The absence of Danger Mouse on this year’s Gorillaz LP was duly noted, with the end result sounding something closer to Damon Albarn’s last entry, The Good The Bad and The Queen. Still a quality release, it somehow lacked the diversity of the previous two records. Where was Danger this time around? Instead, working with [cont.]

During the recording process, Damon Albarn suggested that Gorillaz third album, Plastic Beach, would be the most pop thing he has ever done. Certainly the British interpretation of “pop” is different from the American one, as there is no Britney Spears or Lady Gaga included on this disc. However the opposite may be true, as [cont.]

If you were able to get Ludacris, Rick Ross, Snoop Dogg, Nas, Young Jeezy, Lil Wayne, Busta Rhymes and Nelly, plus R&B superstars Usher and John Legend, all to appear on your album, you would probably have no doubt it would be the hottest thing out there. Thus, you can hardly blame DJ Khaled for [cont.]

Praying for the death of autotune, R&B is a lost art form these days. Gone are the days where singers could actually sing and soulful blues production was the mainstay. Instead, you have keyboard synthesizer beats and artists that can barely stay in key, even with autotune. Stuck between these two worlds is Jason Derulo. [cont.]

“Between your future and your present, between what’s real and what’s fake, between where you are and where you want to be, lies the land of make believe…” This is the underlining theme of the latest album from emcee Naledge and producer Double-O, better known as Kidz In The Hall, for the album Land of [cont.]

It seems like it has been more then two years since we have had a full length Planet Asia album, but it hasn’t. This critic never got into the flow of the Planet Asia and DJ Muggs’ Pain Language and it always seemed as if they were just trying to recreate something they did before. [cont.]

Call it the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup plan: two great tastes that taste great together. It’s worked out pretty well in the past for pairings like Buckshot and 9th Wonder, so the combination of mixtape ace/producer DJ Green Lantern and respected New York rapper Styles P would seem like a no-brainer. The fruit of that [cont.]

There’s two ways to go when your major label deal goes South and the entire industry is upside down. If you’re Freeway, you take the Bun B approach. Guest spots on almost every relevant album or mixtape, new tracks consistently hitting the web, and a label deal with one of the best independents in the [cont.]

To put it simply, Statik Selektah is one of the few people in the industry that “get it”; and the biggest problem with hip-hop is that many of today’s artists simply don’t. The internet has allowed the once fresh underground to be overrun by hungry wannabes, making the idea of being a “real head” fodder [cont.]

With the sudden popularity of 80′s throwback groups like The Cool Kidz, it has opened doors for the resurrection of classic hip-hop sounds, by people who actually lived through that era. While both Apathy and Ryu (Styles of Beyond, Fort Minor) have had massive success in the underground, they’ve struggled with breaking into the mainstream, [cont.]

It seems like it’s been longer than usual since we last spoke with RJD2. Reason being, his last album, The Third Hand, was a drastic departure from what he had introduced to us on his first two solo albums and his various offshoot projects. The Third Hand was overall a quality record, however the difference [cont.]

Dizzee Rascal is sort of like the U.K. equivalent to Jay-Z. Totally different styles and completely different artists, Dizzee is London’s rap media darling, always releasing albums to great critical acclaim and success. Dizzee has built a solid fanbase with his off kilter garage/grime style with his last three albums, the last one Maths & [cont.]

We’re not sure what’s going on with this album cover. Perhaps those characters are supposed to be Brown’s inner demons, who he chooses to defeat with a spray can, rather than bludgeoning them to death his guitar. And what’s with the boots, dude? Before “the incident”, Chris Brown’s first two albums found him surrounded with [cont.]

There was a short period in the mid-1990′s, when heads were so fed up with direction that major labels were taking with hip-hop music, that many artists just decided to put their stuff out independently. The indie hip-hop movement kicked into full swing, as artists on both coasts (and even in between), began releasing their [cont.]

Providing the backdrops for Aesop Rock’s early releases got Blockhead through the door, leading to his own solo career as an instrumentalist. Comparisons to DJ Shadow were inevitable, as Block employed a similar brand of moody atmospherics, vintage samples, and heavy drum samples found on Shadow’s Endtroducing. But while Shadow seemed to abandon that style [cont.]

Timbaland made a pretty big splash with his initial Shock Value release, churning out three smash hit singles with each “The Way I Are” (feat. Keri Hilson & D.O.E.), “Apologize” (feat. One Republic), and “Give It To Me” (feat. Nelly Furtado). The album went platinum, selling well over 1.1 million copies during it’s first year [cont.]

What is often referred to as hip-hop’s “golden age” is roughly around ’88-’93, a five year period where the sound of classic hip-hop was perfected, left untainted by industry evils. This is not to say there wasn’t wack shit during that time period, however there was an overabundance of classic albums released, so much to [cont.]

“Okay, now put your hand on your head, and make a face like you know you did something really bad….Excellent, I think that’s a wrap!” Black Sheep once did a song called “Flavor Of The Month”. It was about the rise and fall of a one-hit wonder type of rapper that lived out his fifteen [cont.]

In a nutshell, The Clipse’s first album, Lord Willin’, was one of those oft-overlooked records that held it’s weight long after it’s original release date, but initially met with a lukewarm response. A true “grower”, the album sent legions of album reviewers back-peddling to give The Clipse their long deserved respect, whom then, in turn, [cont.]

Snoop Dogg has always been one to adapt to changing styles and sounds, despite the fact that he was once an innovator of an entire sub-genre of hip-hop music. Still holding the entire West Coast on his back, Snoop has transcended the tag of “rapper”, earning the status of “icon”, as even your parents recognize [cont.]