New Hip Hop News

Every artist has their own specific vibe in the studio. Some enjoy recording with only the engineer in the room while others prefer bringing a group of people in the studio to capture an authentic vibe. Kanye West is notorious for enforcing a strict set of rules when in recording sessions. For My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, collaborators were forbidden from tweeting or wearing hipster hats. For Jesus Is King, ‘Ye directed those involved to abstain from pre-marital sex. And for Donda, everyone was expected to be wearing Yeezy merch.

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Fivio Foreign recently sat down with Power 106.1’s LA Leakers where he discussed coming back home and his relationship with Kanye. Fivio had one of the best verses on Donda and ended up spending a significant amount of time with ‘Ye. So, when it came down to his set of studio rules, he said that he would be making everyone wear his merch.

“Everybody gotta be wearing Fivio merch,” he told DJ Sour Milk and Justin Credible. “I learned that from ‘Ye. When we was at the ‘Ye shit… We had the vest on. He made us all wear Donda merch. Know we on Donda time.”

While there were bulletproof vests with Donda written in front of them, it seems like everyone was able to leave with a pair of Yeezys, as well.

“Yeezys, certain pants. No, this is what he do. It’s like a uniform. He’ll give us like Yeezys, some time of pants — some type of black cargo — and then Donda shirts. That’s what he do,” Fivio explained. “Uniform. So I guess it take away the, like, egos.”

Check the clip below.  

It’s been a roller coaster for T.I. of late, as the Atlanta rapper has recently found his reputation under scrutiny following a series of disturbing allegations. Though he attempted to offer his perspective on the controversy with the song “What It’s Come To,” many have been waiting to see how the situation plays out before drawing a firm conclusion. 

As it happens, T.I. actually addressed many of the allegations during an interview with the Big Facts Podcast, where hosts Big Bank, DJ Scream and Baby Jade inquired about some of the claims being made about Tip’s character. 

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“Listen man, that shit don’t hurt me,” says Tip, prompting Big Bank to cut straight to the heart of the matter. “What the hell they talking about you drugging hoes n’ shit?” asks Big Bank. “What’s going on with that shit!?”

T.I. shakes his head, adamantly maintaining that “shit didn’t happen.” He continues, explaining that the allegations eventually reached the ears of the feds. “That shit got sent to the feds,” he says. “They sent that shit to GBI. I trust every legal faculty to do their job.” Bank reminds T.I that there was a man leveling accusations against him — “you going crazy, boy!”

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“To be honest with you bro, stupid people listen to stupid people,” continues Tip. “It’s simple as that. The name of the show is Big Facts. You show me one motherfuckin’ big fact on the subject and we can have this discussion. This shit started January 29th.”

“You go to any superstar’s house or any kind of private gathering, you’re going to sign [an NDA],” he states. “Privacy and anonymity must be held in high regard. That don’t mean nobody doing anything.” When Bank notes that one of the parties involved — Sabrina Peterson — wanted an apology, Tip reacts with a defiant middle finger. “Hey man, I told you before,” he adds. “I know from whence my blessings come, I’m not negotiating with no terrorist. Do your worst.”

In another moment, Tip addresses how people have come to see him as a “creep,” noting that he believed he had earned goodwill through “decades of helping his community.” “Motherfuckers want me to be a creep so fucking bad,” he exclaims. “Where’d that come from? A Peepin-Tom ass muthafucka. An old under-the-bed-sniffin’-socks muthafucka. I ain’t never presented myself as nuthin’ but a playa. I don’t understand where this narrative came from.”

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“Let’s take the instance with my daughter Deyjah,” he continues, addressing a moment that many of his critics would likely call exhibit A. “I made a joke, I spoke on something. Granted, I probably shouldn’t have spoke on it, and it probably wasn’t a laughing matter. Only because she didn’t find it funny. How did it go from that to he must be messin with her, he forced her to go?”

“People are a culmination of our experiences,” he says. “Most people have been exposed to creep-ass n***as. Most people had some exposure to a creep, to where they see or hear certain things they expect creep shit. That’s what leads their opinions. No disrespect…I ain’t never had no experience as a child with a creep. I ain’t got no desire to be a creep.”

It’s a passionate response from the Atlanta rapper, though it’s uncertain as to whether or not it will turn the tides of public favor. In any case, T.I. seems determined to keep it moving, maintaining that his upcoming project Kill The King is due to be his last. “I don’t care enough,” he admits. “I just don’t care about the same shit other muthafuckers out there care about…At this point. It did at one time. When I went to prison and came home, I learned what the fuck was important.”

For those interested in hearing T.I. speaking on those topics and more, check out the full episode of the Big Facts Podcast below.

After spending the summer collaborating and hustling cowboys with T-Pain on “I Like Dat” (after T-Pain finally checked his DMs) admitting that, despite her support of the rising cannabis industry and the plant’s benefits, she stopped smoking back in 2018 and an appearance at last night’s Met Gala R&B songstress Kehlani made waves by announcing the title of her new album, Blue Water Road. 

Unfortunately, the singer did not include an official release date, only Tweeting that the project would touch down sometime “this winter.” She did, however, release a minute-long album trailer on both Twitter and Instagram. 

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Accompanied by the short message, “welcome to my world,” the trailer features cold visuals of broken clay masks, a dragonfly which calmly lands on Kehlani’s hands before disintegrating and being pulled into the Earth by what look like barbed-wire roots and a large, dark, looming presence which overtakes the singer just before the end of the video. As of now, there is no album art or tracklist to give a better idea of what to expect from Blue Water Road, but if this trailer is a taste of what’s to come, we can expect a cooler, more-intimate project.

Kehlani’s last album, It Was Good Until It Wasn’t, dropped last April and debuted at #2 on the Billboard Top 200. 

Kehlani is always experimenting and finding new ways to use her voice and sound which raises the question: what are you expecting from Blue Water Road? Something sounding like “I Like Dat” or something colder, closer to what we saw in this album trailer today? Let us know in the comments. 

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Despite Doja Cat’s array of insane outfits, Lil Nas X’s show-stopping performance of “Industry Baby” with Jack Harlow and everything else that happened *during* the MTV VMAs on Sunday night, the craziest headline came from before the award show even started. 

When Conor McGregor and Machine Gun Kelly crossed paths on the red carpet before both later appearing on stage, (McGregor as an award presenter, MGK as both a performer, performing his record “Papercuts” with Travis Barker, and an award recipient, winning Best Alternative Video for “My Ex’s Best Friend’) all hell broke loose. The story, according to TMZ, was that MGK refused to flick up with McGregor, McGregor lost his cool, threw a drink and the two were separated while Megan Fox stepped in between. 

McGregor was quick to point out that he doesn’t even know MGK aside from him being with Fox and that he only fights “real fighters” and not “little vanilla boy rappers.” MGK and Fox were quiet on the matter and things seemed to have died down and now, as he is one to do, McGregor is the only one still talking. 

Just after hitting the street, McGregor told the paparazzi in front of his hotel that there is “no beef” between he and MGK. Extending an invitation to his next fight, whenever McGregor has fully recovered from the gruesome leg injury he suffered weeks ago in a bout against Dustin Poirier, McGregor was welcoming in saying that “everyone’s more than welcome to come to my fight or come to the shows.” 

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After reiterating that he does not know MGK at all, however, McGregor made sure to drop a line about Fox before leaving it be. 

“I don’t know (MGK). Who is he? Megan’s been at the fights years, so I know Megan,” McGregor made clear. “Then I don’t know the guy. Come to the fights.” 

Whether or not we’ll ever get the real reasoning behind McGregor and MGK nearly coming to blows on VMA red carpet is a mystery but McGregor let it be known that MGK is always welcome at his fights. 

Is there actual beef between the two? Do you think we’ll see MGK at a McGregor fight once his leg is all healed up? Let us know in the comments. 

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If science fiction has taught us anything over the years, it’s that there stands an inherent danger whenever humankind decides to play God. And yet the temptation to seek progress, to satiate curiosity, and gain knowledge is often too strong to ignore. Sometimes, these desires can lead to some truly fascinating innovations. And, depending on who you ask, worrisome ones. 

It was recently reported that a new company by the name of Colossal, reported by Complex to have been founded by scientists and entrepreneurs, has set its sights on reviving the long-extinct Wooly Mammoth.

 Linda Davidson / The Washington Post via Getty Images

A majestic creature that has long intrigued Ice Age aficionados of all ages, the Wooly Mammoth is said to have gone extinct up to ten thousand years ago. Now, Colossal has amassed fifteen million dollars in private funding to bring the great beast back to life, their first step in an ambitious attempt to end extinction. 

While this may sound like a Jurassic Park sequel and/or reboot, it appears that there are several brilliant minds at the center of the project. A report from Stat News highlights the words of “Harvard scientist and DNA sequencing pioneer George Church,” who offered up a few thoughts on the undertaking. “This is a major milestone for us,” he says, speaking on the multi-million dollars worth of funding. “It’s going to make all the difference in the world.”

With experiments being conducted at laboratories in Boston and Dallas, one of the first major experiments will consist of “editing” existing elephant DNA in the hopes of being able to closely mirror that of the Mammoth. In time, the goal would be to produce an embryo of a Mammoth-esque elephant, with Colossal projecting that a calf could theoretically be born within a six-year timeframe.

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But that’s not the endgame — as stated on the company’s website, Colossal one day hopes to see “To see the Woolly Mammoth thunder upon tundra once again.” They also note the positive impact that herds of Mammoth could have on the Arctic Tundra. “By knocking down dark, sunlight-absorbing trees,” explains the Stat News report, “Mammoths, (or even cold-adapted elephants) would transform the tundra into light-reflecting grassland that keeps the ground colder, locking in the methane and creating a lot of plant matter to lock up carbon, too.”

Overall, it’s likely that the pursuit of bringing back the Wooly Mammoth will elicit both cautious optimism and general wariness from skeptics. Lest we forget about the lessons instilled by years of science fiction — including the aforementioned Jurassic Park, which highlighted the dangers of experimenting with prehistoric creatures. Still, it will certainly be interesting to see what the team at Colossal is able to do with a $15 million dollar budget and one hell of a dream– do you think they will succeed in their mission to end extinction as we know it?

[via]