Does the music industry create the market?

It is important to understand that major record labels are not only music businesses, but divisions of media and entertainment corporations that are firstly and foremost out there to make money. An artist for them is like an action figure on a monopoly board. Majors’ intention is not to make someone famous so that their amazing music could be heard, but to bring back gold to the magnates.
Breaking the industry is hard and many upcoming artists see signing for a major label like hitting a gold vein. It guarantees extensive marketing and a safe entry to millions of household radios and TVs. Due to this, the industry has a very influential role in shaping the market products. There is a vicious circle of artists pleasing the industry and the industry offering limited production for the consumers.
On the other hand, majors have always been slow to react to changing trends. More often, it is the independents and underground movements that first introduce a new sound. This contradicts the argument that it is the industry that creates the market.
It will be interesting to see if digitization will see an end to this, as more and more artists are leaving major labels and moving the digital distribution.

NME Review

Boy, I can feel that masculine vibe that flows trough the articles of NME. I would put money on it, that the editorial staff of NME are predominatly young virile 'indie-rocker-lads' who aren't totally ignoring the presence of women but who are systematically excluding them from most of its context. This gotta be fellas selling 'quality' for their mates. It's not only the sexy pair of legs on the first page that welcome me to world of shaving creams and boyish gadgets, but the general style its male journos write. As I said, most of the ads clearly indicate that this isn't a mag for me, unless of course, I'm a true Coldplay fan, who would pay over two quid for the sake of the free record that I could have downloaded anyway. All in all, I suppose it's a decent read if you're keen on new rock and wear tighter jeans than I do.

Are blackness and whiteness useful concepts in the study of popular music?

Throughout history people have felt the need to classify themselves and divide each other into subordinated groups. In music this is no different, and it has led to difficulties in defining genres.

It can be argued, that today's rock is predominantly white, but what defines a black and white genre? Is it the artist, producer or the audience? Elvis may have been a white artist and rock n'roll may be seen as a white musical revolution, but on the other hand, Elvis' voice sounds black and the origins of the musical style were actually in black rhythm and blues. Public enemy later declared that Elvis was a racist but in the end the so-called ‘black music’, hip-hop has now got many successful white artists. Is Eminem the new Elvis? Or Amy Winehouse the new Diana Ross?

In my opinion it is more important to look at the origins of the musical style rather than divide genres on the grounds of skin colour. Ethnicity, class, gender and socio economic atmosphere all influence on produced music. A person’s identity contributes to the music they listen to and people identify with something familiar to them.