In a recent interview with Billboard, J. Cole’s manager, Ibrahim “Ib” Hamad, reveals that artists who don’t mind working hard can still sell lots of albums:
What’s your response to critics who say music doesn’t sell anymore after seeing Cole’s first-week numbers?
I think that the only way music sells is if you put in the work. I think there’s a lot of back work that people aren’t seeing that Cole put in for seven years, and just assume that he’s putting out music and it’s just selling when realistically he’s been on the road for seven years, doing Dollar and A Dream shows, he’s been talking to people. When he has the time, he’ll have like a conversation with everybody that stops him. We literally had to stop doing meet and greets on tour because he would literally sit there and talk for five minutes with everybody and it just started to get to the point where he would be done with his meet and greet right before the show. It was just too taxing. He’s that kind of person. But all that stuff adds up, all those years of talking to people, all those years of doing Dollar and A Dream shows, all those years of going on tour that people weren’t seeing. Not every show coming up was sold out, not every show coming up were people who knew all his words. You need to go through that, you have to put in the work to get to the point where music can sell. If your music is streaming, there’s not much for your music to sell because people can just hear it for free or if they have a membership.
If you’re someone who puts in the work, people are going to support. And it’s not just artists like Cole or Drake or Kendrick [Lamar] that have been around since before streaming, even new artists that’s coming up. I buy a lot of albums even though I listen to them on streaming. I remember watching an Anderson Paak interview and I was just getting into the story, and it made me want to buy his album instead of just streaming it. Once you connect with people and you see the work they put in, you want to support them. In this day and age, even though the sales are down, the people who put in that work get rewarded.
People will only spend money if they feel the music is worth it.
Love J Cole!
I agree with this. I think a lot of people can see when an artist is lazy and when people can see that an artist doesn’t give a damn, they don’t feel the need to spend their money. And most of the artists out nowadays are lazy and lack talent. I’d rather stream their music at the gym then actually spend my hard earned coins on their so, so music.
Facts.