A Salute to Our Veterans

We wanted to take the time out to say Happy Veterans Day to all of the veterans. My wife's father was a vet and served in the Korean War. Although we weren't around during that time, we can only imagine the anxiety her mother went through while he was away at war. Our thoughts and prayers are with all of the families who have servicemen and women currently abroad fighting to keep America safe and free.

Our thanks goes out to all of the veterans for doing what you do. Without your dedication and love for your country, we would not be able to enjoy the freedoms and the lifestyle that we are able to in America. So, Thank You! Enjoy your Veterans Day!!

Luadcris

This months Spotlite will shine on Christopher Bridges b.k.a Ludacris. I would like to start off by saying that those that know me well know that I am very much a Oldskool head and thats where my heart resides, but I have to give credit where it is due and Ludacris is very much deserving of the spotlite as well as some credit for being one of the baddest rappers to ever do it. Ludacris was born in Champign, Chicago his family moved to Atlanta ,GA at age 12 it was then young Chris started to perfect his craft in this rap game. Ludacris has been around music & house parties since he was a toddler, seeing how his parents were in College when he was born. His love for music continued on, when he was 12 he joined a group called The Loudmouth Hooligans. Ludacris used to have battles during lunch in school, it was almost as if he would rather battle than eat his lunch. A while after that Ludacris would show up anywhere where there was an open mic for him to rock. Ludacris landed a job in Atlanta as a radio personality it was there that the ATL got their first real taste of Luda. During his radio show he would rap over radio station promos so so people got to hear his skills over some hot tracks. Ludacris's debut recording was from Timbalands 1998 Album Tims Bio: Life fom the Basement, both Timbaland & Jermaine Dupree wanted to sign Ludacris but Ludacris had different plans, he would launch his debut Album "Incognegro" under his own indie label Disturbing The Peace (DTP). The rest from there as they say is history. Ludacris is one of the highest selling rappers from the south to the tune of 19.5 million units sold in the states alone. Personally Im not very impressed with record sales because that has alot of politics wrapped all up in it. I like to judge the emcees I like by something that has been forgotten in the music industry.... SKILLZ!! Ludacris has shown his verbal skillz on countless compilations from Shawna to Sleepy Brown to Nate Dogg to Mystical. Every time a different flow, every time the vocabulary was different, nothing is the same Ludacris always delivers different flavas with his rhymes. He also has a skill that allows him to talk about women and how attractive they are and still not demean them. Hell he even goes into what he would do with them and to them. See it takes skillz to do that and still not demean our sistahs, check out the lyrics in the the song Sweet Revenge. I mean I would play Ludacris around my Grandmother, how many emcess have street credit that you can play around Granny? On top of that he is a hell one hell of a battle emcee check out "Stomp" a dis to TI. There was no response to this from TI because the beef was squashed before the record even went public, although it was recorded on Young Bucks album Straight Out of Cashville. Ludacris shows a very wide range of verbal skillz and has fans from young to old from black to white. Not every emcee that has accomplished what he has in the time that he has can say the same thing. Hats off to you Christopher "Ludacris" Barnes.















































































Born Christopher Bridges in Champaign, Illinois moved to Atlanta ,Georgia at 9

360 Deals

In the music industry at one time the artist or band or even just the music itself is what all the fans raved and talked about. The record company has always been the silent giant everybody new was there but not alot of attention was aimed in that direction. Now that has changed just as much if not more than music itself today. The record companies are the money behind the artist, so any advances the artist needed came from the record company, just about anything the artist needed came from the record company. Marketing costs, promoting etc. Like in the movie Ray, the record company bought Ray a car, later on he asked for some money and they said "remember that car we bought you"? There goes your money from your record sales just like that. Kind of messed up but that's how its been for quite some time. Today artist are almost forced to sign whats called a 360 Deal. In addition to the record label getting a portion of record sales under the 360 Deal they get a cut of EVERYTHING the artist does. That includes live performances, downloads, endorsement deals, merchandise and ticket sales. If somebody wants to use your song in a commercial guess what? the record company gets a piece, even though they had no hand in getting that deal done. 360 means 360! Of course the record companies will put there spin on it to make it look like a viable option. Some record companies are only offering 360 Deals, these are some of your major labels doing this as well. The reason for all this in short is so the record company doesn't lose their shirt. With the birth of the Internet music is finally catching up, that's good and bad. As a fan its actually great!! Because now we don't have to ask mom or dad for a ride to the mall to buy the latest album like I had to do in my day. Now its just go to your computer...excuse me.. your desk top computer, cell phone, laptop, ipod, ipad or tablet hop on any number of websites that allow music downloads search and download until your is content sometimes for free. Kind of hard for the brick and mortar record store to compete. That's great for the artist not so much for the record company because that artist is selling more records that way and the record company still gets a cut but here is the problem. Music on the net is starting a shift as well, soon there will be no charge for downloading any particular artist material to make up for this predicted loss we now have 360 Deals. I will close with this, I think some artist deserve a 360 Deal, you know the artist that cant really sing, the one that does no writing of any of their material, cant read music cant play any instrument, does this sound like a person that should be in the music industry? I don't think so either but that is where we are in my opinion musically today. If you fall in that category you need to be giving all that up. Lets say you are a artist like Prince or Rick James, triple threats:singer,song writer,producer not that many around like that anymore oh yeah prince can play pretty much any instrument he puts his hands on. Rick James played the Guitar, Keyboards and the Drums. That's the stuff artist should be made of .

Peace,
K.A.O.T.I.K THOUGHT

(Keep All Oldskool Traditions In Konscious Thought)

Oldskool vs The New

This week's session should prove to be a interesting one. We will see if we can answer one question once and for all, which skool is better -- the old or the new? There are several ways we can judge this, lyrical content, popularity, the music production, vocabulary, different styles, or just plain ol' talent. Me personally... I like the lyrics. Be talking about something! Words are extremely powerful -- choose them wisely. Just don't use words as fillers -- use them to help perfect your craft. Speaking of your craft...wouldn't you want to be the best who has ever done it? Who goes into any field and says " I don't care how well I do, I want to be the worse basketball player ever?" Nobody! Take your time to perfect your craft.

I also like content. Again there is power in our words... Give the people something to think about. Uplift somebody with your words that have a positive message in them. Your words can even give a different point of view on any number of subject matters. You can even teach -- KRS-ONE has been on that path since his third album Ghetto Music: The Blueprint of HIP-HOP. It seems that the pioneers held on tighter to these values & traditions. They weren't writing just to sell records saying whatever will sell! They wrote to display there skillz & talent, like K-SOLO in Spellbound (I love that joint) or Letterman. They wrote to deliver a message: LL Cool J's second album, Bigger & Deffer, there is a song called The Breakthrough and pretty much anything Rakim put out are examples of delivering a message. Keep your eyes and ears open for an artist spotlight segment on that brother without doubt...coming soon.


Don't get me wrong I'm a lover of music. I like it all from Rock to R&B to Folk to The Blues. I love music. Today's artists just seem to write JUST to sell records. I understand that is the point but to the sacrifice of what and to what extent? Then we have some artists that have no talent at all they are just simply marketable. There are some very talented artists out there that still just write to sell records, they have mad skills and are extremely talented. They just choose to write a certain type of material for their songs. Some people say "well I write about what I see. If all I see is negativity, violence, drugs, sex, etc., what do you expect me to write about?" I will close with a response to just that. There is more to the world then what your hood, television and movies show us. On the first two albums I can kind of dig it...you have to get out there; but when you hit album number 3, 4, 5 and 6 and you're still spitting the same ish from albums 1 and 2, I feel we have a disconnect somewhere. Just my opinion. You are no longer struggling to make ends meet. You are making legit money -- a real paper check with your name on it. Use your God given talent and be creative in your writing. I would think after album number 5 you are not still on the corner in the hood. Music was your ticket out of whatever negative situation you were in. How long are you going to abuse and pimp the beautiful and powerful expression of the art of music? Music is an expressive art form. Is that all that we are? Dope dealing, pants sagging, how much weed can I smoke, how many sistahs can I call *itch, how much tail can I tap folk? I know and believe we are better than that. We are bigger than that. Our creativity goes deeper than that. We should be proving stereotypes wrong -- not fitting them like a well tailored suit.

Peace,
K.A.O.T.I.K. THOUGHT
(Keep All OldSkool Traditions In Konscious THOUGHT!)

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