Best Posts in Thread: Black Artists vs. Adele: Album Sales in 2015

It's a lot. Marketing, record labels, radio bias, piracy, streaming, white folks have more money to spend and social media presence.

Most Rap artists have pretty loyal fan bases and reach many demographics so it's no surprising when you see them have great sales.

Rihanna and BEYONCE are all the general public/white folks need, but they're pop stars so they're not even exceptions to me, they don't count at all IMO. Black folks that I see on social media seem like they only want to see ONE black artist succeed at a time or at all. Always fighting over the net but never putting the money up when it counts. White folks get involved in that stuff too but they at least have the money to back all the foolishness they do.

 

Quite frankly, white ppl dont need us! Hip hop is its own situation, but as for RnB, its a wrap. Sam Smith is doing exactly what Tyrese and Tank has done (including his sound) for years, and Adele is doing exactly what _____ (insert female real RnB singer here) has been doing for years.

The diff is that, theyre white, so white ppl pay attention to them. And, in turn, support them. Adele and Sam have huge machines behind them pushing them as 'the elusive' blue eyed soul acts.

Also, black ppl suck in general at supporting our own, and would be the first ones to call a black RnB singer irrelevant, because they dont have the same machines behind them. The first ones talking about how they didnt get the last job they applied for because theyre black, but acting like the RnB singer's story is different.

 

So I just got into a passionate discussion offline with some buddies from Cypher Avenue (S/O to the original activity stream squad lol) talking about Adele and her album sales for her upcoming LP, '25.' She is on pace to sell anywhere from 1.3 to 1.8 million albums in the first week just based on pre-sales alone! She will break the record for highest sales for a female solo artists since Britney Speaks dropped her album, 'Oops I Did It, Again,' in the early 2000s, which sold 1.32 million copies in the first week alone!

I was talking to my guys about how it is so crazy that someone like Adele can come along and basically take over the music industry while black artists (more so singers than rappers) are STRUGGLING out here. Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of talent and I do believe that she has plenty of it. I like her song "Hello" and the music video starring my man Mack Wilds (looking too good in there... but uh uhm-hmm anyway lol back to what I was saying). I was wondering why it is like black artists make good music that people can feel too but they just do not sell like their white counterparts (see: Eminem, Sam Smith, Adele, Macklemore, etc). There are exceptions to the rule like I told my guys in artists like Drake, J. Cole, Future, Kendrick Lamar and a few select other rappers. Even though those rappers have had strong 1st week album sales debuts, the majority of those buyers are White people. The majority of attendees of tours for many rap artists are White people.

One of my guys said you can't compare rap artists to Adele but I honestly think you can when speaking on the rappers that have more of a mainstream appeal (see: Future & Drake) or those that have a large following (see: Kendrick Lamar & J. Cole).

You also have the conversation when it comes to R&B/Soul and comparing artists like the Sam Smith and the Adele to other black artists like Tyrese and Syleena Johnson. I have to agree with a point made by Tyrese on The Breakfast Club Radio Show when he discussed how the gatekeepers (white people) keep the doors closed to black artists when it comes to them being able to really break them on larger platforms. In the meanwhile, black radio keeps the doors WIDE open for white artists that dibble and dabble in R&B and hip-hop music. You're more likely to hear Robin Thicke, Adele, and Sam Smith on black radio than you are to hear Mary J. Blige, Tyrese and Jhene Aiko on white radio. It is what it is.

So tell me....

Why do you think black artists don't sell like they used to back in the 90s and early (& mid) 2000s?

Does it have to do with piracy?

Do white people have more money to spend on music compared to other minority populations?

Do other races generally support their respective genres of music when it comes to albums and/or tours?

What do YOU think?

Sound off below!