Diatribes by Joah

Y Rappers R Better Marketers (And M&A Experts) Than U

I just attended an awesome discussion led by Bill Pauls and John McHale, creative directors at Internet marketing & branding agency SapientNitro, titled, “Y Rappers R Better Than U”. I've attended half a dozen panels during SXSW Interactive since it started yesterday (Baratunde Thurston's keynote was badass too), and this one is by-far the best one thus far. Not only did Bill and John do a good job of setting the mood (Nas' Illmatic was playing as I walked into the room), but they also did a great job of balancing their desire to speak as the discussion leaders and moderators with the insights from the people in the room. It's amazing how many moderators don't listen to the audience, especially considering many people in the audiences as these panels are social media, startup or marketing wonks themselves.

The room was energetic, engaged and the speakers well-prepared and informed. The core messages or themes they shared were that:

1) Stay legit. Rappers understand that before you can grow your brand, you must protect it. Jay-Z has maintained his hustler mentality whether it be about the drug game or the marketing game.

2) Always be on the lookout for a bigger venue. Rappers are like highly-trained tech incubators when it comes to uncovering new opportunities and unlocking new value. Run-DMC's iconic "Rock This Way" song with Aerosmith is just one example.

3) Name check. Rappers have crushed the marketing game by being pros at name dropping without overly saturating their brands. Rappers like The Game and upstart guys like Big Sean are name checking regulars.

4) Master social. Sure, brands have done a good job with social media as they've become more versed and developed case studies, but rappers like Soulja Boy have really paved the way for rap's seat as the social media kings. Take that John Mayer.

5) Fuck the rules. Excuse my French, but this is an important one. Ice Cube has gone from a hard-core gangsta rapper in NWA to a rom-com daddy actor and maintained his authenticity by saying "fuck the rules", but doing so in an organic, balanced way from Boyz N Da Hood to Friday to Barber Shop to Are We There Yet?.

6) Manufacture controversy. 50 Cent comes to mind, but there are other examples in the rap game that brands should pay attention to. Don't be afraid to challenge your competitors a la Apple's "1984" commercial.

7) Reflect culture. Project culture. This seems like the other end of the loop from point #1 about staying legit. This is where you see so many rappers constantly speaking to their audiences through other forms of pop and urban cultures.

The discussion about rappers being expert marketers triggered another thought: rappers are highly experienced at handling mergers and acquisitions.

Think about it: Rap started in the late ‘70s, but didn’t really get profile until the 1980s with Run-DMC, The Beastie Boys and Def Jam out of New York. What else was happening during the 1980s? Did you see that movie Wall Street with Michael Douglas and Michael Sheen? Leveraged buyouts and a ton of M&A activity led by New York’s finance industry.

Since that time, rappers from LL Cool J and Vanilla Ice to Rick Ross and Wiz Khalifa have been the winners or losers of mergers and acquisitions in the rap game. To that effect, I wanted to share some highlights of the last 25 years in hip-hop history and the M&A activity that has paved the way for the most powerful music marketing force we have today.

Mergers in the rap game are partnership that yield visible business results and amplify rappers' brands.

Merger Winners

Run-DMC & Aerosmith - The aforementioned "Rock the Way" track may seem more like a partnership, but really it was a significant merger of rock and rap...paving the way for mergers like Jay-Z and Linkin Park or even the late DJAM & Travis Barker.

Dr. Dre & Eminem - Not a merger in the sense of two equal parts, given the fact that Dr. Dre helped Em get his start, but by the time 50 Cent's career was launched by these guys it felt less like a rapper launching a career and more like a successful brand launch.

Jay-Z & Kanye West – Speaking of great partnerships, Watch the Throne has produced a hit album, but more importantly produced the most successful rap tour duo ever put together. This merger has yielded considerations by other rappers of taking a shot at a similar feat a la Lil' Wayne & Drake or Nas & Common. Chances are, they'll be more AOL Time Warner than Exxon-Mobil.

Jay-Z & Beyonce - The world calls it a marriage, but from a marketing and business standpoint this is a straight up merger. Probably the single-most important merger in the pop culture world since Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie don't push product outside of the movies they act in. Perhaps this is why Wiz Khalifa is dating Amber Rose; only problem is Rose has yet to show she has talent beyond her rear-end.

Merger Losers

Master P & Snoop Dogg - Sure, this move by Snoop helped him escape the grip of Death Row's Suge Knight, but it didn't exactly produce a successful, sustainable business.

Common & Erykah Badu - I actually like that Common song "Come Close" feat. Mary J. Blige, but I agree with the criticism he received during his partnership with Erykah Badu that he went a little soft. At least too soft to represent Chicago. His merger with Kanye West resurrected his career.

Acquisitions in the rap game are all about battles. Rappers have brands that carry weight and that weight is tested through battles. The winner gets the spoils, and sometimes - like Jay-Z and Nas - the battle itself isn't the real acquisition play.

Acquisition Winners

50 Cent - Fiddy is never afraid to gamble with an acquisition. Ja Rule and Fat Joe have both had their street cred and popularity acquired by Curtis Jackson's enterprise in the last decade.

Rick Ross - However, 50 Cent has taken an L of late to none-other-than Rick Ross. Rick came in the underdog, but left with a W next to his name thanks to the progress of his Maybach Music releases over the last few years.

T.I. - Houston rapper Lil' Flip never stood a chance when he challenged Atlanta's T.I.'s self-appointed designation as "The King of the South". T.I. immediately put Lil' Flip's business into non-existence upon the acquisition.

Nicki Minaj - Did you listen to Kanye's "Monster" featuring the Barbie Doll rapper herself? Yeah, she pretty much bought all of Lil’ Kim's 1990s glory in one verse.

LL Cool J - An acquisition expert and veteran having waged battles with everyone from Kool Moe Dee to Canibus. He hasn't maintained his relevance years into his career in the way Jay-Z or Common have, but he is one of the early innovators in the hostile takeover business of rap music.

Jay-Z - Sure, "Ether" gives plenty reason to pause when chalking up an L for Nas, but it's clear to see who the king of rap music for the last 15 years (post-Biggie & Tupac) is and he is most definitely from Brooklyn, not Queens.

Common - "I Used to Love Her" is one of the greatest, most important, hip-hop tracks of all time, but surprisingly pre-comedy Ice Cube got serious and shortsighted about his lyrics and tried to squash Common's statement. Common fired back and proved to the world that he was here to stay, no matter how big of a competitor he'd have to face.

KRS-One - Before Jay-Z and Nas there was KRS and MC Shan. One of those guys is still regarded as a legend of hip-hop, the other one not so much.

MC Serch - Not many people remember MC Serch, but his 3rd Base track "Pop Goes the Weasel" helped to put fire on Vanilla Ice's career. Serch went on to executive produce Nas' masterpiece Illmatic.

Acquisition Losers

Prodigy - One-half of notable, Queens-based rap duo Mobb Deep, Prodigy and Jay-Z never seemed to get along...mostly because Jay-Z was always in the seat Prodigy coveted but could never grab. Jay-Z closed the case on this one with "The Takeover" on The Blueprint.

Common - Just as Ice Cube tried to bully Common in his early days, it seems Common has taken a jab at Drake and his crooning. We'll see how this ends up, but it's already started as a failed acquisition attempt by Common. Sorry, no new fans for you.

 

*This may become my next book topic, so be on the lookout for more in the future, and remember where you heard this theory first.

Way to go Ellen DeGeneres & JC Penney!

Watch the Throne: Classic or ...

Everyone, including my friends, want a classic, but they have the wrong thinking cap on in terms of a classic if you ask me. Run-DMC, Beastie Boys and Public Enemy had some classics, but let’s assume for a second that not enough hip-hop albums had yet to be made to really have a high bar for what a “classic” was.

So what are the bonafide hip-hop classics of the last 20 years?

A Tribe Called Quest’s Midnight Marauders, Dr. Dre’s The Chronic, Nas’ Illmatic, B.I.G.’s Ready to Die, Jay-Z’s The Blueprint, Eminem’s Marshall Mathers LP, Kanye West’s College Dropout…that’s just a sampling, I’d assume. Let’s say there are five others by solo rappers (which Tupac album is tops?). Now, can someone point to any groups besides Tribe, Outkast and Wu-Tang Clan that produced bonafide classics? 

I don’t think you will. The fact that you’d have to argue so-and-so’s album is a classic is reason alone to say it’s not bonafide. Basically what we’re looking at is a dozen or “classic” hip-hop albums in the last 20 years, of which only three duos/groups have contributed.

So why the hell do you think that Jay-Z and Kanye will produce a classic hip-hop album together? Because they’ve each made classics individually? Thinking that would be like saying “Say, Say, Say” is the best song Michael Jackson ever did since Paul McCartney was involved. Or maybe Scream, since it was MJ and his lil’ sister Janet. Or how about #1, you know that song Pharrell and Kanye did together. Hell, even Snoop Dogg and Akon were better collaborators.

Let’s face facts: classic individuals don’t make classic teams. I saw the documentary and I love Q-Tip as much as anyone, but I’d pay three times more to see Tribe perform as a unit. Similar, I loved the idea of Jay-Z and R. Kelly doing an album together, but the actual material was never going to top The Blueprint or R.

And that’s ok with me. Kanye West and Jay-Z make great music together. Hits and bangers, people. Do we need more? Is it reasonable to ask for more? Based on history, I don’t think so.

Let’s just acknowledge this album for what it is: a chance for the two to show their closeness, dominate the rap industry even more, do a monster tour, make a ton of money, rap to each other about their perceived perils and brag about the things they own.

That’s why songs like “N*gg*s in Paris”, “Illest MotherF*ck*r Alive” and, yes, “H-a-M” make perfect sense and fit into my expectations for an album of these proportions. Considering the soft sweet sampling by Pete Rock (“The Joy”) and Kanye (“Otis”), it’s almost like they were able to capture the best of both worlds. Something Jay-Z and R.Kelly never got around to.

It may not be a classic in your book, but it’s definitely a high standard for others to try topping. Besides, I don’t expect another Outkast album for a while, do you?

What I'm Reading

I read hundreds of articles and blogs each month, especially some of the ones listed on my blogroll here, but I'm always on the lookout for good books and subscribe to a dozen magazines. Here is a snippet of what's inspired me lately.

Referred to me by my boss, the COO of Bazaarvoice, after she read it. There's a big business book, share-what-you're-reading culture here. This book had so many a-ha moments for me and I look forward to applying a lot of this to my life. This is precisely why I took a job in the first place. It's humbling and rewarding at the same time.

Monocle is probably the dopest magazine in the world and I have to thank my oldest brother, Kahron, for this recommendation years ago. This particular issue has me even more anxious to visit Japan.

I happen to agree with former Def Jam Records president Kevin Liles who said, on the Oprah show no less, that hip hop has done more for race relations in America in the last two decades than anything else. I haven't started reading this one yet, but I'm sure to knock it out next week on a flight to New York.

No man about fashion can not read Vogue, it's just impossible. Sure, GQ, Esquire, Complex and the like give great guys' tips. But we all know fashion starts with what the women are doing.

Recommended to me by Bazaarvoice CEO Brett Hurt and a must read for anyone who fancies himself or herself an introspective type. Hell, I have an entire category of blogging dedicated to it.

Nylon Guys is pretty dope. It speaks to the more indie/preppy side of me while Complex speaks to the rap/street side of me.

 

Sunny Sunday in Brooklyn

Had a blast in NY this past weekend. Shopped at some favorites like Saturdays and Brooklyn Industries. Ate at some nice Manhattan spots like Spicemarket and Hakato Tonton along with Brooklyn's Marlow & Sons and Char No. 4. Walked all over East Village, Lower East Side, SoHo, Greenwich Village and Union Square. Even made it uptown to check out a jazz quintet at Smoke.

I'm in NY often and very very seldom do I get a feeling there that something I'm doing or seeing could be replicated in Austin. Surprisingly, that happened this weekend in Bushwick when I ended up at a BBQ with a friend. Bikers, hipsters, photographers, rappers, skaters and stylish people (who share my love of sneakers)...

24 Year Olds Need Role Models More Than Anyone Else

It's sad, but it's true. The sad part isn't that there are people out there that need role models...we've always needed role models. That's part of the reason why I dedicated an entire book the to subject. Whether you're 13 or 43 years of age, having a role model can be instrumental in your development as a human being regardless of if you're talking about as a son or a dad, a student or a professional, a thinker or a doer.

I recently heard "Y-Size Your Business" author Jason Ryan Dorsey speak about the differences between Baby Boomers (mid '40s to early '60s) and Gen X (early-to-mid '60s to late '70s) and Gen Y (late '70s-to-early '80s to 1995 [the last year you could be born and comprehend Sept. 11th according to Dorsey]) and the thing that I kept thinking back to was the fact that 18 years old isn't the age by which Americans become adults anymore.

But you could strongly argue that there's never been a time in history where the most role-model-needy group in America are 24-year-olds.

- I'm a part of the first generation that didn't know how it felt to drink legally before age 21.

- I'm a part of a generation that sends 80% of its college graduates back home with their parents instead of into the job market.

- I'm a part of a generation that grew up with MTV and ESPN...the two networks most responsible for reducing the need for anyone to read books or newspapers as a source of infotainment because we've had Real World and Jersey Shore for our sexual education and laughs and SportsCenter prevents us from, say, having to watch an entire baseball game.

- I'm a part of a generation that has seen how important political participation can be (e.g. Barack Obama) while also seeing how sensationalized political engagement has become (e.g. Fox News).

- I'm a part of a generation that counts Oprah Winfrey, Jay-Z and Tyler Perry as national black icons. All impressive and respected individuals in their own right, but certainly no Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s and Ella Baker's in that bunch. And Keith Olbermann is no Edward Murrow.

- I'm a part of a generation that saw our parents get divorced at an all-time high rate and is "paying it forward" to the next generation by waiting longer to get married and have kids, if at all.

- I'm a part of a generation that switches majors in college and switches jobs every couple of years and still expect success to come overnight. Why? Because we grew up hearing about how Bill Gates didn't even graduate from college. And LeBron didn't even go!

- I'm a part of a generation that has seen the greatest achievements in film (Spielberg? Hanks?), music (Michael Jackson), sports (Michael Jordan) and technology (the Internet) but doesn't even understand how to qualify what a great achievement is in civic leadership, literature and politics.

- I'm a part of a generation that has seen more gender equality than ever before in the academic and professional aspects of life while allowing something like "hook-up culture" to put women in an entirely different, but still inferior, position when it comes to social dynamics.

- I'm a part of a generation that found out about Sept. 11th, Hurricane Katrina and bin Laden's death within minutes thanks to the Internet, while having that news given equal traction in the airwaves as Charlie Sheen's tirade, Lindsay Lohan's breakdown and Donald Trump's presidential candidacy.

These things don't directly point to the need for role models. What they point to is a need for clarity about the world today. The problem is, role models are typically people older than us. People of a different generation. So they can't possibly understand our day-to-day challenges and dilemnas, pop culture and technology the way someone within our generation could. So rather than reach down to offer a helping hand or mentoring session, they reach into our pockets for marketing success and into our minds via political trickery.

We're six years older, but we're just as amendable and gullible as previous generation's 18-year olds. We're sold on college as a way into the professional world, sex as a way into marriage and Facebook as a way into friendship. Previous generations were sold on manufacturing as a means to financial stability, political activism as a way to effect change, and credit cards and mortgages as a way to legitimize one's self-worth.

What's needed isn't just role models from Gen X to educate those of us from Gen Y. Besides, there are 80 million of us and not that many of you. What's needed is role models within Gen Y who can share best practices with others within our generation. People of our generation want to do it on their own, but they also want to know how others did it on their own. We're not great at giving credit to others, but we're great at stealing from those worthy of getting credit.

That's why people like Donald Glover, Shelby Knox, Levi Maestro, Tea Obrecht, Natalie Portman and Derrick Rose are worth paying attention to. Their boundlessness, passion, energy, words, beauty and humility are all characteristics we should aspire to have but are never sure how to attain. Once we can start figuring this out and helping ourselves, we can better understand how to take advantage of the help other generations have to offer.

Up next...how the Black community isn't all that different from 24-year-olds...maybe.

NBA Fans Need to Wake Up, For Real

There is so much for me to say, but I don't think I have to say it all. Since I write stream of consciousness on this here blog, I'm going to try to contain my thoughts to only what is essential. The bare minimum of what is required to get by. Sort of like how the Dallas Mavericks beat the Lakers, yes the two-time defending champion Lakers who are led by the best coach in basketball and the best player in the NBA since Michael Jordan and some other guys with names like Gasol and Bynum and Odom. Yes, those Lakers. The Mavericks beat them in four games. That's the bare minimum. This wasn't five games, six games or a classic seven game series. This was a shellacking.

This is the series that ended Phil Jackson's illustrious career. The series that moved Kobe Bryant down to All NBA's second team status behind the likes of Derrick Rose, Dwight Howard, LeBron, D-Wade and Kevin Durant. The series that confirmed suspicions that Pau Gasol is in fact a flopping, jump-shooting, soft, no heart, no fire 7-foot Spaniard playing a game against guys from Detroit and South Central and Baltimore. Guys that don't fuck around in the painted area. And maybe Bynum and Odom are more likely to make the Hall of Fame than they are to make an All Classy team. And maybe the pickups of Steve Blake and Matt Barnes weren't worth the losses of Sasha Vujacic and Jordan Farmar after all because they can't hit open threes as much. And, quite frankly, maybe Kobe just isn't Kobe anymore.

This is the series that gave people like me - Kobe fans, Laker fans - cause for concern. More questions than answers. More tribulation than triumph. This is the series that made Mavs fans cheer.

Sure they were the better team. They came in with a game plan that looked more like a five-course meal. There was Dirk. He was the salad. He was the essential, healthy part of the meal. There was Jason Terry hitting threes from every angle of the floor, something like a serving of hors d'oeuvres...you weren't sure what you were eating, but you know you would try it again. There was Jason Kidd and Tyson Chandler, acting as the Mavs' surf and turf...more than enough to fill your appetite on the point and down low. There was Peja Stojakovich, the asparagus that you didn't always finish but got your serving of. And then the dessert. That was J.J. Barea. And, for this series, Mark Cuban was picking up the tab and not looking silly in doing so.

Call me silly, but this is all a fairy tale. Not in the way that Cinderella's story was told. Not in the way that the Hoosiers won Indiana's State Championship. No, the Mavs were deserving of this dream's arrival. That much is clear.

But this is a fairy tale in that the Lakers' downfall being associated with some team from the Lone Star State's title hopes - and in such embarrassing fashion - is something that only happens in dreams.

The Dallas Mavericks won the series. But the dream is a shared one. Sort of like Leo DiCaprio and Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Ken Watanabe and Ellen Page in Inception. The Mavs are Leo. The San Antonio Spurs are Gordon-Levitt, the Houston Rockets are Ken Watanabe and the rest of the NBA is Ellen Page.

The Mavs did most of the heavy lifting and had the most to lose. I mean how much longer could Mark Cuban keep throwing money at this franchise with no banner to hang? Can Dirk and Jason Kidd do any better with another year of regular season games behind them if they don't win it all this year? This is the burden Leo faced and the Mavs were victors by lifting the heaviest of weights during these NBA playoffs. Sure the Heat are facing high expectations, but they also have two stars in their prime and Chris Bosh on their coattails. If they don't win this year, they certainly will be favored next with another season of bonding, especially once they complete their secret pact to be surgically connected and become a three-head basketball monster. That is what they plan to do, right?

So the Mavs made it. They became one blockbuster movie star in the process too. But let's not forget the co-stars. I mean Joseph Gordon-Levitt was a badass. Like the Spurs, he's a great actor who's only slightly underachieved over the length of his career. Since 10 Things I Hate About You, the year Tim Duncan and David Robinson joined forces, he didn't quite live up to expectations. He never did match Leo's promise or skill similar to the Spurs' inability to top the Lakers with Shaq and Kobe. The Spurs still haven't won back-to-back titles. But then there was 500 Days of Summer. And Inception. Here we have a team with some promise. The kind of promise that comes with having the best regular season record. But making a blockbuster movie with Joseph Gordon-Levitt as your lead actor is about as smart as betting on the San Antonio Spurs to win it all with an aging Tim Duncan, an oft-injured Manu Ginobili and a French guy who was stupid enough to cheat on Eva Longoria with a woman far less attractive. You don't bet on Joseph Gordon-Levitt to be Leo. You bet on him to be the Leo's sidekick. That's the role the Spurs have played for the Lakers all these years. Which is why the Mavs' victory, just after the Spurs lost to the Memphis Grizzlies, the Rudy Gay-less, Hall of Fame-less, who's-there-coach-again Grizzlies in the first round, makes this a fairy tale. Only in this landscape could that Spurs (and Tim Duncan's) failure be trumped by a Lakers failure the same way the Lakers' three-peat and back-to-back titles with Kobe leading the way trumped the non-consecutive, but multiple championships won by the less flashy, wholesome team from San Antonio. That scene where Tom Hardy tells Gordon-Levitt to dream bigger is a reality for these Spurs fans who are cheering on the Mavs' victory as if it were their own. They should dream bigger and expect a team with the NBA's best regular season record to make it out of the first round instead of saying "oh, everyone knew they would lose in the first round to the Memphis Grizzlies who almost never make the playoffs."

As for Ken Watanabe, please don't think I'm being a racist and saying he must be the Houston Rockets because of his similar ethnic makeup to that of Yao Ming. No, not that at all. The similarities I see are in the fact that Watanabe wasn't even supposed to be a part of this Inception team. They didn't need an extra guy on the team. But he bought himself in. He wanted to monitor his investment. Sort of like how Houston Rockets fans weren't even a part of the playoffs this year, yet they paid their way into this Lakers-Mavs conversation (monitoring their investment in long-standing Lakers hatred that pre-dates Kobe Bryant) by opening their mouths with no semblance of memory at all. If you can recall, the two-time defending champion Rockets were swept by the then-Seattle Sonics with a hungry Shawn Kemp and Gary Payton on a barrage of alley oops, open three-pointers, stingy defense and energetic fans. Sound familiar?

And all the rest of ya'll are Ellen Page because you're all students to the game. You have absolutely no business pretending to be the experts in how this process works, but you get a single beat on the Lakers (the way Page learned something intimate about Leo) and milk it for all it's worth. So you're either a Lakers hater or a bandwagon rider. You're creating your own world and rules as you go until the mirror is pointing back at you.

As for the real NBA followers out there, think about this.

If the Mavericks are Leo DiCaprio, the Spurs are Joseph Gordon-Levitt, the Rockets are Ken Watanabe and everyone else is Ellen Page, who are the Lakers?

That's easy.

The Lakers are Christopher Nolan.

It took Christopher Nolan something like ten years to make Inception, which is about how long it took the Mavericks, Rockets, Spurs and every other team in the league to win as many titles as the Lakers won in that span. Meanwhile, Nolan also pulled off Memento, Batman Begins, The Prestige and The Dark Knight. All certified championship material.

So while the Lakers are writing scripts and directing movies and finding new ways to entertain all the Dr. Pepper-drinkin', popcorn eaters with the best casts and the best plotlines, you're all just sitting around hoping for some Oscar consideration like the rest of these SAG card carriers.

The Lakers are already busy making the next Batman movie. And you better believe Kobe isn't finished as a leading man. All of you Jokers won't be back though.

Rules for Parents on Facebook

I've been getting into tons of conversations about my friends' parents being on Facebook. It's about time I provide some tips to parents before they are virtually disowned by their children.

Rule #1: Facebook is not real life!

While us young(ish) people know this, parents' first reaction often times is to make Facebook the portal to have the daily communication with their children they so badly desire. But it's not real life! Writing on a wall or commenting on a photo is not going to all of a sudden make your son or daughter want to have an hour long conversation about that thing.

Rule #2: Don't like everything!

To that end, don't get confused to believe that it's your parental duty to "Like" every single thing your son or daughter posts on Facebook. It's not a numbers game. And even if it was, yours doesn't count because you're a completely biased parent.

Rule #3: No, I'm not going to post all those photos.

Parents must refrain from asking their children why they chose to post those photos of their friends or that trip with their boyfriend or girlfriend, but not the photos with mom or dad. Hello...Facebook is not a portal to parent-child relationship management!

Rule #4: Parents should never poke.

Don't poke anyone that is also a friend of your child. Period.

Rule #5: No, you're not invited.

Just because you see an event posted on my wall, does not mean that you're invited. No offense, but if you come, I'll be obligated to make sure you have fun and also that you don't have too much fun. Just not cool.

That's all for now, but if (or when) my mom joins Facebook, I'm sure I'll have about 30 others to add.