New Hip Hop News

Around this time last year, Lori Harvey and star actor Michael B. Jordan make their relationship official on Instagram. Now, the couple appears to be happy as ever, and they continue to make memories together.

On Thursday (Jan. 13), Lori turned 25 years old, and received birthday wishes from all of the people in her life. Michael was among these, as he posted a wholesome video on Instagram of them playing football with another couple at the beach to celebrate Lori’s big day: “Happy B-Day to my turtle. My favorite Patna in crime.”

This comes nearly two weeks after their anniversary where Lori deemed Jordan her “baby daddy,” as they celebrated the New Year’s holiday together.

Also for her birthday, Lori’s friends such as pop star Normani and actress Ryan Destiny among many others helped to organize a surprise party for her. She thanked them for the surprise with a cute post on Instagram afterwards: “I’m so grateful for my family and friends. it’s extremely hard to surprise me because I’m nosey lol but they managed to throw me the cutest surprise early birthday party!! It was so perfect and I’m so thankful to each and every one of you that showed up and made it happen and made me feel so special.”

Life seems to be going well fr both Lori Harvey and Michael B. Jordan as they continue to take on life together. Check out Michael B’s birthday post for Harvey below.

Although The Weeknd indicated before his Dawn FM release that he was not concerned about his album sales, his numbers have still been staggering. The album was released on Jan. 7, the first week of the year, and has been the driving force behind the incredible milestone Abel just reached recently.

On Jan. 15, The Weeknd surpassed 500 million streams in 2022 alone on Spotify. He was the first artist to pass this number this year, mostly due to Dawn FM. The project debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart this week with 154k equivalent album sales. The Weeknd shortened the timeline for Dawn FM‘s release to get it out sooner, which meant there were not any physical copies sold in its first week. So, all the album sales came from streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music.

The seven days after Dawn FM‘s release garnered The Weeknd 426 million streams on Spotify, which is the bulk of the numbers that led to him achieving 500 million streams so soon into 2022.

The only other major album releases so far this year have come from Gunna (Jan. 7), Cordae (Jan. 14) and FKA Twigs (Jan. 14), as The Weeknd is surely the most popular artist of this group.

Along with the songs on Dawn FM, The Weeknd’s previous After Hours album from early 2020 contained songs that have staying power such as hits “Blinding Lights” and “Heartless.” So, it is no surprise that Abel has been a streaming giant early on in the new year.

R&B Season is in full swing. This week, we have new tracks from FKA Twigs, Chris Brown, and Diplo to share with you as we continue to venture into 2022.

On her CAPRISONGS project, 34-year-old Twigs sets a magical tone, revealing that she’s in the midst of healing from all the trauma she’s endured over the years, but she’s still making time for fun with friends and constant self-growth.

We’ve added “ride the dragon” and “meta angel” to our playlist, but other titles that have quickly become standouts include “oh my love,” “papi bones” featuring Shygirl, and “darjeeling” with Jorja Smith and Unknown T.

Virginia-born vocalist Chris Brown also came through for us this week, dropping off a single called “Iffy,” which received an accompanying music video just days later. “NEW ERA HAS BEGUN!!!” Breezy told his Instagram followers while promoting the visual.

“THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO BELIEVES IN ME!!! THANKFUL FOR MY TEAM AND TEAM BREEZY,” he continued.

Last up on our list of new additions is Diplo’s “Forget About Me,” on which the DJ teams up with Durante and AlunaGeorge for an upbeat single that’s perfect for your next workout or commute to work.

What R&B tracks have you been loving this weekend? Leave a comment and let us know.

Over the past few months, Young Thug and R&B sensation Mariah the Scientist have led many people to believe that they are a couple. This story first gained momentum when Thug’s label, Young Stoner Life, posted photos of the pair cuddling together in the club in early November 2021.

However, Young Stoner Life also happens to the label that Jerrika Karlae is signed to, Young Thug’s former longtime girlfriend. The two have even put out music together, including 2018’s “U Ain’t Smile Enough” with Lil Duke and 2020’s “Jimmy Choo” with Gunna. 

After these rumors of Thug and Mariah became widespread, Karlae fans were bewildered by this, considering how long-standing his relationship with Karlae was. Just this past August, Karlae had mentioned the idea of marriage with Thug, and had given him a whopping $100,000 birthday gift. Now, she seems to be on the outside looking in.

After they were first spotted together, Thug and Mariah kept seeing each other, whether it be on a date at an Atlanta Falcons game, or their recent music video for their 2021 collaborative summer track “Walked In.” The visuals, released this week, depict Thug and Mariah getting married and enjoying time together as a couple. This leads many to believe they have gone public with their relationship.

Yesterday (Jan. 15), it seemed that Karlae had caught wind of this, as she appeared to tweet that missed Young Thug: “I miss my baby daddy.”

In response to a post that hinted at Karlae subliminally tweeting at Thug, she commented that it was messing up her plan to potentially get Thug back: “dangggg y’all name dropping , gone mess up my lil motion. all in my bag of chips.”

Via Instagram/@theneighborhoodtalk

Young Thug has not commented on his relationship with either Karlae or Mariah the Scientist since these rumors began, so it is left up to the fans to interpret how his love life is going nowadays.

Amber Rose has joined the conversation. As you may have heard, yesterday, January 15th, was a particularly traumatic day for 44-year-old Kanye West, who took to his Instagram page to plea for help after alleging that he wasn’t given the address of his youngest daughter’s birthday party.

“Chicago, happy birthday. I love you,” Ye said, publicly addressing his 4-year-old. “I’m just putting this online ‘cuz I need y’all support. I done called Kim, I texted the nannies, I got on the phone with Tristan, he said he’d ask Khloe. Won’t nobody give me the address to my daughter’s birthday party right now, and that’s gonna imprint in her mind that I wasn’t there for her, you get what I’m saying?”

Not long after his public plea, the Graduation hitmaker was given the address of the event by Travis Scott, and he also revealed that Kylie Jenner let him in, despite the fact that security was trying to keep him out, as the father of four says they’ve been trying to do quite frequently as of late.

“Kylie let me in right when I got to the spot, ’cause security stopped me once again when I got there. And, you know, it’s just a matter of having a conversation, open dialogue and everyone just had a great time. I’m just really happy I could be there for my children,” he told followers yesterday afternoon.

The Kimye divorce saga has certainly been a dramatic one, and things have only gotten wilder following the release of DONDA at the end of last summer. Shortly after the project’s tumultuous rollout, the rapper’s estranged wife made her Saturday Night Live hosting debut and kissed comedian Pete Davidson while West was in the audience – a move that apparently upset the Atlanta-born billionaire.

“How you gonna bring me to SNL, and kiss the dude you dating right in front of me? And everybody’s like, that’s cool,” he told Jason Lee of Hollywood Unlocked in a recent interview. “And I’m hearing that the new boyfriend is actually in the house, that I can’t even go to,” he added, although TMZ has since shared a report shutting down claims that the Staten Island native has ever been to his new girlfriend’s house, or met her children.

As things unfold, a 2015 tweet from another of the Yeezy creator’s exes – Amber Rose – has resurfaced, in which she seemingly predicts that the “FML” singer would end up being “humiliated” by the Kardashians.

“@kanyewest I’ll leave that up to the Kartrashians to humiliate [you] when they’re done with [you],” the 38-year-old model posted on February 20th, 2015.

Screenshots of the post have been circulating across social media, with users writing things like “she spoke the truth,” and “lmfao if ‘leave it in God’s hands’ was a person” in the replies.

What do you think about Kanye West and Kim Kardashian’s ongoing drama? Drop a comment and let us know.

Kanye West has hit the ground running on his reported Donda 2 album to start the year. At first, fans recently saw him in the studio with artists like Moneybagg Yo, A$AP Rocky, The Game, Pusha T, Scarface, Blueface and more, but there has always been a difference between making music and releasing music for Ye.

But, quickly after fans were teased with these enticing collaborations, the first release came to fruition on Friday (Jan. 14) with “Eazy,” a brand new single featuring The Game and produced by Hit-Boy and DJ Premier. It is now clear to fans that Kanye is sincere about this Donda 2 execution and rollout.

Most recently, footage appeared of Ye and Pusha T shooting a music video for an unnamed song. A collaboration from these two would be the first track they’d put out together since “What Would Meek Do?” on Pusha T’s 2018 Kanye-produced album DAYTONA.

In 2021, the two did feature on “Tell The Vision” on Pop Smoke’s posthumous album FAITH, but this upcoming song will likely be a Kanye West release. As part of the listening parties for Donda last summer, Kanye previewed an unreleased song titled “South Carolina” with Pusha T more than once, but it did not make the final tracklist for the album.

Now, we may finally get to see the return of Ye and his G.O.O.D. Music brother Pusha T soon, as they were both seen in the studio with A$AP Rocky just days ago.

Check out the brief sneak peek of Kanye and Pusha T’s music video below.