Music News Today - Vol. 4
As a large base of music consumers, African Americans have sustained the R&B industry for many years. Many of the industry's hottest and most popular artists have never experienced much love outside of the black community (i.e. Eric Benet, Kenny Lattimore, Luther Vandross). So needless to say, if you embrace us we embrace you back for good - but if you snub us, well..
While Janet and Michael Jackson and Prince have pop appeal and have gained a large base of fans globablly - most R&B artists make their bread and butter stateside with a huge majority of fans of color. So the profits made from a primarily black audience may not make you a megastar, but it ain't a bad living. A slight against us - as a consumer group - could be the first nail in the coffin of any artists who decides to break into the R&B stream.
So here comes Mariah, fresh from a breakdown but ready to get back into the ring. Having been replaced on the Pop scene by Brittney Spears and J-Lo -neither of which gets much love from urban radio - Carey has set her sights on R&B music lovers.
This isn't written fact - but speculation based on Carey's last CD with Sony and her signing with Def Jam. Clearly she's looking to establish a new, funkier direction.
Frank-Ski's commentary this morning was interesting to me - because I've always felt Carey was caught in the cross fires of R&B and Pop. Now that she's been unceremoniously dumped by the Pop crowd, she has nowhere else to go but R&B. Can she make it? Will she be accepted with open arms or only manage an occasional hit among R&B fans - a la J-Lo, whenever she features Ja Rule on a track?
I don't know, but the gloves are off. Mariah Carey has long been tolerated among urban radio - after all, having a powerful voice meant she couldn't be discounted as untalented. But she was never totally embraced or viewed seriously as an R&B diva. Mostly, she was seen as a Pop phenom and musical mulatto - a white girl with a black voice who didn't seem to fit anywhere.
According to Jerry Blair, an executive from Columbia that has worked with Carey since she began her career - "The record she's working on is going to be a real wide-appeal record. There's no artist
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