2012 So Far...

Whitney Houston

The music world stood still again last Saturday when it was announced that Whitney Houston had passed away. The I Will Always Love You singer was found submerged in her bathtub at the Beverly Hilton Hotel by a member of her entourage and pronounced dead on the scene, she was only 48-years-old.

Whitney leaves behind her 18-year-old daughter Bobbi Kristina and a stack of hits for us music lovers who will be mourning the loss of a music great. With her death comes much negativity regarding the role a painful drug addiction had to play in her life, and until we know for certain the cause of her untimely death let's remember Ms. Houston for the music she blessed us with - R.I.P. Whitney Houston (August 9, 1963 – February 11, 2012).


Whitney Houston - It's Not Right But It's Okay

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Blue Ivy Carter

At just over one month old Blue Ivy Carter has to be the world's most famous baby, kicking her rival Harper Seven to the curb the princess of music icons Beyonce and Jay Z has arrived.

First time parents welcomed their bundle into the world on January 7th but kept the world on our toes as we waited for a glimpse of the heir to throne, but then on February 10th the power couple released five very intimate snaps of their pride and joy.

Opting out of the traditional million dollar magazine spread they posted the pictures of their daughter on Tumblr site dedicated to her - helloblueivycarter.tumblr.com

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Just as she finally got rid of that horrid red thing and went to seek refuge with a brown weave, Rihanna has let me down again by deciding to get involved in a blonde mess...



Which just reminds me of...

Wait! Do you see it now...

 No?

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Not a massive Madonna fan myself but I did really enjoy watching this performance, although as she's 53-years-old I don't appreciate seeing so much of her skin.

Other than the fact she lip synced during the entire performance I do feel she gave it her all, I thoroughly enjoyed the way the tracks were mixed during the 13 minute show and the fact she brought my home boys LMFAO on stage to party rock with her put a massive smile on my face *shuffles*

For the halftime spectacular she also "sang" her new single 'Give Me All Your Luvin'' alongside Nicki Minaj & M.I.A. which overall was pretty awful, nothing can save that song but M.I.A. managed to amped up the lacklustre performance by flipping the bird to millions of viewers - good times.

Finally Madonna wrapped up the showing with Ceelo Green who in my opinion saved the entire thing because his vocals on 'Like A Prayer' were so on point.

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Nicki Minaj - Stupid Hoe

It's official Nicki Minaj has lost the plot! However you have to admire the hype she continues to generate as she managed to make history on Vevo with her latest video which gained over 4.8 million viewers in 24 hours but all I have to say on this is ... NEXT!!

Something I Think You Should Hear...

*** UPDATED ***

J. Cole - Cole World: The Sideline Story

Cole World: The Sideline Story is finally here and as a J. Cole fan I'm very proud. He's definitely held it up for us fans of The Come Up, The Warm Up and Friday Night Lights (and more recently Any Given Sunday).

So of course because I pre-ordered his album my copy came through the door on Saturday, but I held off on the album review because I didn't want to prematurely judge his debut record based off of what I already adore about Cole's talent. 

This album is perhaps the best example of the type of masterpiece that can only be put together with pure control over your project, unlike (and yes I'm going to say it) the efforts of Wiz Khalifa & Nicki Minaj, who had the mixtapes to stand up on but failed to deliver the album music lovers and not lovers of the hype were expecting.


Cole Talks About The Sideline Story

The Sideline Story has a nice hip hop/soul sound to it, with the right balance of mellow, mid-tempo and club bangers which all stand up lyrically, within this album there is also a certain level of consciousness that Cole makes coherent throughout each track.

The album begins with a much needed introduction which leads nicely into the first song, 'Dollar and a Dream III' which basically sums up how J. Cole perceives his musical struggle up until this point. Then there are tracks such as 'Mr. Nice Watch' and 'Can't Enough' which most would say isn't typical Cole as they definitely get you moving but they stay true to form as they are packed with witty punchlines. The album also consists of tracks like 'Lost Ones', 'Never Told' and 'Nobody's Perfect' which explore topics rooted within the motions we go through when in love or faced with hardship.


J. Cole - Daddy's Little Girl

The elements that stood out massively with this album is Cole's attention detail; I'm such a big music lover and I truly believe you can hear how much time and effort an artist has put into a song to make it the best it can be.With tracks like 'In The Morning' and 'Lights Please' which are now Cole classics he took the time to rework them by adding and removing parts of the instrumental to make them exciting to old listeners.

As my favourite track from the album doesn't have a video yet but it's about to surface as Cole and Missy have started putting visuals to the track, I've put up the visual for my second - actually third favourite track from the album.

J. Cole - Lost Ones

Let me know what you think of Cole World: The Sideline Story

As you may have noticed I haven't blogged in ages, which is very, very bad!

I will return to my blogging mission in a few weeks, I've got so much to say and I wish you could see how much work I have saved to draft which I haven't posted.

Over the Christmas period I shall be blogging as much as I once was, and letting you all know what I've been up to; until then Keep Calm and Merry On x

Something I Think You Should Hear...

*** UPDATED! ***

Frank Ocean - Nostalgia/Ultra

Now I don't know a lot about Frank Ocean and Odd Future, but what I do know is this mixtape is a great starting point for Mr. Ocean's career.

What I won't say is that Frank Ocean is original because every artist draws influence from someone but Ocean's music is very refreshing and if he makes all the right moves he'll definitely be one of the heavy hitters before 2011's over.

Nostalgia/ULTRA is a good mixtape because it's just good music, he has original tracks and he has taken samples from some unlikely tunes but he's made it work. I can't say that I can relate to everything he is singing about but it's that raw realness that makes this mixtape a good'un. My hopes for Frank Ocean is that he continues to stay on this high, release more music and don't change for the sake of making an album that can appeal to all because that's not what it's about.

Favourites on this mixtape are 'Nature Feels', 'We All Try' and the song below 'Swim Good'.

Frank Ocean - Swim Good

Let me know what you think about Nostalgia/ULTRA

I Literally Can't Get Enough!!

I LOVE THIS SONG...


J. Cole - Can't Get Enough feat. Trey Songz

Yeah and if you're wondering that is Rihanna...

Exclusive!



Why So Serious?



I recently caught up with Chipmunk at the Mercy Prize Awards, and he's revealed that he will be changing his to Chip.

The Champion rapper who is currently taking a break from recording music has said he has decided to shorten his stage name, and knock off the ‘munk’.

When asked what he planned to change his name to, he said, ‘It would only be Chip. If I do it will just be Chip.’

This is a tried and tested method in hip-hop with several rappers choosing to change their names to represent growth, or to purely stay relevant.

The likes of pint size rapper Lil Bow Wow, got rid of the ‘Lil’ in 2003. Southern rapper T.I. seems to have trouble deciding whether to remain as T.I. or to be TIP. Biggie Smalls ended up becoming The Notorious BIG.

But no-one has been more back and forth in the name changing game than mogul Sean Combs. He went from Puff Daddy to Puffy, then it was P. Diddy, and now it’s just Diddy.

Perhaps one day Chip, formerly known as Chipmunk will just be known as C.


Chipmunk - Hustle Hard

Fresh From The Editing Suite...

***UPDATED***

This post is dedicated to my little Sister - Happy Birthday!

I've gotta admit I'm quite pleased with myself with this edition of 'Fresh From The Editing Suite'.
It's like playing 6 degrees of seperation, the only artist who's missing from this is Beyonce.

Rihanna - Cheers

Although I do believe these are the laziest type of videos an artists can make I love them. Nothing beats seeing behind the scenes footage of all that goes on when these stars are on the road, especially when you're actually interested in what they get up to. 'Cheers' is yet another release from Rihanna's Loud album, and the video documents all she's been up to in the last few months. The video also shows her sporting her new hairstyle and colour which I'm really feeling; finally the red is dead and buried.



Nicki Minaj - Fly (feat. Rihanna)

Once upon a time I was a massive Nicki Minaj fan but since her "fashion" sense upgraded to crazy I've switched off. In this video she does well to rock a couple crazy looks, none of which help to put across the potentially inspiring story behind this song. The video isn't really anything special, and I'm really struggling to understand the bit when she goes all ninja on some dudes. And am I the only one who thinks the video was located on the exact same set as Chris Brown's video 'Next To You'; very coincidental.


Lil' Wayne - How To Love

So Tha Carter 4  is here. Anyway. Yeah the hype around Weezy is pretty much gone, and 'How To Love' isn't exactly the best song to use to try to resuscitate the hype. I know it's meant to be one of those deep tracks that make you think but I want a song I can dance to man. The story in the video good but it's been done before, that's not to say that any video treatments nowadays are unique but it could've been done in a refreshing way.


Jay Z & Kanye West - Otis

Ok, my hands are up, I was not excited about Jay & Kanye getting together to make an album because their bromance is a tad bit annoying. But it'd be rude not to appreciate the great music that they make when they hit the studio. 'Otis' unlike 'H.A.M.' is very enticing to the ear and also typical Kanye, and the added element of Jay Z makes it that much better. The video's fun to watch, like who doesn't want to see rappers "discreetly" show off how much money they have by making a video that doesn't have a lot to it.


J. Cole - Work Out

'Work Out' is definitely my favourite song in this bunch, what should I say about the brilliance that is J. Cole? Maybe I'll just start by saying he has smacked it, this is the feel good song of the summer (even though it's more or less over), this track makes going back to the office that bit more bearable, and it 100% gets you ready for the weekend. The video to accompany the track is pretty standard for Cole, not too much going on but you still wanna watch it to see what goes down. Looking forward to the album, which I shall be pre-ordering...COLE WORLD!!

And just in case you missed my six degrees of separation let me break it down for you:

Rihanna obviously features on Nicki Minaj's track, Nicki's part of Young Money which is Lil' Wayne's clique, Wayne and Jay Z have collaborated on tracks together and are the Mr. Carters, and then finally J. Cole was the first artist to be signed to Jay Z's label Roc Nation #SICK

Really Ouick

Baby BJ

Beyonce's done it again! No - not made an album full of monster hits, from which every single is destined for the top spot (that's the norm for this lady). What she done last night was even bigger...

She's announced that her and her husband (Jay Z - for those of you who might not have heard of him) are expecting their first child. Now we all know that bigger than two mega-celebrities getting hitched is two mega-celebrities breeding mini-mega-celebs...Shear madness!!

This is really exciting because Beyonce seemed like one of those women who really wasn't trying to get involved in all the baby-making. In fact, I recall her once saying she wasn't going to have children after witnessing the birth of her nephew. However, I guess it was one of those things you say when you don't see it happening, but boy is it all unfolding now.

More exciting than that is it seems that with the release of her current album, Beyonce's been keen to show us that she is actually a human (not the robot diva I once thought she was). Since the release of '4' we've seen her cry on stage, speak openly about her relationshipb with Jay Z, and she even said "I love me some Jay Z". Also we've seen alot more skin and less of those granny type skin colour tights that she loves. But yes, in proving that she's human having a baby pretty much tops the list.

In closing, I can't wait to see who's features the baby adopts, and more nail biting what are they gonna have? A boy? A girl? Twins...I'm thinking twins, one boy and one girl...On a serious note, I do wish the couple all the best at this glorious time.

Peep her latest video, which I have to say is probably my favourite Beyonce video yet, because I love the visuals:



Beyonce - 1+1

(I guess 1+1 = Baby - sorry I had to *covers face*)

Put That Song On Replay | Rest In Peace

Aaliyah

10 years ago, singer Aaliyah died in a plane crash, and as untimely as her death was she left this world with the greatest gift ever - her music. Although it's been a decade, Aaliyah definitely made music which has stood the test of time, and still has the power to stop and make you pay attention. She was/is probably the coolest R&B singer, and she brought her effortless swagger to every single song.

Below are some videos that Aaliyah graced the world with before her life was tragically cut short. With this post I'm not only paying my respects to Aaliyah, but I'm also saying 'Rest In Peace' to pilot Luis Morales III, hair stylist Eric Forman, Anthony Dodd, security guard Scott Gallin, video producer Douglas Kratz, stylist Christopher Maldonado, and Blackground Records employees Keith Wallace and Gina Smith who all lost their lives on August, 25th 2001 - R.I.P. Aaliyah (January 16, 1979 - August 25, 2001).

If Your Girl Only Knew

One In A Million

Rock The Boat

We Need A Resolution

Fresh From The Editing Suite

Jessie J - Who's Laughing Now

Obviously I do not like this song and I'm seriously losing rspect for Jessie J as an artist.
Ofcourse I'm proud of Jessie J for breaking into the industry the way she did but I really don't think the tracks she's chosen to release really show her true potential. Like I've said, I understand that everyone needs an image to base their talent on but I think Jessie J needs to tone it down. The message behind this song could've been done in a better way. Simples.

Be sure to leave a comment and let me know what you think x