During the Austin, Texas leg of Drake’s “Summer Sixteen” tour, the 6 God took some seemingly apparent shots at fellow Toronto rapper, Tory Lanez.
About a week after Snoop Dogg and The Game hosted a peace rally in Los Angeles, the rappers have reunited for another effort that aims to curb violence in the city. They’re calling it “Time To Unite: United Hoods + Gangs Nation.”
The event went down Sunday in a South L.A. community center, where Snoop and The Game hosted a town hall style meeting for the Crips, Bloods, and other gang members to discuss ways they can make the area safer.
“I want to extend the invitation to all […] GANG LEADERS from every hood in our city as well as the surrounding cities […] to have the much needed conversation amongst ourselves about our influence on the youth in our respective neighborhoods & how we can serve as better role models to them & the brothers we stand beside daily,” The Game wrote on Instagram.
The Trump campaign has plenty of explanations and/or excuses for the portions of Melania Trump’s Republican National Convention speech that many have argued were plagiarized from a previous speech from First Lady Michelle Obama. Speaking with the Hill Tuesday morning, Trump spokesperson Katrina Pierson defended Melania’s speech by arguing that the portions in question, excerpted in the video above, were simply “Republican values” and nothing more.
“These are values, Republican values by the way, of hard work, determination, family values, dedication and respect, and that’s Melania Trump,” Pierson told the Hill Tuesday. “This concept that Michelle Obama invented the English language is absurd.” Pierson also referenced a previous speech from former First Lady Laura Bush, adding that Melania was “definitely talking about her family, her parents, and the values that she taught.”
In the latest round of the ongoing Drake and Joe Budden beef, Budden hits up The Brilliant Idiots podcast to break everything down for hosts Charlamagne Tha God and Andrew Schulz, including why he felt compelled to call out Drake in the first place.
Charlamagne opens the conversation up by letting Budden air out their issues. “I haven’t agreed with you in years—part of the reason I enjoy you so much is because I am able to disagree with you,” Budden tells Charlamagne. Still, later in the conversation, he calls him a puppet because he feels that he just broadcasts the same opinions of the public. “I’m not stuck in the ’90s,” Charlamagne fires back. “I’m not standing on the corner in denim jean shorts and construction timbs talking about bringing back,” which he says is what Budden does.
Despite earlier reports that Taylor Swift threatened Kanye West with criminal prosecution over their recorded phone call that Kim Kardashian leaked on her Snapchat, Kanye likely will not face any charges. TMZ reportedly obtained the entire phone call recording, and discovered something important: the call wasn’t private. Kanye’s phone was on speaker mode, and Rick Rubin reportedly chimed in several times during the conversation. Kanye’s camera crew could also reportedly be heard talking in the background.
This might seem like an unimportant detail, but it’s actually pivotal to the lawsuit threats that Swift made against Kanye. She claimed that the recording was made without her consent, and under California law, she would have to be privy to the recording in order for it to be lawful. However, as TMZ points out, this only applies to “confidential communication.”
A private phone call between two people would count for this, but if Swift knew she was being overheard by Rick Rubin—which she surely did if he chimed into the conversation—then the entire communication would no longer be considered confidential. As such, the law would not apply and the recording would be completely lawful. In this case, Swift would have no legal standing to claim the phone call was confidential.
Although she threatened the legal action back in February, it’s not clear that Swift planned to follow through with this at all. She’s taken a beating on social media ever since the phone call leaked, subject to internet ridicule under the #KimExposedTaylorParty hashtag. A lawsuit might only further publicize an event that she may be keen to move on from. Nonetheless, if she did decide to pursue legal action, it seems that she might not have any recourse there either.
The call revealed that, despite her initial statements, Swift was aware of at least some of the lyrics directed at her on Kanye West’s “Famous.” She maintains that she didn’t know he was going to refer to her as “that bitch,” but the video does seem to reveal that she knew more about the song than she originally let on.
French Montana on Drake’s “No Shopping” Verse: “I Don’t Think We Did That Record About Joe Budden”
Joe Budden fired a number of shots at Drake over the past two weeks, including several diss tracks and podcasts about him. Most of the drama stemmed from a clip French Montana posted on his Instagram of Drake rapping “pump, pump, pump it up,” which seemingly referenced Budden’s 2003 hit “Pump It Up.”
When “No Shopping,” the song that the clip was from, finally dropped, it seemed to confirm what Budden had been saying. Drake rapped “I’m not a one-hit wonder, they know all my stuff/You let me turn into the nigga you almost was,” and Budden almost immediately fired back on the diss track “Afraid.”
Now, French Montana has thrown a curveball into the whole situation by claiming that the track was never about Joe Budden at all. In an interview with MTV News, French said “I don’t think we did that record thinking about Joe Budden… It’s not that I don’t think — I know that for a fact.”
This came as a surprise to everyone, considering the track’s integral role in the Drake/Budden beef. When asked what it was about, French simply responded “Drinking, having fun, enjoying life, and just making a record about that. I don’t think we was in there thinking about anybody. I don’t think we ever went in the studio with negative energy, talking about somebody. We just work and have fun.”
The assertion is an interesting one, as Drake’s verse does seem to be a not-so-subliminal shot Budden’s way. One possible scenario is that French Montana just doesn’t want the beef to overshadow the track as a whole. We’ll have to see if Drake or Joe Budden have anything more to add to the drama.
Joey Bada$$ Thinks the Government Is Still Keeping Tabs on Him for Posting Malia Obama’s Selfie
Joey Bada$$ is convinced the Secret Service is still watching him. And it’s all because of that Malia Obama selfie he posted over a year ago.
In an interview with the New York Post, the 21-year-old Brooklyn rapper says he’s experienced suspicious activity ever since he shared a photo of the First Daughter repping his collective, Pro Era. The image did, in fact, spark in a White House investigation, as officials questioned how the picture was even leaked online in January of 2015.
Shortly after the photo made its way around the internet, Joey claimed his phones had been tapped because of a strange clicking noise. And now, the rapper has revealed more details that suggest he hasn’t been taken of the government’s watch list.
“There was a tree outside my door that shaded my whole house. It had been there for years. But when that shit with Malia went down, the tree was gone,” he told the NY Post. “The timing was too suspicious. I guess they [had] to get clearer pictures!”
Though Joey said the thought of being monitored made him lose sleep at first, he now seems to be less troubled by the incidents: “It’s all good. I’m only doing positive things,” he explained.
So is Joey right to be suspicious? Obviously, the Secret Service doesn’t take matters concerning the First Family very lightly, so it’s possible he is being watched. Or maybe he’s just becoming increasingly paranoid after taking a role on the hit TV thriller Mr. Robot.
It’s been almost three years now since Danny Brown released his third album, Old, so his fans have been ecstatic to see that things are finally progressing with the Detroit rapper’s fourth project. In mid-June, he dropped the single “When It Rain,” along with an accompanying video. And now, the project that “When It Rain” will live on finally has a name. On Sunday night, Brown took to Twitter to share that his next album will be called Atrocity EXhibition.
The album title comes from the name of a Joy Division song, which itself is named after a book by J. G. Ballard. One fan took it upon himself to explain this to Danny, but of course, he already knew the origins of the title and shut the fan down on Twitter.
ScHoolboy Q is heading out on the road in support of his latest album, Blank Face LP. The Top Dawg Entertainment artist announced the tour where he will kick off the whole thing this August in Indianapolis, Ind. and will take him across the world through North America and Europe through the end of 2016.
It sounds like Lil Wayne is in some legal some trouble with American Express. According to TMZ, the Young Money rapper is being sued by the company for being over six months late on a five-figure bill.
American Express filed a lawsuit Thursday for the back amount of $86,396.75 plus the cost of legal fees. The filed documents claim Weezy has been in the red since December 2015.
Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time that Lil Wayne has run into money problems. Back in 2014, Wayne filed a lawsuit against Birdman and Cash Money Records over delays of releasing his album Tha Carter V for $51 million in advances and payments. Later on, the lawyer who helped represent him sued Wayne for $375,000 in unpaid legal fees related to the case.