Ten albums for the hip-hop layman. This list has been my burden, my baby. I’ve carried it for the last month or so. Consider this the document of my labor. It began with a serious debate between me, myself and I and my knowledgeable counsel, who shall remain nameless. The questions Read More…
FILM If you’re not on a flight home come Wednesday evening, you might want to check out the Castro Theatre’s Jeff Bridges double feature. What better way to ring in the holiday season than with The Dude himself? Things get started at 7 p.m. with a screening of “The Big Read More…
Black Hippy Dickies. Bucket hats. Carson, CA tees. Gold chains and a small flat top. Black Hippy was in the amphitheatre. The group came out one at a time, essentially in the (ascending) order that most would rank each MC. The audience members loved Jay Rock’s homegrown anthems. Ab-Soul was Read More…
Reminiscing on this summer in the arts, we put together a mixtape of pop culture memories to look back on. Snoop Dogg became a lion: Excuse me while I light my Executive Branch spliff. Snoop Dogg is dead. But Jah has bestowed another blessing upon us. Snoop Lion has risen. Read More…
Don’t drink 8 ball / cause St. Ides is givin’ ends.” It’s short. It’s simple. It’s Ice Cube. It also sold St. Ides Malt Liquor to countless impressionable youths with fake IDs. To put it another way, your favorite commercial MC is probably compromised. They’re getting paper for advertising, for Read More…
Life is Good — Nas’s tenth album and the final under his Def Jam contract — is not solely a breakup album. Though Nas holds ex-wife Kelis’ green wedding dress across his knee on the cover, it’s not. I assure you. When you’ve been in the game as long as Read More…
When I think of classic hip-hop I think of The Geto Boys’s “Mind Playing Tricks On Me” or Nas’s “One Love” or Outkast’s “Two Dope Boyz (In a Cadillac)” or — you get the idea. At no point do I ever think of adding an ‘al’ to the end of Read More…
School is out for the summer, if only for those of us at UCB. So, that means that this announcement, the announcement for the line-up of arguably the biggest and most anticipated hip-hop festival on the planet was just around the corner. Yes, the bill for this year’s Rock The Read More…
What it mountain dew y’all? It’s a new semester. Everything is full of promise. There are no grades yet and life is good. So, you know what that means. It’s time for Sample Sundays to break you off with some muzak for your hard drive. Now, since we all will Read More…
What up y’all? Dead week is here. And that means finals are coming up. So, in my last Sample Sunday post before finals get here (don’t worry, I’ll be back) I’ve decided to compile my Top Five Study Break Jams, with their samples included of course. You’ve got a lot Read More…
