hip-hop

Watch: A whole bunch of hip-hop all-stars on Arsenio Hall in 1994

It\’s Monday, so you probably need something awesome to watch. Well, here it is. Sure, Arsenio Hall has once again been cancelled, but twenty (!!) years ago, right when it was about to be cancelled for the first time, a group of east coast hip-hop all-stars came to visit the Arsenio Hall Show to show their support. Who? Oh, just: Yo-Yo, MC Lyte, Naughty by Nature, A Tribe Called Quest, Fu-Schnickens, CL Smooth, Guru, Das EFX, Wu-Tang Clan, KRS-One and Mad Lion. And now that you\’re done watching that, here\’s 94 minutes of 1994 hip-hop.

Continue reading...

Crack Rock or a Jump Shot

In the school where I work, there’s a fifth grader who wears a Notorious B.I.G. jacket. There are a few staff who covet it. Though I don’t say anything, I’m one of them. The boy is 11. Biggie Smalls died 13 years ago, today. He doesn’t know anything about Biggie. Couldn’t name an album or even a track, couldn’t give me any 16 bars, let alone 16 Bars. I want to talk about it with him, to school him on Biggie, to get on his level in a way I can’t with their hip-hop idols. God knows...

Continue reading...