You're Up Mr. West

I thought I’d blog about the latest in hip-hop news. Kanye v. 50 Cent. Who’s going to sell more records.

I think the rivalry is good. It's been good for our sports. Look at Red Sox/Yankees, Bulls/Pistons of the early 90's, and the Colts/Patriots. Each year they would have to step it up a little because they knew the other team was going to bring their 'A' game. The lack of real competition has made for some lackluster music these past few years. Look at the 60's. My dad sang in a group called "The Raggedy Roaches". He tells me that the competition was so intense that everybody had to be good or else you didn't stand a chance. I think that's why we have such timeless music come out of that era. There weren't all these media oultets so everyone was battling for the same spots. I would love to see that now.

I’m a huge fan of Kanye and knew his album would do well. He’s projected to have sold an upwards of 957,000 units his first week. Fifty comes in second with roughly 691,000.

In comparison, fellow rapper/producer Swizz beats only sold 45,000 his first week and was heard on a local radio station complaining about his numbers. That’s gotta sting. You have two singles released, two videos, you are on a major label and you can’t move records. It’s not like the bootleggers have it. There is no buzz on the street “ You got that Swizz Beats?” People don’t even seem to care.

It’s a rough game out there. There have always been grumbles about record companies purchasing records to boost sales for the first week. I’m sure everything seems okay when it comes out and then when your mid week numbers come out and you aren’t doing so hot you start thinking about your promotion, advertising, videos, what single you released first. It’s got to drive any person crazy.

We all saw Kanye spazz out back stage at the VMA’s. I think he’s under that stress and he’s also very passionate about what his music.

Fifty is also very competitive as well and has had big releases for his first two albums.

This idea that Fifty would retire was nonsense. What are you going to do if you don’t rap? The only reason rappers retire is so that they can come back. It’s just like those boy bands that “break up” and then get back together for a reunion album and reunion tour. The Backstreet Boys just got back together. Why? Who cares? Not this guy.

I don’t want to see Fifty Dates for Fifty Cent on VH1 two years from now. I don’t want to see Fifty in some straight to DVD movies where he plays a cop or an ex con or a rapper who’s mixed up with the wrong crowd. Whenever I see an interview with Fifty I walk away feeling like he’s a really intelligent guy. I’m sure he’ll get involved in more than just rapping. You can’t have too much idle time on your hands. Look what’s it’s doing to OJ (sorry Juice).

I hope we see more friendly competition from our music artist. Maybe we’ll start to see better performances at these awards shows and get better albums out of some of these artist.