A recent episode of Cartoon Network’s Teen Titans Go! featured a familiar hip-hop group: De La Soul. The trio composed of Posdnous, Trugoy, and Maseo appeared as their animated selves to fight a battle that most musicians could relate to: The group was tasked with taking down a giant octopus monster who was trying to steal their music. While they accomplished the mission, they didn’t do it without help from the Teen Titans who put their talents to use in order to defeat the monster, but not without freaking out over meeting the legendary rap group.
In some ways the episode is a cartoon representation of the group’s legal battle with their former label, Tommy Boy Records, over the ownership of their catalog prior to their 2004 album, The Grind Date, which includes their classic debut, 3 Feet High And Rising. To this day, the group’s back catalog has not been released on streaming stores of digital media stores. Prior to 2017, their back catalog was owned by Warner Records, but that year, Tommy Boy took over control.
Two years later, De La Soul said their catalog would soon appear on digital services but their dissatisfaction with receiving just 10% of the revenue sparked a renegotiation, one the group said ended in August 2019. However, last February Posdnuos said Tommy Boy “sort of came back to the table, we are looking to sort of get it going.”
Next month, D Smoke will have the opportunity to take home a Grammy award in the Best Rap Album and Best New Artist categories. The former comes as a result of his Black Habits project, which he released at the top of 2020. With help from Snoop Dogg, Ari Lennox, SiR, and more, the album proved to be a stellar body of work as it was met with positive reviews across the board. A little over a year removed from the album’s release, and weeks after its deluxe reissue, D Smoke stopped by Ebro Darden’s Rap Life Review show on Apple Music to discuss the nominations.
“I appreciate that because, a lot of people think popularity is the determinant factor,” he said in regards to being nominated in the Best Rap Album alongside Royce Da 5’9″, Freddie Gibbs, Nas, and Jay Electronica. “A lot of people determine their success by the numbers. When you got artists on their own dime and their own time that make something happen, that’s worth recognizing.” He added, “It’s artists that stream more than me. It’s artists that have more radio play than me. But if we’re talking about what I put out and the company that I’m amongst, I’m proud to see that list.”
Next, the Inglewood native touched on which one of his Grammy nominations is more important to him. “People ask me, ‘What’s more important, the Best New Artist or the Best Rap Album?’ I’m like, the Best Rap Album, because for the culture, I think it says so much, even to just be considered amongst those names.”
You can watch his full interview with Ebro Darden here.
Back in November, Nav dropped his second album of 2020 with Emergency Tsunami. The joint project with producer Wheezy followed Good Intentions, the second chart-topping project of his career. Now, Nav attempts to breathe new life into Emergency Tsunami with help from Gunna as they both stopped by Jimmy Kimmel Live! to perform their “Young Wheezy” collaboration. The two rappers delivered the performance aboard a small boat with a backdrop and sound effects that were made to emulate a strong seastorm.
Last year was a very productive period for both Nav and Gunna. In addition to his Good Intentions album, Nav dropped videos for songs that included “Don’t Need Friends” with Lil Baby and “No Debate” with Young Thug. Both were acts that appeared beside Nav on Emergency Tsunami along with Lil Keed and SahBabii. Gunna, on the other hand, was celebrated for his sophomore album, Wunna, which was heralded as one of the best hip-hop releases of 2020. Together, Nav and Gunna found success on Internet Money’s “Lemonade” with Don Toliver, a song that cracked the top-ten of the Billboard singles chart.
On a more recent note, Nav joined Rowdy Rebel for his “Jesse Owens” video while Gunna teamed with Tyla Yaweh and Wiz Khalifa for “All The Smoke.”
Aside from his “Masterpiece” single, DaBaby’s contributions to the music world in 2021 have come in the form of guest features. Looking to change that, the North Carolina rapper returned with a new freestyle over SpotEmGottem’s viral “Beat Box” track. The song has been a hit on TikTok thanks to a challenge that finds participants doing the accompanying dance in series of random locations. DaBaby takes part in the challenge in the comfort of his own home and outside of a gas station while he raps about his carefree approach to life, money, interactions with women, and more.
The freestyle arrives after DaBaby joined City Girls and BRS Kash for a steamy remix of “Throat Baby,” another track that found success thanks to social media. He also teamed with Megan Thee Stallion for their playful “Cry Baby” video which presents them as miniature dolls that come to life in a toy store after it closes for the night.
DaBaby recently shared that his rate for a guest verse jumped significantly from the start of his career. According to HotNewHipHop, the rapper posted on his Instagram Story that he went “from 5k a verse to 300k.” Up until recently, it seems like the rapper used the money to fund his own music videos, something he explained during a recent appearance on the Million Dollaz Worth Of Game podcast.
Last year, Young Dolph made the shocking announcement that he was quitting music to focus on his family life. But like several recent retirement announcements (Nicki Minaj, anyone?), it didn’t last long. Young Dolph returned with a bang with his polished album Rich Slave. Now, Young Dolph teams up with Key Glock to turn out even more tunes with their joint track “Case Closed.”
The song opens with a low, measured beat before the two rappers reflect on their rise to success. “Went from sleeping on the floor / Now my jewelry box froze / F*ck a boat, f*ck a store / Counted millions in a coat,” Young Dolph raps in the hook.
Ahead of the song’s release, Young Dolph came up with a clever way to promote his 2020 Rich Slave LP. Rather than go down the typical route of releasing album-specific merch (which he still did), the rapper upped the ante by hosting a giveaway contest with a Lamborghini Aventador as the prize. “Last week i walked in the garage to get on my 4wheeler and i looked at my Lambo and said to myself ‘Dolph u should give someone your aventador and let them enjoy it, u not doin nothin wit it,’” he had said alongside the giveaway.
Back in August, legendary R&B singers Brandy and Monica put their differences aside to go head-to-head with their hits in an edition of Verzuz. The battle broke records by having over a million viewers tuning in live, and Kamala Harris even made a quick appearance ahead of the performance. Now, the two have reunited once again to fuel their listeners’ nostalgia by recreating a part of their hit song “The Boy Is Mine.”
More than 23 years after Brandy and Monica first released the song, the two joined on screen for a TikTok. Each singer lip synced their lyrics over the part of “The Boy Is Mine” where the two debate who “the boy” actually belongs to. “Excuse me, can I please talk to you for a minute?” Brandy asks.
The duo did not say what inspired them to recreate the song so many years later, but it could have been sparked by a recent Jeopardy! question that referenced “The Boy Is Mine.”
In other Brandy news, the singer announced earlier this month that 1997 live action Cinderella remake is officially available to stream on Disney+. The film was originally made for TV and starred Brandy as Cinderella and Whitney Houston as the Fairy Godmother. At the time of its release, the musical was viewed by more than 60 million and ended up earning seven Emmy nominations.
Metallica played a concert to kick off BlizzCon on Twitch, but apparently not everyone got to actually hear the music they were playing at the online event. The first day of the annual Blizzard event streamed on Twitch on Friday night, and with it came a special performance by Metallica. But the actual audio that played on some channels got caught up in one of the music issues that often plagues streaming content.
On Friday, Twitter lit up with videos from the performance where, instead of Metallica classics, nondescript 8-bit music seemed to be playing instead.
the current state of Twitch: the official Twitch Gaming channel cut off the live Metallica concert to play 8bit folk music to avoid DMCA pic.twitter.com/sCn56So8Ee
And it wasn’t a dub; multiple people shared clips of varying length where Metallica is clearly on the Twitch channel but some other music is playing. Though that moment spread online like wildfire, it apparently wasn’t what happened on the main Blizzard Twitch page. Rather, it was the front page of Twitch Gaming which had to replace the music.
Apparently on Blizzard’s YT/Site/OfficialTwitch it was fine, this was front page TwitchGaming which probably didn’t have the rights to the music so nuked it ASAP. Hilarious seeing the chat reaction though
Still, it’s an interesting bit of irony at the complicated state of Twitch and the music copyright issues that often plague the platform. And as many people pointed out, DCMA takedowns are an issue in internet content creation that came directly from Metallica’s decades-old fight with Napster that set the tone for music copyrights.
The fact that metallica can’t even play their own music at the event they were invited to is fucking hilarious considering this is all literally their direct fault.
Right now the official Twitch Gaming channel is playing copyright free music over the top of Metallica’s live Blizzcon performance, so at to avoid copyright striking themselves.
The absolute state of music rights on the internet. My god.
Metallica not being able to play their own music live because of DMCA that came about in large part due to Metallica’s advocacy of it is a hell of a full circle.
No one seemed to have any sympathy for Metallica here, mostly because they’ve dealt with these sorts of issues in the past. Anyone who has streamed a video game that has original music in it has likely encountered takedown or muting issues, and game makers have had to introduce music elimination options to help streamers prevent their content from getting taken down.
I have a longer clip with Metallica playing and the Twitch production team transitioning seamlessly into the 8bit music but i’m afraid to post in fear of DMCA myself. good work music industry you bunch of ghouls
Ever since fans noticed that Megan Thee Stallion and Pardison Fontaine were commenting on each other’s Instagram posts, rumors began bubbling up about their suspected relationship. People were initially excited for the rapper and glad to see how happy he seemed to make her. But their opinions shifted when a video surfaced of Pardi drunkenly banging on Megan’s bathroom door. However, Megan recently cleared the air on social media and officially confirmed their relationship.
Megan took to Instagram Live to clarify the situation. Talking to her fans while blushing, Megan confirmed that Pardi was her “boyfriend” and told people to leave him alone:
“I don’t be liking some of the stuff on the internet. Like I did not like how everybody, not even everybody, people don’t know what the hell they talking about. They just be saying anything. I didn’t like what they were trying to say about Pardi because he’s so calm and so sweet. That’s my boo and I really like him. […] Ya’ll not about to play with my man. He not doing nothing to nobody. […] Yeah, he my boyfriend. He’s probably on the Live blushing. But yeah, stop playing with him. Ya’ll never been turnt up with your boyfriend before?”
Shortly after Megan came clean about their relationship, Pardi shared a handful of adorable photos of the two on Valentine’s Day.
Watch a clip Megan’s Instagram Live above.
Megan Thee Stallion is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
A bunch of new artists make debuts this week, while a pair of veterans continue to certify themselves within their given niches. Meanwhile, a fallen heroine makes a posthumous comeback, New York drill continues to establish its foothold, and the new wave of LA party rap favorites expands its influence.
Here is the best of hip-hop this week ending February 19, 2021.
Albums/EPs/Mixtapes
CJ — Loyalty Over Royalty
CJ
Staten Island drill newcomer CJ arrived with a splash last year thanks to his hit single “Whoopty.” He followed up earlier this year with “Bop,” proving he wasn’t just a one-hitter quitter. Now, he’s got a deal with Warner Records, and the eyes and ears of the world firmly focused on this debut EP to see if he can really stick.
Ghetts — Conflict Of Interest
Ghetts
UK grime mainstay Ghetts is on his third studio album, released under Warner Records. Featuring fellow British superstars Dave, Giggs, Skepta, Stormy, and Wretch 32 — talk about “star-studded” — his latest album is his most earnest and personal to date.
Lexii Alijai — Come Back Soon
Lexii Alijai
After passing away last year at just 21 years old, Lexii Alijai’s posthumous project arrives with much less fanfare than some other late, rising stars’ debut albums, but it’s just as appreciated by fans of her work, which included appearances on two Kehlani albums. Kyle Banks, P-Lo, and Wale make appearances to give a fond farewell to a powerful talent taken far too soon.
Lil Zay Osama — Trench Baby
Lil Zay Osama
Balancing tough trench talk and plainspoken vulnerability, Lil Zay Osama’s major-label debut (he signed to Warner in 2019) is replete with respected guest stars but offers a self-confident look at an artist who already has a strong sense of who he is and where he’s going. While Doe Boy, G Herbo, Jackboy, and Lil Tjay provide poignant counter perspectives to Osama’s, the story belongs to him alone.
Nef The Pharaoh — SINsational
Nef The Pharaoh
At this point, Nef The Pharaoh album releases have become an annual occurrence, as the Bay Area rapper maintains the consistency of his Vallejo mentor E-40. Here, he continues to walk the line between late-night function background music and truculent fight tunes.
Trippie Redd — Neon Shark vs Pegasus (Deluxe: Presented by Travis Barker)
Trippie Redd
Trippie wants to be a real rockstar and with the monstrous deluxe version of his already massive album Pegasus dropping today, he’s as close as he’s ever been. That’s thanks in part to Travis Barker, who produces the rock-heavy first half of the album, giving fans 14 all-new songs along with a pair of appearances from fellow Ohioan rapper turned rocker Machine Gun Kelly.
Singles/Videos
24kGoldn — “3, 2, 1”
After going to No. 1 on the Hot 100 with “Mood” in 2020, San Francisco sing-rapper 24kGoldn sets his sight on the chart once again with another bouncy, catchy, borderline schmaltzy tune designed to appeal to teenage emotions everywhere. Personally, I like a little schmaltz, and what 24k may lack in lyrical depth, he makes up in a gift for melody and genre-blending with a cross-demographic appeal.
BlueBucksClan — “Horace Grant”
Los Angeles party rap at its disrespectful, conversational, beat-jumping finest. The duo has rapidly developed up a reputation for turning things up and they live up to it here.
CJ — “Politics”
Smartly dropping another new single on the same day as his debut EP, Staten Island’s newest star continues to excavate new pockets for drill, filling them up with his slickly-worded boasts and distinctive, perfectly modulated voice.
Dusty Locane — “Intro 2 Me, Pt. 1”
If CJ is competing for drill’s still-vacant throne, Dusty might be his number-one rival, thanks to his polished storytelling and his voice, which is frighteningly similar to the throne’s former occupant’s. That voice is the primary draw on this drumless production, that lets him introduce himself clearly and concisely.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Last week, Meek Mill was leaving a club event and heading back to his car when he ran into Tekashi 69 and his crew. Upon seeing Meek, Tekashi began hurling insults and attempted to push past his security in order to start a fight with the rapper. The whole skirmish was caught on video and the footage went instantly viral, with Meek theorizing that the whole thing was just a publicity stunt. But Tekashi took things one step further with his new track “ZaZa.”
Tekashi debuted the track “ZaZa” Friday, which features a hard-hitting beat and the rapper’s boastful verses. But halfway through his song, Tekashi references his tiff with Meek. Instead of name-dropping the rapper through lyrics, Tekashi inserted a 10-second clip of the actual fight while the track’s video zooms in on Meek’s surprised face.
“ZaZa” arrives shortly after Meek revealed that he’s working on his own version of a diss track. The rapper shared a snippet of the upcoming song in a teaser posted to his social media. “You a b*tch, he a rat / You on the ‘Gram, like, who is that?” he raps in the preview.
Watch Tekashi 69’s “ZaZa” video above.
Meek Mill is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music group.
This was fun. 
(@cmclymer) 
