Rawkus Records on a European Rap Hunt

This year New York’s ruff & ready underground hip-hop label Rawkus Records are bringing their “Rawkus 50” project to Europe in hunt of the freshest, or as the saying goes in hip-hop, the dopest new unsigned international talent. Rawkus first launched the project in the States last year where they went in search of 50 of the sharpest breakthrough artists they could find from all parts of the country. According to the label’s founders Brian Brater & Jarret Myer the main concept behind the project was to counteract a general decline in new & breaking artist development at major music labels as well as falling sales in the music business. Each of the 50 selected artists would be offered the release of a digital album on Rawkus Records which would be available on all major digital download stores worldwide, also with the option of independently releasing a physical CD. All artists would also receive strong promotion & marketing from the label with their individual profiles viewable on my.rawkus.com, a community platform shared by both bloggers & artists, as well as on-line and country-wide print coverage. Some of the artists would also have the possibility of playing at various Rawkus 50 events around the country. Having received hundreds of entries the judges had a tough job of whittling them down to 50 (which is still a lot really when you think about it), and then in late November of last year, they finally launched 50 digital albums making up 650 tracks available for download. Some of the newly discovered artists are already making quite an impact including 6th Sense, 12Bit and Red Clay. Now it’s Europe’s turn to shine and show the hip-hop world what they’ve got. It’s great to see a US label reaching outside of the states in search of hip-hop talent, as it could be argued that the US are often indifferent or perhaps unware of the massive hip-hop scene bubbling all over the globe. (France currently holds the second highest hip-hop market in the world after the US, while the UK comes in third). So if you have aspirations to be the next Mos Def or Talib Kweli this could well be your chance. The deadline for entries is 14 March 08. Head to www.rawkus.com/group/rawkus50 to find out mo’ & check rap's next possible stars