Chuck D

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Was Ruined By Rush Fans

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony aired on HBO on Saturday. Hopefully you didn't watch it, because it was bad. But pity us: We actually attended the damn thing, at the Nokia Theatre last month. So, for the sake of catharsis, let's briefly run it down. It's the only way we can move o ... More >>

LL Cool J's Authentic: A Track By Track Review, Without Prejudice

LL Cool J can do no wrong lately. Actually, strike that, LL Cool J does everything wrong lately. Last year there was his trend-hopping track "Ratchet," dubbed one of the worst of 2012. More recently there was his duet with Brad Paisley, "Accidental Racist," in which he more or less forgave the sin o ... More >>

Music Picks: Coachella, Merle Haggard, Spiritualized

How Easy Is It to Bang at SXSW?

By Kiernan Maletsky "All the single dudes put up your phone. Now all the single ladies put up your phone. Turn to the nearest person with a phone up. Now type in your phone number. Now you have something to do after this." That was Chuck D, talking from the Doritos Main Stage. Or at least I think ... More >>

DJ Muggs Does Dubstep. Prepare For Your Head to Explode

DJ Muggs at 44 still rocks his skull cap and looks not unlike the 20-something hip-hop head who first appeared in Cypress Hill's video for "How I Could Just Kill a Man." He sits at a laptop in his Burbank studio, playing a track he recently produced featuring a pair of hit Queens rappers, Action Bro ... More >>

The Five Best Concerts in L.A. This Week

Monday, December 10 Lamps PEHRSPACE Lamps are punk (like Chrome? Or Suicide?). They're from space (like Hawkwind?) but also from hell (like Electric Eels!), where everything melts together into a big hot white ball of confusion that's bright enough to give off some sick kind of light but which will ... More >>

Phil Upchurch Introduced Muddy Waters to the Hippies

If he had to pick a number, guitarist Phil Upchurch estimates he has played on over 2000 recordings. Based on the frequency with which his name arises, he's probably right. Asking him to recall some of those dates can be like asking a fisherman about a particular fish he caught 40 years ago. "I'll ... More >>

Henry Rollins: The Column! Memphis on My Mind

[Look for your weekly fix from the one and only Henry Rollins right here on West Coast Sound every Thursday, and come back tomorrow for the awesomely annotated playlist for his Saturday KCRW broadcast.] Sitting on the tour bus, the Bon Jovi Mobile-Def Leppard Express (no offense to either corpora ... More >>

Chuck D of Public Enemy Gets Into Twitter Beef With LA Weekly

I had hoped my brush with fame would involve winning the lottery or meeting the president. But for a second there Chuck D made me Twitter-famous (which is to say, in the words of Saturday Night Live, not famous). It all started when I reported that a weekend event in L.A., widely publicized as a fr ... More >>

Public Enemy - Occupy Skid Row - 1/15/12

Public Enemy, Yo-Yo, Kurupt, King T, Kid Frost, Egyptian Lover Downtown, Gladys Ave. and 6th St. 1/15/11 See also: *Public Enemy and Matt & Kim - Sunset Strip Music Festival - 8/20/2011 *Our slideshow of the Skid Row Street Festival Public Enemy is known for fighting the powers that be. So even ... More >>

'Occupy Skid Row' Concert Featuring Public Enemy, Cypress Hill, Kurupt in Doubt, LAPD Says: It Doesn't Have Permit

See our review of the festivities here. Updated at the bottom with what went down. First posted at 4:33 p.m. Friday. A planned "Occupy Skid Row" free street concert Sunday featuring Public Enemy, Cypress Hill, Kurupt and other hip-hop artists is in doubt, police tell the Weekly. The Los Angeles Co ... More >>

Occupy L.A.: The Revolution Is Being Televised

After 46 arrests for civil disobedience, Occupy L.A. feels its oats

Funky Homosapiens: The Best Rapper Names Of All Time

Busta Rhymes​See Also: The Worst Rapper Names Of All Time, Besides Shorty Shitstain Last week we ran down the world's corniest MC names, and on Haterade Monday this week we complained about the worst albums by the best L.A. rappers, as well as the most ridiculous Beach Boys songs (including o ... More >>

Chuck D, RZA, Shavo Odadjian, Page Hamilton, Angelo Moore and SceneFour "Come Together" at Andrew Weiss Gallery

Keith PlocekShavo Odadjian stands in front of Shavo Odadjian in Nocturnal Art​"They put me next to Dali, and I'm like, Yeah!" said System of a Down's Shavo Odadjian, standing between Salvador Dali's Triumphant Elephant and his own Nocturnal Art. Odadjian's work featured the Armenian genocide o ... More >>

Dennis Coffey's Show Was Canceled; Who Cares? He's Still Amazing

Doug Coombe​By Craig D. Lindsey Detroit soul/funk guitarist Dennis Coffey was supposed to do a show at the Troubadour this week. Unfortunately, it was canceled. But considering how fascinating the man is, we decided to profile him anyway. After all, Coffey brought a new form of funk to Motow ... More >>

2Pac and Walt Whitman

Two professors anthologize the best rap lyrics

Jon Spencer, Extra Wide

Blues Explosion revisited onstage and in recordings

ODB Lives!: N.A.S.A. Releases New Video for Ol' Dirty Bastard, Karen O, and Fatlip Track

N.A.S.A. Releases New Video for Ol' Dirty Bastard, Karen O, and Fatlip Track

Not the Usual Haunts

I FOUND SOME TATTERED NOTES ON THE STREET AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS MULTIBOOK DEAL

A Conversation with Posdnuos of De La Soul: On Nike Run Mixes, The Current State of Hip-Hop and Oodles of O's

De La Soul, back in the day Only a handful of rap groups can be bandied about as G.O.A.T: Wu-Tang, Outkast, EPMD, Tribe Called Quest, Public Enemy, Run-DMC, UGK, The Geto Boys, and De La Soul. If you need an introduction to the De La -- Posdnuos, Dave/Trugoy the Dove, and Maseo -- you obviously hav ... More >>

Coachella Sunday: No Holding Back Public Enemy, The Cure, The Horrors, K'Naan

Anyone who's ever been to Coachella knows it leaves you with a special brand of Monday morning pain. This 3 day monster will test even the fittest, most fervent music fan. For most attendees this was a call-in-sick day, a day of rest and merciful silence. Or, if you did the weary drive home today li ... More >>

Beige Beef Breeds New Rusty's Supperclub, and Lucent Dossier Experience at the Edison

N.A.S.A. lands at Cinespace for Aoki's bash

Up With People Under the Stairs

Hip-hop duo celebrates a decade in L.A.

Tonight at the El Rey: People Under the Stairs Come Up for Some Air

"We'd been around the world ten times and done Glastonbury, Redding, and Leeds before people had even thought about leaving LA. And we've never been heralded by any local media."

Paul Dateh: Hip-Hop Violinist Superhero by Night, Mild-Mannered Bookstore Clerk by Day

In life and in music, he knows how to improvise

Pitchfork Festival Day 1-The Airing of Grievances

A Pitchfork seems like the appropriate emblem. After all, it's been a hellish last two days, culminating with this moment right now, my friends already having set off for the festival at the absurdly early crack of noon, abandoning me to pump Fela on my iPod in a Chicago Barnes and Noble, spitting ... More >>

Wax On, Wax Off

Car wash, yeah; pole-dancing queen; photo Zone at Drkrm

10 Musicians Definitely Not on Steroids

From the New York Times: "When news surfaced over the weekend that 50 Cent, Wyclef Jean, Timbaland and other rap stars had been implicated in a steroids investigation, some hip-hop fans were shocked, but to many in the industry the accusations seemed inevitable." Oh, how our collective pride in t ... More >>

Public Enemy's 20 Years in the Game

Bringing that beat back

Flavor Flav in the Roaster

“How do you embarrass a crackhead?”

Days of Lines and Poses

SxSW journal

Rock PIcks

For the week of December 7 - 14

14th Annual Pan African Film & Arts Festival

Spooky Rebirth

Snakebites

Trip Out!

Uniting underground L.A. hip-hop, Chuck D. and some guy from Linkin Park, Z-Trip’s debut shocks, awes

Live in L.A.

Anger Management

The Growing Pains of Liberal Talk Radio

The Revelators

Martin Scorsese’s blue Christmas

Eazy Does It

Gangsta rap hits L.A.

Back in Black

Sun Sonnets

Rap and Revelation

Words to the wise from Blood of Abraham

Unchained Melody

Word According to B.I.G.

Shout at the Devil

Public Enemy rants to the music

Downloading the Future

The MP3 Revolution — the End of the Industry as We Know It

Home of the Brave

Alone together with P.M. Dawn

All About the Benjamins

Hip-hop: The need, not the greed