How Black Music Saved the Music Industry; and How the Music Industry’s Culture of Robbery Began

“𝐈𝐬𝐬𝐚 𝐑𝐚𝐞 𝐂𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐬 𝐌𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐜 𝐁𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 ‘𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐈𝐧𝐝𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐲 𝐈 𝐇𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐀𝐜𝐫𝐨𝐬𝐬,’ 𝐑𝐢𝐝𝐝𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐖𝐢𝐭𝐡 ‘𝐂𝐫𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐂𝐫𝐢𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐬’” (Variety)

If you’ve ever worked in any industry, then you did business in the *music industry*, you know it’s one of the worst industries – one filled with “crooks and criminals.”

Crazy how everybody knows this, especially people within the music industry. But nothing has changed. So how did it get this way?

To really understand, we have to go all the way back to the 1920s. You see, after World War 1, the music industry was on its death bed. And the then leaders of the music industry turned to the one and only thing that could save it: Black music.

Soon after the music industry was rescued, the nefarious practice of stealing copyrights from Black music artists followed. Once that set in, a culture of robbing ALL music artists took hold. And therein began the culture of robbery that continues to permeate through the music industry to this day.

Read more about how Black music rescued the music industry, and how the music industry built a culture of criminals, in my book The Art of Sampling, 3rd Edition.