This week, while J. ‘Captain Snooze’ Cole was letting Nas down and Kanye was leaking Yeezus and dropping babies, ya boy Mac Miller went and snuck up from behind to son both of them. While I haven’t been shy about throwing shade at Young Teen Wolf in the past, the fact that he sold over 100,000 copies of his Watching Movies with the Sound Off LP means that Miller would have grossed more than Kanye (337,000 copies) and Cole (297,000 units) combined in terms of profit, since he’s independent and outside of the major label system. If you recall that incident where Cam’ron and the president of KOCH Records called 50 Cent to clown him about how Jim Jones sold as many albums as Lloyd Banks, but made $8 per CD instead of whatever tiny amount Banks received from Interscope, then this is a big deal.

There once was a time where a major label deal was essential to get your music heard beyond the core vinyl market, as far as promotion (magazine ads, videos, radio placements) and distribution (chain stores around the world) but that divide is shrinking every day. Traditional record contracts usually consist of an advance, which is basically a loan from the label to record the album, pay for producers and features and maybe shoot a video. Once the album is completed, a promotional budget will be assigned to handle advertising, street teams and more videos, which is also recoupable from any sales once the record drops. What this means is that if you’re an MC and you you’re paid a $300,000 advance and then $200,000 on marketing, you now owe your label $500,000!

Once your album is actually released, you’ll only being earning between 10%–15% of the actual sales once the label takes their cut and covers manufacturing and distribution costs, and from that you still have to pay your manager, lawyer, accountant and the IRS. What this means is that even if you sell a million albums you might actually only end up with $50,000 in your pocket! Traditionally this could be offset by touring and merchandise, but as record sales have dwindled the labels got hip and introduced the 360 deals which give them a cut of that too. Thanks to digital sales and vastly reduced recording and video production costs, it’s now more viable for artists with a strong grassroots audience to do everything themselves, which is why Tech N9ne is making more money than 2 Chainz ever will. That being said, the rap bar mitzvah circuit should be keeping Drake and company in platinum goblets for the foreseeable future.

While rap blogs were reporting on the “sales race” between Yeezus and Born Sinner, Mac Miller quietly came through and outplayed everybody without having to pay back some faceless corporation, which is about as “hip-hop” as you can get, if that means anything. As for the album itself? He’s clearly come along way since that corny lollypop style he was kicking over unauthorised Lord Finesse beats in from a few years back, and can actually rap pretty good for a pint-sized stoner, as demonstrated on that 21 And Over song with Sean Price from the new Statik Selektah project. The album itself is still a split between spaced-out weed musings and party shit for the college crowd, but at least he’s got his own sound and is doing it on his own terms. I’m never going to listen to it again but it at least I made it all the way through, unlike Cole and Ye’s efforts.

Hopefully after this article his publicist, who didn’t appreciate my last piece on Miller, will renew his subscription to the local paper so that I can get my job as a paperboy back, otherwise I won’t be able to afford that next pack of Yo! MTV Raps trading cards and weekly packet of Kool-Aid in between watching re-runs of Cheers and penning fan fiction about me dating Mallory Keaton from Family Ties.

Keep up with Robbie’s weekly ‘No Country for Old (Rap) Men’ here.