Monday, November 22, 2004
Puff Puff Pass to some R&G
The Pacers get smid-acked! And Ron Artest is a wrap for the rest of the season. David Stern was NOT PLAYIN' yesterday when he announced the fallout from Friday's debacle. Guess Artest now has plenty of time to focus on that rap music career. (Sportsillustrated.com | Related: the New York Times take on the story)
Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito reunion DJ gig at Table 50 TONIGHT (11pm)
Also tonight for my Manhattan readers from my friend Jen D:
The West 69th Street Block Association episode of "This Side of Central Park" with Council Member Gale A. Brewer will be shown on Manhattan Neighborhood Network, Channel 34 at 9:30pm. The program will include a panel discussion and an excerpt from my documentary, "The Town of West 69th Street."
New I-Jonez newsletter
Music I'm f-cking with currently:
- Nas feat. Ludacris & Doug E Fresh "Virgo" - now THIS is real vintage hip hop done right. I'm hearing some iffy things about the soon-come Street's Disciple, but so far everything I've heard has been crazy. Maybe Nas has, yet again, bitten off more than he can chew by trying do a double album and match the 2LP legacies left by Pac and the late, great Black Frank White.
- The Game feat. 50 Cent "How We Do" - this has been out for a minute now (actually 2-3 weeks which is forever in the internet/mixtape hip hop measure of time) but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention this banger. Hot just based on the old school 808 handclap intro.
- I'm loving what I've heard from Snoop's R&G (Rhythm & Gangsta): The Masterpiece album so far but Cowboyz 'n' Poodles is less impressed.
Related:
TV Spots - "Chillin' in Chinchilla": hi | lo "Crip Walkin": hi | lo "Dancing Girl": hi | lo
Promos for Snoop's new Puff Puff Pass Tour DVD also dropping tomorrow - real | hi | lo
Well I couldn't get much discussion going here (as usual) but the debate about the Entertainment Weekly's Top 25 hip hop albums of all time rages at O-Dub's Pop Life site.
Meanwhile, Rolling Stone picks their 500 Greatest Songs of all time. The fact that they could find 500 tracks before they got to Jackson 5's "ABC" (#501 supposedly) pretty much says it all from my perspective. Maybe next time they could actually have some hip hop and black music journalists on the nominating panel because their hip hop representation on the list is pitiful - the first track, unless I missed some, is GMF's "The Message" at #51 and the next one is not until PE's "Bring the Noise" at #160.
I know Rolling Stone is basically a rock magazine but when are they gonna finally admit that hip hop is not going anywhere? In fact, we are now living in the hip hop era and have been since either the dawning of the soundscan era when NWA's Efil4zaggin shocked everyone by entering the pop album chart at #2 back in the early 90's or when Kurt Cobain killed himself and the grunge movement faded out (take your pick). U2 coming in #1 next week (maybe, if Eminem falls off enough) notwithstanding, the days of rock 'n' roll being the dominant music genre in pop music are over. I know some of you big dog hip hop scribes drop by here once in a while - how many of you were involved in this travesty and/or have some insight into this chart?
