By George Anastasia

For the nearly 30 years that rap and hip-hop have been part of the entertainment and cultural scene, critics have complained that the lyrics are violent and misogynistic, and that they glorify drug dealing.

The slayings of rap stars Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G., in what may have been a 1990s rap turf war, underscored the art-imitating-life component of "gangsta rap."

The criminal problems of rap executive Suge Knight, a former gang member and the cofounder of Death Row Records, and the 2002 killing of rap star Jam Master Jay in his Queens, N.Y., studio added more grist.

Legal entanglements for local rappers Beanie Sigel and Cassidy and record executive Alton "Ace Capone" Coles have brought the issue closer to home.

Sigel has federal convictions for drug possession and weapons offenses; he was acquitted in an attempted-murder case.

Cassidy, charged in a high-profile shoot-out that police believed was tied to a drug war, was found guilty of manslaughter.

Is rap music a cause of violence? Or does it mirror life on the streets of America's struggling cities?

The questions emerge again in the case against Coles, who, authorities say, used his entertainment business as a front for a $25 million crack- and cocaine-distribution network.

Downtown hip-hop-oriented clubs closing in face of security problems

By Cecily Burt

OAKLAND — One by one, Oakland's troubled downtown nightspots are closing, a victim of their own popularity and a musical format that tends to draw a younger, more violence-prone crowd.

But Oakland after hours isn't dead, just moving to a mellower beat, it seems, as the uptown area takes root and Old Oakland's resurgence fosters a booming nightlife.

Still, the so-called uptown entertainment district has taken another hit with the closure of the once-posh @17th nightclub on 17th Street. Mingles on the Embarcadero closed a year ago; Sweet Jimmie's on San Pablo Avenue a few months before that.

All three had featured disc jockeys playing hip-hop or Top 40 hits some nights, with radio ads drawing young, mostly African-American patrons from around the Bay Area. The clubs also drew the hangers-on who didn't want to pay the cover charge or kids who were too young to get in. Both, it seemed, would end up on the streets after closing time.

It was mostly the scenes outside the clubs that caused headaches for their owners, security guards and Oakland police, who were often called in to keep the peace, shut down sideshows, and respond to fights, stabbings and shootings.

The owners of @17th closed their doors voluntarily after two men were shot and killed and another wounded after leaving the nightclub in the early hours of Aug. 3, said Barbara Killey, the city's administrative hearing officer.

Killey had been working with the owners to come up with ways to discourage problems inside and outside the business.

Killey said the owners had agreed to install cameras outside the buildingbut hadn't yet done it when the shootings occurred. Once they closed, Killey told them they couldn't reopen until they had installed the cameras and better lighting and met other safety conditions imposed by the city.

The club is still closed, and efforts to reach the owners were unsuccessful.

Oakland police Lt. Paul Berlin said the downtown area has been "unbelievably peaceful" since @17th closed. There were five separate shooting incidents nearby in the past year, but nothing since the club closed.

Mingles on Embarcadero was also constantly on the defensive over outbreaks of violence and drinking and loitering on the blocks around it near Jack London Square. Owner John Ivey voluntarily closed the venue a year ago after someone shot into a crowd of people leaving the club, killing a pregnant woman.

Ivey had tried to discourage troublemakers by imposing a dress code that forbade baggy jeans and T-shirts, but there were still problems.

Those problems did not occur on nights the clubs hosted jazz or blues, but that type of music doesn't pack the house, Berlin said.

After years of complaints from police and city officials about violence and sideshows around his nightclub, Jimmie Ward excluded hip-hop entirely from his musical lineup and saw his business dry up. He closed the club and sold the building.

A Dallas rapper who released a song in support of the city’s efforts to discourage sagging pants has faced criticism from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation(GLAAD) for implying that sagging is a homosexual act.

As reported earlier, Dallas’ City Hall launched a “Pull Your Pants Up!” ad campaign last month by placing more than two dozen billboards across the city urging people to stop sagging their pants.

In support of their cause, rapper Dooney Da Priest released the song “Pull Your Pants Up”which insinuated that sagging was gay and was practiced by people on ‘the down low”

“I never considered sagging something that's indicative of homosexual behavior,” Corey Lash, a Dallas based board member of GLAAD told The Dallas Morning News. “For him to specifically target that aspect of what it could mean, well, it's highly offensive and unnecessary to me.”

“There are a lot of homophobic people in the African-American community that would not want to be perceived as gay,” explained Lash, who is black. “But he's adding to the intolerance and the homophobic nature in the community by using it in that way.”

By Trudy Simpson

Gay rights groups are threatening a boycott campaign against Jamaican reggae singer Buju Banton after he apparently breached an agreement with them by spouting homophobic lyrics at a recent concert in Guyana.

Just months after bowing to pressure and signing the Reggae Compassionate Act which required him to stop promoting homophobic lyrics and statements in public, Banton is again embroiled in controversy after reports from the Guyana Music Festival said he sang his infamous, Boom Bye Bye, which advocates killing and maiming gay people.

It was reported in Guyana's Stabroek News that at the concert Buju also said on stage "Buju nah like no batty boy and dem batty boy attack Buju"

By JACOB ADELMAN

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Donda West, mother of Kanye West and former chairwoman of Chicago State University's English department, has died, a spokesman for the rapper said. She was 58.

Donda West died Saturday night in Los Angeles, said the spokesman, who asked for anonymity because not all family members had been notified.

"The family respectfully asks for privacy during this time of grief," the spokesman said.

A cause of death has not been released.

Donda West was known for the strong bond she shared with her son, by whose side she was often seen at parties and award shows.

Kanye West, 30, often spoke of his close relationship with his mother, who raised him alone after her husband left when Kanye was 3.

She was the inspiration for the song, "Hey Mama," on Kanye West's 2005 album "Late Registration," in which he sings: "Hey Mama, I wanna scream so loud for you, cuz I'm so proud of you ... I appreciate what you allowed for me. I just want you to be proud of me."

With December marking the 25th anniversary of Michael Jackson's landmark Thriller album, the reclusive singer actually granted an interview to Ebony magazine in which he talked about his solo career and the state of music and Hip-Hop today. The magazine comes out on Monday, but some excerpts have already been released.

When comparing his debut solo album, Off The Wall, to Thriller, Jackson said it was "a complete transition." "Ever since I was a little boy, I would study composition. And it was Tchaikovsky that influenced me the most," he tells Ebony, according to MTV News. "If you take an album like Nutcracker Suite, every song is a killer, every one. So I said to myself, 'Why can't there be a pop album where every [song is a killer]?'... I do that same process with every song. It's the melody, the melody is the most important. If the melody sounds good in my head, it's usually good when I do it."

Pop star Michael Jackson has said he pays no attention to the negative press written about him.

In a rare interview, the star told Ebony magazine that he knows he has the reputation of being different, but just ignores it.

"In my opinion, it's ignorance. It's usually not based on fact. Every neighbourhood has the guy who you don't see, so you gossip about him," he said.

The singer gave the interview to mark 25 years since the release of Thriller.

Jackson said he has not changed much since releasing the blockbuster album in 1982.

Record-breaking

"That Michael is probably the same Michael here. I just wanted to get certain things accomplished first," he said.

After selling 750 million albums worldwide, Jackson is engineering a comeback


Kanye West, Will.i.am and Ne-Yo are all teaming up and working with the "King of Pop" Michael Jackson on some new music material, which has been identified as tracks for his new album which is rumored to be released in 2008.

Michael Jackson has enlisted the three male pop stars to work on several new songs and producing material. Kanye West revealed to The Sun newspaper that he is working with Michael Jackson on his new album, which will be Jackson’s first album since 2001's ‘Invincible’.

Rapper, singer and producer Will.i.am stated in a recent interview that he received a personal call from Jackson and reportedly insisted it was a “prank call”, “Michael called me out of the blue and I just didn’t believe it was him. I was like, ‘Come on, who is this, how did you get my number? Stop playing around.’ He said, ‘No it’s really me, it’s Michael.’ I still didn’t believe it was him and was like, ‘Dude, seriously, I got to go.”

Michael Jackson has been named the "Most Successful Entertainer of All Time" by Guinness World Records.

Bounce back

Rapper talks gay rights, hip hop and Hillary Clinton on steps of the University of Michigan Grad

By Kimberly Chou

Rapper Lupe Fiasco held court on the Diag yesterday, answering questions about politics, hip hop and homophobia.

"I make really good hip-hop music, Grammy-nominated hip-hop music, GQ-Man-of-the-Year hip-hop music," Fiasco said by way of introduction. "The opportunity-to-speak-to-y'all-in-the-Diag hip-hop music."

Fiasco spit a few verses - old and new material, with the crowd joining in occasionally - but told the 400-or-so gathered that he wasn't allowed to perform.

Students, many of whom saw the event advertised on Facebook.com and through e-mails, were able to get over the initial disappointment.

"I didn't know what to expect," said LSA sophomore Britney Rashleigh. "It's just good to see him, a celebrity in Ann Arbor - an African-American celebrity in Ann Arbor - and for everyone to come out."

At one point, a fan insisted on freestyling for Fiasco. Fiasco let the guy rap, though he joked, "You trying to take my shine, son."

But he then used him as an example. He said he wanted to listen to the wannabe rapper, saying that before current fame and fortune, Fiasco was just like him.

The event was sponsored by Atlantic Records's Urban College Network and the Michigan Chapter of Hip Hop Congress. The hip-hop star promoted his upcoming album The Cool.

Fiasco, whose real name is Wasalu Muhammad Jaco, took questions from the audience for about half an hour.

The questions were often pointed - not surprising for an outspoken artist known for the political content of his lyrics.

Despite its gibes, hip-hop appeals to gay men, women

By John-John Williams IV

The four hundred people draped in the latest urban threads on Thursday nights at Baltimore's The Hippo could sub for any popular hip-hop club in a major East Coast city. The line to the entrance snakes around the corner as hundreds eagerly wait for a chance to groove to the unmistakable bone-shaking thud of urban bass.

Upon entering the dance side of the club, the latest hits by T-Pain, Lloyd, Lil' Boosie and 50 Cent keep the dance floor packed. Small clusters of dancers gyrate to the beat. It isn't until the flashes of red, violet and white lights pierce the dark room that the stark differences between a stereotypical hip-hop club and the Hippo become apparent.

A group of men dressed in white T-shirts, Timberland boots and baggy pants held up by flashy gold belts dance with one another. An elbow's length away, a group of women - some dressed in sports jerseys, backward baseball caps and bandanas around their necks - reveals the dimensions of the club's gay clientele.
In Baltimore and elsewhere, hip-hop has found an unlikely ally in the gay community. The support is shocking because homosexuality completely challenges almost every rule that governs the testosterone-driven rap industry, which is hip-hop culture's crown jewel. Not only are there are no successful mainstream gay rappers, but gay slurs also are frequently tossed into rap lyrics.

By Jill Serjeant

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - After years of silence, rumor and a sordid trial, Michael Jackson has given his first major U.S. interview in a decade -- and has been pronounced normal.

Jackson, 49, appears on the front cover of the African-American magazine "Ebony" to mark the 25th anniversary of "Thriller" -- the world's best-selling studio album that also made him a superstar.

But the self-styled "King of Pop," who has largely shunned publicity since his 2005 trial and acquittal on child molestation charges, gave little glimpse of what the future holds despite hints in recent years that a comeback is in the works.

Song for campaign against sagging pants tells young men their exposed underwear means they’re closeted homosexuals

By John Wright

Homophobic lyrics in a locally produced rap song that’s part of a campaign against sagging pants have prompted the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation to get involved.

Rapper Dooney Da’ Priest’s “Pull Your Pants Up” has become the signature song for Dallas Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway’s push to eradicate sagging pants and exposed underwear, particularly among black youths. Caraway has unsuccessfully tried to get the City Council to pass an anti-sagging ordinance, but earlier this week the first of more than two dozen billboards urging people to “pull ‘em up” was unveiled.

In a reference to what he says is the origin of saggy pants, Da’ Priest appears to try to scare young men into pulling up their pants up by suggesting that if they don’t, it means they’re closeted homosexuals.

“You walk the streets with your pants way down low/I don't know/Looks to me like you’re on the down low,” Da’ Priest raps.

In the black community, “on the down low” is used to describe men who have sex with men but identify publicly as heterosexual.

In addition to penning the song, Da’ Priest reportedly helped design more than a dozen billboards that were donated to the anti-sagging campaign by Clear Channel. The billboards, which debuted this week, say things like, “That’s not hip-hop. That’s flip flop,” and, “Represent yourself like you present yourself.”

Click the icon to hear: "Pull Your Pants Up," by Dooney Da' Priest

“I’m here to say that hip-hop ain’t dead, he just needs to get free!” rapper and activist Tim’m T. West called out.

By Betsy Morais

Columbia, SC  Hip-hop artists flocked to Teachers College Monday evening for a film screening and to discuss representations of sexism, homophobia, and manhood in rap music.

The event featured music and a screening of the film Beyond Beats and Rhymes by activist Byron Hunt. It was sponsored by a diverse array of groups ranging from TC’s Black Student Network and to the Multicultural Greek Council.

“I began to feel very conflicted about the music that I loved,” Hunt said of his beloved hip-hop in the film. “I was like, ‘Yo, I need to make a film that breaks all this stuff down.’”

A diverse crowd packed into the Cowin Center Auditorium as a DJ pumped hip-hop music through the hall.

“I’m here to say that hip-hop ain’t dead, he just needs to get free!” rapper and activist Tim’m T. West called out. Wearing a T-shirt that read, “This is what a feminist looks like,” he kicked off the evening with some of his music.

“If it’s not intelligent, if it’s not moving us to a better place, then it’s not hip-hop,” said rapper Channel Live, who also performed.

In the film, Hunt interviewed rappers such as Fat Joe and Busta Rhymes, rap music executives, hip-hop experts, and teenagers immersed in hip-hop culture, confronting stereotypes and seeking the sources of what he finds to be a hostile, misogynist mindset in the rap world.

In the film, Hunt asked aspiring young rappers why they are “so preoccupied with gunplay,” and whether it is okay to call women “bitches and hos.” They felt that derogatory terms for women differentiated between “sisters” whom they respect, and “bitches,” who they do not.

By Akim Ade Larcher

Akim Ade Larcher hails from St. Lucia and is based in Toronto, Canada, where he is a human rights activist and the founder of the Stop Murder Music (Canada) coalition

It must appear easy for me to be writing from the comfort of my Canadian apartment, to express my concern on the homophobic environment present in the Caribbean region. I mean, I live in a country that publicly prides itself on the equality and justice of its citizens. I would however, like to make it resoundingly clear to my Caribbean brothers and sisters that as a gay black immigrant from the island of St.Lucia, I too experience issues of hate motivated crime, I too face homophobia in a purportedly progressive and metropolitan city like Toronto.

At the beginning of October, the Stop Murder Music (Canada) coalition along with groups like Egale Canada and Black Coalition for AIDS Prevention (Black CAP) sent a clear message that anti-gay dancehall artists like Elephant Man and Sizzla would not be welcomed on Canadian soil unless they publicly denounced their anti-gay lyrics which incite violence and murder against the gay and lesbian community. Both Elephant Man and Sizzla's Toronto concerts were cancelled, causing public education and outcry around the homophobic environment present in the Caribbean. The campaign against homophobia continues in Canada as well, and black gay and lesbian voices are coming forward to provide a face to homophobia within the black community.

South African Reggae star Lucky Dube is to be buried Sunday in a private family ceremony. Fans, however, have already paid an emotional tribute to the singer, who was shot to death a week ago in an attempted car jacking.

By Scott Bobb
Johannesburg

The public was not invited to the funeral of the late Reggae star Lucky Dube, but nearly 2,000 friends and fans gathered at a music hall in Soweto Wednesday for a memorial service. Band members, weeping openly as they performed without their star lead singer, sang, 'nobody can stop reggae.'

Two of Dube's daughters delivered an emotional eulogy. Daughter Laura said she would never forget him.

"Thugs have robbed us of our icon," she said. "We are going to miss you always."

Rap music has long been considered a form of resistance against authority. Boosted by the commercialization of the music industry, that message has proven its appeal to youth all around the world. Now, from Shanghai to Nairobi to São Paulo, hip-hop is evolving into a truly global art of communication.


By Jeff Chang

Inside the steaming walls of a nightclub in the heart of one of the world’s most dynamic cities, you can hear the sounds of the future. Hundreds of people gyrate rhythmically as a DJ spins hot beats. On stage, a pair of rappers face off, microphones in hand, trading verses of improvised rhyme. They look like typical hip-hop artists, dressed in baggy pants and baseball caps. But listen closely and you notice something unusual: They’re performing in Chinese. One rapper spits out words in a distinctive Beijing accent, scolding the other for not speaking proper Mandarin. His opponent from Hong Kong snaps back to the beat in a trilingual torrent of Cantonese, English, and Mandarin, dissing the Beijing rapper for not representing the people. The crowd goes wild, raucously voicing delight and dismay.

Dubbed "the Hip-Hop intellectual," Dyson has been named by Ebony magazine as one of the 100 most influential black Americans.

By Samara Kalk Derby

Michael Eric Dyson, perhaps the world's leading authority on hip-hop music, says that hip-hop culture is under assault in America.

"It is said to be the cause of all manner of evil in society and is blamed for rising rates of homicide in certain cities," Dyson told an audience of about 700 Wednesday night during his Distinguished Lecture Series talk at the Union Theater.

"It is seen as the elixir of those who are inebriated and intoxicated on violence. It is seen as the cause for whatever rising rates of teen pregnancy may prevail in local communities," he said. "It is seen as the vicious detritus of a culture gone mad on commercialized and commodified identities that have nothing to do with the authentic expression of blackness or brownness on the local scenes from which it emerges politically."

Hip-hop is seen as the cause of everything horrible in black youth, Latino youth and even in white youth culture, said Dyson, 49, the author of more than a dozen books including the recent "Know What I Mean? Reflections on Hip Hop."

Reggae icon Lucky Dube warned of the violence that took his life, writes Dingilizwe Ntuli

Do you ever worry about your house being broken into? Do you ever worry about your car being taken away from you in broad daylight down highway 54?
Do you ever worry about your wife becoming the women in black? Do you ever worry about leaving home and coming back in a coffin with a bullet through your head? So join us and fight this crime and corruption

This was Lucky Dube at his most provocative, in a song called Crime and Corruption. The lyrics seem stunningly prophetic after the popular singer was shot dead in a hijacking on Thursday night, in Johannesburg, in front of his young son and daughter.

In the song Dube was asking the powers that be whether it was the armed bodyguards around them 24 hours a day or the high walls they lived behind which made them oblivious to the cries of the ordinary people.

The lyrics reverberated across the country as South Africans condemned Dube’s senseless, violent killing.

· Youths kill Lucky Dube as his children look on
· Calls to end violence after 20,000 murders a year

By David Beresford
Johnannesburg

The South Africa musical world was in mourning yesterday after the murder of "reggae king" Lucky Dube, shot dead in an attempted car hijacking in Johannesburg.

The murder was carried out by two or three youths who apparently gave no warning or demands. Dube tried to drive away, but lost control of his car and crashed into a tree.

His son got out of the car and ran for help. His daughter, 16, also in the vehicle, was unharmed.

Immortal Technique Benefit show for the Jena 6 in NYC - NOV.1st in the BRONX - The birthplace of Hip Hop.

Thursday, November 1, 2007 Immortal Technique will return to NYC for a Benefit Concert for the Jena 6 at Lehman College in the Bronx, the birthplace of Hip Hop. Other hip hop benefit shows to be announced.

The Benefit for Jena 6 at Lehman College will be from 6PM - 9PM at Lovinger Theater.

Many hip hop and rap artists have spoke out in defense of the Jena 6. Immortal Technique says 'This is a benefit show with ALL proceeds going towards the legal defense fund for the Jena 6. It is important to rally and March but it is equally, if not more important, to speak by enforcing the necessary channels for legal action.

Immortal Technique Benefit Show for the Jena 6 in NYC, NOV.1st in the BRONX. Show your support for the Jena 6 and hear some great hip
hop at the same time.

Lehman College
The address is 250 Bedford Park Boulevard West,
Bronx NY, 10468.
The 4 and D trains stop at Bedford Park.

Tickets - Only walk up at the door for CUNY students All other people must buy them in ADVANCE.

$7 for Lehman students
$10 for non-Lehman CUNY students

CUNY show ID at the door. For anyone who is NOT a CUNY student and would like to attend this historic and very inexpensive concert for a
good cause tickets are limited the space is only 500 capacity.

Please call T'helah (845)803-2520
Carla (347) 668-7109 or email carla.whyte@lehman.cuny.edu )
Mobria S. 917-207-1714
Lamont B. 914-620-4708
Nicole D. 845-598-5106

And ask about the Jena 6 benefit on November 1st in the Bronx, the birthplace of Hip Hop.

Train directions: take the Uptown to 205 St B or D to

Bedford Park. Go straight out the station, make a right, and walk up 2 blocks to Lehman College. Come in through that first gate; the music building (that houses the theater) will be the first door on the right.

Or you can take the Uptown 4 train to Bedford Park, make a left, and walk up the block to Lehman...follow the same directions.

And don't forget if you can't make it I will be appearing the very next week for a special set at the Zulu Nation Anniversary. Much Respect.

In the Struggle,

Immortal Technique

Keep up on all the news on Immortal Technique and the Jena 6 Benifit concerts at www.myspace.com/immortaltechnique