Nowadays, the rap game is a lot different from how we used to know it. Back in the day, album promo was going on the radio, doing interviews and freestyles, music video countdowns, etc. Artists used to feel larger than life. Today, we constantly see every celebrity on our screens all the time. Sure, social media presence is normal, but in order to get that extra marketing boost, streaming has become the new cash cow. You could find an artist on TikTok live, Instagram live, and now Twitch, too. You could find Drake live-streaming the same way you would find Akademiks or Kai Cenat.
Consequently, there’s this feeling that streamers and rappers are competing with each other for popularity. At least that’s what Ak thinks. Recently, he argued on his own stream that rappers lost some of their credibility trying to get on with prominent streamers. The people on Twitch and Kick gained more from the exchange than the artists did. As a result, rappers lost a lot of their celebrity mystique, while people like Adin Ross entered celebrity spaces.
Akademiks Argues Rappers Shouldn’t Have Collaborated With Streamers
“Rappers made a huge mistake in the last two years,” the streaming giant and hip-hop personality said. “When they were chasing numbers, they all went to streamers. You’ve got to understand, the rapper collab with the streamers is what got these guys to record levels of clout. These streamers on their way to whatever clout level they get to, they collaborate with rappers, but overall the end result is that it helped the streamers more than they help the rappers.”
Additionally, Akademiks argues that streaming provides a level of consistency that you can’t quite get with music. Describing new songs as hit or miss, you always know what you’re getting from a talking head on Twitch. Now, with this alleged disparity in quality, rappers have “handed their audience over to discover these streamers.”
“I do believe that streamers have done a great job to extract attention of potential fans away from the rappers,” Akademiks says. “Now to the fact that the rapper have to show up to the streamers’ bedroom to try to get the attention back, expect, fans are making a hard choice. We’re buying into personality over this coolness factor and music that is hit-or-miss.”
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