B13 Peer Review

YouTube Lily Allen's recent viral video " Hard Out Here " doesn't so much parody pop music as it demonstrates how little space there is between parody and pop. Allen is ostensibly sending up various other uber-popular songs, including ones by  Three-Six Mafia , Robin Thicke, and most obviously, Miley Cyrus. "Don't you want to have somebody who objectifies you?" she sings before fellating a banana at the behest of a suit-wearing white dude and smirking ironically as her black dancers gyrate in slow-motion amid product-placed cars and booze. Allen is both  commenting on  and pretending to be the exploited woman at the center of the music-making sausage factory. The problem is that this doesn't actually end up looking all that much different from Miley Cyrus both lusting after and pretending to be a twerking black woman. Pop is always about surface appearances anyway; Allen's presenting the tropes as tropes, but they were never anything but trop...

“Think of the children” seems like a pretty unimpeachable defense, but damn it, people are still taking stabs at changing Jay-Z ‘s mind. Mr. Beyoncé took to his website Saturday to respond to the public outcry over his upcoming “New York Holiday” collaboration with Barneys after two black shoppers accused the department store of racial profiling. Fans started a Change.org petition urging him to call off the partnership and apparently “demonized [and] denounced” him for not immediately speaking out, according to the rap mogul’s statement . “I move and speak based on facts and not emotion. I haven’t made any comments because I am waiting on facts and the outcome of a meeting between community leaders and Barneys … The negligent, erroneous reports and attacks on my character, intentions, and the spirit of this collaboration have forced me into a statement I didn’t want to make without the full facts.” Hova also clarified a few things of his own, including the information that...

The Houston-native's webseries will debut on November 21. RiFF RAFF and Complex TV have partnered to launch a new webseries entitled “RiFF RAFF REALM” starring the Houston-native. The series' trailer says the show intends to highlight the rapper’s “entertaining antics and words of wisdom.” It also describes him as “one of the world’s most prolific thinkers.” “RiFF RAFF REALM” will debut on Thursday, November 21. Watch the trailer below.   Although originally scheduled for 2013,  RiFF RAFF's  debut album,  NEON iCON  is now expected in January 2014. In a recent  interview  with  LA Weekly , the former reality show star explained why the album was delayed. “This is gonna be my best work so that’s why it’s taking so long,” said the artist born Horst Simco. “We wanna make sure that all the songs are the best. It’s not a mixtape. It’s not going to be like my normal stuff that I just put out. [First single]  ‘Dolce & Ga...

Tech N9ne said he wants to work with Eminem after working with D12, Yelawolf and Slaughterhouse members from the Shady Records camp. Tech N9ne, who released his  Therapy Sessions With Ross Robinson  EP this month, recently spoke with hotnewhiphop.com  about his hopes for working with Eminem. "I'd like to work with Eminem," N9ne said during the interview. "Just me and him on a song, 'cause I think he's one of the dopest rappers out there, and I wanna hear how I sound next to one of the dopest motherfuckers I've heard. I've worked with some of his homies, Proof, Slaughterhouse, D12, all of 'em, he's the only one left. Even Yelawolf. I worked with all them mothafuckers. He's the only one left." This echoes similar sentiments Tech N9ne had in 2012.  "I think [Eminem] makes everyone want to come with their A-game,"  Tech said in a 2012 interview with S hade 45 . "He's an elite emcee. We are a...

The last time Rihanna released a video, we got an eyeful of big butts, strippers and fake dollar bills . Ugh, at least use real money, RiRi. But now, our favorite poptart is going in an entirely new direction for her vid for “What Now”…and as Ri describes it, it may not be what her fans had in mind… ‘It’s going to be kind of eerie, very creepy,” Rihanna said of her vision for the vid, which was shot in Phuket, Thailand and features a simple setting and a “red carpet goth” wardrobe. “Everybody is probably expecting a narrative video and a love story of some sort, and something really soft and pretty. It is kind of soft but it’s really a little demented.” Knowing what we do about Rihanna’s antics, I’m not sure how much more this video could possibly shock us. The most WTF thing she could do is calmly watch CNN and discuss the stock market. From this little sneak peek, do you think her video will do “What Now” justice? Or will it just turn out kind of weird and awkward, ...

Hannah Patterson made history at the University of Alabama with her election as president of the campus’ Sigma Delta Tau sorority. Astoundingly, theUniversity’s 17 panhellenic sororities have never had an African American president. As reported by WBRC Fox 6 , the 22-year-old engineering major has been a Sigma Delta Tau sister for a year and said, “I’m extremely honored that my sorority voted me as president.” Hannah hopes to help with the growth saying, “I wanted to use my leadership skills to better the sorority and just take our chapter further places.” . Hannah Patterson is the first African American panhallenic sorority president at the University of Alabama (WB … Recently, there were reports of discrimination within the University of Alabama sorority system, which the school administration responded to stating, “We are committed to ensuring that all students have access to and can choose from multiple opportunities that match their personal interests...

Hotstylz disses Eminem for referencing its "Lookin Boy" single on "Rap God." Hotsylz has dissed Eminem due to  "Rap God's" referencing of their Yung Joc-assisted  "Lookin Boy" single, which was released in 2007.  "The first time we even got wind of 'Rap God,' our Twitter started blowing up and people was telling us that Eminem referenced the song," Hotsylz' Raydio G said in an interview with  xxlmag.com . "At first we was like, 'Aight, cool,' but at the same time, we was like, 'Fuck Eminem,' because he didn’t reach out to us. He took so much of the record. That just don’t sit right with us. The thing is they used so much of the song, he could have reached out. He could have reached out to us directly. He could have found a way to reach out to us through some kind of channel. We just addressed that issue on a song called 'Rap Fraud.' We addressed how we felt about it."  Hotsty...

Eminem's remake of Black Moon's "I Got Cha Opin" takes the top spot while Busta  Rhymes enlists Q-Tip, Lil Wayne and Kanye West for his latest single. Today (November 9), on the twentieth anniversary of legendary Hip Hop releases from A Tribe Called Quest and Wu-Tang Clan with  Midnight Marauders  and  Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)  respectively, this week’s top 10 is held down almost entirely by Detroit emcee  Eminem . With the recent release of his eighth studio album, Eminem has also matched a record held for nearly half a century by The Beatles  as the first artist to simultaneously hold four songs on the Billboard’s Top 20 as a lead artist  (the ubiquitous English band accomplished the feat in 1964). With “ The Monster ,” “ Berzerk ,” “ Survival ,” and “ Rap God ” placed on Billboard’s Top 20 in that order, DX’s own list features an alternate set of tracks beginning with the Buckshot featuring “ Don’t Front ” and ending with an...

Eminem's album stream goes berzerk, Lord Jamar and  Yelawolf trade verbal blows and ScHoolboy Q blasts XXL. This week, Eminem, Lord Jamar and ScHoolboy Q made headlines. The stream of Eminem’s  The Marshall Mathers LP 2 garnered attention, as did Lord Jamar’s verbal sparring with Yelawolf. ScHoolboy Q also called out XXL for its cover featuring Black Hippy. Eminem Streams  The Marshall Mathers LP 2  On iTunes Radio The  stream of Eminem’s  The Marshall Mathers LP 2  became available for stream November 1. The Detroit rapper announced the news via his Twitter account. The album stream followed a steady release of information on the album, which included the release of the cover art in September and the different versions of the tracklist in October. One of the collection’s bonus tracks, “Don’t Front,” features the Detroit emcee remaking  Black Moon’s  “I Got Cha Opin” from the Brooklyn crew’s debut album,  Enta da Stage . Em...