Mixtape, mixtape

see SOHH: RIAA Cracks Down On Mixtapes, Police Bust Popular Peddlers

I've been collecting mix CD's for years. I collected them as far back as 1991, and I would buy street tapes from Mister Cee, DJ Clue and Tony Touch. For a couple of years I was buying DJ Rectangle; his CD mixes of rap from the years of 1994-1998 are straight up classics. I, and most hip hop fans understand that hip hop mixes let you know who the latest artists are and you can hear all the newest stuff. DJ's who put out mix CDs have juice, they got respect, they got prestige. Mix CD's are an art at best.

However, I can't get with piracy. The scratchy CD's that you get of the CD in the store are not worth it. Theres a dude from around the way who sells dusty, low quality pirated CDs for the same cost you could get them in the store! That type of thing I can't get with. However, now the government, filled with a bunch of old white farts running things, want to save the poor, poor, major record labels who are such "victims" of this activity. I say, screw the record companies.

All the record companies think that their A&R musical snobs and geeks can dig up the so called "next big thing". When will the major label cats realize that their sales have dropped because the music they put out sucks? What the major labels are doing is ruining hip hop, right along with the radio stations who all play the same crap, the record stores which overprice CD's, and the whole BET/MTV juggernaut which influences the music. Its all a bunch of nonsense.

So, all the old farts in Congress and in the RIAA need to leave the mix tape culture along, and some of these artists need to speak on behalf of the artists and the mix tape DJ's to distinguish mix tapes from pirated CDs. What does the government know? I don't care if some of these politicians say they like Outkast when asked by interviewers, they don't know a damn thing. And saving the artist and saving some industry prick are not the same thing; if anything, the artists need to be saved from industry a-holes!