Is Data Analysis Changing The Landscape of Hip Hop?

Label executives are changing the way that they are searching for new talent. A lot different record labels are utilizing the latest technologies by doing their talent searches through data analysis.

One of the main sources executives are using is Shazam, a mobile application that can identify a song being played in the background. Last year, Shazam launched an interactive map, so that users can zoom into cities around the world to see which songs where searched the most through the application. Through this map, executives can search around the globe and use the data to predict which songs would eventually become a “hit.”

Executives are also using various other data searches such as hits to an artist’s Wikipedia page, Spotify streams, Facebook likes and Twitter followers to discover which bands or songs might be able to break into the mainstream. They have the least amount of faith in Facebook and Twitter as “likes” and “followers” can easily be purchased.

Talent scouts are rarely going out to the local clubs anymore to see bands perform live and judging the crowds reaction based on their gut feeling in order to figure out which artists to sign. They can easily just stay in their office and utilize data analysis to predict whom they will be signing.

This is a huge change in the landscape of Hip Hop. The culture was created off a party themed environment and having charisma and being able to control a crowd were a big part of what made a young emcee successful. Hip Hop thrives in the live performance, which is the foundational source of entertainment for the culture.

The focus of up and coming rappers must now shift from being able to win over a crowd to being able to record a track that is going to gain the curiosity of the listener. They have to create something that is going to catch someone’s attention to the point that they get out their smart phones and click on Shazam or look them up through Wikipedia in order show up on the radar of the major label executives.

Basing talent off of data analysis is going to create an even further gap between “catchy” songs as the representation of Hip Hop music by the major record labels, as opposed to lyrical talent. The only way to be able to combat this phenomenon would be to search dope lyricist through as many applications as possible in order for them to have a chance to enter the limelight.

– Megillah

Boog Avery’s 2014 Year in Review

Honest Narratives

Thanks to Kendrick Lamar’s debut album in 2013, not to mention his call for competition in “Control,” there soon came an influx of open and honest narratives from emcees. From YG My Krazy Life to J. Cole 2014 Forest Hills Drive, from Freddie Gibbs & Madlib Piñata to Open Mike Eagle Dark Comedy and Big K.R.I.T Cadillactica, and many more, it seems like the spirit of GKMC resonated more than a diss response. And it was exactly what hiphop needed. Honesty and substance is the foundation for community, and let’s not forget those factors for element five, knowledge.

Ferguson and Police Brutality

Hiphop has been talking about police brutality and racial profiling in their arts, but this was the year to actually do something about it, from the artists to the consumers. Starting with protests in Ferguson, we’ve watched closely to see if our favorite artists would make appearances in embattled cities, and strongly reacted to the ones who did or didn’t. The hiphop community’s embrace of the I Can’t Breathe t-shirt campaign gave us hope, the funding campaign of arrested protesters and the local appearances in marches and rallies made most of us give hiphop a passing grade in rising up with the community.

The Meme Effect

Let’s face it – as much as we want to simplify it, we don’t discover new music by just opening our Twitter and Facebook apps. It takes until a meme – photo or Vine-style – catapults onto our timeline (sometimes multiple times in a scroll) for us to give the artist’s punchline or hook a listen. The upside usually revolves around the politically-driven stances or well-executed meme promos that closely associate with the artist’s talent to where they at least become an internet star. The downside goes to the many hilarious memes that lead to a disappointing listening experience, sometimes even if the song is hot.

Collaborations

This year was A+ in collaboration albums, from newfound collaborations like Apollo Brown and Ras Kass in Blasphemy and the merging self-titled album ¡MursDay! to the ones who’ve returned like Run The Jewels and Barrel Brothers by the NY duo Skyzoo and Torae who came together after multiple collaborations on individual projects. There were also great mega posse cuts! Although Ab-Soul’s follow-up to Control System was disappointing, his verses with Common, Lupe Fiasco and Statik Selektah made up for it. Logic had his strongest year thanks to hopping on other’s tracks. And let’s not forget when greats collide, like when Talib Kweli hopped on a track with Diamond D, Elzhi and Skyzoo for “Where’s The Love,” Cormega tapped Redman, AZ and Styles P for the jawn “MARS (Dream Team),” Saigon got Big Daddy Kane to spit bars on “One Foot In The Door,” and the scholarship campaign #DearJohn that featured the title track by Common and MC Lyte.

Anticipating 2015

2014 ended with such flames, from an artistic and resistance standpoint, that the entire world is on the edge of their seats to see what we do in 2015. From new music coming from Kendrick Lamar to new and returning shows from our iAM Classic Hip Hop-powered radio station Raw Radio to protests that WILL continue for the justice of the Black and Brown community, we have a lot of work to do, hiphop!

– Boog Avery

Megillah’s 2014 Year In Review

2014 was a very poor year for the music industry in relation to Hip Hop. Rap album sales where down 24% in 2014 and not a single album when platinum throughout the whole year. Out of the top 10 selling albums of 2014, none of them fell into the genre of Rap or Hip Hop. Iggy Azalea’s “Fancy” and Pharell Williams’ “Happy” were the only two Hip Hop songs to reach the number 1 position on the Billboard charts last year and both of the songs could debatably fall into other genres depending on who you ask.

Thanks to Clear Channel’s On the Verge Program, Iggy Azalea’s “Fancy” was constantly being played on the radio, causing her to be nominated and win more awards than any other Hip Hop artist in 2014.  This in return, has created an ongoing Twitter beef involving a handful of Hip Hop artist and icons.

Hip Hop legends Wu-Tang Clan tried to excite the scene by releasing a special speaker with their album A Better Tomorrow. Unfortunately few were interested as the album only sold a measly 21,000 in its first week.

There was hope that Nicki Minaj’s 4th quarter release The Pinkprint would boost Hip Hop sales late in the year. The first week sales were 194,000, which was decent, but less than the first week sales of her first two albums and not enough for her to reach the top of the billboard charts.

Is it possible that Hip Hop’s reign of popularity is finally coming to an end? Maybe, but that is doubtful as 2015 brings in a lot of exciting opportunities for Hip Hop. Kendrick Lamar will finally be releasing the follow up to Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City. Kanye West already has the Internet excited with his new single featuring Paul McCartney.  The N.W.A. movie is coming out in 2015 and is rumored that Dr. Dre may be releasing the highly anticipated Detox album as the soundtrack to accompany the movie.  We will find out if Macklemore has what it takes to strike commercial luck again and in just a couple of weeks, Joey Bada$$ will prove what the younger generation has to offer with his latest release.

Only time will tell what the year 2015 has in store for the fate of Hip Hop. It should be a great experience and I am ready to take the ride with the readers of I Am Classic Hip Hop.

– Megillah

Ke Turner’s Top 5 Songs of 2014

Be it a long ride from Atlanta to visit fam in VA, or a party for one at the crib, these songs stayed in rotation. I like the fact that I have a mix from the most obscure to the most commercial. Anyone that knows me personally, knows that I go from one extreme to the next!

Without further ado, in no particular order from best to best, here are my top five songs of 2014.

1. Rae Sremmurd – No Flex Zone

They said Ke, “you been in the A too long” I said “please, can’t you feel that energy in the song?”

Sometimes, that’s all it takes for me, the energy. I love it, can’t deny it. You like what you like and the song is flat out fun to me! We all got that joint that we normally wouldn’t listen to and those funny looking boys got me last year!

2. King Apocalypse – The Addiction featuring Mntlplx

That mashing out, throw a chair, stomp you out, raise your blood pressure and elevate your heart rate type track that we need in our life! I wanted so bad to pull up next to someone playing heavy trap music and flood them out with this!

3. Doecino – O.G.W.A

I’m a sucker for horns, hard hitting drums and dope lines. When I first heard this, it was immediately burned to a disc, thrown into the cd player with the volume on deafen.

4. Tripple M – Lost Generation

In the pocket for marching music and spiritual warfare. This joint evokes such a feeling of hope. Definitely one that reminds me to never give up the fight! This is one to carry on into the New Year and beyond!

5. Hit Boy / HS87 – Grindin My Whole Life

Gosh, this takes me back to July 4th, box braids and Marlboro lights.

Lyrically it’s not the greatest and truthfully I wore it out because of the production. Many say G-Unit gave this track way more justice, but lawd, Childish Gambino just danced all over it! Anywho, the beat was one of the hardest to me, so anytime I’d be in a whip you could hear me coming around the bend when the bass dropped, doom doom doom doom.

This concludes my list for 2014. I look forward to hearing fresh new music in the New Year.

May you all have a prosperous one!

– Ke Turner

Megillah’s Top 5 Albums of 2014

5. Logic – Under Pressure

The Maryland based rapper has been building up a fan base via the Internet through a slew of mixtape releases.  On October 21, 2014, Logic released his debut record Under Pressure on Def Jam Recordings.  Logic pays homage to A Tribe Called Quest, throughout the album by using the same narrative style from their 1993 classic Midnight Marauders in-between his 15 tracks.  The young rapper really utilized his debut to lay all his life experiences on the line with a huge payoff for the listeners.  Some of the album highlights include: “Buried Alive,” “Driving Ms Daisy” and “Soul Food.”

4. Apollo Brown & Ras Kass – Blasphemy

For his 2014 release, the Watts, CA rapper enlisted the man behind the boards for Detroit’s group The Left to produce the entire album. Ras Kass starts off the album by displaying his lyrical talent on “How to Kill God” and never let’s up.  Apollo Brown’s production gives Ras Kass a soulful sound to ride to as he tackles a variety of subject matters ranging from religion to women.  Some of the highlights on the album include: “H2O,” “How to Kill God,” “48 Laws Pt. 1” and “Too Much of a Good Thing.”

3. Freddie Gibbs & Madlib – Pinata

The mixture of Madlib’s blue note sound and the lyrical style of Gangsta Gibbs seem like an odd pairing, but the two sounds gel together quite well.  Gibbs laid back flow over the melodic beats from Madlib help the listener to really escape into an alternate reality where they can just get lost into the story line provide by the Gary, Indiana emcee.  Some of the highlights on the album include: “Shitsville,” “Deeper,” “Thuggin’” and “Bomb.”

2. Run the Jewels – Run the Jewels 2

RTJ2 is the third collaborative album between Killer Mike and EL-P and the second as the group, Run the Jewels.  Every time the Definitive Jux co-founder and the Dungeon Family rapper team up they create an undeniably hypnotic sound.  Based on appearance they look like the odd couple, but their chemistry is remarkable and they have captured a unique sound on RTJ2 that hasn’t been heard in Hip Hop before.  Some of the highlights on the album include: “Oh My Darling Don’t Cry,” “Close Your Eyes (and Count to Fuck),” “Blockbuster Night Part 1,” and “Early.”

1. Pharoahe Monch – Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

PSTD is the fourth official solo album released by the former member of Organized Konfusion.  Pharoahe uses the concept of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as the central theme behind the elaborate stories throughout the album.  His style on PSTD creates a pseudo post-apocalyptic feeling to the album that draws the listener in and leaves them wanting more.  Some of the highlights on the album include “Rapid Eye Movement,” “The Jungle,” “Broken Again” and “D.R.E.A.M.”

– Megillah