Remember Jay-Z’s adlibs on dead prez’s “Hell Yeah (Pimp the System)”?

“We together on the same track now, baby, Whatchu gone call us now?”

In those two phrases, Jay summed up the revolutionary act that he, Stic Man and M-1 were undertaking by combining a respected “underground” mainstay with a “mainstream” MC who had taken his talents from the block to the Grammy awards. In the ten years since that track dropped, the lines between underground and mainstream have blurred Read the rest of this entry »

Lost in all the New Year’s Eve excitement , DJ Burn One and Dibiase snuck in one more installment of everyone’s favorite weekly dose of country rap tunes, their Presidential podcast. They switched roles for week seven with Burn One handling the chopped and screwed mix alongside doses of new and classic Southern tracks. Dibiase set his portion off with a dope New Orleans bounce tribute mix featuring many of the songs based on the Showboys’ classic “Drag Rap.” Read the rest of this entry »

“I know some people probably gon tell me, that this beat is borin, ‘Cause it ain’t got no 808s and a repeated chorus sayin…”

Kill N*ggas. Get Money. F*ck B*tches. Sounds like the gameplan for the average radio rap song, no? Read the rest of this entry »

Fans of Black Spade, Coultrain and the Hawthorne Headhunters are most likely familiar with the work of I, Ced, even if they don’t know it. Read the rest of this entry »

SL Jones has been a busy young man. In May, he dropped The Number 23 with Don Cannon and he came right back in September with the Pandamonium EP, spitting with fire and rage over Clams Casino’s Rainforest instrumentals. Never one to sit back and relax, Jones is already giving listeners more Little Rock bangers in the form of today’s 10-track Flight Risk EP. Read the rest of this entry »

The fourth week of the Presidential weekly mix series brings more fire mixes from two of Atlanta’s best DJs. If you checked last week’s edition you already know though. Read the rest of this entry »

After hearing one of the opening acts at a recent show here in ATL rock over a beat with the same sample as Tyler the Creator’s “Odd Toddlers,” I was compelled to do some internet searching and found a French jazz gem. Read the rest of this entry »

A few weeks back we told you about SESSIONS LA, a Hip-Hop education program in L.A. that lost its funding and is pursuing donations so the program can continue serving Los Angeles youth for the foreseeable future. The community has stepped up and Sessions LA has received over 2/3rd of their goal with a little less than two weeks left in the campaign. Read the rest of this entry »

Just because music is basically free nowadays doesn’t mean you can’t still give back to Hip-Hop. Here’s one small way you can chip in to a very worthy cause that uses our favorite art form to make a positive impact on the community. It’ll make you feel better about the twenty albums you downloaded this week, I promise. Read the rest of this entry »

In today’s combustible political climate, it’s more important than ever for artists to use their influence to inform and inspire their audience. Few artists have done a better job of this over the last decade than Immortal Technique and Killer Mike and select cities have the opportunity to witness both of them spitting and sermonizing over the first two weeks of November. Read the rest of this entry »

Photo: Alexander Richter

Ego Trip debuts the third excerpt from J-Zone’s upcoming book Root for the Villain: Rap, Bullshit, and a Celebration of Failure and the “Music for Tu Madre” MC is three for three.The previous excerpts covered rap songs that got him in hot water as a youth and compared today’s “Gadget Hoes” to yesteryear’s pay phone pimpin. Read the rest of this entry »

Black Spade and Coultrain separately have the respect of music lovers worldwide on their own merits for pushin’ their brand of future funk and progressive soul. But together as the Hawthorne Headhunters, they push their individual visions into a whole new level. Read the rest of this entry »

24-Carat Black’s Ghetto: Misfortune’s Wealth has proven to be another excellent example of Hip-Hop breathing life into an important but overlooked album. Read the rest of this entry »

We already proclaimed our love for Tribe this week, but now let’s zoom out and enjoy the output of the entirety of their greater family tree. From Monie Love and Queen Latifah to Black Sheep and the Jungle Brothers, the Native Tongues are one of the deepest crews in Hip-Hop history Read the rest of this entry »

Always versatile, Tef Poe takes a break from his War Machine persona (though the track will appear on the upcoming WM2) to get some things off his chest. Read the rest of this entry »