Bay area veteran Too $hort blows the whistle at Stage 48
A look at the week's hottest pop clips, including the frolicsome ribaldry of Robin Thicke, the mansion malaise of 50 Cent and the insufferable wackness of Somethingorother Yacht Idiots.
For the last six months, the Sound of the City Supercomputer (a 1998 Compaq Presario) has been analyzing the structure and content of every pop news headline in the world in order to create a highly detailed predictive model of the music industry. While this project has important practical uses, suc ... More >>
This past weekend saw Rick Ross and Young Jeezy's long-simmering beef boiling over into fisticuffs as the rappers and their entourages went at each other at the BET Hip-Hop Honors Awards (and possibly broke a very expensive mirror in the process). That squabble wasn't a one-off though! Here's a prim ... More >>
"Gandhi Mandhi was the name that they called him/ Now the honeys call me Young Kama Sutra/ Old white people real mad 'cause I'm the future." That cheeky rap is from "Boogie Nights," a jubilant track on Das Racist affiliate Big Baby Gandhi's recent mixtape No1 2 Look Up 2. The free tape is packed wit ... More >>
If you've listened to much urban radio lately, or even a little, you may have noticed that Lil Wayne and his Young Money Entertainment labelmates, particularly Drake and Nicki MInaj, are quite popular. You may have also noticed the same thing in 2011. And in 2010. And 2009. But perhaps nothing under ... More >>
Action Bronson and Mr. Muthafuckin’ eXquire team up
Innovation keeps culture moving forward. Some hungry kid will always figure out how to put a new spin on things his predecessors have already done. Just ask araabMUZIK. He's still young, but his production track record is stronghe's worked on tracks by Tragedy Khadafi, 50 Cent and Vad ... More >>
Today the wise bloggers over at Daily Intel have attempted to answer a New York City etiquette question for the ages: What is a fair amount of space between the honorable person who is already there hailing a cab, and the jerkish-or-oblivious person (who, if going into labor or needing immedi ... More >>
The Mobb Deep MC is out of jail and ready to look back on his life
One of the happiest of the many stories to get lost in the maelstrom that was Kanye West's 2010 was the rehabilitation of Pusha T, perhaps the single most critically beloved and commercially unsuccessful rapper of the last five years. The Clipse, his duo with his brother Malice, had sat on th ... More >>
Ugly Betty star opens Latino Film Fest
The hard-boiled NYC rapper has found a new artistic medium for his badassness
Not even the 15th worst record this decade. Have a good weekend!In the week our F2K crew quantitatively decided that though Nickleback and Gym Class Heroes are bad, William Hung and Hinder were a whole lot worse, we continued to count down the worst songs of the '00s. That Santana song keepin ... More >>
And thus, ten thousand Okayplayer readers are forced to reevaluate the basic premise of their lives. The occasion? Curtis Jackson bringing his abysmal new single "Baby By Me" to Jimmy Fallon's TV show, where he was stoically backed by the Roots. And indeed, onstage with rap's best live band, one m ... More >>
Since this archive page mysteriously disappeared over at its original home, consider this your new bookmark/placeholder/friend on late, lonely nights. Confused? More here. It's super-cute to peruse decade-end lists and pretend to be enthusiastic about true artists like Arcade Fire, timeless m ... More >>
The God MC confronts a hip-hop landscape far different from the one he once ruled
If you are marooned on a desert island, train feral cats to be your protectors and companions, like Alexander Selkirk. Also: Be a tyrannical dickhead, like famous director John Ford, but also warmly encourage collaborations, like famous director Ingmar Bergman. All these 50th Law-fueld revela ... More >>
Who moved my cheese? Illustration by Shane Harrison.In this week's Village Voice, Rob Harvilla reads 50 Cent's surreally insightful self-help book, The 50th Law: "This book is actually kind of sad, in the bleakness of its cutthroat, shoot-nine-times-or-be-shot-nine-times worldview. Trust no o ... More >>
What may we expect of a third Mike Bloomberg term? Few people pay closer attention to city politics than Wayne Barrett, so he's your man for "A Bloomberg Score Card: The Mayor's Hits and Misses." He still thinks "the self-serving reversal of term limits was the greatest abuse of power I have ... More >>
Alternative link here. The answer to the third of the three questions in yesterday's teaser quiz was The Newbeats, whose song "Bread and Butter" easily made it onto either the 10 Best or Runners-Up lists, but which one? Listen to this Youtube clip and see if can figure out in which position ... More >>
It's an unusually bad day for New York rappers and police. First the jakes ran up in Jadakiss's Yonkers apartment and walked out with 5 grams of heroin, 6.5 pounds of marijuana, and $40,000 cash. (Jada wasn't there, and isn't presently wanted by the police--his roommate (?!) seems to be takin ... More >>
The newest chapter of an ever more biblical 50 Cent Vs. Rick Ross battle, assiduously chronicled in great depth last week by Erik Parker? Acting out your enemy's funeral, complete with sobering exterior shots of "Jay's Funeral Home," a fake pastor, whole elegant wreaths of flowers, a sepia-ton ... More >>
In this week's Village Voice Music Section, Rob Harvilla on Superdrag's snarling, ferocious comeback, spiritual awakening notwithstanding. Erik Parker on rap battles, circa 2009, starring 50 Cent and Rick Ross. Plus Ben Detrick comes through with a particularly formidable catalog of spectacular rap ... More >>
50 Cent and Rick Ross have a beef. Will it be settled with guns? Actually, it will more likely be settled with internet videos and rapid response units. What what? Erik Parker explains the new state of the art. Burial societies are supposed to assure their members of a grave when their time comes. ... More >>
We challenge any and all sentient human beings to get through this song three or more times, as we just almost did. So many questions: from where is this abysmal accent, which I'll venture is vaguely Arabic (open to corrections here), coming? What could possibly be interesting to one of the bigges ... More >>
This is video in which 50 Cent first interviews a woman who purports to be Rick Ross's baby's mother, then takes her shopping for fur coats and implies that he's probably fucking her when the camera's not around. Now you might think that a man who may well have burned down his own baby's mother's ... More >>
EPMD bring New York back
M.I.A. triumphantly knocks the hustle that's driving hip-hop's materialist malaise
The corporations murdered hiphop and all I got was this lousy G-Unit throwback jersey
Clothing mogul Marc Ecko on designing for 50 Cent, the Oscars, and that regular dude on the street
As Battles Turn Complicated, Murder Remains Bigger Than Hip-Hop
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