Dilemma

If you heard my show a couple of weeks ago, you will have spotted my mistake when playing 'Meet Me At The Top' by Serius Jones. Initially, I accredited the track to Snoop Dogg (although I corrected my error swiftly) not because they sound similar either vocally or musically but because I had Snoop on the brain.

Let me explain. For the last five or six weeks I've had a couple of new Snoop tracks (one of which came with a 'clean' version) that I was going to play on my show. However, when it comes to it, I've always baulked in favour of tracks from lesser known (or at least less commercially successful) artists.

The dilemma is this; I want to promote music that most (if not all) mainstream media ignores or, worse still, deliberately stifles. Not just to be different, but because I genuinely feel that the music deserves to be heard by a wider public. Thanks to the name he's established for himself, Snoop (and others like him) has already got a large fan base and doesn't lack promotion.

However, whilst many people will happily listen to new, independent music all day, every day, probably the majority of people like to listen to what and/or who they already know. So the decision I have to make is do I accept that I'll only ever have a small core of regular listeners who are down with supporting new and emerging talent, or do I throw in a significant amount of established artists' works in an attempt to expose the independent stuff to a potentially wider audience?

Furthermore, just because Snoop et al get played within the mainstream media doesn't mean that he doesn't deserve my support too, does it?

Although three hours sounds like a long time it goes by in a flash, especially when you consider that at least 10% of that time is taken up with advertising, and remember that the remit for my existing show is to play music from a mixture of different genres. So trying to fit in Hip Hop from independent artists and established ones is a difficult task.

I'd be interested in hearing your opinions on this one, after all the show is for you.

One Love, Spy!