Rap Radar

Plies talks to 1515 on working with Jeezy on his latest record as well as Da Snowman’s current single. Has anyone else noticed the difference between Plies’ speaking and rapping voice?

“He hit me the other day, and I told him he has a song that I consider to be a street antique,” Plies added. “To pick and choose the records we do is the most important thing. I always told myself from day one: I’ll never be a music whore when it came to this business. I always wanted to make sure I did in my heart what I felt was the right things to do. To get myself in a financial space where I don’t have to make desperate decisions, I feel we accomplished that thus far. I’m gonna try to continue to make more right moves than wrong moves.”

At DJ Prostyle’s fiesta on Monday, Styles P took to the stage and kicked a 30 second freebie. This is that red bubble rap.

Last November, Fuse aired 50 Cent’s On The Record episode. The footage left on the cutting room was salvaged and was shown last night. Above is the full 20 minute segment. Lock in. Curtis is always a good interview.

Yardie

This year’s VH1 Hip Hop Honors is paying homage to the South. But not everyone is happy on how they’re being recognized. Uncle Luke tells VIBE he’s upset for not being honored for his entrepreneurial contributions.

“This year I’m supposed to be honored, but they only want to honor me as a member of the 2 Live Crew,” says Campbell, who also led Miami’s bass music scene for much of the ‘80s and early ‘90s. “They want to honor Master P for his business savvy and they want to honor Jermaine Dupri for his business savvy and I’m kind of offended by that. We have basically been talking it out, but it’s just so sad that people just don’t know my history. They try to link me with a group and not see me as a businessman. Luke Records was the first independent black owned record company owned by a rapper. We were the first to distribute our own product. There’s just so many first…the first to have an independent R&B group to go platinum with H-Town.“

“For an organization like VH1 to try to say I’m just the first person to go to the Supreme Court over music censorship and be a part of the 2 Live Crew…I told them the other day, ‘Just go fuck yourself.’ We were even the first to have a street team. That wasn’t discovered by [Loud Records head] Steve Rifkind. I love Steve to death, but they keep giving him the credit. I don’t want to be a part of it unless you honor what I’ve done in a proper way. I’ve never asked anyone to do anything. But when you ask me to be a part of something, I’m not going to let you disrespect me.”

Pardon the shitty footage, but tilt your head sideways and listen up. Last night Drake’s Away From Home Tour made its way to the University of Missouri in Kansas City. On stage, Drizzy announced that he sent in the final copy of his debut before segueing into “Fireworks”. June 15th, June 15th.

In a phone conversation with 1515, Guru’s older sister Patricia Elam speaks on the whereabouts of her brother’s body before he was cremated. She also reveals that the family plans to hold a public memorial on the day he would have turned 49: July 17th.

“I don’t have any more specifics at this point in time,” she said. “There’s also talk of a musical tribute; I don’t have the specifics on that yet. We want something for the public and for fans. We’re also working on website so fans can post things. We’ve gotten so many wonderful, loving messages and tributes from around the world. We want fans to have a place for that.”

Second single released. And two videos in one day. And is that Stacey Dash? Slow down, Jayceon, you killin’ em. Ha.

“Put 24 on ya back just like a Laker”

Joey gets pretty ill real quick as he hops on Red Cafe’s track. Plus it looks like he got some nice beat makers onboard for the next album. Enter The Darkside on June 29th.

DJ Christion

Yeah, we had the same look on our face too. It appears that Rae’s OBCL2 has started a trend. According to the Abbot’s recent tweet, he will be handling the production to the sequel of GZA’s ’95 solo classic, Liquid Swords. Bong! Bong?

Heads up: AHH

Don’t know much about M.I.A. Truthfully, I’ve been avoiding her music like a plague for the past few years. Even the “Paper Planes”/”Swagger Like Us” movement didn’t pull me in. I really don’t know why. I mean, my music taste can be broad at times. Plus all the critics I know dig her. I mean she did win the 2009 Best Female Hip-Hop Artist at the BET Awards. Owww.

Still the hot talk yesterday was ole girl and her controversial new video so I had to see what’s what. And yup, a whole lot of violence is goin’ on up top. The overall script: Attack of the redheads. A bunch of Sheamus lookalikes get touched. A bootleg Justin Bieber gets bucked—rock-a-bye baby—New Jack City style. This ain’t no Ice-T Surviving The Game shit either. It’s dark, artsy and scary. Oops, there goes a flying hand. Shit, I’m waiting for Kanye to take a break from recording in Don Ho land just so he can post it. All caps everything. And don’t forget the exclamation points!!!!

Still lost in the mini-film is the actual music. You know, this is supposed to be about Maya’s first single from a new album and I can barely notice it. Except for the occasional, “I was booorrrnnn. Freee!” Catchy. But I wanted to hear more. So I just downloaded the song and you know what, it’s pretty good. I mean I’m probably not gonna bump it as much as all the new rap that just dropped (Today was a good day for traffic!) but I’ll keep it in my New Shit playlist. For now. Listen up!

“I don’t wanna talk about money, ’cause I got it
And I don’t wanna talk about hoochies, ‘cos I been it
And I don’t wanna be that fake, but you can do it.”

Maybe if Minaj doesn’t float your boat, we should open our hearts and find a place for our Sri Lankan sister in the hip-hop universe. I know I miss MC Lyte as much as anyone and Roxanne Shante when she was still honest. Hey, Latifah’s in Hollywood and she ain’t comin’ back. Lauryn Hill is not walkin’ through that door! It might just be OK to give M.I.A. a chance. That’s all I am saying. No justice. No peace.