Kanye Topples 50 In First-Week Sales

Alright, almost everyone has been talking about it, and I've bought in to the hype: Kanye West beat 50 Cent in album sales last week. Kanye's Graduation smoked 50's Curtis by nearly a third. The former moved 957,000 units according to Nielsen SoundScan, the latter 691,000.

Quite bombastic sales in the face of a crippled album sales industry, where recent chart-toppers have moved less than 200,000 in their first week. According to Billboard.com, Graduation is the best-selling album in the week of release since, ironically, 50 Cent's The Massacre which moved 1.1 million in its debut.

The question remains: Will 50 follow through on his promise to retire if Kanye outsold him by actually bowing out? My guess is no, but I'd love to see him show some class and stay true to his word.

The Decline of Hip Hop

In a USA Today report, the newspaper discusses the decline of album sales in rap music, stating that "this year, rap sales are down 33% from 2006." This is even greater than the overall decline in album sales, and cannot be dismissed as simple suffering from digital sales and/or illegal downloads. Culprits include skipping whole album sales in favor of hyping the singles that sell ringtones and digital singles.

The greatest culprit in the declining sales, however, cannot be denied: people are just tired of hearing about bullets and bling. As USA Today puts it, "the young, largely white audience that can make a difference between modest and blockbuster sales ó are tiring of rappers' emphasis on "gangsta" attitudes, explicit lyrics and tales of street life and conspicuous consumption."

And one of my favorite hip-hop artists, KRS-One, puts it this way: "The music is garbage. What has happened over the past few years is that we have traded art for money, simple and plain, and the public is not stupid." You've got that right, Blastmaster! Hip hop as an industry has given up information and education and social activism in favor of being strictly party music. There is no balance in hip hop.

"The public has made a choice," KRS-One says. "They're saying, 'We do not want the nonsense that we see and hear on radio, and we are not putting our money there.' Rap music is being boycotted by the American public because of the images that we are putting forward."

Arguing that the current language of hip hop is blasted because it is a cultural representation of reality, 50 Cent counters "Music is a mirror, and hip-hop is a reflection of the environment we grew up in."

In my conversation with Salim, a Baltimore hip hop artist (the podcast will be available on Any Given Tuesday tomorrow), we discussed the lack of balance in hip hop, and it is clear from the above comments by KRS and 50 that there are different cultural representations that hip hop can make. There is a time for party music, a time for mirroring one's reality, and a time for speaking out against political and social injustice.

50 Cent Won't Clean Up His Lyrics, Punks Master P; TI Agrees

50 Cent has issued a characteristic response to the recent movement to "clean up hip-hop", with artists such as Master P changing their game.

In response to questions about others demanding artists to clean up their lyrics, 50 quipped: "I personally believe on every level that it's easier to attack an individual than it is to go after a corporation. They'll go after a specific hip-hop artist as opposed to a Paramount or a Columbia Pictures.

"Music is a mirror, and hip-hop is a reflection of the environment that we grew up in. It's the harsh realities that end up in the music. If I ask you to paint a picture of the American flag and not use the color red, you're gonna have a difficult time. To capture what we try to capture in the art form, I'm sure some conservative Americans can't actually ID with it because of their lifestyle and the way they've actually been brought up, and they haven't been exposed to those realities."

I appreciate that 50 Cent is standing up and presenting a valid argument for what he is doing, rather than dismissing it with a wave of the hand or lashing out. What 50 seems to miss is that one can reflect the environment they grew up in without sensationalizing those realities, and one can paint an American flag in an abstract manner with other colors, or with just black on white canvas, and still get the point across. The flag is an icon, it will be recognizable no matter what color it is painted in. Further, there are plenty of Americans, conservative, liberal or otherwise, who can identify and who cannot identify, regardless of their upbringing. Some folks grow up in tough places, both emotionally and geographically. But not all of those folks sensationalize that upbringing.

It is certainly important to create a historic record of these realities. Corporations, as 50 mentions them, have capitalized on the cycle of violence, lining their pockets with hip-hop money, and so has 50. Society will go to the individuals at the front lines over the corporation because the corporation is an intangible. It is much easier to blame the artist, though both the artist and the corporation are of unclean hands. I support 50's right to say what he wants, and he's lived a life that allows him to rap about his reality with authority.

50 also went at Master P during his commentary: "Well, Master P doesn't sell CDs anymore," he scoffed. "You can tell him I said it. Cameras is rollin' right?...Curtis, June 26." You heard it. June 26.

T.I. joined the fray with good points of his own. "What 50 was trying to put into words without losing his temper is it all starts at home. I'm a father of five. And my kids watch BET. They watch all kinds of videos, they watch movies, they listen to music, they like 50 and Lil' Wayne, whomever you can mention. But when my children look at these videos or listen to this music, I don't care how impressionable it is. They know they aren't going to have to deal with 50. They're going to have to deal with daddy. And that's the way it starts."

Continuing, T.I. said, "The things I say come from the life that I used to live."

Good words, but T.I. confirms the only point I keep returning to in my own battle with what kind of hip-hop to listen to: the life he used to live. Rappers tend to rap about their realities. Well, T.I., 50 Cent, your realities are now full of cars and money, and you're selling your past back to both those who do and do not understand that reality. I've seen you both on "Cribs." You've got it all. Rap about what your reality is now. Don't keep returning to the same stuff that you were lucky enough to break free of. Let's look forward a little bit instead of always looking backward. Rap about how important it is to look to the future and a chance to get out of these harsh realities that will always be a part of you. I'm not saying on every song, just some. Give your fans something they can look forward to, strive towards. Most of us aren't going to be huge commercial rappers like you. We're going to have to find other ways to change our situations.

Hip-hop, like any kind of music, is a wonderful thing. It's a creative outlet, and emotionally cathartic form of escapism, and many other positive things. In the end, the artist can, and should, have the right to say what they want on their record. But music is always involving. The climate changes. Artists grow and their world view becomes more complex. Let's get political, get sociological. People are growing tired of the status quo of hearing the same message in any form of music. Challenge the listener to dissect the complexity of the work. Be a part of the evolution.

50 Cent Starts The War With Cam'ron, Still Loves Jim Jones

50 has decided he's going to bring it, with a video for "Funeral Music", featuring hearse rolling by with the "Cam'ron's Career" written on the side, and then continues a giant hip-hop cliche of G-Unit Soldiers (I thought we were done referring to rap cliques in a military fashion when No Limit went down) flashing guns, money, and scantily clad ladies. The coup de grace is the cartoon animation of Cam'ron's Lamborghini getting shot up, an apparent reenactment of the attempted carjacking in Washington, DC where Cam'ron was shot last year. Interestingly, 50 singles out Cam as the only Dipset member he's beefing with, stating that "From now on Jimmy's [Jim Jones] the boss of Dipset".

I love hip-hop beef as much as the next person, but 50 Cent is taking it to the level that plagues hip-hop today: unnecessary violence. I appreciate 50's attacking Cam's lyrical abilities in the song, but the guns? That is tired, Fif!

50 Cent Beefs With Styles P, Cam'ron On Hot 97

Label beef galore!

50 Cent paid a visit to Hot 97, the always-willing-to-fuel-some-label-beef station yesterday. While on the show, in came a phone call from Styles P, incensed by the show's discussion of Fif's involvement in the delay of Styles P's sophomore effort, Time Is Money (and Styles ain't making none, by the sound of it).

Not only was the beef between 50 and Styles P, but Cam'ron ("Horse & Carriage", anyone? Yeah, he's Dip Set now, but whatever. "Horse & Carriage". That's all I'm saying.) even made a call to the show, taunting 50 about album sales. In the past, 50 Cent has derided indie label Koch Records as a place for washed up rappers to go and die.

Cam pointed out that Jim Jones (on Koch) has moved 330,000 units, while Lloyd Banks (on 50's G-Unit) has moved 300,000. Cam even went so far as to call 50 by his Christian name, Curtis. 50, audibly frustrated at this point, said, "You're getting ready to cause a whole different situation. Watch it."

In an effort to put an end to the circus show, Jim Jones called in (after 50 had left), saying "Ain't nothing going down, its just aggressive competition. It got a little blown out of proportion [but] we don't want nobody to take it beyond that."

I don't know, Jim, that sounds like beef of the Hot 97 variety.

Thanks to SOHH for the story.