SxSW 2012 With Steve Stoute And Soul Train
On Friday, I’ll be heading to SxSW in Austin, Texas for two panels. Saturday at 11a, Steve Stoute and I will be having a conversation about America’s multiracial future. And a few hours later, at 1:30p, myself and Tony Cornelius — son of the legendary Don Cornelius — will celebrate the legacy of Soul Train […]
Def Jam: The First 25 Years Of The Last Great Record Label
The new book that I co-authored with Bill Adler and Cey Adams — Def Jam: The First 25 Years Of The Last Great Record Label (Rizzoli) — is out this week. (Click HERE to buy the book.) So much more than a “coffee table” book, it’s a comprehensive oral history of the label. The book […]
Sylvia Robinson (1936-2011)
Sylvia Vanderpool Robinson — the woman who produced the first commercially successful hip-hop record and perhaps the first female record producer in history — died this morning of heart failure. She was 75. (I know that some accounts have her birthday in 1938, not 1936, but from family accounts I believe the earlier date is […]
Why Eminem Isn’t Elvis
(Written for HuffingtonPost Black Voices) In July, RollingStone.com commissioned Village Voice pop music columnist Chris Molanphy to craft a feature called “Introducing the King of Hip-Hop.” The request came after the success of Molanphy’s previous post for the website, “Introducing the Queen of Pop” — in which Molanphy measured female music artists’ commercial performance in nine […]
Dan Charnas In Vibe Magazine’s “Juice” Issue
Me upon hearing the news: “You guys have an issue about Jews? Nice!” Many thanks to the good folks at Vibe for this inexplicable honor. One of those kinds of features that you read, but never imagine you’d be in. Great to share a page with dream hampton for the first time since our days […]