The problem is that MTV and BET claim to play the good Hip-Hop and the artists all say the same. Even when you search on Yahoo for Underground shit....stuff that appears at the top mostly is stuff that says "Buy underground mix tapes of Eminem, 50 Cent, and Sheek Louche"

That way, kids think that these guys are the only good music out there, which is why they were signed from the underground because they were actually good. I would know....I used to be the same way. I knew that there was an underground, but thought that they were actually crappy and all of the good people were signed to Def Jam and such. Basically, if it wasn't MTV, I didn't listen to it.

Unfortunately it isn't about the music anymore....it's about selling an image. Politics are involved, money is involved, and just about every stereotype and prejudice is involved, too. For example, say El-P walks in for an audition for Making of the Band 3 with a trucker hat and cargo pants on, (Impossible, I know, but play along) and he performs Deep Space 9mm. Now some black man comes in after him dressed in untied Timberlands, a doo-rag, and baggy Fubu shit on, and spits a wack ass gangsta verse with horrible rhyme scheme and the worst delivery ever and provides a beat that a group of monkeys could have improved upon. Now who is going to get on? El-P or the gangsta black man?
The gangsta black man of course because he is portraying a gangsta image, and he is a black man. That is Hip-Hop Puffy says.

So that is what is played on MTV. And since their target audience looks for MTV to see what's new....they miss an entire part of Hip-Hop that is not a banger that people can dance to. People think Hip-Hop is black music, and ignore its diversity in every aspect of the word.

I don't know...I don't have a solution other than to get artist's names out there....but personally....even if Aesop Rock was on the radio I wouldn't listen to it.......

The radio is still notorious for playing shit out pretty damn quick....