A lot of people applauded Kanye West for his genre hopping ability when he used a sample of Daft Punk's song 'Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger' for his 2007 song 'Stronger'. The Daft Punk song was originally released in 2001 and in 2007 a live recording of the song was turned into a music video. However around the same time in 2007, the hip-hop artist Wale sampled the electro song 'D.A.N.C.E.' from Justice. The French Dj duo Justice is the group that beat Kanye at the 2006 MTV Europe Music Awards for the best video award with the song 'We Are Your Friends' and caused his tantrum. When he interrupted the acceptance speech of the label art director, SO ME, he said he had never seen the video. However in 2007, he made Jonas and François, the director and SO ME, the animator of Justice's video for 'D.A.N.C.E.', the video director and animator of his song, 'Good Life'.
The hip-hop artist Noreaga created a song with electronic djs MSTRKRFT and artists like Kid Cudi have sampled songs from the electronic band Ratatat and the electro group LCD Soundsystem.
Hip-hop artists are realizing that it is okay to listen to other styles of music and they are applying those influences to their music. Also as hip-hop blends with other musical styles, they are gaining more fans that are new hip-hop. This change in hip-hop also shows that are truly influenced by the first hip-hop artists like Afrika Bambaataa, who was greatly influenced my dance music and used Kraftwerk's song 'Numbers' as inspiration for his song 'Planet Rock'. Hopefully the old hip-hop fans will appreciate the evolution of hip-hop and will help create a multicultural fanbase that appreciates all styles of music.
2006
Kanye West crashes the acceptance speech of SO ME at the EMAs
2007
Justice-D.A.N.C.E.
(directed by Jonas & François and animated by So Me)
Hopefully, a video for 'I Poke Her Face' will be released soon. The idea of Kid Cudi, Kanye West and Common rapping over Lady Gaga's song 'Poker Face' was genius.
America's favorite soft drink and every Americans favorite French duo team up to make a special edition coke bottle. Its' called the Justice x SO ME Coca-Cola bottle. It's sold only at night clubs and colette and a bottle goes for $4.70 and the price of the package races from $56 to $67.12
Speaking of amazing DJs, Million $ Mano and Hollywood Holt tore it down at Streetwear Sunday. Streetwear Sundays is a weekly event thats now located at Hostel on Decatur and it gives an opportunity for those who are interested in fashion, style, music, art and culture to come together and start the week of right. It's a great place to network, see up-and-coming artists of all genres preform, dance and get FREE clothes and shoes. The show was amazing, Hollywood Holt and Million $ Mano showed New Orleans what is the future of hip-hop and how Chicago does a show. The night was filled with crowd surfing....yes crowd surfing at a hip-hop show, jumping, break dancing, juking and more crazy things. Mano laid down some Chicago tracks, current and oldschool hip-hop tracks, house tracks, and even some bounce music to please the local crowd. The front of the stage had a fiery energy that could not be contained on the stage, which resulting in bodies cruising in the air with the assistance of fellow music lovers. If a person walked into the venue, they would have thought they were in a gritty punk show, because not many hip-hop artists have the same skill to make a show so live. Hollywood Holt's set was opened by S.O.U.L. Fresh, which is a very cool duo who remind me a mashup of The Cool Kids and Matt & Kim. It rare to hear musicians sing and rap, but these guys pull it off with ease. Local talent also showed up to show they're support; Curren$y, Force Feed Radio, DJ Spin, Cypher, Lu Smith and G-Eazy were in the building. This night was also the release party for the spring/summer line of Sikkis clothing and I'm excited to see people around New Orleans wearing the freshest local brand out. You can purchase it at Traffic Boutique, Politics or Rukus 103
If people weren't please with the show, it only means that they weren't ready for it.
My partner in crime, STICKYFINGERZ came out and took mad photos. In New Orleans there isn't a lot party photographers who can cover the WHOLE scene like him, from Throwback to Streetwear Sundays to colleges' springfests. The dude is hella ill, he's like the New Orleans version of The Cobrasnake or Bronques of LastNightsParty. Checkout his photobucket until he finishes the creation of his amazing website.
Lu Smith, Hollywood Holt, Million $ Mano and Cypher this is going to be worth something one day
S.O.U.L. Fresh
S.O.U.L. Fresh
S.O.U.L. Fresh
S.O.U.L. Fresh
S.O.U.L. Fresh
Curren$y the Spitta and Crack
Million $ Mano doing what he does best
HOLLYWOOD HOLT
Hollywood Holt and Million $ Mano
Mano in his Chicago shirt
Hollywood Holt crowd surfing
The Hostel on Decatur
Hollywood showing off his finger rings
Sorry to be biased but it seemes like chicago people run the world. On April 4th, the Air Yeezy's were released. These most well designed shoe's since the Jordan Spizike. These shoes have so many different elements that I think they're worth their price tag. People from around the world lined up to buy Kanye's new shows and people posted the shoes on ebay for as much as $2,000...so far three people are selling them for that price.
Streetwear band, Bobby Fresh has relased a shirt called 'Big Top Yeezy Tee' that matches the color way of the new Air Yeezys. Ya gotta match, so why not go all the way. Buy the shirt HERE
This years Rock The Bells will have more oldschool artists and fewer new school hip-hop artists like last year. Rock The Bells is a yearly music festival that takes place every summer to showcase the best of hip-hop. This summer look out for nas again, Damian Marley, The Roots, Common, Big Boi, Krs-One, House of Pain, Reflection Eternal (Talib Kweli), Tech N9ne, K'naan, RZA, Raekwon, Sage Francis, Mickey Factz, Slum Village and more. The festival will come to Chicago, Tornto, Washington DC, Boston, New York City, Denver, LA, San Francisco, Miami and Vancouver. Look out for more announcements of artists and locations that will be added to the tour.
