Every genre in music has different sets of fans. Some are more invested than other's. For a style of music to sustain relevance, it needs a balance of continuously attracting new fans while satisfying it's original core fan base.
Hip Hop is a perfect example of a genre with countless type's of fan's who appreciate different areas of the artform. Either for the artist creativity or personal attributes and qualities.
UK Drill while still in it's early infancy has been developing a very powerful core fan base. With certain artist gaining so much loyalty from their supporters, they can clear 500,000 views in under a day from a new release. But some supports have said certain parts of the audience are very toxic. Furthermore artist have complained about the loyalty from fan's of the genre.
But why?
(image link https://swg3.tv/news/2019/october/headie-one-16-10)
Well since UK Drill is a street artform, many of it's artist may belong to collectives or associated with one, With that brings a level of first impressions.
If your group is buzzing and gaining traction, anything under that umbrella will gain positive support. But say your group is involved in a rivalry with another group that is currently making waves, your likely to see a huge surge in negative feedback.
Fan loyalty shifting every hour depending on who's got the last word on social media.
Social media has forever changed artist and fan interaction. Where any person is one click away from talking to their favourite or hated musician. Also with a few of these rivalry having real life tension. Fan's have been accused of helping escalate issue's.
From long thread debates on artist YouTube comments that sometimes have nothing to do with the content uploaded.
Which is fine sometimes but when the discussions involve more real life situations and defer from differing music tastes, the comments and responses can get toxic.
(Image from sky news)
Even the most controversial UK Drill artist have to disable their comments in fear of having content being taking down from fan interaction.
That's can't be showing good loyalty to an artist you want to support. But with those drawbacks we can't paint everyone with the same brush.
Every fan base has a toxic few but that's what gives UK Drill is edge. The back and froths that lead to positive debates on the culture are sometimes enlightening.
Many UK Drill and channel reactors were just fan's once who have become leading figures in the culture. Grime is artform that is loved as a genre first and it's artist. No mc is bigger than grime and UK Drill could be considered that way for the new generations.
But how many fan's of UK Drill will still be supporting the artform in the next 10 year's? Are the audience that loyal to see the genre through it's lowest moments of popularity and relevance?
What if the number of artist leaving the genre increase and decide to do explore different sounds? Will fan's follow the artist or continue to support the sound?
It's still too early but the direction fan's take in supporting their favourite music could have more consequences and ramifications that could drastically shift it's trajectory in music history.Â
Comments