Nelly has sold millions and millions of records over the years, but considering the sales of 5.0 so far, his latest album will be lucky if it even cracks 100,000. As it stands, the St. Louis, MO rapper's new disc, which was released November 16, only sold approximately 64,000 in its first week. No doubt, Nelly is a little miffed about the situation. While the slowing of album sales could be a sign of things to come for the veteran hip-hopper, the rap star is convinced that his label, Motown, is to blame.
Via a Twitter rant, Nelly voices his displeasure over Motown's apparent lack of promotion behind his latest.
"A record deal is a 50/50 partnership!" Nelly wrote. "As a artist its your job to provide the record company with music that they [the record company] can sell! Thing about the partnership is that n the public eye the responsibility is not 50/50! the artist is always the 1who catches 90% of the blame."
Here's some more of his rant, in unedited form:
When a artist doesn't deliver sufficient material [the artist] gets [their] budget cut for next album or worse dropped from the label! So not only is the label ur partner but also disciplinarian and 90 percent of the time the one who decides if the partnership continues! No doubt wen a artist doesn't deliver a song that does crack top of the charts or even top10 the label is quick to say artist didn't deliver So intern the artist must bare the brunt of that failure and take responsibility and consequences as handed out by his or her label!!
So who fault is it when a artist gives the label not only a #1 hit but there first top40 #1 n label history! sell 2mill n singles n 2.5month. Who should be held responsible wen a artist has a history for selling records so its not like a new artist n no1 knows his r her name? Benefit of the doubt: Maybe no1 wants to hear music from that artist?well if that was true then the artist would not have a #1 song! Benefit of the doubt:Maybe no1is checking 4 the artist anymore? Well if that was true then how do u explain selling 2mill singles n 2.5month was.
While the rapper feels he's been slighted, there is an outside chance that people just might not want to buy Nelly records these days. Only time will tell, so maybe we will get a better gauge on Nelly's popularity if and when he issues a 6.0.
Via a Twitter rant, Nelly voices his displeasure over Motown's apparent lack of promotion behind his latest.
"A record deal is a 50/50 partnership!" Nelly wrote. "As a artist its your job to provide the record company with music that they [the record company] can sell! Thing about the partnership is that n the public eye the responsibility is not 50/50! the artist is always the 1who catches 90% of the blame."
Here's some more of his rant, in unedited form:
When a artist doesn't deliver sufficient material [the artist] gets [their] budget cut for next album or worse dropped from the label! So not only is the label ur partner but also disciplinarian and 90 percent of the time the one who decides if the partnership continues! No doubt wen a artist doesn't deliver a song that does crack top of the charts or even top10 the label is quick to say artist didn't deliver So intern the artist must bare the brunt of that failure and take responsibility and consequences as handed out by his or her label!!
So who fault is it when a artist gives the label not only a #1 hit but there first top40 #1 n label history! sell 2mill n singles n 2.5month. Who should be held responsible wen a artist has a history for selling records so its not like a new artist n no1 knows his r her name? Benefit of the doubt: Maybe no1 wants to hear music from that artist?well if that was true then the artist would not have a #1 song! Benefit of the doubt:Maybe no1is checking 4 the artist anymore? Well if that was true then how do u explain selling 2mill singles n 2.5month was.
While the rapper feels he's been slighted, there is an outside chance that people just might not want to buy Nelly records these days. Only time will tell, so maybe we will get a better gauge on Nelly's popularity if and when he issues a 6.0.