Pat Corcoran (Chance The Rapper’s manager) released a statement last night via Chance’s Twitter, revealing that the artist is suffering from a combination of the flu virus and tonsillitis and may require surgery. As a result, all tour dates for the rest of the week have been cancelled. Read the full statement below.
UPDATE #2: Just Blaze had taken to Twitter recently to speak on Chauncey Mahan, and it’s kind of hilarious (below).
“Chauncey stayed effing up. Big part of the reason Hip and I brought in Guru…Ill never forget the day Chaunce stepped to Duro wanting to fight lol. This guy ruined every tape transfer for the Dynasty Album. Duro calls him out on it. He runs over to Soundtrack studios, comes in the room like “yo Duro I ain’t no b*tch” takes his jacket off. Me and Duro just looked at him. Blankest of stares.. And went back to work. If you listen to Bleek’s version of “is that your b***h” you’ll notice it’s in mono. Why? Bc Chauncey. Lol. If u listen to “get your mind right” from Dynasty, You’ll notice all the choruses after the first one fall in the wrong places. Bc Chauncey. We had to re record “streets is talking” vox. Why? Bc Chauncey. We eventually got tired of it. I randomly ended up doing a session with this new engineer who called himself @Young_Guru. He was young, understood the sound, and knew what he was doing. Brought him in on a Hov session as a test and it clicked. Rest is history. Oh. And I have backups of just about all of those files Chauncey tried to extort for. Dummy. Last thing @ind3lible and I did before we shut down baseline was a digital back up of EVERYTHING that was ever done there. EVERYTHING.”
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UPDATE: According to Hypetrak, the producer who’s being accused of extortion stated that “Def Jam had requested that he hold on the recordings and claiming his prior attempts to hand them over in the last ten years had been ignored by Jay Z’s camp”. Riiiiight.
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From TMZ:
A collection of Jay Z master recordings — valued between $15 and $20 MILLION — is at the center of an alleged theft and extortion plot … and TMZ has learned, police have already nabbed the tapes.
Law enforcement sources tell TMZ … a producer named Chauncey Mahan — who worked with Jay Z from 1998-2002 — was questioned Friday in connection with the alleged plot.
Here’s the backstory … Jay Z’s Roc-A-Fella Records recorded a boatload of master recordings between 1998 – 2002. We’re told in 2002 the masters went missing — Jay Z and his people assumed they were lost.
Fast forward to this past Friday. Mahan apparently had a number of the masters in his Northridge, CA storage facility. Law enforcement sources tell TMZ … Mahan allegedly contacted Live Nation — which has a joint venture with Jay Z called Roc Nation — and said he would either let the tapes go up for auction or give them the tapes for a $100K “storage fee.” We’re told Mahan eventually agreed to take $75K.
We’re told on Friday Mahan went to the storage facility to seal the deal with Jay Z’s people. Little did he know the LAPD had been contacted by Jay Z’s people and showed up. We’re told cops then detained Mahan and he agreed to come into the station for questioning. He also agreed to let the LAPD take possession of the tapes until a judge determines ownership.
Mahan was not arrested, but our sources say the Beverly Hills PD is investigating the extortion allegations because that’s where Live Nation is based. We’re also told Jay Z’s people filed a grand larceny complaint Friday with the NYPD and that investigation is ongoing.
Backstage at Coachella before they hit the stage, Big Boi revealed to Hollywood Reporter that he has album filled of material with electro rock duo, Phantogram.
“We’ve got songs which were already recorded when we were working on my last record,” he said. “They come down to Stankonia and we camp out for like a week and trade vibes. They go back to New York, then they come back down and we just keep the process going.”
Last week, Raekwon took a pretty strong stance on Wu-brother RZA’s musical direction for the Clan (a stance that he’s taken before in the past). Today, we get to hear RZA’s response to the Chef (it’s about 15:00 minutes in). He also spoke on his upcoming films Brick Mansions and The Protector 2, the multi-million dollar album the group is working on and plenty more.
While in D.C. for the Broccoli City Festival, Cam’ron revealed to Hip Hop Wired that his upcoming First Of The Month EPs will be kicking off June 3rd, which will also include a 30 minute episode.
He’ll be dropping 5-song sets every month for six months (and we look forward to it).
XXL recently posted a write-up interview (Joey Bada$$ Wants To Channel The Energy Of Nas, Jay-Z And Big L On New Album) where they spoke to the Brooklyn emcee about recording his upcoming album B4.DA.$$ (Before The Money). Soon after, BADA$$ took to Twitter to express their distaste for the header, claiming that he doesn’t want to channel anybody’s energy.
You can see those tweets above; XXL has since changed the title.
Ha!…Steve Stout stays getting punked….but I have to agree with 50 on this one…he is one of the most dangerous people in our culture…he makes artist from our culture make themselves corny by working for corperate so he can personally gain…he’s wack and he makes everyone around him look wack…beware
You heard him. Steve Stoute recently received a bit of a talking to by 50 Cent, and Dame Dash has given his two cents on the matter.
T.I. is getting ready to drop a visual to his new single ‘Turn It’, which will serve as the first official offering (I think) from the upcoming album Paperwork. ATL Pics has some snaps of the videoshoot, which you can check out above.
I guess the royal Hip-Hop couple had so much fun the first weekend that they decided to return for the second….check out the pics above.
Spotted on Necole Bitchie, where you can also see Bey’s little sister Solange and nephew Julez.
TMZ reports:
Chris Brown’s bodyguard was found guilty this morning of misdemeanor assault … setting the stage for Brown’s trial later today.
Christopher Hollosy had told police he punched the victim after he allegedly tried to get onto Brown’s tour bus … but the victim said that was never the case.
Brown’s case will be heard later today in D.C. and the stakes are HUGE. If Brown is found guilty of misdemeanor assault (he denies punching the man) the judge in the Rihanna beating case could revoke his probation and sentence Brown to up to four years in jail.
Nicki Minaj recently dropped a new single featuring emcee Lil Herb, which put the spotlight on the current culture and music scene in the latter’s city of Chicago. While it’s getting a lot of credit for what sounds like a refreshed Nicki, some aren’t too pleased with the subject matter, particularly in the wake of the city’s rising death toll amongst minorities…..one of the critics happens to be none other than Lady Gaga’s producer DJ White Shadow.
You can cast your thoughts below and check out the tweets above.
The news came out on a new flyer that reveals an upcoming baby shower for the Queen Bee….congrats.
Spotted on Daily Mail:
Cannabis smokers campaigning to legalise the drug were washed out yesterday by the soggy weather.
Lobby groups boasted ‘thousands’ would descend on London’s Hyde Park in a protest over legalisation.
The move follows a trend in the US and Canada known as ‘420 Day’ where pro-cannabis activists hold mass smoking rallies on April 20.
But the persistent drizzle ensured that only the most determined and hardy users of the drug turned up.
Some also took to social networking sites to say it was not appropriate as the protest fell on Easter Sunday and many families would be in the park.
The few pro-cannabis campaigners who did arrive were met with police posters warning that possessing the drug is illegal. The Met even placed large signs at the park entrances announcing ‘extra police on patrol’.
A few dozen pro-cannabis campaigners were seen in the park, including some who had travelled from Bristol and Brighton. Other rallies were held in Manchester and Glasgow.
Three people were arrested in London, including one man seen posing for photographs with a poster reading: ‘Keep calm, smoke a zoot.’
Some took to Twitter and Facebook to warn off others from attending, pointing out that there was an ‘army of police’ in the park.
The number 420 is slang for cannabis, but its origins are unclear. Some claim it began with a group of Californian smokers who met up at 4.20pm every day in the 1970s.
The term was picked up by the rock band the Grateful Dead and became common parlance among fans.
A Met spokesman said anyone seen ‘openly smoking cannabis’ faced arrest or a warning for possessing the drug and its confiscation.
Chance The Rapper’s team has posted a picture of him in a hospital bed on Instagram (which also spread to Twitter) as an announcement of his Coachella Week 2 cancellation. Other than that, little has been said about the current status of the rising start from Chicago, except that he “fell ill” Friday night and is expected to recover fully. You can read all the tweets below…we will have more news as it comes.
Got the next two days off and got sick. #goeshomehappily
— Chance The Rapper (@chancetherapper) April 19, 2014
On behalf of @chancetherapper and our entire team- We sincerely regret to have to cancel our 2nd weekend at coachella. -CTR MGMT — Chance The Rapper (@chancetherapper) April 20, 2014
Thank you for the prayers and support during this time, Chance, his team and family deeply appreciate it.
— Chance The Rapper (@chancetherapper) April 20, 2014
Chance fell ill on Friday night & was admitted to the hospital today- Doctors & family are with him & he is expected to make a full recovery
— Chance The Rapper (@chancetherapper) April 20, 2014
Spotted on TMZ:
Mike Epps has been accused of punching a woman in the face Wednesday night after the premiere of “Haunted House 2” — but sources close to Epps tell TMZ, the actor didn’t lay a finger on her.
The incident occurred at the after-party at Lucky Strike in Downtown L.A. — law enforcement sources tell TMZ, the woman claimed she had a prior romantic relationship with Epps … and wanted to confront him about something.
According to law enforcement sources, the woman told police Epps then punched her in the face. She called cops and filed a report, but cops say there was zero sign of injury on the woman. Epps also told police he never touched her.
Sources close to Epps insist the woman was nothing more than a fan — we’re told the actor had asked for privacy because he was with his wife … and the woman allegedly grew belligerent, throwing a drink at both of them. We’re told Epps then asked security to escort her out of the party.
Law enforcement sources tell us, the case has been referred to the domestic violence division because the alleged victim claims she had a prior relationship with Epps. The investigation is ongoing.
Spotted in the NY Daily News:
Rubin (Hurricane) Carter, the middleweight contender-turned-murder suspect-turned-cause célèbre when his triple homicide conviction was exposed as a sham, died Sunday. He was 76.
Carter — wrongly jailed for nearly two decades — lost a battle with prostate cancer that dropped the former fighter’s weight to a mere 90 pounds.
He died early Sunday morning in Toronto, according to his longtime friend John Artis, who had been caring for him and was wrongly convicted of the same crime.
The indefatigable Carter was twice wrongfully convicted in the 1966 killings of two customers and a bartender inside the Lafayette Bar & Grill in Paterson, N.J.
It wasn’t until 19 years later that a federal judge overturned his second conviction, ruling the prosecution’s behavior was “as heinous as the crimes for which (Carter was) tried and convicted.”
Carter’s struggle for justice inspired Bob Dylan’s hit single “Hurricane” and a movie of the same name with Denzel Washington, earning him an Oscar nomination in the title role.
Prior to his arrest for the slayings, the New Jersey-born fighter appeared poised for a shot at the middleweight championship.
You can read more here.
Spotted on Beta Beat:
Tech has a serious diversity problem — so General Assembly (GA), the New York City private vocational school for programming and engineering, is now opening an “Opportunity Fund” to give scholarships to women, veterans, African-Americans and Latinos.
The first contributors to the fund are Google, Microsoft, Hirepurpose and Nas.
Yes, rapper and recording artist Nas, the man who brought us “Illmatic.” The partnership with Nas began when he met GA cofounder Matt Brimer at SXSW, but Nas isn’t the only media figure to approach GA about these kinds of programs.
Each of the donors is taking on a target demographic. Google will provide scholarship money for women, Hirepurpose and Microsoft will fund veterans and Nas’s QueensBridge Venture Partners will sponsor African-Americans and Latinos.
“This is the start of what hopefully will be a contribution to what will be a more diverse and accessible community worldwide,” GA CEO Jake Schwartz told Betabeat in a phone interview.
You can read much more on the story here.
During a brief courtside interview during the Nets/Raptors game Drake was asked about Jay Z. He answered; “This is the people’s team. Jay Z is out somewhere eating a fondue plate.”
Yesterday, Beyoncé and Jay Z were in the High Desert in Los Angeles shooting a new video. No word on what video they shooting, but some people speculate it being ‘Part II (On The Run)’ or a backdrop video for their upcoming rumored tour.
Today, Prince announced a new deal with Warner Bros., along with a plan to release a re-mastered digital deluxe version of Purple Rain in celebration of the film and album’s 30-year anniversary. The new deal is a global licensing partnership which will cover all of his albums from 1978 into the ’90s. Under the new deal, Prince plans on releasing a new album with all new music.
“Everyone at Warner Bros Records is delighted to be working with Prince once again: he is one of the world’s biggest stars and a truly unique talent” – Cameron Strang, Chairman & CEO of Warner Bros Records
From TMZ:
Paul Walker’s brothers don’t just look like him, they sound like him too … and TMZ has learned the “Fast and Furious 7” folks will use their voices to help fill out portions of Walker’s movie dialogue.
Sources close to the the Walker family tell TMZ … the production team for “FF7” will try something they have never done before … merging archival audio of Walker’s voice with his brothers’ voices to fill in some gaps in the movie.
We’re told it will take both brothers, Caleb and Cody, to get everything to match up. Our sources say the production team tested the voice of each brother and learned that certain words sound better coming from one brother, and different ones from the other … so they will combine them to help make the dialogue work.
Our sources say the men have already started working on production.
Spotted on the Daily Mail:
The Spice Girls are set to reunite for a Las Vegas residency – without Victoria Beckham.
The chart-topping girlband are reportedly in negotiations with the entertainment team at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino, and hope to follow in the footsteps of the likes of Britney Spears, Sir Elton John and Celine Dion in securing a stint in Sin City.
It is thought the residency – featuring Geri Halliwell, Emma Bunton, Melanie Brown and Melanie Chisholm – could take place some time next year, if all goes according to plan.
A source told Perez Hilton: ‘The Girls (minus Victoria) are in negotiation with Planet Hollywood about doing a residency in Las Vegas!
‘The earliest a show would launch is spring of 2015.’
Looks like Swizz Beatz’ next step in his life will be going to Harvard’s Business School, as he revealed to the world on Instagram (above). Congrats.