Rumors: 50 Cent Borrowed Cars for MTV CRIBS?
Real Talk NY uncovers online claims by Ferrari enthusiasts that those Ferraris on MTV Cribs weren't 50 Cent's.
But it's all about selling the house so can't we just stand back and let the kid work?
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« November 18, 2007 - November 24, 2007 | Main | December 2, 2007 - December 8, 2007 »
Real Talk NY uncovers online claims by Ferrari enthusiasts that those Ferraris on MTV Cribs weren't 50 Cent's.
But it's all about selling the house so can't we just stand back and let the kid work?
Hip hop film and tv industry news from WoooHah.com:
First look photos of 50 Cent in new action/thriller "Righteous Kill" starring Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino.
Video preview of Method Man starring in next week's new episode of Law & Order: SVU.
Ice Cube's upcoming movie "First Sunday" co-starring Tracy Morgan with new movie poster and website.
Exclusive update on upcoming Notorious BIG movie.
Ludacris discusses his next film "Rocknrolla" and balancing time between music and acting.
If you've been considering adding social network elements to your blog or website you may have considered Ning's social network platform, where many have built unique social networks, and/or Flux's social distribution platform, which has begun offering widgets and will soon offer build-your-own networks.
In a great attack from Ning presented in a Techcrunch post, their CEO Gina Bianchini shares her analysis of why Ning is the better platform.
Given that Flux isn't fully available, that might seem unfair but check her description of the rights you sign over to Flux. It's a good reminder that we really should be reading all those agreements before checking those little boxes when we sign up for a service!
I'm going to check things out on Flux but this doesn't look good for them.
Bianchini sticks it to Flux's owner Viacom as well by providing a timeline of ten years of new media failures followed by a brief history of Viacom's tendency to sue their partners. Nice twist of the knife.
Romeo & Demar Are THE TRANSFORMERS!!!
I was already surprised at how Romeo Miller and Demar DeRozan were being marketed with their initial signing event.
Today I received the above photo and the following tie-in to their senior year seasons:
Come witness the future - Romeo Miller and Demar DeRozan - a.k.a. "The Transformers" - up close and in person as they kick off their respective high schools' basketball seasons.
Who: Romeo Miller - "the next Allen Iverson"
What: Beverly High's first basketball game of the season
When: December 3, 2007; 7PM
Where : Beverly Hills High School Gym
Who: Demar DeRozan - the #1 high school player in the country; "the next Lebron James"
What : Compton vs. Bakersfield
When: December 10, 2007 8:30PM
Where: Ocean View High School
Romeo and Demar are headed to USC in 2008! Come see why they call them THE TRANSFORMERS.
What do people think about this campaign billing these two young men as The Transformers? I know a bunch of you out there know much more about this than do I so please share your thoughts.
Boost Mobile Anthem 2.0 Commercial f/Jermaine Dupri, Young Jeezy & Mickey Avalon
Here's the Boost Mobile commercial featuring Jermaine Dupri, Young Jeezy and Mickey Avalon we've been expecting as part of the Boost Mobile Speaks to Youths campaign.
My only question is, "Who's the drag queen they call That Dude?"
Via Different Kitchen whose only question seems to be:
"Who the f-ck is Mickey Avalon though??"
I would so love to know the details of how this came to be. In particular, I would kill for the details of how Mickey Avalon was pitched to any of the relevant parties and especially for the details of how his presence was pitched to Jermaine and Jeezy.
Come on, insiders, give me a 2007 worth remembering!
I will say this, if they really want to take Mickey Avalon across the chasm from early adopters to the mainstream, they should shift their focus from the aspirational pitch [aspiration, that's what ties them together, duh!, i'm so slow] and connect the mutual love for white girls shared by Jeezy and Mickey. That could be huge.
But "I'm That Dude from Hollywood with my Hair in an Al Sharpton Perm" just ain't gonna make that leap. Mickey's just too easy to undermine from this angle of entry.
On a related note:
If Mickey Avalon's is supposed to be this year's equivalent of The Game [?!?], who would be a better fit with Jermaine and Jeezy?
Previous ProHipHop Coverage:
Boost Mobile's Anthem 2.0 Starring Young Jeezy, Jermaine Dupri & Mickey Avalon
Beyond the (White) Rapper: Nerdcore & Glam Rap
I don't even know what to think about De-Haven Irby's attacks on Jay-Z but I know the only YouTube video of his I watched was him going on and on about what he was going to prove in future videos and that's as far as I got.
But his campaign's getting him some attention with an interview in New York magazine and opportunities to monetize his tale supposedly in the works.
Great piece in the NY Times by Jake Bernstein on women djs as fashion trendsetters with a focus on such DJ's as Justine D, Beverly Bond and DJ Lindsey.
Some interesting angles here about blogs but mostly I'm fascinated by what most people would consider mundane, the process in which people all start dressing exactly like someone well known, whether locally or at the pop star level:
Like others in the growing contingent of female D.J.'s commanding the dance floor and building cults on the Web, she [Justine D] has an avid following. Scores of young women have picked up on her sound, and with it, her style, a graphic amalgam of black shirts with white bib tops and slinky halter dresses accessorized with tattoos and cataracts of cola-tone hair.
"I did have several female club-goers ask me, 'How does it make you feel that everyone is dressing like you now?'" Ms. Delaney said...
"When you go into a club and the D.J. is wearing something, it almost gives it idol status," said Frannie Schultz, 21, a college student from Brooklyn. Ms. Schultz, who mingles high style and low in deference to idols like Leigh Lezark of the MisShapes and Roxy Cottontail, noted that on the Lower East Side, epicenter of the downtown club scene, style is "centered around the promoters and the D.J.'s."
"If you see a girl who is D.J.-ing, wearing a certain shirt or brand of shoes," she said, "it makes people want to buy that item."...
"A lot of these girls are just novelties," said Alisa O'Connor, 21, of Brooklyn, alluding to the D.J. who flaunts glitter and angel wings to distract from the fact that she is playing prerecorded CDs. But "if she is a good D.J.," Ms. O'Connor said, "I'm going to respect her for what she wears."
This is a powerful process that works both in these localized trendsetter milieus and on a larger scale with pop stars. Straight up, the fact that people are actually proud to be dressing like someone else because they like some other thing they do that isn't fashion related is something I have to accept as an aspect of objective reality that will always baffle me.
But that doesn't mean I can't consider how to monetize it like any good hustler or con artist, even if I only play one of those in the hip hop blogosphere.
Here's my big plan inspired by this NY Times article and today's Dilbert:
Ok, so here's the deal.
I've been following urban wear and street wear trends via blogs long enough to be able to keep up with new developments as closely as needed. I've also been in Raleigh, NC for a couple of years now noticing how slowly this stuff works its way from initial appearances on blogs and in videos and into the general public's consciousness.
What I think I can do is combine the Dilbert concept with the easy ability to keep up with breaking edge fashion online and leverage the music industry cliche of the old guy wearing what the kids are wearing to effectively organize the brand destruction of any new brand. But instead of being the old guy who's following the trends, I'll be the old guy who's wearing what the big city trendsetters are wearing before they become local trends.
What's obvious is that I can keep up with breaking edge fashion as well as any of the local trendsetters in this area, which would be considered a reasonably up to date and forward thinking region of mass America, simply by mail ordering stuff and hitting NY once a quarter.
If I then get a bunch of other old guys to join me, we could just start showing up at the mall in fashions most of the local kids haven't started registering yet and make them look uncool before word hits the local scene.
If I continued to expand on a national scale, not only could I effectively make it impossible for any targeted brand to break out of the trendsetter scene, I could then begin a reverse process of making the trendsetters look uncool and destroying their careers as well.
Dig This:
What would happen if Bun B shows up on MTV wearing a hoodie that the majority of the kids watching first saw at their local mall on some old white guy?
Fantasy?
Or a new level of the game about to emerge?
Either way I'm loving this idea and may start playing around with it locally just to make the kids uncomfortable and see what theater emerges.
"Yo, Hector. Nice hoodie! I saw your grandpa wearing it down at the Food Court last week! No, seriously, dude. Sorry."
Ultimate Goal:
To get paid not to wear a brand, just as companies pay to keep their products out of embarrassing movie placements.
Interested in funding such a startup?
You know where to find me:
clyde(at)prohiphop(dot)com
Update:
I was just picturing my great aunt and her friends from the retirement community getting off the bus at the mall all wearing Gino Green hoodies! The more visible the brand, the greater the destruction.
I think my great aunt might actually like some of the more colorful hoodies and she's got a birthday coming up!
Sicker yet, in a good way, would be to engage in such tactics while wearing bootleg editions of the brands you're destroying.
The more Nas reveals about his plans for the album N*gger, the better it sounds.
Related ProHipHop Coverage:
Nas' Next Album Pushed Back to February
Too Short Get Off The Stage Commercial
A quick promo for Too Short's Get Off The Stage due December 4th from Jive.
You know Damon Dash and Kareem "Biggs" Burke are getting a laugh [and anticipating a nice payoff] from putting Jay-Z's Reasonable Doubt on iTunes after the recent rejection of iTunes by both Jay-Z and Jermaine Dupri.
Watch those fans chop up that album and take the good parts of Jay-Z's only true classic album and listen to those parts as individual tracks, destroying the artist's vision and leading us further down a hellish path where ringtone rappers rule and true artists can't get no respect.
Chop it up, bag it, sell, sell, sell.
Wait a minute, that sounds like drug dealing. I thought Jay-Z was so into that kind of thing.
Distribution via Tunecore.
SkeeTV: Behind the Scenes at the Sensual Seduction Shoot
Snoop Dogg kicks off promotions for the anticipated March 2008 release of Ego Trippin with the startling single/video Sensual Seduction and the above behind the scenes look from SkeeTV.
Freeway - Free At Last
Jay-Z's American Gangster drops out of the top 10 on the Billboard 200 album chart as Freeway's Free at Last debuts at no. 42.
Top 10 Albums on the Billboard 200:
1. Josh Groban - Noel
2. Alicia Keys - As I Am
3. Now That's What I Call Music 26
4. Garth Brooks - The Ultimate Hits
5. The Eagles - Long Road Out of Eden
6. Soundtrack - High School Musical 2
7. Carrie Underwood - Carnival Ride
8. Celine Dion - Taking Chances
9. Chris Brown - Exclusive
10. Jordin Sparks - Jordin Sparks
Related ProHipHop Coverage:
Video Promo for Freeway: Free At Last
Rick Ross' Trilla is delayed till February 19th.
Are there a lot more pushbacks this year or am I just paying attention for a change?
Star and Buc Wild are back at Pedo Pulse 87 FM!
Hip hop radio [or whatever they do] is saved!
Somebody go tell mama!
[Oh, and hide the kids, Star seems to have "issues" with children.]
I really was going to take the day off and reconsider my relationship to Corporate America but Birdman, Slim and a bunch more folks got busted for drugs and pot and I thought you'd like to know if you haven't already read about it.
Once again, the smell of marijuana leads to a bigger bust. But rappers don't have time to work for marijuana reform. They're too busy in jail on the phone crying to their mamas.
Update:
Birdman says that initial media reports are nonsense, the guns are legal and there was a small amount of marijuana leading to a misdemeanor charge.
That title should actually read:
Why Artists & Content Producers [& All Non-Technical Business People] Need As Much Technical Knowledge As They Can Stand to Develop [& More if Humanly Possible]
I just got out of a meeting in which an engineer made an exaggerated claim about a technical challenge in order to, as he later revealed, test the client's need for the feature.
In this case, the engineer's machinations were revealed by the engineer himself who seemed totally unaware of the implications of what he had just done. That's not usually the case as most stories about deceptive maneuvers by technicians who have alternate agendas reveal.
For example, a friend of mine was the field producer at MTV a few years back for a very successful show that involved primary production at ever changing locations. She would be on the headset asking for a particular shot, the cameraman would say it couldn't be done and then, since she had all those skills, she would explain to them how to do it as they went.
That kind of thing cut down on the unprofessional behavior she encountered regularly from male cameramen who made certain stupid assumptions about her abilities, not that they would ever openly cop to that kind of behavior. And that was MTV.
Seriously, it's a buyer beware scene and absolutely any speck of knowledge you have will make it much less likely that you and your work will be undermined by people that are not really on your team.
MTV News Interviews Jay-Z
On writing lyrics, Jay-Z says, do as I say, not as I do.
Jay-Z also says he stopped writing at Reasonable Doubt. Interestingly enough, all the hardcore Jay-Z fans I know and respect seriously wish for something else at that level. Could there be a connection?
Given that context, for Jay-Z/Def Jam to withold American Gangster from iTunes and then present it as an artistic choice is a bit ridiculous, though plenty are willing to buy in.
Jermaine Dupri does a nice job of revealing how he thinks on the matter and he's got some good points that are totally undermined by objective reality.
For example:
Back in the day when people were excited about a record coming out we'd put out a single to get the ball going and if we sold a lot of singles that was an indication we'd sell a lot of albums. But we'd cut the single off a few weeks before the album came out to get people to wait and let the excitement build. When I put out Kris Kross we did that. We sold two million singles, then we stopped. Eventually we sold eight million albums!
Did consumers complain? Maybe so. But at what point does any business care when a consumer complains about the money? Why do people not care how we - the people who make music - eat? If they just want the single, they gotta get the album. That was how life was.
That was how life was and now it's not. Doh!
Even back in the 80s, when albums were still supposed to be somewhat album-like, the most common complaint I heard and personally expressed was that most of the time when one bought an album because of a great single, odds were that the album would suck.
But we were stuck. That's how life was. Now it's not.
Hip hop has become a singles sport and the music industry has exploited that to the max. But trying to save the album by restricting singles sales rather than bothering to write down your lyrics so maybe they can get a little deeper isn't gonna work when everybody can see this isn't about art, it's about commerce, and such moves are holding actions so folks like Jermaine Dupri and Jay-Z can skim as much cream as possible before the ship sinks.
Hey, maybe the real problem is that Jay-Z doesn't put out great singles anymore?
But his timing remains awesome. If he had released American Gangster a week earlier and gotten the same sales, he'd have debuted at no. 2 with 425,000 sold behind the Eagles no. 1 with 711,000 sold.
But he'd still beat Britney Spears!
The Best Of Mack 10: Foe Life
Coming from Priority Records December 4th:
The Best Of Mack 10: Foe Life
The Best Of Fiend: Mr. Whomp Whomp
The Best Of Fiend: Mr. Whomp Whomp
Press Releases:
MACK 10'S TOP HITS COLLECTED FOR THE FIRST TIME FOR NEW CAPITOL/PRIORITY RELEASE, THE BEST OF MACK 10: FOE LIFE
CAPITOL/PRIORITY PRESENTS THE BEST OF FIEND: MR. WHOMP WHOMP
Nas' next album, currently titled N*gger, has been pushed back to February and that's Black History Month. Expect the first official single in January.
For Promotional Use Only commemorates the passing of 1xtralarge.
Look, he's got a way groovy ProHipHop sidebar widget!
Extensive profile of Nigo & A Bathing Ape by Karl Taro Greenfeld at Conde Nast Portfolio.com.
Fascinating stuff. Way too many cool things to quote from the current state of A Bathing Ape to Nigo's move to Tokyo at age 18 and his subsequent fashion career.
Hey, I think I might get a t-shirt for mentioning this interview with Joe Conzo by Ivan Sanchez regarding hip hop photography and his book Born in the Bronx: A Visual Record of the Early Days of Hip Hop.
But before you call me a sellout consider that I've already covered the book as well as a related exhibit.
Nevertheless, disclosures were in order.
On a related note, SiTV has an article on Chingo Bling, the "one man-marketing show".
MDA Senior Management Rap
From the Singapore Media Development Authority via TechCrunch.
I'm not sure what to think.
Young Jeezy, Jermaine Dupri & Mickey Avalon for Boost Mobile
Boost Mobile announces Anthem 2.0, a follow-up to the 2004 Anthem campaign featuring Kanye West, Ludacris and The Game.
The new campaign features "music tycoon Jermaine Dupri, hip-hop mogul Young Jeezy and crossover rock star Mickey Avalon" [crossover rock star?] together in an "innovative 3D animated music-video-style commercial. The spot also features an original track produced by Dupri with vocals from all three artists, which will begin airing Nov. 26 on MTV, BET, ESPN, COMEDY CENTRAL and other youth-oriented national networks."
First, let me make it clear that I'm actually a Mickey Avalon fan. That said, I think he's an awful fit for this commercial. It's obvious there's a big label push for Mickey Avalon and an attempt to connect him with more traditional hip hop acts but that's not where his market lies unless you think that the often homophobic fans of such acts as The Game and Young Jeezy are going to warm up to a Hollywood street hustler [in his lyrics Mickey Avalon claims to have turned gay tricks].
There's a market for this guy but it's over somewhere in the rock scene. If having him in commercials with Young Jeezy and Jermaine Dupri helps over there, then fine for Mickey, but this won't look good for Young Jeezy, in particular, unless he's developing a new queer friendly approach to reach some demographic that only the major label/mobile carrier/corporate pr geniuses have identified.
Whatever. Good luck guys.
Related ProHipHop Coverage:
Boost Mobile Anthem 2.0 Commercial
Fat Joe's so serious about ensuring the success of The Elephant in the Room, due March 11th, that he's making his first mixtape:
"I'mma do it in this next month," he said. "I'mma write mixtape material, do 12 joints for the mixtape, put a couple of unreleased joints on there and let it go. I never wanted to do a mixtape, but I'm going in."
Mixtape Monday has more from Fat Joe on the album, Terror Squad and just how young he feels.
Cunninlynguists - Dirty Acres
To receive this report separately each week, please visit Weekly Hip Hop Albums and sign up for our free weekly newsletter delivered every Monday with Tuesday's releases.
The following new releases are available from Amazon.
Away Team - Training Day
B Real - The Gunslinger III: For a Few Dollars More
Black Milk - Sound of the City
Chuck D & The Slamjamz Artist Revue - Tribb to JB
Common - This Is Me Then: The Best Of Common
Cunninlynguists - Dirty Acres
H Town 2 Tha A Town
Large Professor - Beatz, Vol. 2
Mac Dre Presents Me-N-My Goonz
Pitbull - The Boatlift
Thizz Nation, Vol. 18: Mistah Fab N G-Stack
Thizz Nation, Vol. 19: Star Studded
Thizz Nation, Vol. 20: Starring Geezy Town Thizzness
T.I. & Jim Jones - When the North & South Collide, Pt. 3
Whoo Kid - Guess Who's Mothaf#@kin' Back
Zimbabwe Legit - House of Stone
For a database of upcoming and past releases with updates,
please see Hip Hop Albums @ netweed.
Music industry news from Hypebot:
The Guitar Hero video game is leading to increased download sales for the acts featured.
The ad supported music model is expanding and MySpace has plans to join the experiment.
Hypebot continued its 4QFor (Four Questions For) series with an exclusive interview with band empowerment and music discovery site ReverbNation's Michael Dorenberg.
Is the march to DRM free music stalled?
This week's Coalition of Independent Music Stores' Top 200 sellers.
OurDigitalMusic shared Top 10 Songs For A Modern Thanksgiving and How To Save Money On Music This Christmas
See ProHipHop's Hypebot Industry News category for past roundups.
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