(trust me, it will make sense below (well, hopefully anyway)) Andrew Duke wrote: > [Bobby] Konders has always been a big fan/proponent > of roots and culture.
He has a show dedicated to it on Hot97, the main hiphop/r&b radio station in New York City, on Sunday afternoon. Also, I seem to remember that around lunch time on weekdays they have a 'classics' show with lots of great old electro, but I'm not sure whether that was Hot97 or another station. Anyway, about Hot97: I was in NYC from July-September last year and listened to it quite a bit. One thing that struck me in the last one/two months or so, is the number of hiphop and r&b tunes that are new in the charts or on the radio here in the Netherlands (and I presume in most of Europe) that were in heavy rotation on Hot97 three to six *months* earlier. Some examples, some slighty more recent than others: Donell Jones - "U know what's up" (v. good r&b tune, btw) Montell Jordan - "Get it on tonite" (ditto) ODB - "Baby I got your money" 702 - "You don't know" (313 relevance courtesy of TP: Mark Kinchen produced this) Kelis - "Caught out there" aka 'I hate you so much right now' This several-month-lag between the US and Europe surprises me. With house and techno, if a track is not just on promo/white anymore and is out officially, it's *out*. Worldwide. There may be a delay of a few weeks, but certainly not months. Why this difference? I can think of a few (partial) explanations: - Hiphop and r&b are much more controlled by major labels. They probably have a marketing strategy in which this lag is purposefully built in. The rationale for it is unclear to me though. - House and techno rely much more on grassroots marketing through word-of-mouth, reviews on mailing lists like these and others. Word travels fast (especially in an IT-savvy community like this one), so this creates instant demand for a track. Hence stores everywhere ordering it. - Word travels fast, but so do DJs (got any more travel stories Alan? :) Get a hot track in the right hands and within a few weeks it will have enough frequent flyer miles to forget which timezone it is in... Again instant near-global demand. Any thoughts? Otto
