Download or read book Mo Meta Blues written by Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson and published by Grand Central Publishing. This book was released on 2013-06-18 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "You have to bear in mind that [Questlove] is one of the smartest motherf*****s on the planet. His musical knowledge, for all practical purposes, is limitless." --Robert Christgau A punch-drunk memoir in which Everyone's Favorite Questlove tells his own story while tackling some of the lates, the greats, the fakes, the philosophers, the heavyweights, and the true originals of the music world. He digs deep into the album cuts of his life and unearths some pivotal moments in black art, hip hop, and pop culture. Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson is many things: virtuoso drummer, producer, arranger, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon bandleader, DJ, composer, and tireless Tweeter. He is one of our most ubiquitous cultural tastemakers, and in this, his first book, he reveals his own formative experiences--from growing up in 1970s West Philly as the son of a 1950s doo-wop singer, to finding his own way through the music world and ultimately co-founding and rising up with the Roots, a.k.a., the last hip hop band on Earth. Mo' Meta Blues also has some (many) random (or not) musings about the state of hip hop, the state of music criticism, the state of statements, as well as a plethora of run-ins with celebrities, idols, and fellow artists, from Stevie Wonder to KISS to D'Angelo to Jay-Z to Dave Chappelle to...you ever seen Prince roller-skate?!? But Mo' Meta Blues isn't just a memoir. It's a dialogue about the nature of memory and the idea of a post-modern black man saddled with some post-modern blues. It's a book that questions what a book like Mo' Meta Bluesreally is. It's the side wind of a one-of-a-kind mind. It's a rare gift that gives as well as takes. It's a record that keeps going around and around.

Download or read book Check the Technique written by Brian Coleman and published by Villard. This book was released on 2009-03-12 with total page 530 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Tribe Called Quest • Beastie Boys • De La Soul • Eric B. & Rakim • The Fugees • KRS-One • Pete Rock & CL Smooth • Public Enemy • The Roots • Run-DMC • Wu-Tang Clan • and twenty-five more hip-hop immortals It’s a sad fact: hip-hop album liners have always been reduced to a list of producer and sample credits, a publicity photo or two, and some hastily composed shout-outs. That’s a damn shame, because few outside the game know about the true creative forces behind influential masterpieces like PE’s It Takes a Nation of Millions. . ., De La’s 3 Feet High and Rising, and Wu-Tang’s Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers). A longtime scribe for the hip-hop nation, Brian Coleman fills this void, and delivers a thrilling, knockout oral history of the albums that define this dynamic and iconoclastic art form. The format: One chapter, one artist, one album, blow-by-blow and track-by-track, delivered straight from the original sources. Performers, producers, DJs, and b-boys–including Big Daddy Kane, Muggs and B-Real, Biz Markie, RZA, Ice-T, and Wyclef–step to the mic to talk about the influences, environment, equipment, samples, beats, beefs, and surprises that went into making each classic record. Studio craft and street smarts, sonic inspiration and skate ramps, triumph, tragedy, and take-out food–all played their part in creating these essential albums of the hip-hop canon. Insightful, raucous, and addictive, Check the Technique transports you back to hip-hop’s golden age with the greatest artists of the ’80s and ’90s. This is the book that belongs on the stacks next to your wax. “Brian Coleman’s writing is a lot like the albums he covers: direct, uproarious, and more than six-fifths genius.” –Jeff Chang, author of Can’t Stop Won’t Stop “All producers and hip-hop fans must read this book. It really shows how these albums were made and touches the music fiend in everyone.” –DJ Evil Dee of Black Moon and Da Beatminerz “A rarity in mainstream publishing: a truly essential rap history.” –Ronin Ro, author of Have Gun Will Travel

Download or read book Parental Discretion Is Advised written by Gerrick D. Kennedy and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2017-12-05 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Experience the stunning rise, fall, and legacy of N.W.A. and how they put their stamp on pop culture, black culture, and hip-hop music forever in this “incredibly vivid look at one of music’s most iconic groups” (Associated Press). In 1986, a group was formed that would establish the foundation of gangsta rap and push the genre forward, electrifying fans with their visceral and profane lyrics that glorified the dark ways of street life and brazenly challenged the police system. Eazy-E, Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, MC Ren, and DJ Yella caused a seismic shift in hip-hop when they decided to form N.W.A in 1986. With their hard-core image, bombastic sound, and lyrics that were equal parts poetic, lascivious, conscious, and downright in-your-face, N.W.A spoke the truth about life on the streets of Compton, California—then a hotbed of poverty, drugs, gangs, and unemployment. Going beyond the story portrayed in the 2015 blockbuster movie Straight Outta Compton, through firsthand interviews, extensive research, and top-notch storytelling, Los Angeles Times music reporter Gerrick Kennedy transports you back in time and offers a front-row seat to N.W.A’s early days and the drama and controversy that followed the incendiary group as they rose to become multiplatinum artists. Kennedy leaves nothing off the table in his pursuit of the full story behind the group’s most pivotal moments, such as Ice Cube’s decision to go solo after their debut studio album became a smash hit; their battle with the FBI over inflammatory lyrics; incidents of physical assault; Dr. Dre’s departure from the group to form Death Row Records with Suge Knight; their impact on the 1992 L.A. riots; Eazy-E’s battle with AIDS; and much more. A bold, riveting, “non-stop, can’t-put-it-down ride” (Library Journal), Parental Discretion Is Advised unveils the true and astonishing history of one of the most transcendent and controversial musical groups of the 1980s and 1990s.

Download or read book Hip Hop Raised Me written by DJ Semtex and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2019-02-26 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The definitive volume on the massive and enduring impact of hip hop over the last forty years, now in a compact paperback edition. In 2008, with help from Jay-Z and Puff, Barack Obama got the hip hop vote, and became the first African American to be elected president. For a brief moment, the “Audacity of Hope” seemed attainable. The 2014 Ferguson riots signaled the end of that hope, and in 2016 the hip hop community had to grapple with the election of Donald J. Trump as Obama’s successor. Now more than ever, hip hop artists such as J. Cole and Kendrick Lamar are the voice of the voiceless. In the new, updated compact edition of Hip Hop Raised Me., DJ Semtex examines the crucial role of hip hop in society and reflects on the positive influence it has had on his own life, and the lives of disaffected youths from generation after generation. Featuring specially commissioned photography and seminal interviews he conducted with key artists such as Jay-Z, Kanye West, Eminem, Drake, Nicki Minaj, and Nas, Semtex traces the course of hip hop from its origins in the early 1970s through its breakthrough to the mainstream and the advent of gangsta rap in the late 1980s to the global industry that it has become today.

Download or read book Decoded written by Jay-Z and published by One World. This book was released on 2010-12-07 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Decoded is a book like no other: a collection of lyrics and their meanings that together tell the story of a culture, an art form, a moment in history, and one of the most provocative and successful artists of our time. Praise for Decoded “Compelling . . . provocative, evocative . . . Part autobiography, part lavishly illustrated commentary on the author’s own work, Decoded gives the reader a harrowing portrait of the rough worlds Jay-Z navigated in his youth, while at the same time deconstructing his lyrics.”—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times “One of a handful of books that just about any hip hop fan should own.”—The New Yorker “Elegantly designed, incisively written . . . an impressive leap by a man who has never been known for small steps.”—Los Angeles Times “A riveting exploration of Jay-Z’s journey . . . So thoroughly engrossing, it reads like a good piece of cultural journalism.”—The Boston Globe “Shawn Carter’s most honest airing of the experiences he drew on to create the mythic figure of Jay-Z . . . The scenes he recounts along the way are fascinating.”—Entertainment Weekly “Hip-hop’s renaissance man drops a classic. . . . Heartfelt, passionate and slick.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Download or read book The Cupid Guild The Complete Series written by L. Penelope and published by Heartspell Media. This book was released on 2020-08-18 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of short, sexy, romances with a touch of the paranormal. This is a box set of The Cupid Guild series containing all four stories. It does not contain any material that has not been previously published in separate volumes. The Cupid Mixup The Montagne hotel might as well have been a castle, and he might as well have been the prince. I met him in the bar late one night and it was obvious he was too much for me — too handsome, too charming, too rich. And while I could pretend I was a princess for a night, at the stroke of midnight, I ran away without giving him my name. I didn’t leave my shoe behind, but I might have just lost my heart. Can the Cupid Guild help this modern-day Cinderella get her second chance? A quick, sexy, standalone romance with a paranormal touch. The story first appeared in Heart’s Kiss magazine, published as “Before I Go.” The Cupid Getaway When curiosity leads Renee to duck under the caution tape marking off the top floor of a college house party, she’s not quite prepared to find Milo. The popular girl and the solitary boy couldn’t be more different, so why does he make her broken heart feel whole again? One night changes everything, but in the morning, the gulf between their lives looks impossible to cross. Can the Cupid Guild magnetize these opposites before their chance at a happily ever after runs out? A quick, sexy, standalone romance with a paranormal touch. The story first appeared in Heart’s Kiss magazine, under the title “Before I Fall.” The Cupid Complication This just might be the worst day of my life. I quit my job and walked out—without my purse, wallet, or keys. The good Samaritan who returns my stuff is none other than our friendly, neighborhood rock star. Did I say worst day? I meant best. But when this drummer’s dreams for the future are more than I can give, will that leave us playing out of tune? Can the Cupid Guild bring this musician and his muse together in sweet harmony? A quick, standalone romance with a paranormal touch. The story first appeared in Heart’s Kiss magazine, under the title “Before I Run.” The Cupid Fiasco While trapped in a basement during an earthquake, sparks fly between co-workers Luce and Mat—too bad they’re sparks of rage. So when Mat needs a fake girlfriend for a weekend engagement party in wine country, there’s no way Luce will say yes… is there? It’s up to the Cupid Guild to show this salty pair how sweet it could be. A sexy, standalone romance with a paranormal touch. This novella first appeared in Heart’s Kiss magazine, under the title “Before I Break.”

Download or read book Rap on Trial written by Erik Nielson and published by The New Press. This book was released on 2019-11-12 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A groundbreaking exposé about the alarming use of rap lyrics as criminal evidence to convict and incarcerate young men of color Should Johnny Cash have been charged with murder after he sang, "I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die"? Few would seriously subscribe to this notion of justice. Yet in 2001, a rapper named Mac whose music had gained national recognition was convicted of manslaughter after the prosecutor quoted liberally from his album Shell Shocked. Mac was sentenced to thirty years in prison, where he remains. And his case is just one of many nationwide. Over the last three decades, as rap became increasingly popular, prosecutors saw an opportunity: they could present the sometimes violent, crime-laden lyrics of amateur rappers as confessions to crimes, threats of violence, evidence of gang affiliation, or revelations of criminal motive—and judges and juries would go along with it. Detectives have reopened cold cases on account of rap lyrics and videos alone, and prosecutors have secured convictions by presenting such lyrics and videos of rappers as autobiography. Now, an alarming number of aspiring rappers are imprisoned. No other form of creative expression is treated this way in the courts. Rap on Trial places this disturbing practice in the context of hip hop history and exposes what's at stake. It's a gripping, timely exploration at the crossroads of contemporary hip hop and mass incarceration.

Download or read book How Music Can Make You Better written by Indre Viskontas and published by Chronicle Books. This book was released on 2019-04-02 with total page 125 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How can certain songs carry us through a tough workout, comfort us after a breakup, or unite 50,000 diverse fans? In this fascinating field guide, neuroscientist and opera singer Indre Viskontas investigates what music is and how it can change us for the better—from deep in our neurons to across our entire society. Whether hip-hop fans, classically trained pianists, or vinyl collectors, readers will think about their favorite songs in a whole new way by the end of this book. This is a vibrant and smart gift for any audiophile.

Download or read book The Musical Artistry of Rap written by Martin E. Connor and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2018-01-14 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For years Rap artists have met with mixed reception--acclaimed by fans yet largely overlooked by scholars. Focusing on 135 tracks from 56 artists, this survey appraises the artistry of the genre with updates to the traditional methods and measures of musicology. Rap synthesizes rhythmic vocals with complex beats, intonational systems, song structures, orchestration and instrumentalism. The author advances a rethinking of musical notation and challenges the conventional understanding of Rap through analysis of such artists as Eminem, Kanye West and Jean Grae.

Download or read book The 10 Traits of Successful Hip Hop Artists written by Blueprint and published by . This book was released on 2020-09-29 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While much attention has been paid to the lifestyles of successful hip-hop artists, very little attention has been paid to what they did to achieve their success. For the first time ever, the code has been broken. In the 10 Traits of Successful Hip-Hop Artists, rapper/producer Blueprint breaks down the ten traits behind some of the most successful artists in hip-hop and explains how to develop those same traits.

Download or read book Hurricanes written by Rick Ross and published by Harlequin. This book was released on 2019-09-03 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER* *AN XXL BEST RAPPER-PENNED BIOGRAPHY* “A gripping journey.”—People The highly anticipated memoir from hip-hop icon Rick Ross chronicles his coming of age amid Miami’s crack epidemic, his star-studded controversies and his unstoppable rise to fame. Rick Ross is an indomitable presence in the music industry, but few people know his full story. Now, for the first time, Ross offers a vivid, dramatic and unexpectedly candid account of his early childhood, his tumultuous adolescence and his dramatic ascendancy in the world of hip-hop. Born William Leonard Roberts II, Ross grew up “across the bridge,” in a Miami at odds with the glitzy beaches, nightclubs and yachts of South Beach. In the aftermath of the 1980 race riots and the Mariel boatlift, Ross came of age at the height of the city’s crack epidemic, when home invasions and execution-style killings were commonplace. Still, in the midst of the chaos and danger that surrounded him, Ross flourished, first as a standout high school football player and then as a dope boy in Carol City’s notorious Matchbox housing projects. All the while he honed his musical talent, overcoming setback after setback until a song called “Hustlin’” changed his life forever. From the making of “Hustlin’” to his first major label deal with Def Jam, to the controversy surrounding his past as a correctional officer and the numerous health scares, arrests and feuds he had to transcend along the way, Hurricanes is a revealing portrait of one of the biggest stars in the rap game, and an intimate look at the birth of an artist.

Download or read book Book of Rhymes written by Adam Bradley and published by Civitas Books. This book was released on 2017-06-27 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: If asked to list the greatest innovators of modern American poetry, few of us would think to include Jay-Z or Eminem in their number. And yet hip hop is the source of some of the most exciting developments in verse today. The media uproar in response to its controversial lyrical content has obscured hip hop's revolution of poetic craft and experience: Only in rap music can the beat of a song render poetic meter audible, allowing an MC's wordplay to move a club-full of eager listeners. Examining rap history's most memorable lyricists and their inimitable techniques, literary scholar Adam Bradley argues that we must understand rap as poetry or miss the vanguard of poetry today. Book of Rhymes explores America's least understood poets, unpacking their surprisingly complex craft, and according rap poetry the respect it deserves.

Download or read book Losing My Cool written by Thomas Chatterton Williams and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2010-04-29 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A pitch-perfect account of how hip-hop culture drew in the author and how his father drew him out again-with love, perseverance, and fifteen thousand books. Into Williams's childhood home-a one-story ranch house-his father crammed more books than the local library could hold. "Pappy" used some of these volumes to run an academic prep service; the rest he used in his unending pursuit of wisdom. His son's pursuits were quite different-"money, hoes, and clothes." The teenage Williams wore Medusa- faced Versace sunglasses and a hefty gold medallion, dumbed down and thugged up his speech, and did whatever else he could to fit into the intoxicating hip-hop culture that surrounded him. Like all his friends, he knew exactly where he was the day Biggie Smalls died, he could recite the lyrics to any Nas or Tupac song, and he kept his woman in line, with force if necessary. But Pappy, who grew up in the segregated South and hid in closets so he could read Aesop and Plato, had a different destiny in mind for his son. For years, Williams managed to juggle two disparate lifestyles- "keeping it real" in his friends' eyes and studying for the SATs under his father's strict tutelage. As college approached and the stakes of the thug lifestyle escalated, the revolving door between Williams's street life and home life threatened to spin out of control. Ultimately, Williams would have to decide between hip-hop and his future. Would he choose "street dreams" or a radically different dream- the one Martin Luther King spoke of or the one Pappy held out to him now? Williams is the first of his generation to measure the seductive power of hip-hop against its restrictive worldview, which ultimately leaves those who live it powerless. Losing My Cool portrays the allure and the danger of hip-hop culture like no book has before. Even more remarkably, Williams evokes the subtle salvation that literature offers and recounts with breathtaking clarity a burgeoning bond between father and son. Watch a Video

Download or read book Write Lines Adventures in Rap Journalism written by Andrew Emery and published by Velocity Press. This book was released on 2024-03-08 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Having failed at rapping, what’s next for an endlessly passionate rap nerd? In this sequel to the acclaimed memoir Wiggaz With Attitude, it turns out what’s next is a sometimes controversial career in rap journalism. Write Lines: Adventures in Rap Journalism tells the tale of hip-hop writing from the inside. From death threats to interviewing Lauryn Hill while she’s in the shower. From calling Jay-Z a c*** to his face, to letting a notorious rapper sleep in his bath, it’s a hilarious, anecdote-studded tale that takes in hip-hop's first ever magazine and lifts the lid on rivalries, squabbles and how music journalism really works. Brutally honest and endlessly opinionated, Write Lines is also a love letter to hip-hop as it changed seismically through the decades. It charts those changes from the front line through encounters with many of the greats of rap: Chuck D, Missy Elliott, RZA, Eminem, Jazzy Jeff and Gang Starr. This is an unfiltered tale of hip-hop that is both heartfelt and scabrously funny.

Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to Hip Hop written by Justin A. Williams and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2015-02-12 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Companion covers the hip-hop elements, methods of studying hip-hop, and case studies from Nerdcore to Turkish-German and Japanese hip-hop.

Download or read book CMJ New Music Monthly written by and published by . This book was released on 2003-06 with total page 64 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: CMJ New Music Monthly, the first consumer magazine to include a bound-in CD sampler, is the leading publication for the emerging music enthusiast. NMM is a monthly magazine with interviews, reviews, and special features. Each magazine comes with a CD of 15-24 songs by well-established bands, unsigned bands and everything in between. It is published by CMJ Network, Inc.

Download or read book How Music Works written by David Byrne and published by Crown. This book was released on 2017-05-02 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • David Byrne’s incisive and enthusiastic look at the musical art form, from its very inceptions to the influences that shape it, whether acoustical, economic, social, or technological—now updated with a new chapter on digital curation. “How Music Works is a buoyant hybrid of social history, anthropological survey, autobiography, personal philosophy, and business manual”—The Boston Globe Utilizing his incomparable career and inspired collaborations with Talking Heads, Brian Eno, and many others, David Byrne taps deeply into his lifetime of knowledge to explore the panoptic elements of music, how it shapes the human experience, and reveals the impetus behind how we create, consume, distribute, and enjoy the songs, symphonies, and rhythms that provide the backbeat of life. Byrne’s magnum opus uncovers thrilling realizations about the redemptive liberation that music brings us all.