Videos of the Week

When watching @iamwill's new video for T.H.E., the only though that crossed my mind was that's about right. I wouldn't expect anything less than interstellar, Michael Jackson-esque, Scream type, CGI driven madness. The only thing I'm in complete awe about is what jboymoo said about him on iTunes (below):

Saying Will I Am is a great rapper would have been debatable ten years ago, not today. Now he's more international pop star, let's try and keep his pop star persona from the association of the word rapper, k?

As a sidebar, it's pretty cool seeing all of the behind the scenes footage of Kanye and Jay's Watch the Throne tour. Other than the fact that they play N words in Paris a record 10 times in one concert (not joking), it seems to be the most highly sought after concert ticket. I'll be the first to admit, I was very lukewarm on their album initially, but lately I've found myself going back to it and liking it better the more I listen to it. Some things are just too intense and shoved down our throat and over-hyped that it borders on too cliche to even say nice things about. Now that the dust has settled, I'm more than happy to say should be in the conversation for album of the year...#NotTheBestThough

Will.i.am feat Jennifer Lopez & Mick Jagger - T.H.E. (The Hardest Ever) Video

The Cataracs feat Dev - Sunrise (Video)

Gym Class Heroes feat Neon Hitch - Ass Back Home (Video)

Kanye & Jay-Z Watch the Throne Episode 3

Kanye & Jay-Z Watch the Throne Episode 4

Kanye & Jay-Z Watch the Throne Episode 5

Young Jeezy Performs I Do and Lose My Mind on Jimmy Kimmel

B.O.B. on NBC Nitecap

"Coke on Her Black Skin Made a Stripe Like a Zebra, I Call That Jungle Fever"

Well...after one full lap through Watch the Throne, the cream rose to the top in the form of a wilderness sermon that kicked off the album with an absolute explosion. The rolling 808 thump and dull, repetitious guitar riff create an infectious backdrop that is characteristic of countless other @kanyewest beats. What you shouldn't overlook is the help that @eightyocho put in behind the scenes to help craft the sound and the well placed, on point hook that @frank_ocean delivered to send it home. I'm not a fan at all of @OFWGKTA, but I'm finding that I like so many new tracks that Frank Ocean is putting out, it's hard to hate on the group as a collective, solely because of him.

A whole lotta people are saying that Ye is killing Hov throughout the album on their verses, but it's not a fair comparison in my eyes. It's gotta be a little different for a producer who also raps because he has that extra investment in the track and vision of what it should sound like. I'll say this, Kanye is capable of dropping more audacious, shock value lines that will get more headline ink, but when it comes to being on point and telling a story through verses, it's hard to mess with @s_c_. It's like would you rather go with something like bacon ice cream over cookies and cream ice cream. Sure, bacon has the potential to really change your night and if you saw a headline you'd probably do a double take, but cookies and cream is always good no matter how you slice it and it'll always beat the plain flavors any day of the week. Yep, sometimes it's just easier to drive home a rapper comparison with an ice cream reference...#DamnIceCreamSoundsGood

Everyone is quick to judge and get their opinion out, but I'ma let it marinade a lil bit before forming an opinion. If you're looking for a quick standout and suggestion as far as where to start when exploring the album, don't even think about skipping track one because that...shit...is off the chain! #ThatsMyWord

Kanye West & Jay-Z feat Frank Ocean - No Church in the Wild (prod by Kanye West & 88 Keys)

|iTunes

Children Being Born Now Will Never Get a Chance to Use Compact Discs

“It is not going to leak,” tweeted a confident John Meneilly

Here we are, less than 3 hours before the digital iTunes release and the only crumbs we've gotten from @s_c_ and @kanyewest's Watch the Throne come in the form of a 6 minute YouTube video that has 30 second snippets of the tracks.

30 Second Snippets From Watch the Throne

To put it in context, Beyonce's new album 4 leaked three weeks in advance, Eminem's Recovery and Drake's Thank Me Later leaked two weeks in advance, and Lil Wayne's The Carter 3 leaked 10 days prior to release. Shoot I thought Lady Gaga was queen of the world for finding a way for her album to not leak until 5 days before her release. I'd say it's about time for all the naysayers, who scoffed at Jay-Z's manager for confidently declaring last Wednesday that the record is "...not going to leak", to cut themselves a big piece of humble pie right now.

You might be wondering why it didn't leak or what all of this means? First off, it didn't leak simply because no physical copies have been sent to distributors. In other words, the album will initially only be available digitally, when the album, all 12 cuts plus four deluxe edition bonus tracks, will be exclusively released in digital format on iTunes. I say exclusively because their release plan is very unique in that they are allowing iTunes to exclusively sell digital copies of the album tonight at midnight on August 8th, four days before the thousands of other retail record shops get to sell the physical copy on August 12th. It gets better, the physical copy retailers will be able to sell will be limited to the standard 12 track album, since Jay-Z and Kanye struck a deal with Best Buy to be the only retailer who can sell the deluxe 16 track edition for the first ten days of sale until August 23rd. I'll let that sink in a little while you read the petition below that was put together by a huge group of unhappy retail outlets who are being hung out to dry by the decision...

"Dear Jay-Z and Kanye West,

Independent record stores serve our communities. Our passion is music, and we convey this to the millions of customers who come to our stores. That’s what we do.

Four years ago independent music stores across the country banded together to create Record Store Day. Our goal was to counter the negative media coverage about the supposed demise of record stores brought on by the closing of the Tower stores and to respond to the music business practices that fans deemed to be manipulative and onerous.

We reached out to the artist community to see if they would join us, and the response was overwhelming, with words of support coming in from Paul McCartney, Erykah Badu, Tom Waits, Chuck D, the Foo Fighters and countless others. Working with their label partners, many of these musicians created limited edition works of art, including vinyl and CDs made especially for music-specialty retail. Hundreds of these artists took the opportunity to perform, DJ, and interact with their fans in our record stores. Here in the U.S., Record Store Day lifted the entire music business by 8% and contributed to the growth in music sales. Record Store Day is now one of the biggest music events in history, with millions of people participating worldwide. We also continue to work throughout the year with labels, artists and managers and run regular promotions via physical independent retail and recordstoreday.com.

We are responding to the bad news that your new album will not be available to independent record stores until after iTunes gets a window of exclusivity. We also learned that the deluxe version (which is what the true music fans who shop our stores will want, by an overwhelming majority) will only be available at Best Buy exclusively for a period of time. We believe this is a short-sighted strategy, and that your decisions will be doing great damage to over 1,700 independent record stores — stores that have supported you and your music for years.

We know that you are busy, and that you put most of your energies into creating great music, but we are writing to you in the hope that you will hear us and take the time to rectify this matter. As representatives of the independent record store music community, we are asking you to allow record stores and music fans equal access to your new album.

With the utmost respect. (signed Indie Record Store Owners)"

I'll bet you're pretty surprised that Jay and Kanye didn't feel the need to respond to the open letter?

So what does this all mean? In my opinion, this will turn out to be one of the more significant events in record industry history. I say that because no other artists have had the combination of audacity and power to control every variables relating to their record being released that like Jay-Z and Kanye did. And now, as a result, it's probably going to turn out to be a really eye opening case study when their record sells the exact same amount (or probably more) even when they staggered the physical release of their album.

The impact on industry stakeholders will be widespread too, with digital retailers (Apple), exclusive big business retailers (Best Buy) and the artists (Kanye/Jay-Z) being the big winners, while pirates/bootleggers and small Indie record stores and Amazon being the obvious losers. With the extinction of many brick and mortar retailers like Circuit City and Borders, moves like this should quicken the already rapidly declining physical sales and eliminate the possibility of Indie record stores to survive in the current market.

For me, that's sad because I grew up spending my allowance or whatever cash I could scrape together to run down to Sam Goody and cop whatever single or album I could get my hands on. That is where I grew my roots in Hip Hop, which has rapidly evolved itself into more of an internet driven, technology forward, digital distribution business model. As a blogger, part of my job is to keep my eye out for new music that you haven't heard yet that I personally like. Sure, the absence of leaks would limit my power and influence as a writer because I wouldn't be able to provide a heads up on music that will be coming in the future, but in truth, I don't mind one bit that Jay-Z and Kanye chose this route and prevented their album from leaking. It's not going to prevent people from ultimately bootlegging the album as early as tonight, which is a sad realization for those Indie record stores who feel like they're getting singled out and losing money for nothing, but it will be wake up call for all artists/record companies looking to maximize their profit by preventing the initial sales push of their album being squashed because everyone has been listening to it for weeks before people can actually buy it.

Like any other industry shift, chalk it up to Social Darwinism where the evolving companies ahead of the technology wave are reaping the benefits and eliminating everyone else with the old business model in the process. The best way I can sum it up, thanks Ye and Hov, you've managed to make a mid-twenties blogger feel old because there are probably kids being born now that will never know what it was like to buy or burn a compact disk...

Feel free to watch the last Watch the Throne trailer to surface before everyone shuts down iTunes in a couple hours...

Watch the Throne Trailer 2

Videos of the Week

With Drizzy makin' Headlines this week (literally), he gets a lotta ink this week deservedly. That track is growin' on me now, especially after seein' him perform it live in concert. In case you forgot, Watch the Throne is due out in three days and hasn't leaked other than Otis, which is some kind of accomplishment these days. No idea how they did it, but bravo Hov and Ye, as a blogger I am impressed man.

Drake Performs Headlines For the First Time in Windsor, CA

Drake Talks About New Single Headlines and Take Care

Drake Talks About Remixes to Marvin's Room, Calls Them "Flattering"

The Cool Kids - Down to Ride (Interview/Video)

Lil Twist feat Mishon - New Money (Video)

"Luxury Rap, the Hermes of Verses, Sophisticated Ignorance, Write My Curses in Cursive"

And so it begins, the gradual leak the next week or two of the much hyped Watch the Throne from @kanyewest & @s_c_. The back and forth over a funky Otis Redding sample is awesome as both legends go in 8 bars at a time and do it without a hook. Really you don't need a hook when you know everyone will listen, so it's cool when well known artists step outside of the usual and do something out of the ordinary with the verses.

Let's be honest, I don't need to hype this track one bit, all I need to do is remind you that Watch the Throne is out in two weeks. Shouts out to Otis Redding on the original track Try a Little Tenderness...#Classic

Kanye West & Jay-Z feat Otis Redding - Otis (prod by Kanye West)

Video/Images of the Week

Between the lack of videos and the noteworthy announcements that became images, there wasn't all that much to post. What you need to know is that:
1) Kanye/Jay-Z's album Watch the Throne is damn near done and coming to fruition
2) Drake's new album Take Care is due out October 24th
3) Cory Bold has a new remix out

@katyperry - E.T. (Remix) (prod by @corybold)

Take Care...October 24th...

Anybody have any doubts that their new album is gonna be anything but classic?

"Watch the Throne, Don't Step on Our Road, Bad Enough, We Let You Step on Our Globe"

For a week we've been waiting in anticipation for this track and today Kanye released it via Facebook. Personally I enjoyed the fact that they temporarily overloaded the facebook servers, causing the dreaded page cannot be displayed (below)...#SafariSwag

The whole production from the cover art, to the verses, to the white hot beat brought to you by Lex Luger, who is sure to become a household name with this beat. Between this beat, Rick Ross's BMF beat and Wacka Flocka's Hard in da Paint beat, I'd say it's about damn time we give dude some dap.

As far as the track as a whole is concerned, there are a few things I really like about it. First off, the build up of the beat is disgusting, remaining subtle until the hook flies off the hook with the infusion of grandeur through opera style swag at the crescendo. I'm a big fan of goin' H.A.M. or H.ard a.s a M.otherf***** every now and then, so I fully respect putting the term on blast for pop culture to adopt. To me the track came off like a house under construction with the foundation of the track (the beat) leaving a lot of room for expansion (on the verses). It's like they left room for another verse, but the beat was so hard, they let it ride it. It's weird because I respect that since it's different and if you were going to do it, this is the track to do it on, but wanted more because there was a whole lotta unclaimed real estate throughout the beat. Also, was it me or was the vulgarity a little forced since every line contained at least one "hard" word? It's splitting hairs at that point and I'm sure @kanyewest and @s_c_ could give one damn whether or not this gets cleaned off for radio since any and every music fan that likes Hip Hop even a little bit, was well aware of this track today and found a way to cop it.

Don't miss the wagon as it passes and gets jumped on by the masses. Kids ain't safe anywhere but home, March 1st home boy, Watch the Throne...

Kanye West & Jay-Z - H.A.M (Prod By Lex Luger)

|Download

01-11-11...H.A.M.

Consider yourself warned...