a bit more thought out then the usual, i havent seen his latest video, the last video i saw was the one he did for his greatest hits release, which i thought was quite a serious video....so.

its spelt nigger, "nigga" is just some dickhead chav from london being unable to pronounce it correctly, hence every other chav copying and saying it, as they do...so im guessing they got it from whatever gangster cunt from america did.

I hate rap, unless it is with talent behind it like RATM, its as simple as that, and im sure im not alone with my disliking of the bland and fading genre.

Just another posting illustrating how little you know what youre talking about.  Hopefully you grow out this simple-minded thinking process.

He's sixteen and angry.

I will die a happy man if rap and emo fade away and die  :yes: