It can’t be so unthinkable that a musician would dare to think about getting paid for songs, and as rappers are continuing to prove, the line between the album and the mixtape is a negligible one.
As much I love free things, if we’re gonna start reexamining the financial value of music in this time of streaming, then I want to know why we aren’t reconsidering rap’s place, and why people have complained about having to pay for mixtapes. This intense blurring of the line between the mixtape and the album is something that rap has naturally been moving towards. All three of these projects have come out in 2015, and though they were advertised as mixtapes, they were sold through iTunes and other retail outlets. Recent examples that spring to mind are Drake’s If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, Young Thug’s Barter 6 and Drake and Future’s What A Time to Be Alive. Other artists such as Gucci Mane became known primarily by their many (many) mixtapes, which often had songs that hit harder than album tracks.įrom this environment emerges “the retail mixtape,” or commercial tapes, which have been gaining more and more traction in the current rap climate. Some mixtapes attained the status of being better than most rappers’ commercial albums (a strong flex), and groups like the Clipse’s acclaimed We Got It 4 Cheap series of mixtapes (recorded with the Re-Up Gang) went on to be reviewed as standalone albums on music critic sites that didn’t even regularly cover hip-hop. Plus, when rappers started snatching each other’s beats and putting better verses and hooks on them like Lil Wayne and 50 Cent, things only got crazier. The system works pretty well, as rappers can put out music without having to jump through industry/label hoops whilst still building hype and fans get very affordable music, and lots of it. It’s commonly understood that mixtapes are not intended to generate a ton of immediate money, but rather more abstract credit, such as name recognition, buzz, and advertisement for later projects so in other words, mixtapes were meant to generate later, potential profit.
Anyone who regularly listens to rap knows that mixtapes are a wonderful thing frequent, full of DJ drops (sometimes wonderful, sometimes trash), and featuring track after track of free music.
Now part of this is due to Tidal’s awkward rollout strategy and it being such an emergent platform, whereas Apple Music carries the consumer-attracting talisman of “Apple” along with it and Spotify has proven itself to be an excellent choice, especially for students.Īnyways, as I watched The Recording Academy President Neil Portnow and Common pleading with the public to pay artists during this year’s Grammys, their question “Isn’t a song worth more than a penny?” left me wondering about mixtapes and rap. Streaming has only recently gotten an “artist-approved” horse in the race, and Tidal’s third place position relative to Apple Music and the long-dominant Spotify show that people still aren’t super concerned with artist compensation.
Of course, this dynamic has put pressure on artists to adapt, and though piracy and bootlegging has been around since music could be recorded, no one could imagine the speed and ease that torrent sites would bring. It’s really nothing to, in the span of a day, acquire and listen to every single project an artist or band has produced, and (allegedly) not spend a single dime.
Are you a sophomore in high school and you just discovered Radiohead? Download their entire discography, and then the Pixies and then Pavement and maybe get up on your Jamaican dancehall as well, all at the same time. It’s been well understood (by non-music industry execs at least) for several years now that the internet has made curators out of us all, and consequently, everyone is mostly free to explore the ranges of their musical tastes with relative abandon. Whereas before, our parents and grandparents had to really make that journey down to a physical place selling physical copies of the new Luther Vandross and part with their pocket change, the only thing that’s stopping us now from having Sonic Youth’s entire discography is an internet connection. It’s become an even greater part of many music lovers’ lives with the onset of the eras of downloading and streaming. When you find something you like, usually you want more of it, and this basic relationship finds a lot of relevance in music.