It's just a sign of the times. And tbh a lot of these women are being stubborn.
I'm not going to speak on Latinas and other ethnicities, but throughout the history of music, black females (and artists in general) have always adapted to the times. Whether it was disco, rock N roll, pop, R&B or whatever... artists like Donna Summer, Tina Turner, Whitney, Janet, Diana Ross, etc etc etc have all kept up with the shifts in music and were influenced from various aspects and found success.
As others have mentioned, comparing the beginning of last decade to this decade is a bit of a stretch because R&B/urban/hip hop music was going STRONG last decade. But non-black artists adjusted to that - look at Jennifer Lopez: while she had her dance hits, she also had plenty of collaborations with urban artists, be it Ja Rule or LL Cool J or whoever. Britney collaborated with the Ying Yang Twins and Snoop and the Neptunes, Justin worked with urban producers and artists, hell Christina Aguilera was collaborating with Lil Kim, **** in 2002 NSYNC did a ****ing remix with Nelly (just mentioning this to show there was a period of time where lots of white artists were getting ignored for the urban takeover, but they did what they needed to do to stay relevant).
Now dance music has taken over, which the charts display, and tbh... Rihanna and Nicki are the only ones who kept up. Beyonce tried with Run The World, but I think the whole sample thing screwed that up, and so she just stuck with the classic sound for her (and Beyonce, unlike other black females, survived with 4, because she has a huge fan base and still found success and support from them & the general public). Call them sellouts, call them whatever, but to be a POP[ular] artist you must keep up with what is POP[ular] at the time.
If artists wanna keep making the same, tired ass music when it is clear that is not what the public is interested in at the moment, and they don't see the top of the charts, then that's their fault. The black R&B male artists (Ne Yo, Usher, Chris Brown, etc) have found success releasing mainstream-friendly singles while still keeping an R&B focus on their albums. It's not impossible.
Kelly Rowland had KILLER dance tracks and both When Love Takes Over & Commander reached #1 on Club here (WLTO also debuted on hot 100 and went top 30 on pop), showing potential, but she did not promote either anywhere and instead dedicated herself to Motivation Ciara could make things so easy for herself. She chooses not to. So could Brandy. So could a lot of artists. Brandy could pull off Where Have You Been (just imagine her voice on it and TELL ME it wouldn't work).
Maybe they can't even afford the producers? Who knows? Maybe there's stuff behind the scenes we don't understand.
Also, in the black community anyway, when an artist tries to cater to mainstream so that their career actually has some ****ing longevity, they get viciously attacked. So maybe they're just scared.
You know why sis, even though Fefe was first she didn't make it cause it was unheard of for a black female artist to do this kind of music. Even though there was another black female before her who did rock/pop Res
!!! I mean, Usher started releasing more pop songs like OMG or DJ Got Us Falling In Love Again and did okay, but people complained, so he tried to go more R&B for his last album (climax) and that's not doing so well either. Scream was...decent I guess, but he's in a bind now like Nicki is. Stuck between pop and R&B/hip hop. Release a pop song, get a hit but low album sales. Release your original genre and get no hits.
It is hard. Did Usher promote Climax though? it could've been bigger on the hot 100 if he did.
It's just a sign of the times. And tbh a lot of these women are being stubborn.
I'm not going to speak on Latinas and other ethnicities, but throughout the history of music, black females (and artists in general) have always adapted to the times. Whether it was disco, rock N roll, pop, R&B or whatever... artists like Donna Summer, Tina Turner, Whitney, Janet, Diana Ross, etc etc etc have all kept up with the shifts in music and were influenced from various aspects and found success.
As others have mentioned, comparing the beginning of last decade to this decade is a bit of a stretch because R&B/urban/hip hop music was going STRONG last decade. But non-black artists adjusted to that - look at Jennifer Lopez: while she had her dance hits, she also had plenty of collaborations with urban artists, be it Ja Rule or LL Cool J or whoever. Britney collaborated with the Ying Yang Twins and Snoop and the Neptunes, Justin worked with urban producers and artists, hell Christina Aguilera was collaborating with Lil Kim, **** in 2002 NSYNC did a ****ing remix with Nelly (just mentioning this to show there was a period of time where lots of white artists were getting ignored for the urban takeover, but they did what they needed to do to stay relevant).
Now dance music has taken over, which the charts display, and tbh... Rihanna and Nicki are the only ones who kept up. Beyonce tried with Run The World, but I think the whole sample thing screwed that up, and so she just stuck with the classic sound for her (and Beyonce, unlike other black females, survived with 4, because she has a huge fan base and still found success and support from them & the general public). Call them sellouts, call them whatever, but to be a POP[ular] artist you must keep up with what is POP[ular] at the time.
If artists wanna keep making the same, tired ass music when it is clear that is not what the public is interested in at the moment, and they don't see the top of the charts, then that's their fault. The black R&B male artists (Ne Yo, Usher, Chris Brown, etc) have found success releasing mainstream-friendly singles while still keeping an R&B focus on their albums. It's not impossible.
Kelly Rowland had KILLER dance tracks and both When Love Takes Over & Commander reached #1 on Club here (WLTO also debuted on hot 100 and went top 30 on pop), showing potential, but she did not promote either anywhere and instead dedicated herself to Motivation Ciara could make things so easy for herself. She chooses not to. So could Brandy. So could a lot of artists. Brandy could pull off Where Have You Been (just imagine her voice on it and TELL ME it wouldn't work).
Maybe they can't even afford the producers? Who knows? Maybe there's stuff behind the scenes we don't understand.
Also, in the black community anyway, when an artist tries to cater to mainstream so that their career actually has some ****ing longevity, they get viciously attacked. So maybe they're just scared.
So, you don't think Usher gave the right balance? "Climax" and "Scream" were hits, but after that, it was downhill. "Dive" and "Numb" (two songs I really like) flopped hard. His album sales have been atrocious, too.
It's really tricky with Male R&B artists, it seems like they can't be "TOO MUCH" What I mean by that, they can't be too urban & can't be too pop, they have to find some place in the middle if that's makes any sense. idk. Same with Chris Brown he can make a Pop single go Top 10 but his album sales are the rocks.
It's really tricky with Male R&B artists, it seems like they can't be "TOO MUCH" What I mean by that, they can't be too urban & can't be too pop, they have to find some place in the middle if that's makes any sense. idk. Same with Chris Brown he can make a Pop single go Top 10 but his album sales are the rocks.
This is true, but in CB case his latest album flopped cause he didn't promote it like at all.
Thanks for leaving out Nelly Furtado out (sarcasm)...
Technically, Nelly doesn't count - she's Portuguese, which is an European ethnicity. (just like Penelope Cruz isn't, technically, a Latina because she's Spanish.)
Early 2000's was a great climate for RnB bops, which is the type of music black female musicians primarily invested in.
Now it's a time for ****** electro-pop bops and I guess there's not many black female artists willing to get with the sound.
Then again maybe there are some who are interested in making such music and are waiting to break out from the shadows, but record companies don't have faith in them.
Forget about would the GP accept.
Would the black community?
I always wondered why a certain channel dedicated showcasing black artist
tends to forget there are black artist who sing something other than R&B & Hip Hop.
Forget about would the GP accept.
Would the black community?
I always wondered why a certain channel dedicated showcasing black artist
tends to forget there are black artist who sing something other than R&B & Hip Hop.
Right? Like you'd never catch Fefe Dobson there. Did they even acknowledge that Donna Summer passed? BET is for the birds.
Ciara could make things so easy for herself. She chooses not to. So could Brandy. So could a lot of artists. Brandy could pull off Where Have You Been (just imagine her voice on it and TELL ME it wouldn't work). 
