Navigating the blogosphere is overwhelming, so I want to give you a place to start discovering where all the taste makers kick it.  Enter the New Music Cartel and the Fresh Coast Collective.

Both of these affiliations are a group of different blogs with a common interest in bringing you what’s happening in the world of Hip Hop before it hits the print publications and radio.  Blogs hear it first… and they filter it out to us readers and other bloggers, editors, DJ’s, etc., that’s how it’s goin down nowadays, take note! 

The New Music Cartel consists of :

- nahright.com
- 2dopeboyz.com
- youheardthatnew.com
- xclusiveszone.blogspot.com
- onsmash.com
- dajaz1.com

The Fresh Coast Collective consists of:

- whateyethought.com
- 2dopeboyz.com
- eazeest.com
- thenotoriousblog.net
- knowxone.com

I suggest you subscribe to all of these blogs in your g-reader, more so for research on who is in the limelight, than anything else.  For the most part you could just read nahright.com and be thoroughly informed, but each blog does have it’s own style and personality, along with exclusive content that is worth keeping up with. The FCC seems to have more of a focus on the west coast (duh), and the NMC publishes more content on a daily basis. 

Basically, these are today’s tastemakers.  As an artist you should know who they are, read their blogs, interact with them on twitter, and when you think you have some solid work to promote, you can email them directly (gmail address is listed on each blog.), and hopefully get some shine.

I’ll leave you with a “gift” from one of the FCC artists - Convinced, I think you’ll be “convinced” when you listen to his work, (i know that was corny), and you’ll be hearing a lot more about him in 09…

Convinced | Miss Memory (Prod. by J-Trax) from Convinced Music on Vimeo. 

 DOWNLOAD CONVINCED
Stocking Stuffers mixtape - http://sharebee.com/fbc0a545
Refreshing Album - http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=TTdFT2pBUzhZY1R2Wmc9PQ