The blog bubble is microscopic. There's an entire galaxy of rap music being produced that doesn't even clip the distant margins of our radar. And most of it is not good or even worse than that. But artists get signed, videos get made and, then, they disappear. But someone is listening. They must be. Take Lil Niqo, for instance. The ten year old is "doing it big like Gucci Mane's stomach," getting very light late night rotation on MTV Jams (which is what one watches when trapped in the suburbs on a long weekend without basketball) and has racked up three hundred thousand or so views on Youtube (which isn't exactly Kreayashawn numbers, but still is numbers, word to Kraftwerk). Niqo is the latest young person bred in a lab for a few years and then thrust into the kiddie rapper cottage industry (at least half of the others are on Young Money).
There's nothing tangibly different from Niqo and those other creepy little weirdos and yet watching his video has an oddly entrancing effect. Because it's so much like a regular big kid rap video. He's stunting in front of a car that he won't be able to drive for at least six years. He's hitting on grown women at Dave & Busters and they are into it. He even has an equally pocket size Mannie Fresh type hypeman and the actual, life size DJ Khaled screaming. Does he have parents? Do they care?
The first A&R to sign a literal rapping baby will be the first A&R to get the big promotion that all the other A&Rs are vying for. The Double A&R position with the company car and the office with a view. And a mini-fridge.
