hip hop: solo artists vs.groups

which is better?
and am i correct in thinking that solo artists are far more common than groups - at least relative to the 80's & 90's?

was wu-tang's voltron strategy the apex of groupdom in hip-hop - which raised the expectation that everyone in a collective would eventually have their own solo stardom? did wu-style solo success ruin hip hop groups - or at least devalue them to borderline vainty projects like G-unit & D12?

Would you rather have three arms or one leg?

Would you rather sweat cheese or cry glue?

Would you rather watch a monkey dance with Crazy Mary, or watch a zebra play the harp while Jennifer Love Hewitt stars in a new horror movie, I Continue to Retain the Information Regarding the Nature of Your Activities Last Summer?

(Real answer: it's hypothetical.)

maybe groups have been replaced by guest spots (at least in how they function on record)

are rappers more like free agents now?

Duos & Trios represent: mobb deep, pete rock & c l smooth, gangstarr, black star, de la soul, run dmc, organized konfusion, ultramagnetic, 3rd bass, eric b & rakim

public enemy was basically a duo too

true or false: the predominance of hip hop solo artists over groups = dumbing down and easier marketability & simpler "branding". one star, one backstory, one message.

groups more multifaceted, funnier, more complex, harder to sell.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGtOIL2vgbs

the real question here is "are there more solo artists now because people are greedy bastards?"

Public Enemy's whole group sitch was a response to all the duos and trios at the time, ca 1986-1987. it was meant as a return to like Furious Five, Funky 4 +1 levels of crewdom

true or false: the predominance of hip hop solo artists over groups = dumbing down and easier marketability & simpler "branding". one star, one backstory, one message.

― Brio, Monday, April 12, 2010 1:09 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

In short: MTV

also - why did hip hop move toward the singular voice while indie rock groups swelled onstage - with all the "collectives" and glockenspeils?

t or f: indie rock ideals are scandanavian socialism while hip hop = ayn rand
(NB: i don't buy this)

but MTV was more influential in the groups-era than in the solo artist-era

music-wise anyway

anyway black-eyed peas being super-humungous kind of ruins my theory anyway.

what other duo/trio/etc's are big now?

i feel like The Man atomized the rap group into solo artists because of the sense of community projected by outfits like PE. i'm not even joking. also the rise of DAT meant a touring rapper in 1990 or so didn't need a dj, before that even a braggart solo artist like Kane would have a dj track on his record, it was never just abt him.

public enemy was basically a duo too

uh who are you excluding? Keith and Eric Sadler?

sorry that was half a thought, poorly expressed.

PE was definitely a group.

I was trying to make the point that there's just 2 voices on the records most of the time - that they could have easily billed themselves as a duo (or even Chuck D & his hype man).

but they made a conscious decision to construct PE as a group - not just to acknowledge the musical input of the bomb squad & terminator x, but as a theatrical/political device w/ the S1W's & Griff - and that construction was all part of their message.

another thought when hip hop gave a fuck about rock n roll, it was more apt to use the group construction (eg "there's 3 of us but we're not the beatles")- and rock fans (especially the punk and metal dudes who were picking up on PE) were more apt to relate to groups

if u look at the jerk movement today it's all abt groups, like i was saying in the jerk thread a few days ago.

no need to look at rock n roll at all. look at doo-wop, groups doing acappella routines under bridges. hip hop, groups beatboxing and tag-team rhyming on corners, same dealie. it was organic.

prob u can trace a trend back to when majors saw the numbers young mc & tone loc were doing on west coast independents. they were followed by vanilla ice and hammer numbers. but i still think it's no coincidence that pushing solo artists ddin't involve pushing imgs of unity and cooperation.