The Carter III Cover: Hoax or Truth?

Amazon.com released the supposed cover of The Carter III today on their website, for pre-order sales. The cover, shown above, depicts a "Little" Wayne with a few of his more notable tattoos. While Weezy's label, Universal, has yet to comment on the artwork, acclaimed photographer Jonathan Mannion was singing a different tune about the cover's concept in an interview on HipHopDX.com (Click for story).

Featured Artist: Tha Q

Today’s feature artist is DC’s own Tha Q. Educator by day, rapper by night, Q practices his craft for the love of hip hop. He recently opened up a myspace page and has started networking with producers and DJs in order to keep finding new challenges. He’s got some insightful views on the current state of hip hop and how he keeps himself grounded and real without going commercial.

Cicero: So Q, How and when did you first get into rapping?

Tha Q: Haaaa....good question...Honestly, looking back, my entire life has been a prime and prep-session for what I'd eventually end up doing. I'm a kid of the 80s. So, I grew up listening to Public Enemy, LL Cool J, Salt N Pepa, and Run DMC. I've always been into poetry. But, it wasn't until I heard the Late-great Biggie Smalls' album, "Ready to Die", that I truly feel in love with rap. I mean, it was something new and exciting to me, Biggie's music that is. That was back in 1999. I didn't record for the first time until a couple years later. I was still developing my style. I finally grew into my current persona of Tha Q in 2004. The rest is history and the future.

Cicero: You’ve stayed relatively unknown by today’s standards. You have just set up a myspace account and are beginning to reach out to other musicians. Why the sudden change?

Tha Q: Man, are you reading my mind? We're on a psychic wavelength here. That's another good question bro. I have a sense of urgency. I don't want to come across as narcissistic, but I realize that life is fleeting and we all have a purpose. I recently turned 30 years old, which is ancient by many standards. But, I realize that it's the perfect age to launch my music. I'm young enough to still be culturally relevant, yet old enough to have insight and experience. I look at myself as a bridge to future generations. Rap is the vehicle that will carry me there. When I was younger, people said I didn't have a shot in rap. I didn't quit. Now that I'm older, people say the same thing. You see the pattern here? When I eventually achieve my goals in rap, I will be satisfied and not concerned with how it's perceived. I want to be heard. I want my music to be spread all over the world. I want everyone to know my name

Cicero: You talk about being “old” in rap. There's a term "Contemporary Adult Hip Hop" has been circulating around a number of different artists these days. What do you think about that term being applied to artists, as opposed to the young cats that rule the airwaves today?

Tha Q: I haven't heard of that term...I was thinking about this topic and my target audience today. It's interesting. My appeal is very broad. But, something that surprised me was when I found out that I have many rural and suburban white fans. This kid from Iowa of all places made a Myspace page in my honor. It's crazy. On top of that, he and his "rocker" friends have a video on Youtube with a track of mine as the background music. I can assure you that when I made that song, and all my songs, I wasn't thinking Billy-Bob from Idaho would be bangin' my music. Honestly, it's pretty amazing...What it says to me is I have the potential to have a big impact in the game if I stay real, humble, and true to myself.

Cicero: What projects are you working on now?

Tha Q: I'm working on my 4th mixtape called Man Up. It's coming along nicely. It just feels right, because I’m not forcing anything. If I'm not feeling something, I quit it...nix it...I'm not force fitting anything on this joint.

Cicero: Where can people listen to your stuff?

Tha Q: Well...I've been slow to hop on the digital revolution; even though I spread my music mostly online...I do have a myspace, www.myspace.com/thaqraps. I have a new video up on Youtube. Just type in Tha Q and I'm there at the top. It's a song about HIV awareness I did for an MTV contest. I hope to hear from them soon with some good news. Wish me luck! I was also recently featured at lyrickings.com, which is a up and coming rap site. Other than that, you'll have to wait to see me on MTV! haaa...For real though, hit me up on my cell: 301 437 4786 if you want to collab. I'm about the art. I'm not doing this for fame or fortune.

Take a listen to Tha Q's track "Rain I See," produced by Nick Cicero, below.

T.I. Totally Innocent No More

T.I. entered a plea of guilty to the charges he faced of possessing unregistered machine guns and silencers (two counts), and possessing firearms after having been convicted of a felony.

"While I'm not looking forward to being incarcerated, I have a long road of redemption to travel," T.I. said, reading a statement outside the Atlanta federal courthouse. "I am dedicated and committed to that."

T.I. will be sentenced on these charges a year from today on March 27, 2009. If he abides by the conditions of his plea agreement he will be sentenced a year from now to one year plus one day in federal prison. He was originally facing a maximum of 10 years in prison and quarter-million dollar fines for each count against him.

Reportedly, the plea agreement stated he must perform 1,000 hours of community service, which will include speaking to "at-risk young people," promoting respect for law enforcement, opposing violence, illegal and reckless use of firearms, illegal drugs and gang activity.

Until his sentencing T.I. will remain under monitored home confinement, where he has been since he was released on $3 million bond on October 26th to await trial.

After T.I.’s change-of-plea hearing today and subsequent sentencing he will still be eligible for a reduced commitment to the court if he fulfills the terms of this agreement and maintains good behavior while incarcerated. Because his sentence is technically longer than one year, he is eligible to earn 15 percent time off for good behavior.

T.I. had reportedly been working on his sixth solo album, Paper Trail, while on house arrest, but the status of that recording is unknown now.

Britney's Coming Back Already?

I was walking through the grocery store last night when I saw the headline "Inside Britney's Comeback." Of course it was on a tabloid...

Tell me, how Britney is already making a comeback? She's been all over the news from no hair to middle eastern boyfriend or whatever he is, lil' sis is getting smashed out by half of Hollywood...and now she's making a 

COMEBACK?!?!?!? 

I saw the preview for her guest spot on that Neil Patrick Harris show about a million times watching the NCAA games this weekend...she looks good. Damn good still if you ask me.

IDK what the hell she's thinking...but I wish she would go back to a being a nice girl, being hot and making music that makes people dance...and not this mythical creature that she appears to be.

BTW I got an interview with Producer J.Troup coming tomorrow...check it out!

Featured Artist: Brown

You know I can't wait too long to get new posts out. The first featured artist is a rapper by the name of Brown. I actually produced a few tracks for Brown. He's from Milwaukee and currently preparing a new EP.

Cicero: Milwaukee isn't generally known as a hip hop hotspot, how do you get your music heard in a small region in the business?

Brown: The internet is a huge help, especially for me in a small region. I've made a lot of connections with producers and many new fans through myspace and other spots.

Cicero: What are you currently working on?

Brown: I'm currently working on my album, Charlie. I feel it's my best project yet.

Cicero: Besides myself, what other producers are you working with?

Brown: Lots of guys, there's you of course, and also Filthy Productions, Real See, Nasty Kutt and more.

Cicero: Who are some of your musical influences?

Brown: My main musical influences are Tupac, Scarface, and Yo Gotti

Cicero: Where can readers listen to your music?

Brown: myspace.com/MoneyMadeRecords

Check out Brown's track "Ballers" produced by Filthy below:

Pennywise's New Approach to Digital Music

Received a message from Pennywise today, about their free digital album...thought I'd share

------------------------------------

Here is what you’ve been waiting for…

Here is how to download your copy of Pennywise's Reason To Believe – FOR FREE!

Make sure you're logged into your MySpace account and you are friends with Textango.

Click this link or go to:
http://promos.myspace.com/download.ashx?pid=1&did=

------------------------------------

I'm not a fan, but it's a nice way to market

Coming Soon...Cicero's Featured Artists

Too many cats are on their grind, with only myspace to help them out. I've decided to put the call out to artists that want to be featured on this site. It's not going to be too long, just a little blurb about them and their upcoming projects. There's always a potential for mixtapes and other compilations from this, but for now I'm just going to start bringing you the new cats. If you or someone you know want to be involved with this, send an email to ncicero0@gmail.com or hit my myspace (link on the right)

iMeem Playlist is Up

I added an iMeem playlist with some beats I've made to the left of the page. Leave a comment if you like them, and check out my myspace page (link on right) for more. Also beats are always for sale/lease so hit me up. Thanks.

10 Digging Secrets

Fuck the sample CDs and Compilations...Go out and dig yourself. Fortunately we have movies like the Deep Crates Series and The Beat Kings to keep the excitement of digging up. If you're looking for some tips, try these:

1. Follow The Leader – If someone has already sampled an artist chances are that there are more hot used and unused breaks & samples by that very same artist.

2. Follow The Musicians & Producers – So you like that crazy piano sample, sound, or that unique feeling the song seems to evoke? Guess what… you can probably find that same artist playing even better on another album. Many times musicians and producers worked on different projects with each other and you can catch someone early on in their career putting down some great sounds with another group.

3. Watch The Year - Just like the golden age of Hip Hop, each genre has had its highs and lows and there are virtually no exceptions. Jazz, Funk, Soul, and Rock have all had their great time periods containing distinctive styles of the times.

4. Know Your Resources – Read the All Music Guide, Read album liners, online sample databases, Wax Poetics, sample dictionary books.

5. Make Friends With Diggers – Although digging is generally very secretive and almost anitsocial, if you have a friend that knows their stuff you can both put each other up on records while digging.

6. Trust Your Intuition – A certain spidey sense tends to develop after spending a bit of time getting dusty in the bins.

7. Become A Label Whore – Many of the best artists had a tendency to hang around the same label and be produced by the same people. Some of the more known examples of this are Kudu, Blue Note, Westbound, and CTI.

8. Develop Your Ear, Personal Style, And Love For Music – This is probably the most important piece of the lesson. You will only become a successful digger if you truly have a love of music. This may be beyond the comprehension of many; however loving Hip Hop and loving music are two completely different concepts. I know many people who claim to love music, but the only time they listen to anything other than Hip Hop is when they are looking for samples. Most diggers I know would rather listen to Soul, Funk, Rock or Jazz than Hip Hop. For some reason it’s a natural progression to appreciate the true creativity of the original players. After falling in love with an artist’s work and really getting into their catalog, you’ll eventually be able to recognize the styles of many musicians and develop the ability to guess an artist when you hear them playing on another unknown track.

9. Purchase A Portable Turntable – This is the single most important factor that has caused a great increase in my digging success. I have saved an immense amount of time, money, and aggravation by avoiding worthless records. I’ve also been able to pick up many records that I would have passed over and would have never known about because of the fear of taking a risk and plunking down large sums for unknown records with nothing on them. The investment hurts a little bit in the beginning, but the key word is investment and it eventually pays huge dividends.

10. Keep An Open Mind – Listen to everything and I mean everything, except for Country of course! You will stumble upon finds in some of the most surprising areas and genres. Also, to contradict my earlier tip… don’t judge a record by its cover. You will find great breaks and samples on some of the worst looking covers.

Bonus Tip:

Keep Digging – Be strong, develop your endurance, and dig until you can’t dig anymore. The best diggers keep digging for hours and entire days to make sure that they have covered every bit of whatever location they may be at. This may mean that you have to run out and grab a coffee, but make sure that you get make into the mix. You never know what you could be passing up.

Sampling in Hip Hop Part 1

Sampling’s Origins and Legality

A Hip Hop On My Mind Three Part Series

Sampling has been a part of hip-hop since it’s very inception. It was the main lifeblood of a musical genre that grew out of the funk and disco scene in the seventies and early eighties. As of late, articles written by bloggers Gooch from XXL, and Ivan from Hip-Hop is Read have brought an old topic back into the hip-hop community’s forefront. The issue of sampling and its legality has and will always be a dividing force between the new and old school. However that will be discussed in Part 2. First, for people unfamiliar with sampling, I present a brief, and I mean BRIEF history.

The earliest Party DJ’s would find the musical break portion of certain records and blend or cut them into one long musical vamp. Often times you could take seemingly corny records and turn them into party smashes. For example, the Run-DMC song, Mary Mary comes from the Monkees.

Many songs like this received new fame as the pioneers of hip-hop scrambled to find the best records with the best breaks and grooves. The new culture of hip-hop started as a South Bronx underground scene and grew to a nationwide, and eventually a worldwide phenomenon. 

This form of sampling dominated the early era of hip hop until DJ Marley Marl accidentally discovered that you could chop up drums from one drum break, and play them as his own drum kit over another musical groove. In the movie, The Beat Kings, Marley Marl describes his initial epiphany:

“I made a mistake at unique recording studios…sampled a snare by mistake when I was trying to get a vocal sample of the record. I started to play the snare on the beat, and I told the engineer to turn that old weak ass snare down, and now I’m poppin’ a James Brown snare on top of the beat I just made! I’m like you know what this means? I can take any kick, any snare, any hi-hat on any record and make my own kits?!?!”

This brought about sampling how it is today. The procedure is basically the same, with the equipment evolving, though many producers stick with old stand-bys like the Emu SP-1200, Akai MPC series, and Ensoniq ASRs.

Now when hip-hop began to reach mainstream status, the issues of copyright came to light. Before, producers had been making beats from any record, not clearing the samples. Clearing samples refers to the process of obtaining permission from the original copyrights owner to use the sample, and also distributing royalties from and profits made. However there hadn’t been any cases against the producers or rappers for this infringement of copyright, so the trend continued. This would all change with or old friend BIZ MARKIE.

In 1991 the first case was brought against a hip hop song from its original copyright holder. The song “Alone Again” by Biz Markie used a piano loop and three words from the Gilbert O’Sullivan song “Alone Again (Naturally).” O’Sullivan’s publishing company, Grand Upright, brought about a lawsuit against Warner Brothers Records, to whom Biz was signed. Warner Brothers actually had contested the fact that O’Sullivan hadn’t actually transferred copyright to Grand Upright, which really hurt their case, when they should have contested the rights of musicians to sample one another. Anyway, the judge had proclaimed that sampling was thievery and now for a song to be officially used in a profitable sense, permission must be obtained from the copyright holder, and subsequent royalties must be paid. 

Even though the result of the case deemed uncleared sampling illegal, there are ways around this,. Many producers have replayed samples themselves, essentially turning their creation into a “reinterpolation” or better known as a cover song. Like other musical acts that play cover songs, a less significant portion of profits is paid out.

To this day there are “sample police” that search through songs for uncleared samples in order to collect royalties. Usually working for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA,) these agents also go after “piracy” cases, most notably the raid on DJ Drama and the Aphilliates in January of ’07. Again the legal heads said that these mixtapes were illegal, copyright violating material, and so they were arrested on Racketeering charges.

Most influential musicians have a problem with samples and clearing them at some point in their career. While some have the funds to just pay for the rights, other artists have to find unique ways around them. This is the basis for the recent debate on identifying samples, and I will get into that in Part Two.