I'm Back!!!

First off let me apologize for my absence, as I haven't posted any new material in 6 months. My access to computers was severely limited as my living condiitons in New York City were not the greatest.

However I am back to provide with more of my insight about the Hip-Hop game and what's hot on the streets from my perspective. At any time feel free to stop reading this blog as at times I get very lengthly and I tend to be very biased about the material I am writing about. But then this again this is my blog.

A lot has happenend in the Hip-Hop game since my last post. I was thinking about making this blog an outlet for younger artists who submit me their mixtapes (This happens all the time) and then I would take them, decipher, and decode exactly what it is that they are trying to say. Because honestly there is a lot of talent out here that needs to be exposed.

Thanks again for reading this far!!

J Cole

J Cole???

Who is that???

The average music fan probably wouldn't know who he is. He is headlined as the first artist signed to Jay-'s newly formed "Roc-Nation" label. He first earned himself a little bit of recognition nationally when he was featured on the famed "Blueprint 3" album by hip-hop living legend "Jay-Z", on he track titled "A Star is Born".




He also became even more recognizable nationally when he was featured on the single "Beautiful Bliss" off the "Wale" "Attention Deficit" album.

His witty flow, and raw lyrics that bring a breath of fresh air into the young hip-hop community, is exactly what hip-hop has been missing. Many people have said that he draws comparisons to artist's like Drake. Now, let me set the record straight now and say that I'm not one for comparing anybody to other people, but when an emcee is compared to a superstar such as Drake, respect must be paid. Personally, I feel they are neck to neck in the battle of who is better lyrically. Drake obviously has the upper hand when you talk about commercial success. However, with street bangers such as

"J Cole" is destined to blossom.

All the songs listed above were created from original beats that he produced himself, showing that he's more than just a rapper, and can produce if he wanted to. His freestyles over already esatblished beats such as

""I'm the Man" off the Nas "Stillmatic" album,




""I Really Mean It" off the Diplomats compilation album "Diplomatic Immunity"




""Dead Presidents II" off the classic album by Jay-Z titled "Reasonable Doubt", was great showcasing his ability to flow over any beat. /strong>

He constantly is shouting out his hometown of Fayetville, North Carolina, with nicknames for his city such as "Fayetnam", or the more simply put "The Ville". He never forgets where he came from and where he honed a lot of skills, which were from the New York City area. He has two highly successful underground mixtapes titled "The Come Up" and the "The Warm Up". If there's nothing else that you remember from this entry, just remember that "J Cole" is the next artist to BLOW.

The last time I felt so strongly about an artist like this was about the late great "Stack Bundles", and anyone who knows anything about me, knows that I Love everything "Stack Bundles" ever did. "J Cole" has the potential to be the next "Stack Bundles", he's that talented.

"I'm Ill" (Remix)

"Red Cafe" teams up with "Fabolous" to bring the heat with...

Great up-beat track for the New York City area

Hip-Hop at it's finest

"I'm Ill" (Remix)

"Fabolous" killing the competition

"Fabolous" is at it again...

This time with a new mixtape for the Streets titled...

There Is No Competition 2 -

The Funeral Service...

Hosted

by DJ Drama

Fabolous a.k.a. "Loso" brought an album feel to the mixtape game. With every track seemingly geared towards killing the competion in the Hip-Hop world, "Loso" reassures his fans, and everyone else who listens that rappers are not on his level lyrically. Loso does his best to annihilate all who come to mind. The Album, I mean mixtape, featured contributions from "Kobe", "Paul Cain", "LA the Darkman", "Freck Billionaire", "Camron", "Vado", "Nicki Minaj", "Red Cafe", and "Willie the Kid". I find this very interesting because Fabolous is certainly already an established artist who certainly has had big success mainstream. The fact that he still is taking the time out to do mixtapes of high quality, and putting on artists such as "Kobe", "Paul Cain" and "Freck Billionaire" shows his love for hip-hop, overall grind, and his loyalty to the emcee's he's known for a long time, who haven't had nearly the commercial success that he has. Great album I mean mixtape, to listen to with a great theme that "Fabolous" sticks to throught all 20 tracks. Even the skits are interesting, and with "DJ Drama"'s noticeable energetic voice this all true Hip-Hop fans can appreciate this.

Here is a link where you can listen to the entire Album, I mean mixtape for free via Datpiff.com...

http://www.datpiff.com/Drama_Fabolous_There_Is_No_Competition_2_The_Fun.m103255.html

Here's who contributed lyrically to the album I mean Mixtape...

Freck Billionaire -

Paul Cain -

Kobe (Singer) -

Willie the Kid -

Vado -

Beamer, Benz, or Bentley

New smash hit for the summer of 2010

A great track for NYC hip-hop

Lloyd Banks, feat. Juelz Santana

Beamer, Benz, or Bentley

Yung Berg give it up AlReady...

Christian Ward aka "Yung Berg"...

This is a feature on "Yung Berg", and why I think it would be most beneficial for him to give up the rap game up and move on to something else in his life. In a 3 year time period the 23 year-old has managed to go from promising young artist, full of potential, to someone who ABSOLUTELY gets no respect from his peers.

For those who dont know who "Yung Berg" is, let me explain. He hails from the streets of Chicago. He is a lightskinned individual who once had everything you could ask for. He had fame, he had hot records spinning, he was iced out, and his was relevant to the public for making great music that we all loved to enjoy.

Howeve somewhere along the lines of all that, he started making terrible decisions, that ruined his image in the public and those around him possibly for life. In the society that we live in, where image is almost everything, and how people percieve you is very important, Yung Berg is certainly lacking in respect from almost everyone.

I don't know if it's his cocky attitude he has? If he thinks he's untouchable by those around him or what?

Let me be the first to state though, the young man definitely has talent. He has quite a bit of success in the mainstream with hits such as...

"Sexy Lady" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=419-SUgKA6c

"Sexy Can I" -http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeVOnHce37Y

"The Business" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeocwaZDVx8

However, due to recent comments made by the rapper, and just overall bad luck, I feel it would best to either give up rap entirely, or step away from the game for a few years, and reassess just what he wants out of life, while being associated with the industry.

The 1st of Yung Berg's debacles started on Dec. 21st, 2007, when he was arrested for marijuanna possesion on the set of the "Sexy Can I" shoot in Miami, Florida.

The 2nd came in March and April of 2008, when he was interviewed by "DJ Envy", and made controversial comments regarding "Bow'Wow". He said that he repected "Lil Bow Wow", but he couldn't respect the new Bow Wow. He also stated that "50 Cent" advised him to "demolish Bow Wow" and for Yung Berg to stop at nothing to finish Bow Wow. He even went as far as stating "I don't have any problems with Bow Wow, if he does a song with me. If he doesn't though I'm going finish him".

In a freestyle later that month in April, 2008, Yung Berg told shots at 106 and Park host "Terrence J".

In May of 2008, on an internet video he was addressing the rumors on why his album had been pushed back, and he stated jokingly "It's been pushed back furthur than Flo-Rida's hairline. Flo-Rida is a FL rapper. This only started major controversy with "Brisco", a FL rapper who has ties with Flo-Rida, who sated he would beat Yung Berg up on siht because of comments.

When I stated above that Yung Berg also had bad luck, well here it is. In July of 2008, he made a derogatory comment about dark-skinned women. He said he didn't like "dark-butts" which was the terminology he used. He stated that he wasn't attracted to girls who were darker than he was. As you would imagine, this upset a lot of people, and it was very detrimental to his image. I call this bad luck because I honestly don't think he meant to offend all those people. He was only speaking his mind about his personal preferences. To save his image he created an apology video, apologizing to everyone he had hurt with comments even saying "my mother is a lovely dark skinned lady". However, to the fans, many people saw this as a cheap attempt to take back what he had said, but many felt that the damage was already done.

In August of 2008 him and 4 of his friends were arrested in New York City, on possesion of weapons, and marijuanna. The case was dropped however.

On August 22nd, 2008, arguably his biggest blunder happened in a nighclub in Detroit. Yung Berg had been running his mouth stating that local Hip-Hop act "Trick-Trick" was "wack" (not talented) and the entire Detroit Hip-Hop scene was dead. While in a night club in Detroit some of "Trick-Trick"'s "goons" (followers) ran down on Yung Berg. They assaulted him, and then snatched his very infamous "Transformers" chain that he was notorious for wearing.

On Oct. 3rd, 2008 Brooklyn emcee "Maino" slapped Yung Berg in a nightclub in Atlanta, Georgia. "Maino" stated that Yung Berg approached him very disrespectfully about a situation. So Maino smacked him because he felt cornered. He also stated if Yung Berg would've approached differently than they could've settled the situation better.

Also in Oct. of 2008, Yung Berg was dissed by R&B singer Ne-Yo (which lets you know right there he gets no repsect from anyone, when R&B dudes are disrespecting him). Neyo said he wanted to 3-finger slap Yung Berg.

Even ex-girlfriend Drew Sidora went as far as to dissing him in her new single titled...

"Not Alone" -http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONaY8eo2qYk

January 2009 Yung Berg was arrested again in Miami for public intoxication, and when he was being handcuffed by the poloce officer he stated that he didn't deserve to get arrested because he’s signed to Universal and is an artist. #cmonson that's pitiful...

Recently Yung Berg was the victim of a home invasion in which he was reportedly pistol-whipped and robbed of jewelry that he owned.

Overall, I feel that you have to stay humble at whatever it is your doing in this life. Because once all respect is lost you have nothing. To me it just seems as if no one respects Yung Berg.

Salute to Stack Bundles and Max B

I felt that it was only right that I pay respect to 2 of NYC's hottest emcee's of the last 4 years.

Rayquan Maurice Eliott a.k.a "Stack Bundles", and Charlie Wingate a.k.a "Max B"

Starting around the time of 2006, when the famed group "Dipset" seemed to be inevitably on their demise, or lost their luster their had gained over the years from 2001 to 2006, Stack Bundles and Max B revived DipSet's image and made its movements, and music relevent again.

Stack Bundles hailing from the virtual unknown streets of Far Rockaway, New York (Queens), suddenly was an outlet for the people of what he liked to call "Far Rock". Stack Bundles was almost a saint to his people at such a young age, everyone looked up to him for what he represented from a music standpoint and how he never forgot where he came from. He was to "Far Rock" what "Biggie" was to Brooklyn, What "Big Pun" was to the Bronx what "2 Pac" was to the Westcoast. I write in this manner because someone like I, Myself as a young man who looked up to Stack Bundles, and he died when I was 18 years old, so I was old enough to honestly understand everything that he represented. The only other death I will probably mourn more will be the day I have to say goodbye to my parents, my Grandmother, or Jay-z.

With his raw, clear cut delivery, and confidence in the booth he was absolutely "Fuego" at the time. No one was hotter. He had the streets of New York City buzzing and for good reason. With his memorable catch phrases like the "Gorgeous Gangsta", "Handsome Hustla" "I don't look like him, or know him, I am that Ni***" "Never mind who done it, I'm Mr. Still Doin' it" "Mr. See more Cake himself", he showed why everyone in the NYC area was a fan of Stack Bundles.

He first started garnering fame doing production with his self-made group called "Rockaway Riot Squad", later to be formerly known as "Riot Squad". He also was a staple of "DJ Clue"'s "Dessert Storm" series. With his steady grind he started gaining attention from other emcee's in the NYC area, most noticably "Jim Jones" of the Harlem based group the Diplomats. Stack Bundles and Jim Jones really hit the rap scene hard, and the chemistry was remarkable, producing numerous mixtapes, and feeding the streets what they wanted to hear. Jim Jones even went so far as to putting Stack Bundles on his third studio album titled "Hustler's P.O.M.E. (Product of My Environment)" With the track called,

"WeatherMan"

"which featured the likes of "Lil' Wayne".

Although Stack Bundles never reached true mainstream status, he was certainly the hottest emcee in NYC at the time, before his untimely dimise on June 11th 2007.

He had signed a 7 figure deal with ByrdGang Records through Jim Jones. Byrdgang is an affiliate under Diplomat Records, who was headed by DefJam.

Everything that Stack Bundles represented was so true down to the core. I am not from Far Rockaway, Queens, New York, I am a young man from upstate, Beacon, N.Y. about a 2 hours north of "Far Rock" but I can respect any man who puts on for their city, even when they know their individual city, or "Hood" has never had anything to be proud of, in terms of fame. He was "Far Rock"'s posterchild or outlet for the youth. As he qouted in one of his raps "I gave the youth something they could look up to/The new coupe with the roof they look up through". Stack Bundles was gunned down on a muggy June night in front of his building in the "Red Fern" housing development in "Far Rock". He wasn't even robbed of his jewelery or his money. He was killed because of pure jealousy and envy. The best lesson that can be learned from his untimely dimise is that once you "get on" and you sign that 7 figure deal, it's time to move on because like Biggie wrote in the classic song "10 Crack Commandments", "The Cheddar breed Jealousy". Stack Bundles made his million but he was still living amongst people who had nothing, compared to himself. Honestly it's a SHAME we have to look it at the situation like this.

10-21-1982/6-11-2007...

The Good Die Young RIP Stack Bundles...Gone but never forgotten.

____________________________________________________________________

"Max B" along with "Stack Bundles" was another hip-hop artist who rose up out of nowhere to bring NY rap where it belonged, back on top. Hailing from the prominent streets of Harlem, USA, Max B came with a sound that was never heard before in rap music. Combining a mixture of Jamaican, and Puerto Rican flavor, along with the gritty punchlines, and catchy phrases Max B couldn't lose. "Max B", said his name is a mixture of "Notorious Biggie Smalls","Jay-Z", name and Tupac Shakur's other identity "Makaveli" to form the name "Max Biggavell" a.k.a "Wavy Crockett".

Max B's story was a little different from Stack Bundles. After serving 8 years in prison on robbery charges from 1997 - 2005, "Max B" came out and had NYC buzzing again. "Jim Jones" certainly knows talent when he sees it, as he signed Max B to "ByrdGang Records" immediately upon release, and began recording. Jim Jones had Max B on heavy rotation on his third studio album titled "Hustler's P.O.M.E (Product Of My Enviornment)" featuring him on the lead single titled

"Baby Girl"

Max B was even instrumental in helping with the writing of then smash hit

"We Fly High"

You remember that song right? "We Fly High, No Lie, You Know This, BALLLIINNNN". I've long said that that track single handedly brought hip-hop back to NY, and "Biggavell" was instrumental in that process. However, everything that Jim Jones and Max B did was great for the NYC hip-hop movement, but it didn't last, as the 2 had one of the biggest fall-outs to date in hip-hop. Disputes over financial situations, and whether Max B was being pushed enough towards the mainstream by "ByrdGang", and that seemingly was the driving force for the break-up. Even though Max B split aprt from Jim Jones, he was still extemely relevant in the NYC area. He became an internet celebrity almost over night. His website http://www.wavycrocket.com/ was extremely popular over the last 2 years. He took the eastcoast over with his catchy phrases such as "Wavy" which is a statement meaning being cool, or feeling yourself to the max, and the phrase "OwWwWwW" which could mean anything you wanted it too if used in the right context. Also "Ride The Wave" , which means just go with the flow don't think about anything. He also released a bevy of mixtapes, and was the light that Harlem World had been missing in recent years, when nothing seemed to be going as strong.

As popular and talented as he was, his life was taken from him because of bad decision making on his part. Not in the sense of how you think either, not the same way Stack Bundles life was taken away from him. On September 3rd, 2009, Charlie Wingate a.k.a "Max B" was sentenced to 75 years in prison for charges of felony murder, kidnapping and armed robbery. Although "Max B" is still physically breathing as I write this, he is as good as dead behind bars for the next 75 years unless he can successfully appeal his decision in a timely manner, while he is still relevant in the fans minds.

On that note I leave this to say...

RIP Stack Bundles...The Good Die Young

RIP to "Max B"'s music

Music isn't all what it's made up to be!!!

The life of a rapper/singer may look good but few know the necessary steps it takes to become mainstream.

Take a closer look ups and downs of an aspiring musician.

The life of a young musician seems to be the way of the future for many young minority men, especially of Black, or Latino heritage. It is a very misleading lifestyle. It’s easy to get caught up with what an individual may see on T.V., or what they see in person. The sight of “Jay-Z” driving a Phantom, or “Rick Ross” wearing extremely gaudy pieces of jewelry, can be misleading to the youth who pay attention to them. Especially in the eyes of both men and women who so desperately want to live that lavish lifestyle that they portray. Little do they know much of the hype that they see is “Fools Gold”, or a fabrication. The huge mansions you see these people living in, are most of the time rented out for the time being, the cars and jewelry that we see are rented too, often times they are there just for the video shoot.

Not only is that lifestyle very difficult to attain, it is hard to legitimize. It takes a long time to reach that level of success, and the fan base that must be attained is extremely difficult to obtain.
Let’s examine this one step at a time. First a person must come to the realization that they are in fact talented enough to be even taken seriously to themselves and fans. Second, you must write and compose a ton of decent material that could warrant a fan base of some sort. That alone is extremely difficult. When I say “fan-base” I mean a group of followers who would support your movement, and play your music because they actually like it. Keon Chandler a freshman here at Longwood University, is an aspiring rapper/singer and stated “If the talent level isn’t there, and people aren’t feeling you for your music than you really have no chance. It’s like a sport, you have to write every day, you can’t take no days off. The people have to love you”. Keon Chandler goes by the name of “KcWyldFiya” and his personal music can be found at http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.myspace.com%2Fkcwyldfiya&h=de69c4252bbc564e8b1852f24e9912aa

Once you have all that behind you, the next question is, how do you get into mainstream media like the superstars you see on T.V.? For everyone this process is different. For some people, they become mainstream without attaining much genuine fan base. When I say mainstream I mean the public; people outside of your immediate demographic. At this time it becomes “who you know” more or less than “what you know”. Other people have started when they were 15 years old, and never “got on” until they were in their 30’s. As expected of course they are many stories of people who have tried and failed, and, just never reached a level of success that they were comfortable with.

If a person does reach mainstream success the next “stage of the game” is to stay there, because once you “get on” it’s extremely easy to fall off. This often times is the case with one hit wonders. One minute they’re everywhere, if their song is a hit, then a month later their gone never to be heard of again. We all know a few of those.

Honestly there isn’t a lot of money in the music industry. If you talk from a pure music standpoint. In the last three years album sales were at an all-time low. This is due to an ever increasing popularity of internet use, and free music downloading. Fans are no longer buying hard copy CDs. They are now downloading entire albums or they’re downloading their favorite individual songs from the albums. There are numerous websites that host the videos to songs such as youtube.com, where a fan can listen to the song anytime they want to for free. Longwood University alum Brandon Evan’s stated, “Even though the music has been watered down a bit due to saturation of the game (so much new material in a short amount of time) artists have done a great job of staying positive and producing good music. Even though sales are down in stores, it’s still equally important to stay poppin’ with the fans. I tell the people that I manage to not get discouraged and keep working hard”. Brandon Evans is a small time producer in the Knoxville, Tennessee area.

My advice to the youth, would be do not put all your eggs in one basket. The music industry has a lot more failed attempts than success stories. If you have what it takes great, but don’t be too hard on yourself if it doesn’t pan out the way you expected.

The Good Times

This post is a tribute to the DIPSET family and everything they represented and meant to a young man like myself growing up in up$tate, Beacon, New York.

There was a time when DIPSET was almost a cult movement, and everyone I knew including myself looked up to the members of the group. They were the modern day "Wu-Tang", only difference was they were from Harlem, USA, and not "Shaolin" (Staten Island). I used to hang the DIPSET eagle logo up all over my room, and I had posters of "Juelz Santana".

The group consisted of "Cam'Ron" (Camron Giles) "Jim Jones" (Joseph Guillermo Jones), "Juelz Santana (Laron James)", 'JR Writer (Rusty Brito)", 'Hell Rell (Durrel Mohammed0", "40 Cal (Calvin Byrd), and hype men such as "Duke da God" and "Freekey Zeekey".

From the time period of 2001 to 2007 they where what we as young New Yorkers knew as Hip-Hop. Everything they did was cool, and appealing. My personal favorite out of the group was "Juelz Santana". I looked up to him as if he was a hero of sorts in my mind.

I remember thinking back to that time when everything was good in music, when they were their most effective was when they were together working as a group. One unit. It started with Cam'Ron and Jim Jones coming together and forming the group, and the label Diplomat Records, originating out of East Harlem. "Cam'Ron" started gaining commercial success off his 3rd album titled "Come Home With Me". It featured chart topping hits

"Oh Boy"

"Hey Ma"

It featured the likes of a young, energetic, and charasmatic "Juelz Santana". From there they took off. They then started to form movements or scripts every young black, or latino kid in the NY, NJ, or CT area would follow. "Juelz Santana" had everyone wearing bandanas of every color to match outfits they would wear, which was his signature. 'Cam'Ron' had young men wearing the color "pink" for the first time., and just overall as a group they were distinguised by "red, white, and blue". Around early 2006 Jim Jones started wearing clothes that fit his body, almost form fitting. Because of this it was no longer cool, or acceptable to wear baggy clothes.

DIPSET as a group had much success with studio albums titled "Diplomatic Immunity I and II", also followed by compilation albums titled "More Than Music Vol. I and II". Feature smash hits from those albums included

"DipSet Anthem"

(My ALL-TIME fav. DIPSET song) "I'm Ready"

"Mic Check"

"Crunk Muzic"

Thats what they did collectively. Not to mention the smash hits they had individually.

"Cam'Ron" has to date 6 solo studio albums, which includes arguably his most successful album titled "Purple Haze".

"Juelz Santana" has to date 2 studio albums, including his best album to date "From Me To You".

Jim Jones has 4 studio albums to date, with "HARLEM, Diary of a Summer'.

To date in present day 2010, the group has since split apart due to jealously,bad managing amongst each other, and possibly just overall guys wanting to venture off and do their own thing in the industry.

Juelz Santana has started his own label "Skull Gang Records". All the members now distribute music for themselves however at the end of the day, it will always be Rocafella/DefJam, for all the members.

Jim Jones started his own label titled "Byrdgang/MOB Records", which had a lot of local support, due much in part to the rise of a superstars in the making by the names of "Stack Bundles" (Raekwon Maurice Elliott), and "Max B" (Charlie Wingate). Cureently Max B is serving a 75 year prison sentence for felony murder, kidnapping and armed robbery.

"Stack Bundles" was the next new big act of out the New York City area, hailing from the streets of Far Rockaway, Queens. Having being named the mixtape artist rookie of the year in 2006, and with his thuggish ways, catchy punch lines, memorable qoutes, and his chant that still rings heavy in my head "SSSSSSSS SQUAD UP! CHEAAAAA", Byrdgang/MOB entertainment couldn't lose. However on a muggy summer night on June 12th, 2007, the Byrdgang superstar was gunned down in front of his building in the Redfern housing projects of Far Rockaway.

Much to the chagrin of MANY loyal DIPSET fans like myself. The music just hasn't been the same. That feeling of pride and exitement that I used to get when I played a DIPSET song is no longer there. A few of the members have had minimal individual success, but they will never be as successful by themselves than they were together as a team. Overall, the group had what it took to take the country by storm, but it just didn't pan out that way. I felt it was important to reflect on the impact that they had on my life, and many individuals who lived throuhg that the time period of prominence.