Underground my ass

Ive been noticing that more and more underground/ indy labels are starting to become something they never were.
One of my fav. labels is/was TVT Records/Wax Trax...Does anybody remember when they were industrial label? With their Black Box set??
now they are a rap label??

Same with Cleopatra records. Underground goth/deathrock..mostly compiliations here and there..but visiting their site they have Nas and Bone thugs and harmony all over it??

so question is.. how many more labels that provide alternitive musick will go the MTV mainstream of thugs?
Opinions anyone?

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Originally Posted by VoldtaEngler

Ive been noticing that more and more underground/ indy labels are starting to become something they never were.
One of my fav. labels is/was TVT Records/Wax Trax...Does anybody remember when they were industrial label? With their Black Box set??
now they are a rap label??

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That sucks. Wax Trax was the best back in the day. I have a black box dvd with a bunch of oldschool videos. I still watch it, it's great. What a shame it is that such cool labels are now retarded.

Although, part of me enjoys seeing the lemmings gorge themselves on pop culture. I hope they choke on their own vulgarity.

maybe be cuzz everyone is jumpin on the rap bandwagon,and because of the music promoting equalities alot of peeps feel now in the industry..or because theres more money flowing thur the rap music as of late ,more that any other industry out there ..
i dont like rap ,all that much ,or ganKSter,too each his own but that is why alot of bands are unsigned ,and why i dont watch MTV..
this has been going on for so long im surprized that ya didnt see a lot more labels go under r switch too rap to save them selves as they see it.

just my 2 cents .

I like nas and bone thugs better than switchblade symphony... *shrug*

ok, time to pull out the sociology textbook kids... Any endevour that is targeted to be an economic medium is going to have to adhere to the principles of capitalist tactics. while there's always going to be less jobs than people in a market, it is especially true in one's that require a particular ammount of skill. the long and short of it is that a musician is going to have to fulfill supply and demand if they want to be successful. they can't do that if they are on a label that has no exposure through crossover advertising and presses 10,000 copies. additionally, the same conditions exist for everyone else at that level, which makes it even harder for any indiviudal to stand out.

I have no doubt that among rappers they are putting heart and soul into what they do. Even though that genre has the best chance of a sucess rate for an urban african-american based on it's target audience, it still was developed as a unique culutrual expression. So I think that is a draw, at least in part, and certainly it was in the beggining. Unfortunetly, people that come from poor social conditions are even more initmately aware of the workings of the (wage) system, although usually from a more subconscious level. In other words, although they perfectly understand it, they wouldn't neccesarily be able to descrive it as I have. the bottom line is with less to go around, there is more competition. The attitude of "get rich or die trying" is prevalent on the streets.

I think that's why you'll see so many musicians willing to compromise thier artistic integrity to be more succesfull and gain a larger fullowing. What is called "selling out". It really is a shame for music genres that were started out by those who were shunned by the very same system and just keep contributing to the repression... but that's an whole 'nother subject.

its understandable that labels want to jump on the capitlistic market and start releasing what sells and all...but they are forgetting about their original artists who helped shape them into what they become.
some artists have been going to lower labels that nobodies ever heard of because of this (which is either because they are rebelling against their label/ or their contract is up).
and yes there is some rap artists that i believe DO pump their heart and soul into what they love to do..but then there are some that just want to make a quick buck and push back the better artists. (just my opinion)

im not downgrading rap..just trying to understand why labels care more about $$ than the artists that helped them become who they are.
and vice versa.

wax trax has really gone downhill, Cleopatra however IMO sold out a long time ago when they started mass marketing EBM to the goth scene. Of course unlike Wax Trax which still isnt that big of a label, Cleopatra is huge in terms of semi-underground labels and has several imprints for handling non goth stuff, but most of the stuff on the main cleopatra imprint is still goth related (or EBM).

oh and it appears cleopatra also has a country/bluegrass imprint and an oldschool soul/R&B imprint.

Wow, totally over my head.....I uh....like Gwar. Gawd, I suck at this.

hah yeah dont worry about it man... im more into the music side, than the label side... i dont care what label someone is with, as long as its good music...

as long as i can remember, waxtrax always did rap labels along with industrial stuff, did they just move most of their prios to rap now?

all the good stuff goes to shit, 90%of the time anyway

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Originally Posted by Mr Karl

all the good stuff goes to shit, 90%of the time anyway

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too true......I think lol

i was watching this punk documentary on ifc today... they had an amazing quote:

there really isn't alot of difference between where the punk and rap scenes were coming from except that rap was always trying to get the gold while punk was shying away from it.

(slightly paraphrased due to poor memory but it made alot of sense when he said it especialy since i like alot of music from both genres)

I liked the old Cleopatra "Tribute " albums, I have a few and they are great. Can't believe they've sold out to Rap. For Fuck's Sake, it's bad enough that black rap stars pass off their shouting into a microphone as music, but when they start using their influence to poison other genres, it's time people said "Enough!" and put a stop to it. I have been told by coloured people that if it wasn't for them, there wouldn't be any modern music. I say, if it wasn't for them, there'd be no C-Rap Music!

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Originally Posted by Black Spiral Dancer

I liked the old Cleopatra "Tribute " albums, I have a few and they are great. Can't believe they've sold out to Rap. For Fuck's Sake, it's bad enough that black rap stars pass off their shouting into a microphone as music, but when they start using their influence to poison other genres, it's time people said "Enough!" and put a stop to it. I have been told by coloured people that if it wasn't for them, there wouldn't be any modern music. I say, if it wasn't for them, there'd be no C-Rap Music!

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well anybody can say that the genre of musick they dont like is "shouting into a mic" ...i mean i like some black metal and its shouting/screaming... rappers and the like would say the same thing about that. so in all fairness everybodies opinions differ on that. to me all country musick sounds the same..as well as R&B... but indsutrial & metal, i can hear differences...
but to a rapper or R&B person all of their genre's of musick sound different..but rock sounds the same.. i hope that makes sense