Is This What Success Is All About?

“Fuck the system, at Lady Justice I blaze nines…Your Honor, I no longer kill my people, I raise mines”-Jay



I'm at the office right, pondering bout how worse off artists have been since the beginning of time when music was sold. I’m looking at the math like I’ve done bout 400 times since last June and as usual the shit does not make any sense. I am a capitalist to the tee; ‘Free market system, Laissez Faire, Invisible hand of demand e.t.c’ I support all these ideas. I’m looking at contracts for authors (yeah, those who write books), and the shit is just like the music joints. I sometimes wonder what on the planet makes people sign some of this shit. There is enough money to go around, for everybody who works hard on getting a product out, more money to go around if the product is a great seller. But, under no circumstances should an artist be broke because of the labels jerking him/her. For example, consider that an artist sells 250,000 units of his music (the industry’s changing by the way. CD’s are becoming like cassettes now “Obsolete”) and has a $200,000 advance, my man should be out of the red based on my simple math. This is including all the marketing and promotional costs that go along with it, which I would say would be about 35% of the retail price of each individual unit (or someone needs to lose their job @ that company). But like you guessed, it isn’t so. We are now dealing in a system where an artist could drop A-mil (sort of like Jay did) and still be in need of A-meal. It is crazy when TLC sells 10 million and file bankruptcy.

Bottom Line: To all my artists / business people out there:

Point #1: Understand that the system is against you, built for you to fail. I’m telling you this so that you know how to maneuver in shark waters. I’m optimistic bout the future, and believe in being well prepared (that is by knowing as much as possible who is who, and what is what). The thing to remember is ‘Top heavy, bottom light”

Point #2: Try to get the best possible team around you (SwaggaBack is here for you). Weak link breaks the chain, the stronger the squad the more thorough you’ll be (ask Bill Gates)

Point #3: Disaster means opportunity. I for one take this whole situation as an opportunity for new ways and measures to evolve. We can’t make the same mistakes of years and generations past. Let’s keep it moving. SwaggaBack… We Here!