Lil Wayne is the Key

*Disclaimer*
-most of this was written quite a long time ago, it is a long, rather unorganized collection of personal ideas, in other words; it is a rant, it may not even make any sense.

-b Funk



Okay, I’ve figured it out. The whole music industry is out of control right now nobody knows what’s going on; money is being lost, nobody is buying CDs! Radio sucks! WHAT THE HELL DO WE DO? The industry needs to adapt, find something new and different. Change to a new business model because the old one isn’t working.

Here’s a prime example of somebody that is innovating the industry right now and seemingly still making money at the same time. READY FOR IT?



LIL WAYNE.

WHAT ! How dare you! How dare I? Okay, listen.

The body of work Lil Wayne has put out in the last lets say 4 years (after the Carter I) is massive, I mean huge (I’m not even getting to if it’s any good or not). Just the fact that the amount of songs he has recorded is massive. He is constantly working and putting out new songs and mix tapes. Now you can argue other rappers do the same thing, and that is a valid argument BUT, I’m not talking about other rappers, although this could possibly encompass the hip hop and rap scene as a whole. Okay well moving on. Lil Wayne essentially makes an assload of songs over a few years and keeps creating hype for himself. When he finally decides to release an album, he hypes it up some more, puts out a tentative date, releases a single (Lollipop), pushes the date back, maybe a few songs get leaked, maybe the WHOLE ALBUM gets leaked (Carter III Mixtape). I’m not entirely sure about this but I believe Wayne actually let the whole thing get released anyway. Okay so now what? Is he going to just let all the songs everybody knows already get put on his actual album? NO. He goes back and records 16-18 more songs in a relatively short amount of time and there is your Carter IIII. Personally I was pretty disappointed with the album BUT what it did do was show a diverse collection of songs that in my opinion showed where rap and hip hop (and maybe all modern pop music) is currently at and maybe some hints to the future. Now how many copies of the C3 were sold? A LOT (in today’s terms). Why? I dunno, maybe with so much hype going on, people wanted to hear what it was like. It really wasn’t THAT good. It’s not a Classic record. How could it be? Classics have longevity; they don’t get old after a few years. Classic Rock, get it? It’s old music, but for some reason people still like it and listen to it.


Anyway, the dude gets it. Who is your favorite band? Now how many new songs do they put out a year? How many in 2 years? Maybe 20-40 if that (I know not EVERY band is like this). Obviously it’s different when you need a collective group of people to actually come up with music, lyrics, and then find the time when you can all come together to play it. How about this, why don’t bands just send shit to eat other and add it together piece by piece? Sure I’ll admit it’s easier to have producers just sending you beats everyday, but still there is a point I’m trying to make. Lil Wayne (or somebody behind him) gets it. He understands. The Drought Mix Tapes, The Dedication Mix Tapes, they were all popular and they were ALL FREE. He said, “Fuck, I’ll go promote my damn self.”
And now guess what? He is free to travel any music genre freely. Rap, Country, Techno-hop, Rock…whatever. As my homie Duke said:

“Wayne’s flexibility/adaptability on diff types of tracks is uncanny. From writing his lyrics down to then realizing he could freestyle and rhyme more cleverly/better without having a piece of paper (or in modern days having a blackberry) in front of him. Then putting out album worthy material for free...for his FANS?? Without seeing any money from downloads?? Wow. He could have made millions but he might not be the Rock star he is today. He might have had to stick with simply rap ( cause of record labels), and we might have never gotten the Lil Wayne we have today”

Whether he is making good or bad music doesn’t even matter. It’s the premise that he’s doing this and someone (actually a hell of a lot of people out there) are digging it. The dude was right; he’s a Martian, a chameleon even, trying to blend in with any and every type of music out there. Now I guess he’s a Rock star, but like I said though, that is still not the main point. WHAT IS IT THEN?



Okay here it is...be original, creative, outside the box, do something nobody else is doing. Kanye West moved in a similar direction with 808’s, more recently Kid Cudi did it with Man on the Moon, even originally a lot of “indie” bands had the same idea (but currently 75% of them all sound the same) and Lil Wayne is doing it with his constant genre crossovers.

I mean seriously, who the hell would do this? Maybe it’ll catch on (I kind of hope not). But still he is performing concerts, staring in moves and still making money other ways. The dude can afford to be out of his mind if he wants to.

So, to sum it up, here is the formula.

Get good at something and get noticed. Then don’t let everybody know your full potential, keep a secrete stash of whatever it is you are doing, your songs, baked goods, new technology, new clothes, whatever the hell it is. Then just keep putting shit out! Once you get recognized (isn’t that the main goal now a days anyway? Just to be FAMOUS for whatever reason you can be noticed by) So once that happens you can start doing whatever the hell you want. But don’t expect this to happen over night. The internet is saturated with people trying to do the same damn thing. But anyway, 2009 marks Lil Wayne’s 10th year in the music game, starting with Tha Block Is Hot all the way to this new crap. I feel like he will keep rapping though and at least some of it will be good but I suppose only the future can tell what’s really going to happen. He’s actually gotten way too played out, but that’s what happens anymore. People just milk things until they run completely dry, until that “hot single” turns into the annoying song you here on the radio every 20 minuets.

As for everybody else unaware of what to do in the music business. Here’s a little more input from the homie Duke:

Instead of making money from albums( which is damn near impossible), you cut out the record label entirely. Make your mixtape shit available for download( and if its hot and free, people will get to it.) get popular and just go on tour. Keep on touring to make money (puttin in work mangg) and then put out an album to solidify your place in the game. (aka Drake?....i mean even if his album flops he's still gonna have a place in the game because of the other tapes he put out and prolly the same amount of money as a middle/high class rapper these days)

Got it now?

I don't care if you're a rapper, violinist, DJ, dog whisperer, 3 string foot propelled air celloist. Put out some(GOOD) music, play concerts, promote yourself, it can’t be shit either, you need to be saying something worth while or doing something actually good and dammit, please don’t be like everybody else.

Okay, GO MAKE SOME MAGIC.



-b Funk