S. Samuel
SOHH reached out to Soulja Boy's protege JBar to find out what his experience has been like as a new artist on Universal Motown.
According to the rapper, being on a major label is better than staying independent.
“The advantages of being on a big record label, you got a whole team, like a whole staff just like working for you all day,” JBar told SOHH. “[They’re] making sure you’re doing interviews, making sure you’re getting press and all that stuff, and making sure you’re here on time. Therefore, I think having an independent like, if I was just on SOD Money Gang solely, it’d probably take way more work and a [limited] sort of amount of people like versus being at Universal where you have like 200 people staffed working, it’s always like more work is going on here.” (SOHH)
JBar recently told SOHH he has been strategizing his upcoming music releases with Universal Motown president Sylvia Rhone.
“I met with Sylvia Rhone, like two days ago,” JBar revealed last month. “We were just talking about details on my album, like how far done am I with my album, like who I wanted to work with, like, do I need any help for anything, just stuff like that. She’s just checking in on me. And then we were talking about the video, we’re gonna shoot my video [this] week, on the 5th and 6th [of March]. I’m ready for that. She cool to me. She ain’t seem stuck up to me. She’s nice.” (SOHH)
Last month, rap veteran Too Short cited the lack of major label support as a primary reason for dropping his upcoming Still Smokin’ album digitally.
“My thing is I just like to work in the studio & make a ton of newmusic,” Too $hort explained. “I work with several different producers & artists and whenever it’s time for me to release another album, I always have plenty of material on hand to choose from…It’s always been that way with me. I’m doing a digital only release because at this point in my career, I have to be able to make my music available to the masses without depending on a major label. The majors will not push your product if you don’t have the hottest single on the radio & huge first-week sales.” (All Hip Hop)
G-Unit‘s Tony Yayo also said it is to his advantage not to be signed to a major.
“If I was still on Interscope, I would say I would probably have to wait a long process to get my mixtape on iTunes,” Yayo explained to DJ Green Lantern. “And now my mixtape’s on iTunes, go pick it up — I get my bread faster instead of waiting on the label to make moves for me. Them days is dead…We’re gonna drop these independent records this summer, it’s more money for me anyway, so, it’s a beautiful thing. It’s the do it yourself [era]. Eh yo, all those Hype Williams days are over. N*ggas used to spend half a million for a video. Now — my videos are done in five minutes.” (DJ Green Lantern TV)
Check out JBar’s SOHH interview below:
