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The Demise Music Industry is Like the Demise of Our Cities

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Noz’s post on the end of KMEL has me thinking about both
the decline of the cities and the record industry in general.

In order for any partnership to work, there has to be
a meeting of concerned parties, so that everyone with
a vested interest has an opportunity vet, discuss, criticize
and new plans or procedures.

Functional cities and record labels follow this process.
The ones that don’t, well, you can predict their demise
with precision.

The notion of demise brings me to Eric Arnold’s recent piece on the
end of the Hyphy movement in SF Weekly.

… the largest single factor in hyphy’s decline may have been the withdrawal of support for local music by KMEL 106.1FM, the Bay Area’s top urban radio station and a powerful industry tastemaker.

The article is interesting in that it points how how
a record company can afford to be profitable
and major, while steadfastly refusing to include
local voices in its programming.


What better way to kill a vibrant city by bowing to non-local interest
for short term gains.
 Think about it.

Payola?

Ball stadiums hyper subsidized with city taxes
with promises of jobs for the community?

In another twist on the future of the music
industry R.M. London speaks on bootleggers
at Rhymehouse,

I got in touch with, Krooked1, one of the main contributors of HipHopBootleggers, the most popular hip hop album download blog on the internet that has received an amazing 1.5 million hits since the summer of 2006, and asked him that very question, he confidentally told me: “Well, if you look at hip hop at the moment the record labels do not do enough to get their artists the promotion they want and need. We get artists asking US to promote them, and they even resort to sending there albums to us to post. I don’t think we’re doing anything wrong. If it wasn’t for the internet a lot of people would not know about what has been released, or what is due to be released. Yes, we are doing a service to the artists who do not get what they deserve (promotion wise). If you are signed to a record label, your album is about to come out, and the label is not doing shit about it before its release– what is that? What is the artist to do at that point to get their name out? Yea, we put it online, but if we like what we hear we will purchase. Artists moan about their shit getting leaked on the net– they should just not send it to the press.”


This in turn affects how artist, the most out of the trunk guerrilla artists
remain regional, but get can’t catch that one Big Break
which would allow them to go national.

Another example of how local support can be used as leverage to
do other things.

KMEL’s provincial attitude toward local rap artists is perhaps best exemplified by the station’s treatment of Mistah F.A.B., a charismatic Oaklander sometimes referred to as “hyphy’s crown prince.” According to F.A.B., a “personal situation” with current music director Big Von Johnson has existed for years. The rapper speculates that jealousy might be the cause: “Von wanted to be an artist.” Still, “It’s no bad blood, it’s no hatred from me,” he now emphasizes. As any parent knows, each child develops at a different rate and all children face their own special challenges. generic sildenafil viagra It’s india viagra thought about this a fashion accessory, a designer label and a household name. Learning to drive is not enough; you must learn how professional cialis to drive safely. This honest love and trust of this herbal tadalafil canadian pharmacy by its users is unbeatable, since they can hardly find any enhancement pill in the world which can enhance your sexual life interesting. (At press time, Johnson hadn’t responded to several requests for an interview.)

I can’t imagine how it feels to another city and asked why
your music isn’t played on your local station.
A city, like the record industry is a delicate ecosystem.

But then again, arn’t all ecosystems, by their very nature delicate?

Then there was a post at artstechnia where Nate Anderson
discusses why Music 1.0 is dead. He writes,

An anecdote in a recent Economist perfectly summed up the problems facing the major music labels. After EMI, the smallest of the Big Four, invited a teen focus group to its London headquarters in 2006, it wanted to give the teens something for their time. The response is worth quoting in full.

At the end of the session the EMI bosses thanked them for their comments and told them to help themselves to a big pile of CDs sitting on a table. But none of the teens took any of the CDs, even though they were free. “That was the moment we realised the game was completely up,” says a person who was there.

He then goes on to discuss independent movement and their
current and growing market share.

Greg Scholl, boss of indie label The Orchard, pointed out that the music business is not just four companies, and that indie music’s market share is now approaching one-third… and it’s growing. Indies have also been more open, historically, to experiments such as selling music without DRM. If the major labels take more than a decade to turn the ship around, they risk running a ghost ship with little in its cargo hold but a valuable back catalog.

So we have independent gaining more of a market share
and millennial’s disinterested in taking free cd’s.

Perhaps there is hope.

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30% for independents?

Thats a good look.

Local food, Local music, Local……Power.

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Spitzergate

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Man. Elliot. I liked you dude. You went after the white collar cats
with a vengeance.

Bill- Clinton. Monica.
Kwame- Detroit Mayor. In fact, many of Facts about cheap levitra cialis overnight no prescription these can be performed in many different ways. Eventually, the penile organ also receives abundant blood to experience tadalafil viagra rigidity. This should not be difficult to understand by people. discount cialis 20mg Finding a Good Urologist As mentioned, there are many health problems faced buy viagra by both men and women. Had an affair with his assistant.
Gavin- SF Mayor. Really offended men by sleeping with his best
friends, wife.
Ted Haggert- Republican. Denied having sex with young boys.
Antonio- LA Mayor. Had an affair with TV news reporter.

Men and sex with women who are not their wives, or in Ted Haggerts
case, young men.

Perhaps we need more women mayors?

Just read in the paper that.
Peep game. Gavin is getting ready to run for governor.

As a politician, when you hold yourself out
to be a morally accountable, the definition of
political accountability at work, you are all the more delicious
of a target.

Perhaps like so many people, politicians an non politicians alike, he
believed the hype and got zapped.

I am uber curious about one thing.

This man has been in public life for years.
He has presumably been doing this for years.

Why the investigation now?

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Spitzergate.

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Back to the My Life Album

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I was suppose to go to Dallas this weekend.

I called SJ last Wednesday.

The ticket was purchased during the post
break up “lets see” era.

I asked him if I could still come. He replied
neutrally, “ummmm, don’t know if you want to do that.
I would love to see you but, it just may not be…”

I told one of my homies I wanted to go.

M.dot: I want to go to Dallas.
Homie: Ok. Why?
M.dot: I want to say goodbye in person.
Homie: Hmmp. I can see that. But….
M.dot: But what?
Homie: Its natural to want to do that. What do you
expect to get out of it?
M.dot: I want to see him and say good bye in person. But…
Homie: yeah…
M.dot: He prolly gonna make me mad, and we will fight and I
will end up at the airport early.
 Homie: Ok….
M.dot: Whhhhhhhhhhhat?!?^&?& ***Gets irritated. Say it!
Homie: Don’t you think by going to the epicenter
of the pain you may hurt yourself further?
M.dot: Yeah. You have a point.

Sunday evening I caught it. I was good until about 6pm.
It was warm all day. viagra cheapest pharmacy A chronic deficiency in vitamin B12 might lead to erectile dysfunction condition in man. This medicine is made brand cialis price for a healthy grown up adult man. Erectile dysfunction condition takes place when blood vessels are filled with blood and carry http://amerikabulteni.com/2012/04/17/lets-mobilize-the-earth-for-earth-day-2012/ viagra on line it towards male reproductive area. Of course the effects of Tadalafil are different for each individual person, which is why you http://amerikabulteni.com/2011/12/10/iste-new-york%E2%80%99un-en-pahali-kiralik-dairesi-ayligi-165-bin-dolar/ women viagra online should consult with the doctor before intake of Kamagra. About 62 degrees and sunny.

My momma stopped by the Whole Foods
to kick it with me. I thought she was gonna clown me
about how boogie it was, but she didn’t. She liked my hat.

Around 7pm, walking home, after I blogged, I just felt
unshakably blue.
Upon reflection, I should have posted this last night.

I mean I had quite a weekend. I got my stuff out of storage.
Old clothes can be like old friends. Snug and comfortable.

I saw dig dug. Mis favorito, even though those Gemini’s in him
drive me nuts.

And I learned that Filthy is coming to visit Cali, he got people
in The Bay.

Then at 7pm, it was like the sadness socked me in the grill.
I missed him. I missed my friend.
Not because I wanted to talk to him per se, but because so many
things happened this weekend that, in the past, it would
have been so natural to share.

Spiritual things, transformative things. In a way, Sunday night was
about accepting that they won’t be shared, at least not the
way they were before puddle Friday.

In a lot of ways, I imagine that the conversation
that I had with myself last night is the same one
that cats have when they are about to serve a bid.

Hold ya head.
Even if your in pain, its temporary.
It’s uncomfortable, but it will pass.
This isn’t harder than anything else you have done before. (~gotty)

Erykah’s joint couldn’t hold me down anymore,
I had to take it back to the My Life album.

And I’m good better now.

Black Wonkett on Why You Need to Read "Trapped" by Daniel Brook, Part II.

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Now that we have established that $250K is the
new $100K.

Let’s revisit why our social workers, teachers, and
filmmakers are choosing to go into finance.

Daniel suggests that young people
don’t want to be investment bankers because they
want to be rich, they want to do it because they want
to live in the city and and they are scared of being poor.

Thats real talk.

Daniel posits that tuition costs are high because
the trustees can set them high. When he wonders
aloud, “Where is the sticker shock, and refusal to pay?”

I think of the “keeping up with the Jones’s
syndrome” and how that can impact a family’s decision to give
their children the “best education” even if that means saddling
the child and the family with $150K worth of debt.

I understand that school is expensive.
However, Daniel wonders out loud why Dartmouth and Harvard’s
tuition is within $500 of each other when they are both located
in two different states, with two different costs of living.

And don’t get me started on their billion dollar endowments
and their rarely criticized tax exempt status.

I am obsessed with school finance. But, you knew that.
So it was interesting to learn from his book that
U.C. Berkeley used to be free.
Yes. Cal was tuition free for 100 years. It was only in the
the late 1970’s that Cal instituted in-state tuition.

It wasn’t that long ago — not as long ago as you’d think — that UC Berkeley cost $212.50 a quarter. When it went up to $236, there was serious debate in the Daily Cal as to whether it would cause the unfortunate to drop out, at the least, or cause blood in the streets, at the most.

It’s a quaint story that doesn’t mean much in the post-Proposition 13 world of public education. That’s why; it is suggested to the patients take control of their mind, stopping their anxiety and depression that ultimately increases the intake of smoking, alcohol and tadalafil cheapest online lifestyle drug use are not good candidates. So to get your suitable dosage among generic viagra in usa these available patterns you need to visit your doctor for a consultation to know the suitable dosage by detecting your body tolerance. They are formulated with rare botanical extracts that improves erection of penis while dealing with untimely viagra india prices ejaculation and also strengthens the parasympathetic nerves. To make certain it professionally, it needs good look at this web-site brand viagra pfizer cloth testimony and chiropractic is metaphysical in nature.We understand that in fact deaths happens day-to-day in medical interventions and even they may also not be due to many causes that are not associated with ageing. But these numbers mean something: Spread over 30 years, from 1975-76 to 2004-05, Cal has gone from $637 a year to $6,730, an increase of about 1,060 percent. Then as now, education at the University of California is tuition free for residents, a tradition since 1900 that was reaffirmed in the 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education. What students pay are “fees,” a sleight of hand similar to the way executives who are fired have always decided to “spend more time with family.”

CUNY was free until New York’s fiscal crisis in the seventies and the city
and the state decided to charge working and middle class students tuition.
According to Wikipedia,

CUNY has historically served a diverse student body, especially those excluded from or unable to afford private universities. CUNY offered a high quality, tuition-free education to the poor, the working class and the immigrants of New York City until 1975, when the City’s fiscal crisis forced the imposition of tuition. Many Jewish academics and intellectuals studied and taught at CUNY in the post-World War I era when Ivy League universities, such as Yale University, discriminated against Jews.[2] The City College of New York has had a reputation of being “the Harvard of the proletariat.”[3]

Filthy astutly pointed out, that a city that decides to charge
poor and working class students tuition, in the middle of
a recession INSTEAD of charging more to corporations,
is pretty clear about its priorities.

Accessible, high quality k-16 education is
connected to health of a city, and the health of the
families that reside within.

Daniel closes his book with a reflection on Thomas Jefferson’s
vision for this country. He writes,

“Jefferson understood that his Aristocratic birth and private eduction had given him the ability to pursue his talents. Cognizant of his good fortune, he understood that a just and dynamic society should not leave th flowering to talent to chance. The gifted, not merely the high born must be able to contribute, both for their own sake and for the sake of society and humanity.”

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College debt makes investment bankers
out of teachers, social workers and it’s
a problem for all of us.

We need teachers, bankers, lawyers,
filmmakers and social workers.
They are the thread that hold the cities
together.

New York and SF is looking
at a New Gilded Age and it doesn’t
have to be this way.

We can change it.
They have ideas.

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The Silent Treatment

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Tonight I saw The Savages.

Great Movie.

Horrible audience.

Seeing a neurotic movie about putting your dad in a nursing
home and preparing to, as if YOU CAN prepare to, watch
him die, should be seen in with particular kind of audience.

I felt loud in the movie because I laughed. I chuckled at, cheered on
disagreed and identified with the characters.

I was on some “hell naw dude” and “she did THAT sh-t blood?”
and it was like crickets.

Watching that movie was like quiet, bad, sex.

Whereas movies in New York are a cross between
church and theater. Call and response and audience
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For instance, the last movie I saw in the theater
was “Vantage Point” at one my top 5’s spots to catch a
film in NYC- the jawn on 17th and Broadway.

At first the movie seemed intriguing like a espionage
laced version of 24.

Then half way through it went dumb over the top.

Two thirds through, people were actively smacking their teeth,
talking sh-t to their homies, not rudely, but loud enough
to express their discontent enough for the rest of us to
nod in agreement.

Filthy stanky a*s fell asleep two thirds through.

I realize now, that going to concert, can be like going
to the movies, in that the audience can impact
the overall experience of how we perceive the event.

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Bad crowd experiences anyone?

Awkwardly quiet movies are like bad, quiet. sex.

My homie Slinky cracked the f-ck up at that analogy.

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