Update: Lyor Cohen Crashes The Party…Lupe’s Fanboys Hit The Streets For Fiasco Friday

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As we reported earlier, Lupe Fiasco’s fanboys took to the web to petition Atlantic Records to release his long-awaited third album, Lasers. After realizing that there was serious hype surrounding the petition and that the situation made them look like money-grubbing bastards, Atlantic execs decided to give Lasers a March 8th release date.  So what did Lupe’s fanatics do?  They took to the street to celebrate Fiasco Friday.  Starting at the statue of William Tecumseh Sherman outside Central Park, Fiasco’s fans are set to march over to Atlantic’s NYC headquarters to show their support for the Chicago musician.

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Oddly enough, the 17 year-old protest organizer, Mathew La Corte, told The Village Voice that he has never purchased a single Lupe Fiasco album!  In fact he organized the protest because he’s tired of misogynistic music, solely advocating partying, getting radio play, and sees Lupe as “a social advocate [and a] political activist.”  In response to being asked if he purchased 2006’s Food & Liquor or 2007’s The Cool, La Corte responded, “I did not buy the records, I just listened to them over the internet.”  This reiterates the original reason why Atlantic didn’t want to put out LasersLupe’s fans and many fans of ‘conscious rap’ for that matter are hesitant to make purchases.  Non pop rap records are quite arguably the most pirated form of music, and the suits at Atlantic aren’t the bumbling idiots we sometimes make them out to be.  If anything can be learned from this, it’s that the industry is changing and what’s being consumed online isn’t what’s selling.  In short, if you want to make ‘real music,’ you need more than your music alone to profit.

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Update: Warner Music Group CEO, Lyor Cohen, came outside the Atlantic offices today to join the fans in the street.  He came equipped with  a ’90s-style boombox  playing Laser’s first single “Go To Sleep.”  He went on to announce that the single will be released for free online on October 26th.  Afterward, Lupe himself came out to meet and greet his fans and thank them.

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In addition, the first video from Lupe Fiasco’s side rock project, Japanese Cartoon, dropped today.  The song “Heirplanes” falls somewhere between punk and thrash, with a little glam thrown in.  I doubt most Lupe fans will feel this, but it’s alright in my opinion…not rushing out to buy this album.

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