Juelz Santana

The Best Dipset Songs Ever

Time flies especially when one of your aliases is "The Fly Boys." It's been 10 years since the Cam'ron, Jim Jones, Juelz Santana and the rest of that "hooligan gang" the Diplomats (a collective of Harlem hustlers and goons) released their double disc effort, Diplomatic Immunity. Since then they've g ... More >>

Rakim's Most Random and Confounding Appearances

This Thursday night, the man who set the standard for greatness in rap, Rakim, takes the stage for a show with Wu-Tang member Raekwon at Stage 48. It's a rare event that fans get to see Rakim as, even in this era of 24/7 social media, he's remained one of the few artists in hip-hop to maintain an au ... More >>

BUILT THIS CITY

Cam, Juelz, Jimmy, and Zeke remember the good times

Juelz Santana on His New Album: "It's Time To Follow the Leader Again"

A decade ago, Juelz Santana burst onto a rap scene that didn't know it needed him, rapping about trapping out of Harlem crack spots and moving weight for the goon demographic (and delusional, escapist hipsters too) but he also made pop friendly, sing-along raps for the MTV and the now defunct 106th ... More >>

Ryan Leslie+Juelz Santana

Live: Drake Brings Dipset, Busta Rhymes, A$AP Rocky, And More To Jones Beach

Drake w/ J. Cole, Waka Flocka Flame, Meek Mill, 2 Chainz, French Montana Nikon Theater at Jones Beach Saturday, June 16 Better than: That other suburban rap mega-show. Well over halfway through his set, having already given the crowd a festival's worth of openers and played everything but his bigg ... More >>

Sound Of The City's March Madness Begins With An Uptown Faceoff Between Diddy (4) And Dipset (13)

The Round of 64 for Sound of the City's own version of March Madness—in which we determine the quintessential New York musician—launches this morning with a series of polls. Up first: Harlem's quintessential hip-hop cadre, Dipset, takes on the genre's megamogul, Diddy. Check out the argu ... More >>

Radio Hits One: How The Whistle Became Pop's Secret Weapon Of 2011

​After Billboard released its 2011 year-end charts on Friday I pored over them, looking for patterns and trends with which I could make sense of the year in pop. If someone asked you to pinpoint "the sound of popular music in 2011," there are countless fads and running themes that you could po ... More >>

Live: Kendrick Lamar Arrives In New York, Takes Over S.O.B.'s

Kendrick Lamar S.O.B.'s Wednesday, August 31 Better than: bringing back that old New York rap. "There are two rules for a Kendrick Lamar show. First rule: everybody put one hand up. Now everybody put two hands up." Those were Kendrick Lamar's instructions as he led us into his third song of the ... More >>

Live: Rick Ross Lives Out His Dreams At Summer Jam

​Hot 97 Summer Jam New Meadowlands Stadium Sunday, June 5 Better than: Sitting at home and moping like 50 Cent. Rick Ross closed out Summer Jam. Just so there's no revisionist history here, let's remember how incredible that statement is. Three years ago, Ross was the punching bag of hip-h ... More >>

Joe Crowley, New York Congressman, Pulls a Bob Dylan Against GOP on Capitol Hill

Rep. Joe Crowley, who represents New York's 7th District, took a creative approach to attacking the GOP on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives in a presentation without spoken words titled, "Speechless." Even if it's not a direct homage to Bob Dylan, it reminds us pleasantly of "Subterran ... More >>

Nicki Minaj, Louie Vega, Talib Kweli, And Bollywood Disco Headline Your (Christmas!) Week In Nightlife

​The holidays tend to bring a mass exodus from the city, but not everyone is leaving. In fact, some of our favorite DJs (and rappers) have chosen to come for a visit, giving us a full week of dance parties and awesome shows. We recommend that you take a night off from your holiday daze, grab a ... More >>

Zach Baron's Top 10 Singles of 2010

Rich aliens, rich alienation. Still via connect.in.com​With sincere apologies to Chuck Eddy, my two favorite records of the year also produced my two favorite singles: funny how that happens. And though ten songs increasingly feels like about forty too few, especially when Dr. Luke is working, ... More >>

Was 2010 The Best Year For Music Ever? LCD Soundsystem and Nostalgia's Creeping Scourge

Welcome to Sound of the City's year-in-review rock-critic roundtable, an amiable ongoing conversation between five prominent Voice critics: Rob Harvilla, Zach Baron, Sean Fennessey, Maura Johnston, and Rich Juzwiak. We'll be here all week! James Murphy, pulling no punches.​Dear fellow illumin ... More >>

The 20 Worst Songs of 2010, #8: Ludacris featuring Nicki Minaj, "My Chick Bad"

F2K10 is a countdown of the 20 worst songs of 2010. Track our progress here. ​Your chick ain't the only thing that's bad...

Live: Dipset Stage An Egalitarian Reunion Show at Hammerstein Ballroom

Ay! All photos by Jesse Serwer​The Diplomats Hammerstein Ballroom Friday, November 27 Better Than: Byrd Gang, Skull Gang, Purple City, U.N., Dipset West It seems a little silly, really, this Dipset revival. When times grew lean for the Cam'ron-led crew a few years back, the support staff--f ... More >>

Dipset Reunites, and Vado Ascends

Harlem's finest are back, but Cam'ron's new protégé might steal the spotlight

Live: Maluca and AraabMusik Headline Our Own Personal Fashion's Night Out

AraabMuzik, dropping jaws​During Friday's Fashion's Night Out spectacular, we were faced with a dilemma: Should we head to SoHo to elbow our way through boutiques for a free cupcake, attempt to walk in heels around the cobblestone of the Meatpacking District, or wait in mobs of lines uptown ju ... More >>

Download These Are Powers' Game-Changing New Club Banger (!), "Anything Above Nothing"

Yes In My Backyard is a semiweekly column showcasing new and emerging MP3s from local talent. ​It's been generally impossible to keep up with the ever-changing moods of tireless, futurist dance trio These Are Powers. In roughly six releases over four years, they've dabbled in don't-call-us-No ... More >>

The Dipset Reunion Is Nigh, If This Footage Of Everyone Hanging Out At A Construction Site (?!) Is To Be Believed

So in large part the above video consists, hilariously, of Cam'ron, Juelz Santana, Jim Jones, and Freekey Zekey pulling up and getting out of their respective cars really ominously, and yet it shows the four founding members of Harlem's finest slightly esoteric hip-hop clique standing together and ... More >>

A People's History of Summer Jam 2010

Drake debuts, Trey Songz gyrates, and DJ Khaled wins at the hip-hop event of the year

New How to Dress Well: "Decisions"

​So the next EP from the Cologne/Brooklyn-based ghost R&B collective How to Dress Well will be called Can't See My Own Face - The Eternal Love 2, a title appropriately halfway between a never-released Lil Wayne/Juelz Santana mixtape and any given The-Dream LP--which pretty much sums up what th ... More >>

New York's Most Fierce 2010 Rap Single, "Beamer, Benz, or Bentley," Gets Perhaps 2010's Dullest Video

Still not in the least sick of hearing this song come on the radio--whether in the original, menacing Juelz Santana/Lloyd Banks vintage, the Joell Ortiz "Nissan, Honda, Chevy" remix, or the blistering Fabolous remake from There Is No Competition 2. That said, they somehow found a whips-n-vixens vi ... More >>

At Long Last, the Video To "Mixing Up the Medicine," Juelz Santana's Best Song In Years

After a two month run obliterating the internet and any club or car in which it's played, the first great Juelz Santana song since 2006 gets the video it deserves--mad scientist Juelz in the lab, gun-addled and chemistry-steeped, Yelawolf lurking in the back, channeling something between Dylan and ... More >>

The 50 Worst Songs of the '00s, F2K No. 22: The Notorious B.I.G. ft. Bob Marley, "Hold Ya Head"

F2K is a countdown of the 50 worst songs of the decade. Track our progress here. It's a shame the legacy of impossibly gifted MC Notorious B.I.G. is limited to two classic albums and one decent-enough comp--but, hey, better than the Pollard-style recording jags that Tupac has mysteriously maint ... More >>

Week in Review: Humming and Ready to Take Us On a Golden Ride Way Out Somewhere in the Yonder

​In the week we learned to our deep and lasting dismay what a Gummibar is, we counted down the worst songs of the '00s with the newly relocated F2K crew--peruse if you dare but do not blame us when you come in contact with something like "I Am Your Gummy Bear (The Gummy Bear Song)," or are ina ... More >>

What Ezra Koenig and Juelz Santana Have in Common

Item #8: Swagger on a hundred thousand trillion. Photo by Christopher Struman, via​A Polo vest, according to this SPIN article written by Voice editor Stacey Anderson. "I was wearing this a lot over the summer, and then Chris Baio, our bassist, sent me a picture of Juelz Santana wearing the ex ... More >>

Eminem Can Still Rap, World. (So Can Black Thought.)

Every year, the BET Hip-Hop Awards--the 2009 edition of which aired last night--round up three or four different rapper cyphers, taped off-site and with somewhat counterintuitive gangs of MCs going in with what are ostensibly freestyles. Last year, Jadakiss, Fabolous, Juelz Santana, and Ace Hood t ... More >>

The Curious Case of Tobb Cobain

We'd heard about it, but we didn't believe it. But the man with the worst name in rap exists--this is his faux-Drake hook on Jim Jones and Juelz Santana's "Forever" remix. The song's not bad, otherwise: Jim Jones is such an entertainingly terrible guy that he actually goes out of his way here to c ... More >>

New York Rap Crime Wave!

​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 >>

On Red Cafe's "Hottest in the Hood" Remix, Featuring Jadakiss, Rick Ross, Fabolous, and OJ Da Juiceman

Song via the NMC Red Cafe, who apparently just signed to Bad Boy, finally has a decent song on his hands--the original version of "Hottest in the Hood" has been getting burn for what at least seems like months on HOT97, and this remix will definitely get run back on-air four or five hundred times ... More >>

Live: Busta Rhymes and Ron Browz at B.B. King

Busta Rhymes and Ron Browz B.B. King Blues Club March 10 Star power does funny things to your eyes. Take last night's Busta Rhymes/Ron Browz show at B.B. King, for instance. I mistook Kool Herc for Grey's Anatomy's Dr. Richard Webber--an honest mistake considering that the four elements of hip-ho ... More >>

Rappers for Obama, and Vice Versa

Why Young Jeezy and his revitalized ilk owe our new president more than he owes them

Great Job MGMT, Vampire Weekend, and TV on the Radio!

Best Fall from Local Rap Grace: The Diplomats

Cam'ron Surfaces, Sort Of

Status Ain't Hood Podcast 41

Picking Apart Lil Wayne's Tha Carter III, Part 3

Music

Major-label hip-hop records in burying-best-tracks shocker!

Dipset's Parole Model

The Harlem crew's president and cred-enhancer is once again free to fly high

Status Ain't Hood Does Summer Jam

Surgical Strikes

R&b hitmakers attack with precision, be they vulgar or merely lonely.

The Status Ain't Hood Valentine's Day Playlist

Trapped in the Kitchen

Current coke-rap LPs raise the crucial question: If I'm the seller, who's the buyer?

After the Snow

The mirror crack'd: Last year, a drug and its discontents seeped into books and hip-hop

Urban Resolutions

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

Status Ain't Hood Interviews Juelz Santana

British Rappers Pretending to Be Rappers