Asher Roth Officially Sucks

Of the three predictions written for Gawker of how well Asher Roth's album would do, Byron Crawford's was almost exactly right. It was especially nice to see Touré's prediction fail, his overestimate hinging as it did on myths about how "the majority of hip hop fans" are "suburban," "[think] hip hop is theirs," and "enjoy listening to and looking at someone who reminds them of themselves." This is pretty much wrong in every particular as well as mistaken overall.

I don't care one way or the other about Tom Breihan's being wrong, but it's interesting that he got caught up in the idea that Roth would succeed entirely due to successful marketing. If anyone should recognize the speciousness of that kind of thinking, you'd think it would be Lil Wayne's biggest mainstream stan...dard bearer. If it were as simple as marketing, every label would have a Soulja Boy or a T-Pain. One thing every label does have plenty of, however, is Asher Roths...not gimmicky white rappers with "suburban" schticks, but artists they've pumped zillions of promotional dollars into creating buzz around who subsequently put up lackluster album sales.