The Neptunes would go on to work with many of the 2000s’ biggest stars, helping to transform the careers of Justin ...

From reverb-drenched dub to hair-raising field recordings, these are the most memorable sets that the last month had to offer ...

I forget who coined it, but “ghetto spy music,” has entered my permanent lexicon as a way to describe some of my favorite rap songs. Fullychop, only 17 years old and out of Chicago, is not only on a ...

Video Music Box co-founder Ralph McDaniels will be honored by the Paid In Full Foundation this weekend in Las Vegas.

Growing up in East Tennessee, it wasn’t uncommon for your neighbor or grocery cashier or mailman to ask, unprompted, if you’d found your “church home” yet; my devoutly religious first-grade teacher ...

If form does, in fact, follow function, then it’s fitting that the one time Serengeti sounds like Drake is when he’s rapping as a character whose mansion was sold to a “crypto kid from Miami.” “He put ...

Theoretically, a Kanye and Jay-Z song produced by Lex Luger that sounds like the slo-mo bombing of a Gothic cathedral should be the greatest thing ever made. In practice, it was the first song I ever ...

“After Further Review” was an idea I came up with years ago to discuss key recordings long after their original release, exploring whether the passage of time led to a change of perspective or new ...

At this point, we know the supposed story: Napster and the internet in general leveled the playing field for hip-hop. Blogs and message boards helped artists and scenes transcend location and ...

Editor’s note: Over the course of this year, we’re publishing a series of essays about the rap albums that defined 2001, both creatively and industrially, and whether they predicted or were abandoned ...

I’m guilty of using the metaphor in a single way. As a critic, I’ve sometimes referred to works as being xeroxes of other, more original ones. This is not complicated or cryptic—biting, copying, track ...