“New York, New York”

Ima take this joint over like godzilla

Im going to be on vacation for a week or so, so I wont be posting. One note though, if your in the DC area this weekend, the Stone Soul Picnic is this Saturday. So if your not doing anything head over there and enjoy free food and music and everything else that goes with the Stone Soul Picnic.

“The Takeover, breaks over” (The Best Rap Beef Ever: Volume 1)

 

Clash of the Titans

“You guys dont want it with Hov/ Ask Nas, He dont want it with Hov/ NO”

And thus was set up one one Jay-Z’s best verses ever spit. The year was 2001. The place: Hot 97’s Summer Jam. After Ethering Prodigy of Mobb Deep* during his song The Takeover, Jay hinted to the crowd that it would indeed be a hot summer. The masses however would have to wait for the album, The Blueprint, slated to drop later that year to hear exactly why Nas did not want it with Hov. Now I dont know if Jay already had the verse ready and just wanted to make the fans wait, or if he went back to the lab to concoct the next verse, but whatever the case may be, rap fans everywhere were buzzing about Jay’s Summer Jam Takeover of the New York Hip-Hop crown from Nas.

I know you missin all the – FAAAAAAAME!
But along with celebrity comes bout seventy shots to your frame
Nigga; you a – LAAAAAAAME!
Youse the fag model for Karl Kani/Esco ads
Went from, Nasty Nas to Esco’s trash
Had a spark when you started but now you’re just garbage
Fell from top ten to not mentioned at all
to your bodyguard’s “Oochie Wally” verse better than yours
Matter fact you had the worst flow on the whole fuckin song
but I know – the sun don’t shine, then son don’t shine
That’s why your – LAAAAAAAME!

Coming off the heels of the success Hard Knock Life: Vol. 2, Roc La Familia and Life and Times of Sean Carter: Vol 3, Jay was feeling himself. He was the commercial king of rap, consistently dropping successful albums for 3 summers straight, and was also well respected in the game as a lyricist, ghost writing for everyone from Dr. Dre (Still Dre) to Will Smith (Men In Black), but he still wasn’t considered the best in NY. That title had long belonged to Queensbridge’s native son in the wake of Biggie Smalls untimely death. Thus was set up Hip-Hop’s greatest beef. Not for publicity or record sales or anything other than pride and bragging rights, Jay shot off the first salvo in this lyrical war of words with Nas that did not relent for the next 24 bars.

 career come to a end
There’s only so long fake thugs can pretend
Nigga; you ain’t live it you witnessed it from your folks pad
You scribbled in your notepad and created your life
I showed you your first tec on tour with Large Professor
(Me, that’s who!) Then I heard your album bout your tec on the dresser
So yeah I sampled your voice, you was usin it wrong
You made it a hot line, I made it a hot song
And you ain’t get a coin nigga you was gettin fucked and
I know who I paid God, Serchlite Publishing
Use your – BRAAAAAAAIN!

After pointing out Nas’ downward career turn – going from one of the greatest albums, rap or otherwise, ever in Illmatic, to the dreadful Trackmasters produced Nastradamus- Jay then went in on what has become a staple of rap beefs, pulling Nas’ street cred card**. Jay claims in this verse to have shown Nas his first tec***, and goes on to claim that Nas is only reciting what he saw from his window and not what he was involved in in his native Queensbridge. Jay then references his hit, Dead Presidents, off of his debut album, Reasonable Doubt, which contains a Nas sample in the chorus. He insinuates that there had been legal troubles concerning the clearance of the sample but states unequivocally that his business game is tight and that , “I know who I paid God, Searchlight Publishing“. This segment was also responsible for the now oft repeated lin, “You made it a hot line/ I made it a hot song”.

You said you been in this ten
I’ve been in it five – smarten up Nas
Four albums in ten years nigga? I can divide
That’s one every let’s say two, two of them shits was due
One was – NAHHH, the other was “Illmatic”
That’s a one hot album every ten year average
And that’s so – LAAAAAAAME! Nigga switch up your flow
Your shit is garbage, but you try and kick knowledge?
(Get the fuck outta here) You niggaz gon’ learn to respect the king
Don’t be the next contestant on that Summer Jam screen
Because you know who (who) did you know what (what)
with you know who (yeah) but just keep that between me and you for now

And with that closing, Jay forever seared his image into the annals of Hip-Hop history. This was the ‘Clash of the Titans’ that fands were clamoring for. Everyone’s favorite newer, but established, rapper against the whily old vet.

In our next episode: Nas responds in kind with a song that has become so legendary as to be a verb in the rap lexicon when he Ethers Jay-Z.

*Prodigy has since been ethered by Nas (twice), Jay (again), Keith Murrey (Actually beat his ass), Saigon (Also beat his ass), and most recently the NYPD (currently serving a 3 year bid for weapons possesion), in other words, damn

**I hate this phrase btw

*** Thats tec-9 for the uninitiated.

“Ive got work to do”

If i had an assistant, this is what this morning would look like

Im kind of swamped this morning so I wont be doing a post during the day. I may be doing something later on tonight, depending on when I get home. What I will have for you today – cus I know you need your fix – is videos, including Nas featuring Jay @ Rock the Bells!

and finally,

enjoy.

“Im so hood that (Ron Artest) should have been on the original version”

This cut had to have cost at least 50 or 60

If you haven’t heard, Ron Artest has been traded from the Sacramento Kings to the Houston Rockets in what can only be described as a salary dump for the Kings. The Rockets in turn sent the Kings this years draft pick, Donte Greene, next years number 1 pick (probably number 23-30), and veteran guard Bobby Jackson who has 1 year and 6.1 million left on his contract.

Great trade for both teams. The Kings weren’t going anywhere with Artest and weren’t going to resign him anyway, and the Rockets get that all important third star that should help them finally get out of the first round of the playoffs. So that’s the end of the story right? Wrong. This is the NBA, and there is always a story.

Ok so some reporter asks Yao Ming how he feels about the trade and he responds this way”:

When I text messaged with [teammate] Luis [Scola], we talked about team chemistry. That’s only what worries us. We worry about the new attitude to the team. We are adding talent to the team and we need that, but building team chemistry is important. This is not bad. I don’t mean he is not welcome to Houston. But a new player always needs some time.

“There’s worry. Obviously, yes. We will think about it, of course. Hopefully, he’s not fighting anymore and going after a guy in the stands. I haven’t talked to Ron yet, so it’s hard to say. I have to find a way to talk to him and see what we can do as a basketball team. He has a history. But we know he is a physical player. He is a good player. He really can help us. And Ron is on a contract year, too.”

With all that Yao said, or course only the part I highlighted was relayed back to Artest. Some hack reporter then asks Artest how he feels about what Yao said and Artest drops this gem:

“I understand what Yao said, but I’m still ghetto,” Artest said, according to the report. “That’s not going to change. I’m never going to change my culture. Yao has played with a lot of black players, but I don’t think he’s ever played with a black player that really represents his culture as much as I represent my culture. Once Yao Ming gets to know me, he’ll understand what I’m about.”*

Man, that Artest guy is special. I don’t really blame him for his response ‘cus I would have been heated too if I had just expressed my excitement at being traded to the a playoff contender and the teams “leader**” had some shit to say. This is once again a case of the media creating the news instead of simply reporting on it, but what are you going to do. We live in the ESPN age of sports journalism.

I want to know your thoughts on what he said though. Agree? Disagree? Both? Holla

*At least he didn’t throw up a gang sign a’la Paul Pierce

**People act like Yao is the leader of that team but its really T-Mac, don’t believe the hype

“Some how, some way, we gotta make it up out the hood one day”

Glorification

So I was over at allhiphop earlier this morning reading an interview they had with Charles Cosby, the star of the new documentary, “Cocaine Cowboys 2″. The 2 part interview was interesting for two reasons: First were Cosby’s statements about how most of the drug dealer stories of guys like Alpo, Supreme and Freeway Rick are greatly exagerated. The only “hood dealer” he said that really was making millions a day was D.C. kingpin Rayful Edmond.

The second interesting part of the article was the interaction on the comments section of the second part of the interview. While allhiphop.com does have its faults, I enjoy it more than other hip hop websites because the people who comment aren’t five year olds who think typing in all caps and slaughtering the English language is the best way to get their point across*. In turn the comment section of this interview had some real good insight into where exactly the line between glorification and simply telling a story lies.

I want to give an accurate description of what was said so here are a couple of excerpts from comments that I felt were most interesting.

“WHEN NIGGAS GOING TO LEARN THAT THIS SHIT IS JUST GLORIFYING A LIFE OF DESTRUCTION FOR OUR YOUTH… HOW BOUT PROMOTE SOMETHING POSITIVE, BUT ALL YOU DOING IS PROMOTING THE SAME SHIT THAT IS KILLING OFF OUR NEIGHBORHOODS…..

ILL SEED WTF….TYPE OF COMMENT WAS THAT…INSTEAD OF AHH BEING THE MOST DANGEROUS SITE ITS BECOMING ANOTHER PUPPET FOR WHITE AMERICA…..

KRS 1 “YOU MUST LEARN”

In response to this someone who I am assuming works for the site wrote this :

Documentaries like this end up how they are supposed to : with everyone dead or in jail.  there are consequences in this life.  just like when you beat a chick with no rubber.  you coud get them pregnant you can get aids.  but everyone doesn’t bag up all the time.

When we publish positive stories you don’t read them.  That rockesteadyjoint published a day before got like a thousand hits.  This shit had 5000 before 3 hours.  i didn’t se eyou posting in any “positive” story we did.  Not for the entire Black Music Month or anythin gelse homeboy. Cat’s be couch revolutionaries.

I personally find the author of that comment to be fairly disingenuous with his assessment of his detractor. For one thing this story is the prominent feature on the site, complete with interesting picture and back story, so of course it will have more hits than a fluff pieceabout a black record company executive or a black music month article. Everyone is always trying to blame someone elsefor their own shit. They put out stories promoting gangsters because it gets more hits is the same logic a corner boy uses. If I don’tdo it, someone else will because the demand is still there.

I will readily admit that the inner workings of a multibillion dollar drug ring is ten times more interesting than any article that is “positive”. My problem is with the glorification of this Cosby character and the Rayful Edmond’s and the Alpo’s and Supreme’s, all of whom snitched by the way. The interviewer does not ask any tough questions and the article is littered with pictures of Cosby flashing money and cars and guns, all the while he is railing against being flashy and murdering people. I dontblame Cosby for this because he was saying some real shit, but allhiphop surely dropped the ball again on how to best report on this guy. He was a drug dealer who directly helped destroy the African American lower class and is even remorseful for his role in this. Yet he is treated like a hero in the interview. Some of us need to get a fuckin’ clue.

*Im looking at you WSHH and HiphopDX

“Dear Summer I know you gon’ miss me”

Great cover

With summer being in its last month I thought that a summer music wrap up would be in order. Im trying to think of what this years song of the summer was and I am coming up blank. I mean I guess you can put “A Milli” up there, you could also arguably put “Lookin Boy”, “Bust It Baby”, “Love in the Club” and a number of other songs. So if you, the readers, have a definate summer jam for this year please comment because I can’t figureout/remember what it was. There was no “Ballin” or “Hot in Here” to speak of.

Meanwhile here are some upcoming August releases to close out the summer that should be making an appearance on my Zune*:

D-Block – Prepare For Glory – August 19 (What a great album title)

**Young Jeezy – The Recesion – August 19

Ice Cube – Raw Footage – August 19

The Game – LAX – August 26

With the dissapointment that was “Tha Carter III***” this summer has been a bit of a snoozer. However with Nas album being absolute fiyah, Jigga supposedly droppin’ in the 4th quarter along with Em’ and the good Doc and “Detox”, this might turn out to be a pretty good year musically.

*Yea I said Zune, me and the other person in America who have one are very happy

**Not really excited for this one but it will be a big release

***Part 2 remains his best album

“Why do rappers lie in 85% of they rhymes?”

Ha!

The Boss-Boss-Boss-Boss-Boss-Boss-Boss…………

- The lyrical Shakespeare, T-Pain

So everyone has presumably heard about the situation Rick ‘The Boss’* Ross now finds himself in. Ross, government name William Leonard Roberts, it seems has been outed by an anonymous tipster who has provided the media with pictures of him when he was a corrections officer in Florida. Ross claimed that the man in the photo was indeed him, but that the picture must have been photoshopped. The anonymous tipster then struck again** and released negatives of the photo which then proved to the masses that Ross had indeed been ‘cuffin em’ before he started his illustrious rap career.

He He

 The whole situation is pretty funny if you ask me, but what I can’t understand is all the people running around the Internet acting hurt. You see it on comment boards on allhiphop and especially those cess pools of ig’nance, hiphopdx and worldstarhiphop about how Ross is this that and the third. Pump your brakes children, Rick Ross is a rapper. Of course hes not a real drug dealer! It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that a man who is 31 and claims to have known Pablo Escobar personally, is probably lying about his past. Its entertainment folks.

Lol

 

I put rappers in the same lane as I do actors. Do I believe that Al Pacino was a Cuban exile who came to this country for a better life and ended up with a double barrel shotgun slug in his back? Absolutely not. Do I believe that there is a big fat guy delivering gifts to children who have been nice every Christmas Eve? Absolutely not. Likewise I don’t believe you Tupac, Biggie, Nas, Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Plies, T.I, Ne-yo, Beyonce, whoever! Does that mean I cant enjoy these peoples music? Absolutely not. Rick Ross wouldn’t be nearly as entertaining if he was rapping about his life as an overweight corrections officer as opposed to him rapping about his life as an overweight drug kingpin who knew Pablo Escobar at the age of 12. Which brings me to my final point.

I could literally look at photoshopped Ross pictures all day and be entertained

Trilla, Ross’ latest album, is absolutely fiyah! I wasnt even a Ross fan until this album, that’s how good it is. So who cares if hes a phony. Keep making good music and don’t worry about nothing else and you’ll be fine.

*As in “I dont want no trouble boss” and “Which way is commissary boss”

**HA

“Thats how it went, when we were kids”

"I did it because its fun. Fun to do bad things"

I was up late last night trying to think of a topic to post about this morning. Unsuccessful, I simply went to sleep and figured something would come to me in the morning at work. I mean I have had 3 days off, there must be something I am angry/excited/happy/scared about, right? Wrong! Ive got nothing, except for a story from my childhood that is pretty funny now that I think about it, but wasn’t so funny when it happened. I remembered this story after chilling with a friend on saturday I graduated with in 2005.  It takes place in the year 2000 when I was in the 8th grade.

So my friend was the hell raiser at my school. He was constantly getting in trouble for dumb shit such as but not limited to: Waking up the principal of our school, who was asleep in our class,  by slamming a book on the table by his ear, acting a fool during assembly, mocking and mimicking teachers to their faces, destroying shit and pretty much anything else you can think of.

composite sketch of my friend

My school was a small private school full of lower income families, so the facilities were hood to say the least. Our classes were divided by these ten foot Styrofoam dividers. My friend thought it would be funny if during class he would ask to go to the bathroom and while outside shoot rubber bands over the dividers into other classrooms and then run. While I never joined him in this foolishness, I thought it was funny as hell. They never caught him but there was this big investigation into who was doing it and everyone knew who it was, but there just wasnt any proof.

So one day the teacher in the class next to ours comes to my class. My friend isnt there, but me and another classmate are and she starts letting me have it. She proceeds to yell at me about how she knows that its me and my friend doing it, and that if we dont come forward then we were going to get in more trouble and all that bullshit. She leaves and Im pissed like shit like ’how dare that heifer accuse me’! I hadnt done anything wrong. So im talking to my other classmate, and I quote “Im not doing this shit, but if they are going to accuse me I should start” and at that moment, the rubberband I was playing with accidentally shoots over the divider and lands into her class. She comes back and screams ‘I knew it was you’ and promptly takes me to the principal’s office. I remember I got into so much trouble meanwhile the real culprit was still on the loose shooting rubber bands into other classes.

Now I was never mad at my friend. It wasnt his fault I’m a clumsy idiot, but I was mad at myself and that whore of a teacher for getting me in trouble. Even though I got punished for it* its still a very funny episode.

*Im pretty sure I got a beating when I got home lol

“Even though it seems heaven sent, we aint ready to see a black president”

Be afraid. Be very afraid!

 

 

The main stream media needs to cut the shit! Stop the bullshit sensationalism, I’m tired of it. A year ago you know what they were asking about Barack Obama? Is he black enough? Will the black community embrace him because he’s not really black? He grew up in Hawaii, he had a white mother, he has not had the typical African American upbringing so he’s not one of them. Does anyone remember this? They brought out polls* to show that the majority of African Americans were going to vote for Hillary. And now?

Oh my 91% of African Americans are going to vote for Obama in the upcoming national election. The question the main stream media is now asking is “Is this right”. They say “black people are blindly following Barack, just because he is black”. Wow, just wow. While the 91%statistic may be true**, it is disingenuous to come to the conclusion that blacks are simply flocking to Obama because of his race. Newsflash, 65% of African American voters are registered Democrats!  I’m tired of the black vote being belittled in the mainstream media. According to this MSNBC article in 2004, the vast majority of African Americans who were eligible to vote did vote. Blacks represent 13.2 percent of this country’s population and in turn represented 11.2 percent of the voting population. 84% of the 16 million registered African American voters voted. From the article:

According to a 2002 survey by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, 63 percent of African-American voters consider themselves Democrats, while 24 percent call themselves independents; only 10 percent call themselves Republicans.

If these numbers hold true, then where does the 91% figure come from? Well let’s look at the last 8 years. African Americans were already down on the Republican Party, and now the rest of the country seems to have caught up to what we already knew about the neo-con movement. So not only are we down on Republicans, but there also is not a strong Independent candidate running. Nader has fallen out of favor with just about every bloc of Independent voters and with the Republican/Libertarian option off of the table, WHERE THE EFF ARE WE SUPPOSED TO GO!

I would have voted democratic in this election if the candidate had been white, blue or green. The fact that Barack is black is only an added bonus in my book. Hell yea I’m proud of what he is doing, hell yea I’m happy that a black man is in this position, but I am not voting for him because of his race. If it were really true that blacks were so politically inept that they just vote their race, then why haven’t Jesse or Al had the same following as Barack. Why haven’t we elected Puff fucking Daddy to office yet. Huh?

Hes black, and even wearing a suit. Will never be President!

 

 

The black middle class in this country, happens to be the largest segment of blacks, is habitually belittled by everyone from BET to Fox News**and I am absolutely sick of it. Blacks are more politically savvy than just voting for the guy who shares the same color. What about whites who will NOT vote for Obama because of his skin color? I would be willing to bet that that number far exceeds the blacks who will vote for him for the wrong reasons.

The youth vote in America has risen over the last 8 years to unprecedented levels. And you know which communities had the largest jump? Ill let you see for yourself. I am voting for Obama in November not because of his skin color, but rather because I can ill afford not to.

*You can make a poll say anything you want it to. A great quote about statistics as a science is that statistics is the only “science” where two different statisticians can see the exact same data and come to completely different conclusions

 

**How the fuck could you possibly know that?

 

***One in the same in my book

Oh and one last thing. Peace to Derrick Ashong, who if you havent heard of him is this kid who was interviewed by this real agressive white guy on the street about why he was voting for Obama and completely owned the fool. Heres the vid.

“Dream Team, this is the Supreme Team Squad”

In my past life I could do this

The World Cup is such a great sporting event because it only happens every four years and it allows fans to get behind their teams on a deeper, more patriotic level. With that being said, I am never more patriotic* than during the Olympics when basketball is on. It only happens every four years, and I actually cheer the U.S. on as the beat the living crap out of other teams. That is until recently. The first Olympic team I was really cognisant of was the ‘96 Dream Team and the dominance that they showed will never be imitated again on the global stage. The 2000 Athens team, mistakenly named the Dream Team also, won the gold but the world showed the U.S. the strides it had made over the last 2 decades. Then comes the debacles that were the 2002 World Championships (6th place finish), the 2004 Athens Olympics (Bronze finish), and finally 2006 bronze finish at the World Championships.  But now…

PG: Jason Kidd, Chris Paul, Deron Williams

SG: Kobe Bryant, Michael Redd, Dwyane Wade

SF: Lebron James, Carmello Anthony, Tayshaun Prince

PF: Chris Bosh, Carlos Boozer

C: Dwight Howard, Tyson Chandeler

Damn straight!

While we don’t have our very best players going – Amare Stoudemire and KG come to mind – we do have a very good team going to Beijing. What this team lacks in size down low, especially defensively, it makes up for with pure athleticism and perimeter defense. Against the international pick and roll style of basketball, perimeter defense is of utmost importance. Kidd, Wade, Tayshaun Prince and Kobe Bryant – whose role on the team has been described as defense first and scorer second – are all excellent defenders. Down low, both Howard and Chandler are rebounding blocking machines, and the scoring can be taken care of by LBJ, Mello and Redd. Can you say Dream Team.

During the FIBA Americas Championship tourney last year Lebron averaged 18.1 ppg, 3.6 rpg, and 4.7 apg all while shooting a ridiculous 72% overall and 84% from inside the 3 point line. In other words, HE WAS UNGUARDABLE! LBJ, the King, will be able to both showcase his talents on the world stage and sell a couple million shoes in China for Nike** in one fell swoop. With LBJ dunking, Kobe defending, Redd shooting, and Dwight Howard being the absolute monster that he is, I dont see any team coming within ten points of the U.S team. And I say good, because its about time we reclaimed our spot as the best basketball playing country in the world.

*Whatever that word means

**I wonder how mucha  pair of Jordans cost in China