B13 Peer Review

UPDATE: B-13 PEER REVIEW Presents: Monster  

Beyonce explains her thought process behind the self-titled visual album. Beyonce  released a self-titled album today  (December 13) with no publicized release date prior to its arrival. Hours after the project dropped, she also released a video explaining her decision to unveil an unexpected visual project.  "I see music," Beyonce says. "It's more than just what I hear. When I'm connected to something, I immediately see a visual or a series of images that are tied to a feeling or emotion, a memory from my childhood, thoughts about life, my dream or my fantasies. They're all connected to the music. That's one of the reasons why I wanted to do a visual album. I wanted people to hear the songs with the story that's in my head. That's what makes it mine."   Beyonce also discusses how the release is meant to help fans experience an album as opposed to a single and its "hype." "People experience music differently,...

Leon Morris, Hulton Archive / Getty Images We are now winding down the anniversary of hiphop's 30th year of existence as a populist art form. Testimonials and televised tributes have been airing almost daily, thanks to Viacom  and the like. As those digitized hip-hop shout-outs get packed back into their binary folders, however, some among us have been so gauche as to ask, What the heck are we celebrating exactly? A right and proper question, that one is, mate. One to which my best answer has been: Nothing less, my man, than the marriage of heaven and hell, of New World African ingenuity and that trick of the devil known as global hyper-capitalism. Hooray. Given that what we call hiphop is now inseparable from what we call the hiphop industry, in which the nouveau riche and the super-rich employers get richer, some say there's really nothing to celebrate about hiphop right now but the moneyshakers and the moneymakers—who got bank and who got more. Hard to argue with th...

So while you’ve been busy Christmas shopping (in stores and online for Cyber Monday), Ashanti hit up Hot 97 to talk about her new music and upcoming album,  Braveheart . But of course, instead of asking her much about said album, the questions from Ebro Darden and Laura Styles were mostly about Nelly. Well, at least for the first seven minutes of the interview anyway. The singer gave a “final” answer on if she and Nelly will ever get back together, talked about how that relationship impacted her music (including the song “Never Should Have,” which she confirmed was about him), and how they had an amazing sex life. No, seriously, she touches on that with only the nervous Long Island-based laughter that Ashanti can (she’s so charming). Check out the tea from that sit-down, as well as her thoughts on issues with Irv Gotti, and be sure to watch the interview below. Ebro: Are you guys getting back together again?  Negative. Nelly and I are kind of in the space where, I’m...

With the current controversy surrounding high-end retail store Barneys and racial profiling allegations, one thing stands evident. Harry Belafonte was right about Jay-Z. In the midst of this controversy, fans have called on Jay-Z to end his partnership with Barneys, in which his new holiday fashion line is going to be sold. Jay-Z’s response has been a calculated public relations effort in which he negates any real responsibility to his default, “I’m doing it for charity” statement. Currently, Jay-Z is continuing his partnership with Barneys with his collection set to launch next week. This “doing it for charity” response only further highlights Jay-Z’s disconnect with the masses that he often claims to represent. This notion of accepting racism in exchange for charity is downright laughable. If a charity is supposed to be helping people, why work with a store that appears to marginalize his own fan base due to class and race perceptions. Now, Jay-Z claims he’s ...

Santa Clarita, California (CNN)   -- Actor Paul Walker, who shot to fame as star of the high-octane street racing franchise "Fast & Furious," died in a fiery car crash in Southern California on Saturday. He was 40. Walker was in the passenger seat of a 2005 Porsche Carrera GT, driven by a racing team partner, that slammed into a light pole and burst into flames in an office park in the community of Valencia in Santa Clarita, about 30 miles north of Hollywood. Walker's publicist Ame van Iden confirmed his death Saturday. The driver, identified by CNN affiliate KCAL-TV as Roger Rodus, also died. "Thank you all for your condolences and prayers while we mourn the loss of our loved ones," read a message posted on the Facebook page for Always Forever, the high-performance car shop owned by Rodus. Los Angeles Coroner Investigator Dana Bee told CNN on Sunday it would likely take 48 hours to officially identify the remains taken from the twisted w...