Maybe its just me.

But I just don’t feel the love in most mainstream hip hop these days. I mean just listen at some of the beats. And don’t even get me on the rhymes and subject matter, we’ll save that for another post lol! I may be just rambling because I’ve been on I tunes and You Tube listening to some underground producers and artist, and I’m just amazed at how such talent doesn’t make it to the mainstream!

I started out on Facebook watching a posted video by one of my favorite underground producers named M-Phazes. He was doing a tutorial on how he made the song “Another Classic” on his new album called “Phazed Out” I ended up following the link to his I-tunes page where I could preview the whole album and it is SICK!!

He has a slew of the illest underground lyricist to bless the mic over his pure hip hop landscapes. There is a song on there with underground beasts Saigon, Inspectah Deck & Bekay called “Raw” that is just simply raw! I could ride to it all day!

My favorite though, is “Another Classic”, another appropriately named track lol! It features Burke and Torae. I’m probably in love with this song because the sample choice is one I would have made being a crate digger myself.

OMG, I found a new favorite!

Yeah, while I was checking out M-Phazes, I found a new favorite group. I don’t know much about them yet, as I’m writing this article right after mydiscovery of them lol! Its these guys named JR & PH7. I clicked on the “listeners also bought” below the playlist because I liked the album cover (I’m a graphic design student) and the title “My Favorite Demons was interesting. When I went to the play list…damn…. I know everyone has their own tastes and opinions, but I just don’t understand how anyone can not like these guys! Upon further discovery I found that they have two more albums in I-tunes dating back to 2009!

Lets just say these cats are dope! I’m not sure who the producer is or the who is who on the rhymes but I will figure it out soon lol! I havent felt this way since I discovered Little Brother when the dropped “The Listening” and I’ve been a fan ever since.

Who ever does the beats, like myself has been influenced by the late great J Dilla, who I’m proud to be from the same home town as. Wut up doe Detroit lol! Which leads me back too…

Love for the game…

When I listen at my old Dilla cds, Littles Brother, Fashawn, Freddy Gibbs and many others that you don’t really hear in the mainstream, I heard a different love for the actual music that I don’t hear with a lot of the major lable music.

It’s like the industry can suck the life out of the artistry by trying to force the artist to bang out the next hit to generate the next buck. For example, Kanye West at one time to me was the essence of pure hip hop that landed in the major label circle. Don’t get me wrong, he is wildly successful these days, but his music these days just doesn’t feel the same to me as it did during the “College Dropout” through the “Graduation” era. Maybe something to do with dark forces or something, I don’t know lol! I’ll also save my thoughts on that for another post.

I guess I’m just saying that most, not all, but most mainstream music lacks the soul of the underground guys who actually study and love the craft of beatmaking and rhyming. Maybe its because most of it is manufactured with a motive way deeper than rap.

I’am an aspiring independent artist myself, but I’m on a hiatus while in school for the next year. I will still be working on projects to keep sharp, but I need to go into a different career for now, to earn the money necessary to remain an independent artist. Because of the internet, I do believe that those of us who have love for the craft of hip hop music can put out our beats for sale, or even full length albums and profit off of them with no record labels involved.

I feel its just necessary to keep the integrity of the music intact and not become some sort of illuminati industry puppet lol!

For the other aspiring producers and artist reading this

If you are also some who make beats and or raps and would like to learn how you can put you musical products out to the world, you should get knowledge. Personally, I love hip hop and I know that being signed to a record label will come with a high price, artistic freedom being one of the main ones I wont stand for. Plus even getting to the “inner circle” is damn near impossible for most.

Talent alone dosent even cut it. I mean compared to the world of talented beatmakers out there, there are just a hand full of major lable artist who can even use those beats!

That’s why if you are a producer/ beatmaker you should just build a website and learn to market and sell your own beats to the world of aspiring artist. And believe me, there are waaay more aspiring, than those who have make it to the major lables lol! And if you are someone more like myself, who make beats and rhymes and want to record a whole album, you should invest in some training like Gen-Y Rockstars on how to market your project globally! With the power of the internet, it can be done, no B.S.!

Anyway, I’ll get off my soapbox now! I just wanted to talk about the love of hip hop and where it is. I’m not here to dump on major label artist and their music, there is some good music on the radio. But the real gems are buried in the underground! Long live true hip hop!