Due to some embarrassing performances and some fundamental misunderstandings about the culture, breakdancing didn’t exactly get its due at the 2024 Olympics. Taking place at Venice Beach, Florida last month, Red Bull’s BC One did its part to do right by the hallowed hip-hop tradition. Since 2004, Red Bull BC One has been breakdancing's Super Bowl and Olympics, not only pitting the world’s best breakdancers against each other for B-Boy and B-Girl supremacy, but showcasing the way the art form has expanded from New York City parks to street corners around the globe. Growth at the expense of re ..read more

For his latest song, Flying Lotus wants to make you dance. The talented producer and creative polymath has released “Ingo Swann,” a four-on-the-floor house song that booms from beginning to end (and is named after the late purported psychic). “Ingo Swann” follows the release of “Garmonbozia,” which FlyLo released back in August. Hopefully, the two singles signal a new album is on the way for the artist. Unless you’re counting the soundtrack he made for the Netflix anime series Yasuke, the last album FlyLo released was 2019’s Flamagra. In recent years, he’s been more involved with writing an ..read more

With time comes perspective and, often, the ability to laugh at yourself. Pharrell enjoyed that personal liberation while remembering his turn as the hookman on Snoop Dogg’s second Paid Tha Cost to Be Da Bo$ single, “Beautiful.” During an appearance on CBS Sunday Morning yesterday, Skateboard P recalled appearing on the song, comparing his quirky falsetto to the voice of an iconic cartoon character. “I had a song called ‘Beautiful’ with Snoop, right?” he began. “Girls heard me singing that. I heard Mickey Mouse. ... I swear to you, when you just get a moment and you just listen, you’ll never ..read more

“From the top of the key for three, villain.” In that husky, low timbre, MF DOOM starts off his first of two guest verses on “Rock Co.Kane Flow,” the album closer for De La Soul’s seventh album, The Grind Date. It’s an anticipated moment, even now, 20 years since the album was released. Jake One’s sparse, no-frills beat — just stomping and thudding drums and piano plinks — is fitting terrain for the Villain, as DOOM fills up the space with his coolly disjointed delivery. It’s essentially a DOOM track, with the MC commandeering “Rock Co. Kane Flow” to wax poetic about his pay rate for writi ..read more

Weeks after Diddy was indicted on sex trafficking and racketeering charges, his mother has stepped forward to defend his name. In a statement she released through the law firm Figgers Law on Sunday, Janice Combs expressed her disappointment over the charges while proclaiming his innocence. “I come to you today as a mother that is devastated and profoundly saddened by the allegations made against my son, Sean Combs. It is heartbreaking to see my son judged not for the truth, but for a narrative created out of lies,” Janice wrote. “To bear witness [to] what seems like a public lynching of my s ..read more

There are more treats than tricks to be had when it comes to new music in October. The month is already starting strong, with new songs from Benny the Butcher and 38 Spesh’s upcoming collab album, Stabbed & Shot 2, as well as a new track from Erick the Architect. As for albums, there are a couple that are deluxe versions of previously released projects, but we’ll let it slide since they both have some new songs (with one of them having 10 new tracks). Alongside these deluxe releases are new albums from Rome Streetz and Daringer, Leon Bridges and the first Rich Homie Quan album to be rele ..read more

If Cash Cobain is the general of sexy drill, then Bay Swag is something like the lieutenant. After developing a following throughout the late 2010s and very early 2020s, Bay hit a new wave of momentum with “Fisherrr,” an understated, yet irresistible single that became a Song of the Summer contender upon its release. With frenetic soundscapes, brazenly flirty lyrics and a penchant for hooks, he’s only continued his level up. This past summer, Bay hit the road with Ice Spice for her Y2K! World Tour. If you’ve been to New York shows through the fall, there’s a decent chance he appeared as a sp ..read more

After Ms. Lauryn Hill’s Fugees co-member Pras announced he was suing her for fraud and breach of contract on Tuesday, Hill has shared a statement addressing the lawsuit. In a report from Variety, Pras filed a lawsuit against Hill in New York, suing her for fraud, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty and refusal to permit an audit of the Fugees’ shortened reunion tour last year. All of the claims stem from the tour. As the report noted, Pras accuses Hill of mismanaging the tour, including handling its budget “that was so bloated with unnecessary and, most likely fictitious, expenses ..read more

While enveloping Webster Hall in a haze of boom-bap nostalgia last Thursday, Common took a break for a date. Kicking back on a tomato-red couch, Com unfurled a folksy freestyle for both the crowd and the lady — an audience member — sitting next to him. With Pete Rock and classic vinyl behind him, he delivered a free-wheeling and immediate rhyme session, nodding toward celebrity guests like DJ Premier and just about anything else his racing mind could conjure. With its blend of a gymnast’s acrobatics and an easygoing, but focused mic presence, it was technically sharp yet occasionally clumsy ..read more

Any way you look at it, Quando Rondo has been as troubled as he is talented. Since emerging from Savannah, Georgia in 2017, he’s blended pain melodies with blunt street raps to become a powerful young voice in Peach State hip-hop. But legal issues and explosive rap beefs have often threatened to overshadow his talent behind a microphone. Ahead of his December prison sentencing for a federal drug charge, Quando has been perfecting ways to take the good with the bad, staying out of the spotlight while jumping into the world of community service and putting the finishing touches on his new albu ..read more