“Other People’s Property” is a very good book that is at its best when its author acts like a DJ. But don’t get it twisted: [Jason] Tanz sees hip-hop as text more than as sonic phenomenon or, for that matter, stone groove. “Other People’s Property” is made up of nine journalistic pieces, each a mix of reportage and personal reflection about race and the industry of hip-hop. It’s freaky, equally in love with Western philosophers such as Jean Baudrillard and the classic albums from hip-hop’s golden era. In a very hip-hop effort to get his shine on, the author mashes up his prose, cutting in and out of reportage and confessional styles.
This cutting edge documentary not only unmasks the faces of seven individuals addicted to graffiti, but it exposes their thoughts, feelings, faults and fears — an avenue unrivaled by any graff film to date[…]”Graffiti is like the United Nations. There is a representative from all corners of the earth. Black, white and the many shades in between, man or woman.”
Rock and Rock Hall of Fame voters have chosen an eclectic new class broad enough to encompass jazz trumpeter Miles Davis and punk group Sex Pistols, but they once again snubbed rap. For a second consecutive year, hip-hop’s prime candidate, Grandmaster Flash, failed to gather the necessary support from the 700 rock historians overseeing the nominee selection.
Music is at its most potent when it carries a message, write Ryan Smith and Swati Pandey. Tomorrow’s most powerful political voice won’t be on CNN. Tune in to your iPod. In 1939, Billie Holiday crooned against the lynching of black men in her song Strange Fruit. In 1969, Jimi Hendrix’s version of The Star-Spangled Banner blasted peaceniks out of their drug dreams and into the streets. Then, in 1989, came Public Enemy’s Fight the Power. That inchoate shout of rage against all forms of oppression is growing into a force of real potential. The hip-hop nation has gone global, and it’s going to change the world.
Vallejo’s Mac Dre was shot in a dispute over money, and that led to 2 reprisal slayings and a third related killing, police say. Vallejo rapper Andre “Mac Dre” Hicks wasn’t on MTV, on magazine covers or in movies. But his clever, hardcore rhymes had an underground following, and when he was killed on a Kansas City freeway last November, hip-hop radio stations mourned him at length. Mac Dre was big enough for that.
New York federal prosecutors Monday rested their money laundering case against the founders of the hip-hop recording label, Murder Inc.
The Australian Office of Film and Classification (OFLC), has refused to rate 50 Cent’s new video game “50 Cent: Bulletproof,” effectively keeping the video game out of stores down under. The game was deemed to be excessively violent by The OFLC. The organization cited the ability to kill victims who moaned or begged for their lives, the ability to shoot injured characters as they attempt to crawl away and blood splattering on the screen as reasons for not classifying the game.
Artist’s Yele Haiti organization uses beats to enter gang-controlled slums. The almighty power of hip hop is clearly evident in one of the most dangerous areas of Haiti. In an effort to provide badly needed help to Cite Soleil, a new aid organization has teamed with Wyclef Jean’s Yele Haiti organization in an effort to get food and supplies into the seaside slum controlled by armed street gangs.
The Source Magazine co-owner Raymond “Benzino” Scott has recently been charged with failing to file tax returns in 1999 and 2000 despite reportedly earning a combined $1.5 million over the two years.
