The Neptunes

Producer Khalief Brown: Beats for a Space Brawl

[Editor's note: Weekly scribe Jeff Weiss's column, "Bizarre Ride," appears on West Coast Sound every Wednesday. His archives are available here.] It's rare that you hear a rap song on the radio and your only thought is, "Who produced this?" That's what happened last summer when I first heard Kid In ... More >>

Issa Rae and Awkward Black Girl Fill a (Tiny) Niche

Check out our entire YouTube issue here. In front of the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf at the Grove, someone is scraping lightweight plastic chairs across the pavement instead of picking them up, and the sound is akin to fingernails being dragged down a chalkboard. Issa Rae, the 27-year-old writer, direct ... More >>

Top Ten Rap Albums For People Who Don't Know Shit About Hip-Hop

Hip-hop is nearly 40, but many still find this slightly-disorienting world of beats, rhymes and oversize personalities a bit daunting. So consider this our hip-hop Cliff's notes; here are the albums you should know about if you don't want to look silly at cocktail parties. We're not saying these a ... More >>

Mono/Poly Disses Obama, Praises Ron Paul

It was the '90s in Bakersfield, and West Coast gangster rap gripped much of the town. But Charles Dickerson felt bored. So he ignored what was popular, sticking with his beloved electronic music. He now performs under the name Mono/Poly, and released an EP under Brainfeeder last year. The 25-year-o ... More >>

Why Limp Bizkit on Cash Money Makes Sense

See also: Fuck Guilty Pleasures: Limp Bizkit Had An Amazing Run It's confirmed: The Limp Bizkit-on-Cash Money era is upon us, whatever that might entail. We know because last week at the Laundry Bar in Melbourne, Austrailia, Bizkit/House of Pain turntabilist DJ Lethal spun "Ready to Go," the world ... More >>

J-Swift Made Big Hits 
With The Pharcyde 
Before Tragedy And Drugs 
Nearly Took Him Down

Nanette Gonzales​[Editor's note: Longtime Weekly scribe Jeff Weiss's column, "Bizarre Ride," appears on West Coast Sound every Wednesday. His archives are available here.] See also: Top 20 Greatest L.A. Rap Albums Of All Time: The Complete List J-Swift hit rock bottom five years ago. Sacks o ... More >>

OverDoz - The Roxy - 11/22/11

See also: Meet OverDoz: L.A.'s Freakiest, Cheekiest Collective OverDoz The Roxy 11/22/11 A beat before the curtain dropped on their show last night, OverDoz's de facto leader, Kent, addressed the audience soberly, "We did this shit all by ourselves." He could have been referring to any number of ... More >>

Scarface Is Out Of Jail, Performs At Key Club Tomorrow: Excerpts From His Last Interview

​Scarface plays the Key Club tomorrow night. This is big news, considering most folks didn't even know that the greatest of all southern rappers was out of the pen. In October 2010 he began a term at Montgomery County Jail in Alabama over numerous unresolved child support cases. (There is also ... More >>

Pusha T on Vegas Nights, Partying with Rick Ross, and Driving Lamborghinis in the Club

Pusha T​See Also: Pusha T and Tyler the Creator's "Trouble On My Mind" Video Shoot "I've had a good fucking year and it's pretty amazing!" Pusha T, one half of the Neptunes-endorsed rap group The Clipse, sounds relaxed and happy as he prepares to release his new solo project, Fear Of God II: ... More >>

Identity Festival: Steve Aoki, Jessie and the Toy Boys, Chad Hugo and More - Hollywood Palladium - 9/4/11

Roselle ChenJessie And The Toy Boys​Steve Aoki, Booka Shade, Jessie and the Toy Boys, Chad Hugo Identity Festival Hollywood Palladium Sunday, September 4 See also: Identity Festival Preview: We Talk With Steve Aoki, Nervo, Figo, Jessie And The Toy Boys and Others Sunday's Identity Festival a ... More >>

Exclusive: Pusha T and Tyler the Creator's "Trouble On My Mind" Video Shoot

Andrea DomanickThe father becomes the son...​Reported by Andrea Domanick and Rebecca Haithcoat. This is for the critics who doubted the chemistry Two different worlds, same symmetry. -"Trouble on My Mind," Pusha T Leaning on a sticky table in a hotel room stained the color of urine, direct ... More >>

Odd Future Meets The Neptunes, Finally (PHOTO)

Billionaire Boys Club blog​Tyler, the Creator, and Left Brain were in the studio last night with Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo of The Neptunes. If you follow Tyler even peripherally, you know what this means: ​ ​We don't really care about Bieber (sorry). But PHARRELL? Consider ... More >>

Big Boi: The Legend

Outkast's less flamboyant half steps into the spotlight at Club Nokia

Mystery Dance Track Leaks: Early Reports It's LA's Armenian-American Princess Kim Kardashian Backed by The Neptunes Denied, Still Would Make Great Ad Music for the ShakeWeight

Shake Shake Shake​Billboard got egg on its proverbial, industry-fellating face this morning when it released a "leaked" dance track that purported to be a collaboration between Kim Kardashian and The Dream. Then they had to backtrack, after everyone's favorite/least favorite (America: so spli ... More >>

Calling All Star Trakkies: Kiss-n-Grind Spins The Neptunes Tonight

Neptunes Grind-ING!​Started by Vikter Duplaix and Garth Trinidad sometime around late 2006, when it was promoted last-minute and solely by word-of-mouth, Kiss-n-Grind must be in summer school, cause lately they're so thematically well-structured. Tonight's studies Chad Hugo and Pharrell Willi ... More >>

Heart-Ons: Kelis And Robyn Bring All The Boys To The Yard, Eh, Music Box.

The Summer tour co-headlined by Kelis and Robyn is called "All Hearts" but Friday night, when the tempestuous twosome thumped and pumped it up at the Music Box, it was more like, "all boys," the ratio of male to female appearing to be about 90% (gay) male and10% female. The place was a sweatpit of m ... More >>

Can a Yeasayer Remix Save N*E*R*D (and Nelly Furtado) from Totally Sucking?

N*E*R*Ds​Or a Hot Chip remix? Or one from Crookers? Or an entire iTunes EP of remixes of the exact same song -- the Nelly Furtado-featuring "Hot-N-Fun," which is neither of the things its title suggests? The Neptunes have made some of the darkest, weirdest, greatest beats that mainstream hip- ... More >>

Music Picks: Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, Bad Religion, Non

Also, The Wedding Present, Phil Alvin and others

Rock Picks: Van Dyke Parks, Chicago Underground Duo, Rickie Lee Jones

Also, Clipse, Imaad Wasif, Josh Charles and others

Rock Picks: Prefuse 73, the Gaslamp Killer, VoicesVoices, Beyond the Pale

Also, Do Make Say Think, the Living Sisters, Wale and others

Download Free 5-Song EP from J*DaVeY [MP3s]

​The many-genre'd sex tartlet-led reincarnation of N*E*R*D otherwise known as J*DaVeY has just released a free EP via Bandcamp titled Boudoir Synema: The Great Mistapes. The five songs gathered therein range from synth 'n' shuffle beat electro jams to sorta sexy, nasally Britney Spears elect ... More >>

Rock Picks: Quantic and his Combo Bárbaro, Elvis Costello, Rock & Roll Summer Circus

Also, Flaming Lips, Clipse, Silk Flowers, the Muffs and others

Rock Picks: Sly & Robbie, Johanna Kunin, White Rabbits, Daniel Francis Doyle

Also, Blue Jungle, A Camp, Neko Case, Jay Reatard and others

Don't Miss This Show: Oliver Wang on Q-Tip, the Cool Kids (MP3), the Knux and Pacific Division at H.O.B.

Saturday, November 15 Q-Tip, The Cool Kids at House of Blues It has been nine years since Q-Tip's last album yet strangely, it hasn't seemed so long. That says much about the enduring power of Q-Tip's old band, A Tribe Called Quest - guaranteed to be in heavy rotation on iPod playlists for any hi ... More >>

Rock Picks: Brian Wilson, the Juan Maclean, Common

Also, Citay, Nightwish, Savina Yannatou

The Kidz In the Hall Demonstrate the Power of A Good Rolodex

When ex-Just Blaze proteges, Kidz in the Hall released their debut album, School Was My Hustle on the newly revived Rawkus Records, I didn't listen to it for a variety of reasons. Chief among them was the "Ivy League Rap" label critics ascribed to the duo of Nawledge and Double-O. Still scarred f ... More >>

Record Reviews: Burial, Wu-Tang Clan and Kenna

Burial, Wu-Tang Clan and Kenna

The Fil-Am Invasion

Embedded with the hip-hop movement that’s taking over Hollywood

Rock Picks: The Humpers, Secretary Bird, Cut Chemist & DJ Shadow

For the week of June 21–28

Rock Picks

For the week of November 10–16

Revenge of the N.E.R.D.

Pharrell’s long-delayed solo debut, In My Mind, is not completely horrible

Free as a Bass

Music Picks

For the week of July 27 - August 3

Music Picks

For Feb. 17 - 23

Woman vs. Machine

As persona overtakes person, Love, Angel, Music, Baby shows Gwen Stefani still drives her own ambition

Payback

Howard Dean makes a pitch for the under-30 vote

Recombinators

N*E*R*D moves on from hip-hop and rock

The Beat That Kills

The Neptunes Don't Front

It’s High Time

Hip-Hop Boo-Hoo

The Cute Ones

Dopemen

Getting a fix on Scarface and Clipse

Blood Rush

No more Coldplay, show us the love

Love in the Abstract

Cool Schmool

N*E*R*D want theirs

Troubleshooters

New Music

Stronger Than Pride

With Sade at your side