Hot 97

Spring Arts Guide: The Once and Future Ratking

The trio have been hailed as the saviors of New York rap, but they've set their sights higher

The Ten Best Concerts in New York This Week, 3/18/13

Here are the10 best concerts to check out around the city this week, in no particular order.

LEADERS OF THE OLD SCHOOL

Five legends spin records 
at Santos Party House

TRIPLE A

'Minor league rappers' 
get major

The Nine Best Concerts In New York This Week

These are the best concerts in New York this week, in no particular order.

Lamin Fofana's African-Inspired Techno Is Dutty!

By Joseph "JP" Patterson Dutty Artz is a NYC-based independent record label that knows a thing or two about nurturing talent from a grass roots level up. Ever since Matt Shadetek and DJ Rupture started it up in 2008, the label has churned out left-field grime, house and techno to bass music lovers ... More >>

Live: Busta Rhymes Pauses Conversation With Bun B To Perform At Angie Martinez's BBQ

Angie Martinez's Backyard BBQ The Garden At Studio Square Saturday, August 18 Better than: Getting lost coming home from Queens. CBS sitcoms, Tom Wolfe and Republicans alike have all painted New York City as a noisy, grimy nightmare, a melting pot of sex and kvetching, guns and soupy hot dogs, wh ... More >>

Live: Nas Celebrates His New Album At Tammany Hall

Nas Tammany Hall Tuesday, July 17 Better than: Listening to Nastradamus. "I don't even know how to start this shit..." lamented a young Nas right before presenting the most complete, most timeless rap album in history—and doing so his first time out of the gate. Illmatic was a lot to live u ... More >>

The Top Six Contenders For 2012's Song Of The Summer

Now that the calendar has flipped to May, and the schedules for the area's big sheds have been announced, and the Hot 97 Summer Jam lineup is on the verge of being made public, it's time to think of other musical concerns related to the year's hottest months. Today, let's wonder about what song will ... More >>

Live: Machine Gun Kelly Is The Valedictorian Of XXL's Freshman Class

XXL Freshman Class 2012: Don Trip, Kid Ink, Iggy Azalea, Roscoe Dash, Macklemore, Hopsin, Danny Brown, Future, French Montana, Machine Gun Kelly Best Buy Theater Monday, April 9 Better than: Ten rappers you're completely unfamiliar with. Every year, XXL selects a group of rappers to label as "fres ... More >>

TOO BIG TO FAIL

Lloyd Banks invites you for Thanksgiving

Dipset, A-Trak, Delorean, And The Vandam Party Headline Your Week In Nightlife

​It's a long weekend! (Really long, hopefully.) To celebrate, we decided to give you a full week's worth of nightlife options, dance-music-oriented and otherwise: Our recommended picks for each day of the week feature some established parties, some underrated gems, and a few one-off shows, all ... More >>

Nicki Minaj Roundup: Letterman Last Night, Hot 97 Today, Pink Friday Monday, Hammerstein Ballroom On Thanksgiving, Arguments About Her Singing For The Next Several Weeks At Least

Romance​Let's just say multiple members of the Voice critical braintrust are generating possibly dozens of hundreds of words about Nicki Minaj's Pink Friday even as you read this, and leave it at that -- we are excited, is all. Nicki herself, meanwhile, is ubiquitous. Her "If I'm Lucky I'll Fi ... More >>

Week in Review: Weezy Freed

Welcome to my life, Weezy.​So Lil Wayne is finally a free man. Perhaps a lonely free man, but a free man nonetheless. It's been a hell of a two weeks for the law around here, in all honesty. After last week's barrage of club closings, this week brought news of yet more: 171 Lombardy was raided ... More >>

The Ten Best Quotes From Kanye West's Epic Hot 97 Interview With Funkmaster Flex

Left to right: Pusha T, Funkmaster Flex, Kanye West. Photo via In Flex We Trust​It is a measure of Kanye West's proximity to the heart of the zeitgeist that even on the day after a disastrous midterm election, his name is front and center in the news cycle. The Internet is aflame today with th ... More >>

NYPD Stops, Frisks Radio Exec For No Reason!

​The latest from The NYPD Tapes case files: Terrence Battle, an executive at Hot 97 and KISS FM, was pulling up to his house in a livery cab early last Saturday morning when a sergeant anad two officers from Brooklyn's 81st Precinct stopped the taxi. The cops were doing a routine check as pa ... More >>

Live: Drake And Trey Songz Sneak Into Best Buy Theater, Purr Some Innuendos

Hopefully Drake got a free camera out of this. Pic by Puja.​Drake/Trey Songz Best Buy Theater Tuesday, October 5 Secret, invite-only hip-hop shows don't exist, even if we went to one last night. Then again, with a lineup of Drake, Trey Songz, and Pitbull, we couldn't be too surprised at the l ... More >>

The Golden Age of Advice Rap Starts Now

"When you've run out of peaks," Jon Caramanica wrote in yesterday's Times, by way of reviewing Monday's ridiculous Jay-Z extravaganza, "all that's left are ridiculous, sublime stunts, new ways to climb old mountains." This is counterintuitive but true: a guy like Jay-Z has been a ... More >>

Mister Cee's Hour-Plus Tribute Mix To Guru Is Very Very Much Worth Hearing

​He did it on Hot 97 at noon; Rap Radar's got the stream and the download. Commercial-free and gleefully relentless, it's an excellent tribute to "a great man, a great rapper, a great humanitarian for hip-hop," as Mister Cee puts it, the heartbreaking catch in his voice eventually replaced by ... More >>

Bonus Random Mr. Magic Rap History Moment: "No More Music By the Suckers"

That sample at the beginning there is the sound of man placing himself squarely on the wrong side of history. But what a thing to have said. Hear Mr. Magic do it to himself in context, courtesy of Unkut, right here:

Interview: The Clipse on Till the Casket Drops, Their Official Position on "Girl Songs," and Whether Kanye Got Them on Their Own Song

"If they say anybody got us on anything, who better than Kanye?" ​ Right around this time three years ago, the Clipse were on the verge of releasing Hell Hath No Fury, their terminally delayed follow-up to 2002's Lord Willin'. Anger--at their label, Jive, for failing to promote them, and at t ... More >>

Live: Dinosaur Jr. Leave "Billie Jean" Alone at the Music Hall of Williamsburg

via dennischang's photostream Dinosaur Jr. Music Hall of Williamsburg Thursday, June 25 Dinosaur Jr. did bring up Michael Jackson from the stage last night, frontman/guitar wizard J. Mascis muttering something about Farah Fawcett and MJ and, later, when Lou Barlow took requests: "What are we gonna ... More >>

Cam'ron, the Prodigal Killa

A return as hyped as Brett Favre's, and about as successful

BLAZE IT UP

Hot 97 brings nostalgia to Rastafarians

THE TAKEOVER

Time for Summer Jam

Michael Jackson's Nigh-Unstoppable Thriller Gets the 25th-Anniversary Treatment

Still Tryin'

Macy Gray soldiers on where her formerly mighty neo-soul cohorts fear to tread

All Money, No Blood

Mobb Deep cashes in and craps out

Let the Music Play (Again)

Latin freestyle's dreamboys and dreamgirls dance back into the spotlight

Earphone Heads

Urban Resolutions

New Yorkers revisit last year's promises and share hopes for 2006

Mixed Up

Bust at Mondo Kim's exposes record-industry hypocrisy

Married to the Hook

The corporations murdered hiphop and all I got was this lousy G-Unit throwback jersey

Sharpton Chronicles

Black radio buries the Rev

Gangsta Homonyms

Obsessive-compulsive rap artist repeats repeats repeats

Fast and Folliclous

One of the rapidest guest-rappers around thinks as slow as he helps everybody else jam

Top Ten Plus

Hey Get Ya Mom a Crazy Milkshake in Da Club

Tales of the Tape

Mix CDs Radically Transform the Business and Culture of Hip-Hop

Home Improv-Ment

Freestyling About Freestyling, for a World That Couldn't Care Less

New Thugs on the Block

Next-Big-Thing Rappers Arrive With Wheeze, Breeze, and Cheese

2Gether 4Never

Motherland Connection

Slow Ride

Houston Screws Off the Cough-Syrup Cap

Post-Rappers' Delight

Vagina Monologues

Mos Testifies, Monch Eats

More Than One Way to Rawk a Funky Joint

That next bitch

That Next Bitch

We got your hip-hop hall of fame

Hard-Knock He-Men