With CD Sales Down, Every Hack Wants a Producer With Chops

Scott Storch's Midas touch will be tested as B-level talents seek his services. (By Brad Barket -- Getty Images)

Hip-hop super-producer and noted conspicuous consumer Scott Storch is living the life -- a fleet of luxury cars; a $3 million, 34-carat yellow- diamond ring; a seven-bedroom, 14-bath Florida estate that Rolling Stone has described as "a gaudy residence that resembles the mansion Al Pacino's Scarface lived in."

Storch has all this and much, much more (net worth: $70 million) because he has a knack for crafting Very Big Hits: His CV reads like Billboard's Hot 100, from Beyonce's "Baby Boy" and Chris Brown's "Run It" to 50 Cent's "Candy Shop," Terror Squad's "Lean Back" and Christina Aguilera's "Can't Hold Us Down."

But it's hard out here for a hip-hop hitmaker these days, with rap and R&B sales down by nearly 20 percent in 2006 despite new releases from some of the genre's leading stars. The sales forecast for 2007 isn't any better, which is bad news for producers, who typically take an advance against royalties.

High-flying beatmakers such as Storch have a particular lifestyle to support, so you can count on seeing him and other top-shelf producers selling their services to all comers -- no matter how untalented they may be.

You know: when good beats happen to bad artists, and all.

There was already evidence of the trend this year. Storch, for instance, beefed up his résumé -- or at least his bank account -- by working with Jessica Simpson, Raven Symone, Hulk Hogan's daughter and one Paris Hilton.

But at least he managed to avoid the most spectacular disaster in 2006 pop, Kevin Federline's "Playing With Fire." The year's biggest commercial and critical flop, the project was helmed by a couple of producers whose track records are otherwise solid: Disco D (50 Cent, Nina Sky) and J.R. Rotem (50 Cent, Rick Ross, the Game and, um . . . Paris Hilton).

Can it be long, then, before these guys book studio time with William Shatner for his hip-hop debut, with such hitmakers as Pharrell, will.i.am, Kanye West and Timbaland in tow? After all, they have to make the payment on that new Rolls-Royce Phantom somehow.