Ever heard of Myspace! Sure you have. But, since the rise of Twitter, YouTube, and the mighty Facebook, Myspace kind of lost in the shuffle. Fear not. After the exit of News Corp which sold the site for 35 million dollars to Specific media, the sites new owners have vowed to put the music back onto Myspace, as it relaunched in October.
The new Myspace is not attempting to compete with Facebook. Instead, they are returning the sites focus to music. A lot of the advertising once spent on Myspace has move on to YouTube. The site's user interface has been, and is still in a state of flux. Many users who abandoned Myspace in protest over News Corps heavy commercialization, have been slowly trickling back, as the site continues to become more user friendly again.
Many of the Myspace users who never left have continued to network and meet new friends, bands, or artists amongst it's 120 million users. They have been enjoying the new cleaner, leaner look and some added features that make reaching out much easier than it was in it's early days.
The new Myspace will continue to cater to the so called "premium" artists, those whose music is promoted by the four major record companies. However, much of the music and music profiles from countless independent bands and artist still remain. Scores of music files containing some of the most obscure DIY artists still abound. If your looking for that hard to find song, band, or artist it is most likely that you will find it on Myspace.
Many of the returning Myspace users no doubt have been pleasantly surprised at just how much easier the site has become to use. Perhaps, if you were a Myspace user who moved on to Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube, you might consider coming back to Myspace. If you do, you'll find that it is slowing returning back to "My Space," instead of "Their Space." Personally, I find myself spending more time at Myspace rather than Facebook, but being a DIY artist, I think that that only makes sense. After all, Myspace is where the music lives.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
There And Back (Part V)
The year was 1989. Two very important events in music would happen in that year. The first took place early in the year as the first ever Rap Grammy was given to DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince. Just two years earlier, a rumor had circulated that an independent Rapper had grossed more than $750,000 selling homemade tapes from the trunk of his car. I'm just speculating, but it is quite possible that industry bigwigs, realizing the potential for big dollar success may have done a little finagling in order to get the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences or NARAS to bestow it's highest honor on Rap music in recognition of it's success at the cash register.
The second event was the release of the hugely successful album, "Back On The Block" by Quincy Jones. The album was a veritable whose who of music and featured a melding of various genres. Everyone from Ray Charles to Steve Lukather and Jeff Procaro to Sarah Vaughn, Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, David Paich, Chaka Khan, Kool Moe D, Big Daddy Kane, Ice-T, and many many more were present. The album was the first of it's kind by a major figure in the music industry to embrace Rap music and included it, woven into the fabric of various other genres. Only Quincy Jones, the man who produced, "We Are The World," could have brought together so many talented artists, representing so may different musical styles, into a single project and successfully make it all sound right.
These two events helped to set the stage for the current state of affairs in today's popular music. With Grammy success and a big name producer/artist such as Quincy Jones endorsing it, Rap and the artists who performed it appeared to be heading for the stratosphere. However, music in general would never be the same. The following year, in 1990, Rap artists began to pop up on everything from R&B to Rock, Pop, Jazz, and even Country. Even Earth Wind & Fire recruited the likes of the Boys and MC Hammer on their release, Heritage.
MC Hammer quickly became an international success with his Rick James inspired, "You Can't Touch This." Both Rock and Jazz had flirted with Rap in the early 80s, but the early 90s saw groups such as Diggable Planets have success fusing Jazz and Rap. And while Rap had been used in films since the early 80s, the Grammy success now made Rap more appealing as a legitimate source of film content. Producers and directors began to seek out Rappers, not only for their music, but also as actors in their films, as a way of giving their movies, "street," credibility.
By 1992, R&B artists such as Babyface, Janet Jackson, and Boys II Men, began to see an erosion of their audiences as the spotlight began to shift towards the likes of Dr Dre, Ice Cube and Snoop Dogg. And though it had been around since the late 80s, and made most notable by NWA, Gangsta Rap found it's biggest success in the guise of Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. These two artist would come to embody the so called, "east coast, west coast feud," which many have said never really existed. It's was alleged to be just media hype designed to lift the Gangsta Rap style into the mainstream music consciousness.
One thing is certain, Rap music produced the first ever generation gap within the Black community, as many Blacks over the age of 35 never embraced the music. Consequently, they rejected the music and deemed it as inferior and degrading to Blacks on the whole. Many people from all walks of life believed that the music was only about big corporate interests exploiting many of Raps biggest successes in order to make monster profits. There were those who believed that just as with Disco some twelve to fifteen years earlier, the sound of the market place, once again was being manipulated by those at the top of the music industry. However, this time around, "keeping it real," led to presenting the most street creditable product possible. And, by so doing, the public is and has been none the wiser and continues to "pony," up at the cash register.
Young would-be Rap superstars would come in off the street and be given a one or two record deal, with possibly a scene or two in a movie, and a boutique label to sweeten the deal. It's interesting how the boutique label actually served as a way for each Rapper to literally recruit his/her own replacement. A Rap career seemed to only last from about one to three years which has created a "revolving door," that keeps new faces before the public, while serving up a sound that has been showing signs of fatigue since it earliest days.
But, there was more going on then who would provide the most drama in the Rap music scene. As the 90s rolled on, and after the deaths of both Tupac and Bigg, a new product was making it's way into the spotlight, as the "made for play," put together, boy and girl bands were about to become the next big thing.
The second event was the release of the hugely successful album, "Back On The Block" by Quincy Jones. The album was a veritable whose who of music and featured a melding of various genres. Everyone from Ray Charles to Steve Lukather and Jeff Procaro to Sarah Vaughn, Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, David Paich, Chaka Khan, Kool Moe D, Big Daddy Kane, Ice-T, and many many more were present. The album was the first of it's kind by a major figure in the music industry to embrace Rap music and included it, woven into the fabric of various other genres. Only Quincy Jones, the man who produced, "We Are The World," could have brought together so many talented artists, representing so may different musical styles, into a single project and successfully make it all sound right.
These two events helped to set the stage for the current state of affairs in today's popular music. With Grammy success and a big name producer/artist such as Quincy Jones endorsing it, Rap and the artists who performed it appeared to be heading for the stratosphere. However, music in general would never be the same. The following year, in 1990, Rap artists began to pop up on everything from R&B to Rock, Pop, Jazz, and even Country. Even Earth Wind & Fire recruited the likes of the Boys and MC Hammer on their release, Heritage.
MC Hammer quickly became an international success with his Rick James inspired, "You Can't Touch This." Both Rock and Jazz had flirted with Rap in the early 80s, but the early 90s saw groups such as Diggable Planets have success fusing Jazz and Rap. And while Rap had been used in films since the early 80s, the Grammy success now made Rap more appealing as a legitimate source of film content. Producers and directors began to seek out Rappers, not only for their music, but also as actors in their films, as a way of giving their movies, "street," credibility.
By 1992, R&B artists such as Babyface, Janet Jackson, and Boys II Men, began to see an erosion of their audiences as the spotlight began to shift towards the likes of Dr Dre, Ice Cube and Snoop Dogg. And though it had been around since the late 80s, and made most notable by NWA, Gangsta Rap found it's biggest success in the guise of Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. These two artist would come to embody the so called, "east coast, west coast feud," which many have said never really existed. It's was alleged to be just media hype designed to lift the Gangsta Rap style into the mainstream music consciousness.
One thing is certain, Rap music produced the first ever generation gap within the Black community, as many Blacks over the age of 35 never embraced the music. Consequently, they rejected the music and deemed it as inferior and degrading to Blacks on the whole. Many people from all walks of life believed that the music was only about big corporate interests exploiting many of Raps biggest successes in order to make monster profits. There were those who believed that just as with Disco some twelve to fifteen years earlier, the sound of the market place, once again was being manipulated by those at the top of the music industry. However, this time around, "keeping it real," led to presenting the most street creditable product possible. And, by so doing, the public is and has been none the wiser and continues to "pony," up at the cash register.
Young would-be Rap superstars would come in off the street and be given a one or two record deal, with possibly a scene or two in a movie, and a boutique label to sweeten the deal. It's interesting how the boutique label actually served as a way for each Rapper to literally recruit his/her own replacement. A Rap career seemed to only last from about one to three years which has created a "revolving door," that keeps new faces before the public, while serving up a sound that has been showing signs of fatigue since it earliest days.
But, there was more going on then who would provide the most drama in the Rap music scene. As the 90s rolled on, and after the deaths of both Tupac and Bigg, a new product was making it's way into the spotlight, as the "made for play," put together, boy and girl bands were about to become the next big thing.
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