Ebro on the Combat Jack Show

[newarkhiphop]

Interesting so its easier to blow as a new artist coming from the south than one coming from NY

 

[☑︎#VoteDemocrat]

Told ya'll.

The south is running this shyt and NYC can't handle it.

MIAMI/ATL/Houston STAY putting on for their own.

 

[☑︎#VoteDemocrat]

Why have a hiphop station? Cause there is money to be made. Now they need to figure out how to maximize their profits. And those artist you're mentioning are the ones that are selling singles, selling cds, selling out shows so of course there is a demand for their music.

I see this like being a DJ at a club or house party, you've got to cater to the crowd that adds most to the party but still keep the purist bumpin their heads in disguise. And HOT97s crowd is not a bunch of purists, they don't wanna hear music about depressing things cause their life is depressing enough, a majority are not looking for advanced bars on their way home from work, or when they're getting their shyt in order to head out and on.


And I don't know why you're mentioning Trinidad James, he's not in rotation.
If he keeps on blowing up and his song pass's the test, then he might.


This is what a commercial driven profit maximizing firm will give you, luckily enough there is satellite stations that will maximize their profit in another field which might contain the music you like, there is blogs, iTunes, Datpiff, illegal download sites, spotify and all that shyt where you can get exactly what you want. Which is the reason to why I don't listen to radio, in 2012 I've got a lot of sources that gives me exactly what I want. In the end I understand that the business model of a profit maximizing firm.

Talking straight economics, they could form an illegal cartel and play the shyt they actually like, and force people to listen to it cause any channel they switch to will only be playing relatively dope music. But over time a cartel will not hold, since there is more money to be made and it's illegal.

This is what people don't understand.

 

[L&HH]

@Busby Yeah that was the best part of the interview. He spoke the truth. Just like dudes will say gunplay>>Ross lol

As far as making listenable songs I'd give it to Ross but straight rapping Gunplay >>> any nikka in MMG IMO

 

[L&HH]

Honestly Idk if you can blame the radio the listener or both (really the right answer is both).

This past week I've been studying for finals and been studying with different ppl for different tests. And it AMAZED me how much lack of variety in the music some of them were listening to. I was with one girl and the entire time she was playing PANDORA and had it on some "hiphop club songs" playlists and EVERY song was some club song that has come out in the last couple years. And Im like you listen to club music when your studying? There's much better rap/hiphop to listen to in that setting.

The next day Im chilling with someone else and they had they IPOD on full blast and, again it was THE SAME THING...club/radio songs. shyt was mad infuriating. Whats even worse is people dont even take the time out to check out other material from the club songs of the artists they did like. Was chilling with some bytches and my cuz smoking/drinkng and one shawty pulled out her phone taking memo notes for damn near EVERY song we played like You aint never listen to Kush & OJ or Blue Dream and Lean...I asked her so what does she listen to and all her most played songs in her phone were... AGAIN nothing but club radio songs . Maybe its just me but I dont even listen to club radio songs outside of those settings (once they become hits), whenever I play an album the singles are the songs I normally always skip because they're OVERPLAYED and I know Im just goin here that shyt when the weekend rolls around anyway.

 

[Soundbwoy]

Its not so much "underground hiphop" as it is music with substance. Its just hilarious that Ebro only fukks with that music personally, but does not make any effort to incorporate that music into the mix. As PD, hes in a position to dictate what becomes popular, if hes not willing to ever take a chance, then obviously nothing will change. It seems like his job requires less "expertise" and creative opinion/insight than you'd think. It seems like he just watches where the numbers rise and fall and then reacts, like an app or software program could do

I dont blame Ebro, hes doing what is expected of him and probably doing it well. His job doesnt require a "social responsibility" just a responsibility to shareholders and advertisers. Some of you are acting like your eyes have been opened, but we didnt need him to tell us that.

Hip-hop aint getting special treatment, its the same principle as other genres, films, video games, news, food/diet....Theres a corporate agenda for everything. Better question: How do you sway people away from corporate interests and trash products and teach them to appreciate quality, things that foster their health and mind? Most people are too damn shallow, busy or careless to put in the time or expect more of their entertainment...

The best thing Ebro could do, is either a) resign b) say "fukk it" play the music he feels is good and get fired or c) tell people NOT to listen to his shytty station

how is this going to help, someone else will take his place and most likely a cac

 

[bouncy]

I think people are forgetting what he stated dictates what they play, and that is what WOMEN want to hear, which is songs that have melody(the theme in the front or middle of the beat), and tell a story. This makes sense because women love a story, and the beat is what intrigues them. This is true for men also, but it isn't needed. Look at all the songs that hit your soul, and they tell some type of story or the beat is melodic. If you can combine both you have a hit, at least to me. If your image is put together right, you can be a star but most people don't get this for some reason, especially in NYC.

 

[Harry B]

how is this going to help, someone else will take his place and most likely a cac

That's what I don't get about these dudes saying those type of things.
Ebro is highly replaceable. Just cause you fire Lockheed martins CEO doesn't mean they will stop manufacturing weapons.
The only way to fix this is to get some rich mou fukker who loves "dope hiphop" and is willing to fukk up his bread to buy the whole thing.

 

[Newark88]

Video

 

[JasonSJackson]

play the background like every other program director u sucka..........

This clown just wants to be seen..........

 

[LilJuicyTaco]

Funkmaster Flex: Is He Guilty of Payola?

by Davey D... 9/17/02


There's some good news and bad news for Funkmaster Flex. First the good news, Flex as you may know is heavy into cars. Not a show goes by where he doesn't make some reference to his love for nice rides. He even had some sort of contest earlier this year where he would customize your truck. Well it looks like Flex has stepped up his involvement by partnering with Lincoln Mercury to create a limited Team Baurtwell 2003 Lincoln Navigator Edition. The price tag will be 81 thousand bucks.

Now that's the good news.. Now it appears Flex may have to deal with another nagging concern that keeps surfacing about how he goes about choosing his music for his hit radio show on Hot 97. There is no doubt that Flex is one of the most influential DJs in the country. He can make or break an artist with the drop of one of his trademark bombs. He is also credited with being the main force behind the rise of what is arguably the country's most influential commercial Hip Hop station-Hot 97. At one point the brother was repping for Hot 97 in New York. Doing mix show for Power 106 in LA and holding it down on MTV's DFX. He was damn near 'running' all the big night clubs including the infamous Tunnel. If that's wasn't enough he was releasing his successful series of commercial 'Mixtapes' where he would break new artists. He also established Big Dawg record pool and marketing firm called Franchise.

Well it seems like over the past year there have been grumblings about him abusing his influence by taking money for airplay and not exactly delivering. KRS-One made mention of this a few months back when he publicly accused Flex of taking 40 thousand dollars and only playing his record once.... http://www.eurweb.com/articles/
musicpages/07172002/musicpages741407172002.cf m

Nas alluded to this a few weeks later when he went on Hot 97s rival station Power 105 and put the station and Flex on blast. West Coast rhymesayer Easki expresses the difficulty in dealing with Flex in his song 'Manuscript'. And that's just the beginning.

Over the past week an open letter has been making its way on various listserves and websites calling Flex into account..It comes from an unnamed source that claims to have infiltrated his business [former employee perhaps? ] and accuses Flex of funneling money through his marketing firm in exchange for airplay. It also calls for listeners to call Hot 97. And it threatens to expose evidence of wrong doing to the NY Times and other news organizations. Here's some excerpts from that open letter:

I'm sure those of you have noticed the downward spiral music radio has taken over the past few years. It all started when Emmis Communications decided to try an experiment which was to change the format of their New York and Los Angeles radio stations Hot 97 and Power 106 from Latin dance music to the Hip Hop & R&B format today. This became a revolution, which have spread over to their competitor Clear Channel, and others to become URBAN POP Stations.

Now I'm going to explain to you how hip-hop and R&B records are played on these stations. Unless you are a hermit I'm sure all of you have heard of DJ FunkMaster Flex who spins 5 Nights a week on New York's Hot 97. He is also the owner of Franchise Marketing and Big Dawg Record Pool.

Franchise Marketing is a music promotion company that gets paid by labels like Bad Boy, Def Jam, Ruff Ryder, Rock-A-Fella, Murder Inc, Cash Money, Arista, J, Universal and No Limit to promote records to Radio DJs like FunkMaster Flex and his crew of 25 radio DJs to convince them that a record is hot.
Big Dawg record pool is similar to Franchise but its really an non-profit organization that services it's members of Radio, Club & Mobile DJ's records from the labels before mentioned. This Record Pool also has a promotions department that influences their members to report to several chart publications like Billboard, Hits, Gavin, FMQB, BRE & DMR.The United States Federal Government has a law called payola which simply means that it's highly illegal for a Radio DJ, Programmer or Radio Station to play records that have been paid for by a record company, manager, producer or artist.

If you're like myself and listen to DJ FunkMaster Flex show you'd realize that he'll play the same record over and over proclaiming how hot the record is. If you were to research the hot record he's so excited about then you'd find out that this record has been presented to him by Franchise Marketing.

This means DJ FunkMaster Flex is breaking a FEDERAL LAW and could be imprisoned like four of his former clients for 25 Years.How I know this is because I infiltrated his organization and collected enough evidence to put him and 25 other famous Radio DJ's away for a very long time.Now why would I do such a thing is because I am a patriot of the hip-hop nation and Mr. Aston Taylor (FunkMaster Flex) is a traitor to us all.

If you are an intelligent person you'd realize how powerful hip-hop is. Thanks to hip-hop people of all walks of life have come together and come to recognize who our oppressors are.This an open declaration of war against payola because I want FunkMaster Flex to use his limited power for good by opening his playlists to great hip-hop artists like the following:

The Roots, Common, Q-tip, Talib Kweli, Dilated Peoples, Peoples Under The Stairs, Pete Rock, Black Eyed Peas, De La Soul, Spooks, 4th Avenue Jones, Defari, El The Sensei, Life Savas, Blackalicous, Lexicon, Mr. Lif, Mos Def, J-Live, Lyrics Born, Public Enemy, Slum Village etc. And other hip artists who are make great hip-hop music. FunkMaster Flex has 20 hours a week of airtime for his show. I strongly suggest that he and his DJs remind themselves of why they became Hip-Hop DJ's in the first place....

What I want you to do is call his show at 1.800.523.9797 and tell him about this post. Because I promise this is not a threat if he don't open his playlist with 60 days I will go before an U.S. Senate panel and testify against him and others within the music industry. I will also turn over all of my evidence to The New York Times and all of the major news organization...>>

While the email raises some valid points that have been circulating, one can't help but wonder if this is just a ploy to get more 'underground' artists played on the airwaves. We'll have to wait and see.

In any case the other side of the coin to this is, if Flex wasn't doing his job, by getting good ratings and maintaining a certain level of popularity he wouldn't be on the air. Radio stations are bottomline in that way. If cats weren't feeling what he's doing they would be turning off the radio station in droves and throwing their support behind other DJs and radio shows.

Who knows, perhaps Flex should play a few Slum Village records or at least dedicate a couple of nights a week to showcasing underground material and that'll make everyone happy...

Is Funkmaster Flex Guilty of Payola

 

[Battle]

This wouldnt work

You have to think numbers wise...say 10,000 people flooded Hot 97 w/tweets to play some real hip hop...

Hot 97 has the tech to watch when/how many people tune in and out

So they put that song on, 10,000 people tune in, but 1 million tune out... because the typical Hot 97 listener doesnt wanna hear Raekwon spit gospel over "Dont Look Any Further"

Hot 97 knows this and the advertisers paying bills know this... they gotta keep the churn going

I do think there needs to be a central place for "real" hip hop acts to showcase their talent to the world... but because of the disappearance of the ability to monetize it on the scale necessary for radio the radio is no longer it. Payola or not.


:

Good point.

Because at most we could get 10,000 via tweets/emails but that's being generous I doubt it would even be that amount......

I do think the reason a lot of people like the songs on Hot 97 is the constant repetition. If you play something over and over then people will start to like it.

 

[drsam008]

Pretty interesting interview. Even though it's not great, I still think Hot 97 is much better than other "urban" stations.

 

[The Devil's Advocate]

it seems most of you didn't learn a damn thing. cause most of you are still trying to blame the man

he said clear as day. radio stations have equipment to track listeners and callers. if he plays a song for 3 mins, and they lose 1,000 listeners, HIS boss is at the door... asking what the hell happened, what song were you playing, why were you playing it, and what are you doing to change that.

now if....

1. his answer ain't good enough.. "but i like sean price" that's not good enough... fired

2. his answer don't have print outs and stats, proving this song is hot... in other words, numbers from past spins, other stations, billboard, etc... then he'd be fired

3. he is doing everything right but the next station is still beating him.... fired


you think he gonna risk his family and money for sean price?? would you?? or for any other rapper?? you love hip-hop right. which one of y'all is getting fired tomorrow for it??

that's the job. and when he bucks the system, there will be another person in there with the same print outs, and formulas, doing his job, who wouldn't tell you any of this

what y'all think? if mos def went diamond next year and was #1 on the charts that hot 97 wouldn't play him 1000 times a day?? of course they would. they got no time to build up an artist.. the boss is at the door

 

[LilJuicyTaco]

it seems most of you didn't learn a damn thing. cause most of you are still trying to blame the man

he said clear as day. radio stations have equipment to track listeners and callers. if he plays a song for 3 mins, and they lose 1,000 listeners, HIS boss is at the door... asking what the hell happened, what song were you playing, why were you playing it, and what are you doing to change that.

now if....

1. his answer ain't good enough.. "but i like sean price" that's not good enough... fired

2. his answer don't have print outs and stats, proving this song is hot... in other words, numbers from past spins, other stations, billboard, etc... then he'd be fired

3. he is doing everything right but the next station is still beating him.... fired


you think he gonna risk his family and money for sean price?? would you?? or for any other rapper?? you love hip-hop right. which one of y'all is getting fired tomorrow for it??

that's the job. and when he bucks the system, there will be another person in there with the same print outs, and formulas, doing his job, who wouldn't tell you any of this

what y'all think? if mos def went diamond next year and was #1 on the charts that hot 97 wouldn't play him 1000 times a day?? of course they would. they got no time to build up an artist.. the boss is at the door

We get it. Hot 97 sold out to the corporations just like the rappers they play.

I don't believe that he will be fired if he plays Sean Price. I just think it means more money for him and the station if he doesn't play him.

His Payola explanation wasn't very good either for the simple fact that a artist already in rotation could play a dj for even more play. It doesn't have to be some no name artist out of the blue like he said. Also I'm sure all of his dj's take payola from artist to be played at clubs which in turns means plays on the radio.

I think he revealed to the public more than he was suppose to and that this wasn't some big master plan of his. The information was good but it shouldn't over shadow the issue that Hot 97 is a dangerous bs station that only plays a few select artist signed to a few select major labels in a system set up to work in their favor. The science behind it only shows me that they have a system of control in place.