Hi Joe777,
"how people like Boyce Avenue and Tyler Ward have marketed their channels and if they used any blackHat methods."
***I'm very familiar with both these artists. Both Tyler Ward and Boyce Ave have been actively YouTubing since 2008. It was much easier back then. There was far less content on YouTube and less people to compete against, so if you uploaded something really good, there was a much higher chance of it catching on. I don't believe either have used blackhat methods. Here is what I believe have been both their keys to success:
1) Be a very talented musician and most importantly an amazing singer
2) Upload a cover song every week (something in the top 40 & climbing and preferably doesn't have it's own music video yet).
3) Talk to your viewers at the end of videos. You must be Authentic. People subscribe probably more for the "connection" and "personality" as much as the "Talent".
4) Work hard on and research about Titles, Descriptions and Tags. YouTube search traffic will be your most important source.
5) Pay Attention to Audience Retention. Work on making sure your video holds peoples attention for the length of the video.
6) Be good looking. Not a requirement, but it's an unfortunate truth that your climb to success will probably be faster. If you're not, at least have style / image but remember to be authentic too.
7) Collaborate with others. It'll be tough to collab with bigger YouTubers but you can start with people around your same level.
8) Time: do all of the above for 5 years straight and there is a good chance you'll have over a million subscribers. That's what Tyler and Boyce did.
Bonus: If you're serious about this, you absolutely must read and follow the YouTube Creators Playbook for Musicians. Free read here:
http://static.googleusercontent.com.../playbook/media/pdfs/playbook-music-guide.pdf
"The particular question I had was can someone explain all the negative views major youtube channels received on March 13th of this year? For most major channels its in the millions. Are they "Fake views" that youtube took down?"
***I at first thought they were fake views as well. What happened was YouTube finally removed views for videos that were deleted, made private or moved off that channel.