Philadelphia is home to truly magnificent music.  Well represented is most every musical shade and timbre: hip-hop, punk, electronica, folk, poetry slams, singer/songwriter affairs, all-age metal shows, and experimental musical theatre performances.

Why then, has the musical hot spot that is Philly gone so unappreciated as of late?

First response? Predictable: "If your city's so hot Philly, then why arent' we hearing about it?"

As a Philly music fan, that hurts.  Why you gotta hate?

Because, although the City of Brotherly Love has exported some of the most noteworthy artists in recent years, there's a great deal of truth to it.  Philadelphia is home to plenty of amazing musicians, but there's very little evidence on the national level.

Exhibit A: Philly is the hometown of none other than Jedi Mind Tricks.

"Big deal," you say, "JMT have made some crucial contributions to independent hip-hop, but they're old news."  Old news?

Imaginary Cynic, you have, again, proven yourself naive.  Jedi Mind Tricks are still alive and relevant.  They've only spawned another Philly-based project: Army of the Pharaohs.

Ritual of Battle (Babygrande Records, 2007), a must-listen for any alternative hip-hop fan featuring some incredible live performances from the city's own Reef the Lost Cauze, is proof-positive that great hip-hop is still laid down in Philly.

Exhibit B: A rock fan, are you? No shortage of significance on the Indie rock front, either.

Take Philly/Brooklyn collective, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.  This band is led by lifetime Philadelphia resident, Alec Ounsworth.  CYHSY has released two LPs entirely by themselves, and those releases have sold in excess of 100,000 copies.  If that statistic doesn't impress you, then you must work for Sony BMG.

There are plenty of other Philadelphia artists who've hit the national spotlight in recent years.  And there's a wealth of great rappers, singers, and musicians perfroming in the city's underground.  Still, there's certainly no magic stirred up by the words "Philly music scene" - at least not if you live more than a few miles away.

What is responsible for this lack of visibility on the Philly Indie scene?
Simple: the record labels.

No, I'm not blaming "the system" here.  At this point, major record labels could do very little to remedy the issue of an unseen Philly.

Which brings us to Exhibit C: I'm referring to the local dogs.  Save one notable exception on the Goth music scene, where Philidelphia labels, Metropolis and Dancing Ferret, are pseudo-demidgods, there are very few prominent, Philly-based Indie labels.  There is a lack of great hip-hop, R&B, folk, punk and other Indie labels in the city.  Thus, there is very little room for these scenes to flourish.  Artists sign to labels based in other towns, de-emphasizing their "Philly-ness."

Think about it.  What defines a music scene better than a record label?  Def-Jam and New York hip-hop were inseparable in the 1980s.  Motown Records made every budding 60s R&B star want to live in Detroit.  Lookout! Records' melodic punk helped the aging hippie town of Berkeley, California seem cool again in the mid 1990s.  Look to Washington D.C.'s Dischord Records.  The label was found to document the hardcore punk scene of the early 80's, and continues to spotlight the city's great Indie artists today.

The almost forgotten truth: Record labels are really there to serve the artists.  This is especially true on the independent music scene, where hopefuls struggle to break through on their own.  A label that can cull together Philly music makers can help put Philly back on the national Indie map.

Philly has plenty of great music, but it's all spread out on labels based, mostly, in other towns.  As a result, fans seldom identify Philadelphia artists by their home city.  We need cohesiveness.

Philly labels, it's time to step up.
Pick a scene.
Document it.