Rapper T.R.E. of the Milwaukee group Malicious stresses that people can interpret the cover image of his group’s new album For Whatever It’s Worth however they’d like, though when pressed if there’s any way to interpret it aside from the obvious...

Milwaukee rapper Ray Nitti didn’t get much of a heads up from V100 when DJs from the radio station called to tell him they were going to premiere his single “Bow” on their local segment “Heat From the Streets.” “They told me I had five minutes before it was going to be broadcast,” Nitti recalls. “I wanted to call everyone I knew and tell them my song was going to be on the radio...

When New York rap artist Jay-Z says, “Jesus can’t save you, life starts when the church ends,” he touches on the twofold conundrum of faith and practice that is explored in The Tao of Wu (Riverhead). New York rappers know about sin in their city, and the internal struggles of breaking through. They wear the hard knocks of their lives—violence, drugs...

Prophetic didn't actually expect to hear back from Pharrell Williams after he ran into him at a N.E.R.D. concert last fall and attempted to pass on his new CD, but against the odds a month later Prophetic received a call from Pharrell's people and, soon after, Pharrell himself.

DJs had been refining their craft since the earliest days of hip-hop, but it wasn't until the mid-'90s that they made the case that turntables could be considered a lead instrument. DJ Shadow's Endtroducing..... was the breakout hit of the era's turntablism movement, in part because it eschewed the showy scratching that battle DJs prided themselves on in favor of brainy compositions. The X-Ecutioners, however, proved...

Gambit is summarizing the namesake for his 12member rap group, the Marvel Comics crossover epic House of M. “Basically, there’s this character, the Scarlet Witch, who can change realities and probabilities,” he explains. “She has this big mental breakdown, and she ends up changing the whole Marvel world. It’s up to all the superheroes in the Marvel universe to band together and get the world back to normal. As his X-Men-derived alias suggests, Gambit has a passion for comics in general, but this particular story line has special relevance for him. “It symbolizes our group,” he says.

“It’s getting hot in here, so take off all your…” well, you know the rest. Nelly scored a major hit with that 2002 single, “Hot In Herre” (sic), but his fame has waned in subsequent years, putting increased pressure on his upcoming album, Brass Knuckles, which is set for a September release. The pop-rapper will likely debut . . .

It was raining Monday morning when Radio Milwaukee 88.9's airwaves broadcast a solemn set of music, with a somber Scott Mullins hosting at an unusual time slot. Milwaukee awakened with the hard truth that DJ Rock Dee, born July 27, 1968, had passed away. Though known most recently as a DJ for Radio Milwaukee, Rock Dee had deep ties to the city's hip-hop scene. This is a tribute to him, a story told by just some of those he knew and loved. Hip-hop was our way of life. It wasn't about the dollars; it was about the love for the music. -Doctor B, owner of the Scratch Pad, one of the first sources for hip-hop records in Milwaukee, and a famed local DJ who mentored Rock . . .

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EMC were in their tour van, en route to a Los Angeles concert this January, when they heard the news: A full two months before its official release date—and just four days after it had been mailed to the media— their debut album, The Show, had been leaked online. “We were angry, especially since we think we know who leaked it,” says Stricklin, the Milwaukee rapper who makes up the group along with veteran lyricists Punchline and Wordsworth and golden-age icon Masta Ace. “We rushed to the hotel so we could get an Internet connection and find out more.” Thanks to the Internet, you can watch the band work out their response to the leak in real time . . .