R&B MUSIC BECOMING RARE?

Hip-Hop is at the head of the class. It’s continuing to become more mainstream and has countless new artist emerging almost daily. With different rappers of different styles collaborating and touring together on a regular basis. It seems as though an R&B artist is lucky to find themselves singing a hook. A few years ago everyone was saying Hip-Hop was dead but the real question is what direction is R&B music going?

With Auto-tunes growing in popularity some artist don’t even need to feature singers on their tracks, and it’s become harder and harder for new R&B artists to be introduced. Alicia Keys, Trey Songz, Beyonce, Monica, and Usher are a few artists who have maintained their popularity but all of these artists have at least three albums already. So what about those new artist? They’re still out their but they aren’t getting the same exposure that new R&B artist were getting a few years ago. “Jasmine Sullivan is one of the most under-rated artist she is phenomenal.” A fan tweeted via twitter. Is she under-rated because people aren’t paying attention to this genre of music like they were before? Even artist like Ginuwine, who had three successful albums, was hardly heard on the radio before his sales began to slow down in the last five years. It seems as though the Rhythm and Blues is becoming lost. None-the-less an artist or two have managed to muster their way to stardom. Keri Hilson who released “In A Perfect World” at the beginning of 2009 experienced major success, but even in writing this article I found it almost impossible to think of a male counter part who is new and had experienced equal success.
It’s clear that to preserve the melodies of songs about love, pain, and personal experiences something has to be done. Someone has to bring R&B back to the for-front or at least create an avenue for it to co-exist with the well oiled machine that is Hip-Hop. Now the only question that remains is whose going to make it happen?