Archive for September, 2010

“It ain’t kicked in,” Baby told MTV News. “My family, I like to do things for him for his birthday, you hear me? This the first time we not gonna get a chance to do that. But he is putting a new album out called I Am Not a Human Being. We pop bottles for him while he’s gone.”

Wayne’s album landed online Monday; 10 songs are being sold digitally, and on October 12, a physical copy of the album will land at retailers. That version has 13 tracks.

“When Wayne do what he do, he takes serious pride in his work,” Birdman told us in Miami last week for the kickoff of Drake’s Light Dreams and Nightmares Tour. “Nothing we do is half-stepping or half-cocked. I think it’s a great album. To me, he’s switching back. This album has no Vocoder; he’s back to raw rap. He’s just rapping how he’s feeling. He’s a genius, so the music is always gonna be great. He wanted to put I Am Not a Human Being out to show people he’s always in the building. Every album we put out, we’re going to do the most. We’re gonna go for it. We’re never gonna come half- cocked. You expect to see a lot, you gonna get a lot. It’s a great album.”

Wayne has exactly 39 days left on his sentence until he comes home November 4. Birdman said he’ll most likely go see his family right away.

“That’s my son. I love him. You always gonna miss a loved one. At the same time, we doing what we have to do,” the Cash Money CEO said. “Work hard. We all excited he’s about to come home. He’s happy. He wanna get out that place. That ain’t no place for him to be. Everybody is energized that he’s coming home. He walked the little walk. That was a left turn in our life. We wasn’t expecting nothing like that.” Executive Decisions: Birdman

Last year, Birdman handed over a sachet with $1 million in cash to his son Lil Wayne for his birthday. But on Monday (September 27), Wayne’s 28th birthday, the #1 Stunna can’t celebrate with his loved one like he wants to. Wayne is still incarcerated on Rikers Island.

“It ain’t kicked in,” Baby told MTV News. “My family, I like to do things for him for his birthday, you hear me? This the first time we not gonna get a chance to do that. But he is putting a new album out called I Am Not a Human Being. We pop bottles for him while he’s gone.”

Wayne’s album landed online Monday; 10 songs are being sold digitally, and on October 12, a physical copy of the album will land at retailers. That version has 13 tracks.

“When Wayne do what he do, he takes serious pride in his work,” Birdman told us in Miami last week for the kickoff of Drake’s Light Dreams and Nightmares Tour. “Nothing we do is half-stepping or half-cocked. I think it’s a great album. To me, he’s switching back. This album has no Vocoder; he’s back to raw rap. He’s just rapping how he’s feeling. He’s a genius, so the music is always gonna be great. He wanted to put I Am Not a Human Being out to show people he’s always in the building. Every album we put out, we’re going to do the most. We’re gonna go for it. We’re never gonna come half- cocked. You expect to see a lot, you gonna get a lot. It’s a great album.”

Wayne has exactly 39 days left on his sentence until he comes home November 4. Birdman said he’ll most likely go see his family right away.

“That’s my son. I love him. You always gonna miss a loved one. At the same time, we doing what we have to do,” the Cash Money CEO said. “Work hard. We all excited he’s about to come home. He’s happy. He wanna get out that place. That ain’t no place for him to be. Everybody is energized that he’s coming home. He walked the little walk. That was a left turn in our life. We wasn’t expecting nothing like that.”

“Education is extremely important, especially in my business, the music business,” Luda insisted at a Get Schooled event on Friday, where Keri Hilson and MTV News’ Sway also schooled attendees on the value of education. “You hear a lot of the times that the music business is 90 percent business [and] 10 percent music. If you don’t have the right education and you don’t educate yourself, then you’re not gonna last in my business.”

The advice may be hard to hear for budding entertainers who want to simply belt some tunes or bust some moves to achieve to musical greatness. However, Luda maintained his tough words are just about tough love, as he’s aiming to empower other people with the chance to realize their dreams.

“I’m here today ’cause I’m one of those individuals that I dream my painting and then I paint my dream and I want to make sure I carry on that message to everybody,” Luda explained. “If I have the time to invest and make sure I give back — I have my own foundation — and I just love when a lot of different people come together for a positive energy ’cause there’s so many negative things going on out there. We gon’ send them a positive message today.”

West may have dissed the show in his track “Power” — where he raps, “F— ‘SNL’ and the whole cast. Tell ‘em Yeezy said they can kiss my whole ass” — but it doesn’t seem that the bookers minded very much. West’s last “SNL” appearance came during its 2007 season premiere; he also appeared in a sketch during that episode, which was hosted by NBA star LeBron James. There is no word on whether he will act during this upcoming appearance.

West appears to be settling scores in 2010. During his VMA appearance, he laid to rest the Taylor Swift incident from a year prior. She too seemed to be putting the skirmish behind them in her new song, the tentatively titled “Innocent.” During the year between West’s interruption of Swift’s Best Female Video acceptance speech at the 2009 VMAs and the beef-squashing earlier this month, both Swift and former beau Taylor Lautner appeared on “SNL” (on separate occasions) and took a few shots at the rapper.

“I got him back in that mode, ask him,” Nelly told MTV News. “I told him — that’s my big brother — I told him, ‘Listen, you’re going too fast: Where you at with the music — people ain’t caught up yet. It’s good, but where you’re at, you got to bring it down. You got to get their attention first, then you can take them wherever you want to take them. My exact words were, ‘We need that “Hate Me Now” Diddy,” Nelly said, referring to the 1999 Nas track featuring Puff.

In turn, the Bad Boy boss told Nelly that he needed to “speed it up.” “He was like, ‘Let’s go! What are you waiting on?’ Nelly recalled.

He admitted that the advice forced him to reflect on whether Diddy’s words of wisdom might have merit. With his last album, 2008′s Brass Knuckles, Nelly experienced his first commercial disappointment. Although the album was certified gold, selling more than 500,000 copies, his previous efforts were all multiplatinum smashes. The rapper replayed Diddy’s talk in his head, and the result of that conversation, according to Nelly, is “Just a Dream,” the rapper’s first top 10 hit since 2005′s “Grillz,” featuring Paul Wall.

“I was like, ‘You know what? You’re right,” Nelly said. “And I left the party to go to the studio.”

But now that they’ve wrapped, is there the potential for the two to join forces again soon? News hit the pavement in the Bronx just outside of Yankee Stadium to pose the question to the people: Do you want to hear a joint Jay-Z and Eminem project?

“Eminem and Jay-Z together,” Karyn responded. “What a phenomenal duo — who can top that?”

Jay-Z has had his share of collabo albums in the past, including two with R. Kelly and a mash-up project with Linkin Park. Now, however, the Roc Nation boss is working on a joint LP with Kanye West. But most fans seemed to agree that a record with Jay-Z and Eminem would be historical.

“If Jay and Em did a record together, it would be off the hook,” Dot said.

“If God can bless this earth with Jay-Z and Eminem doing an album together, all hell would break loose,” Armaan told MTV News. “It would be impossible to find that album.”

“Me and Tyga. Family thing,” Drake revealed last week during VMA rehearsals for his Sinatra-inspired performance at the Nokia Theatre. “I love the Clipse. That’s why initially I was like, ‘Man, I wanna go out with them.’ Huge Clipse fan my whole life. But it’s one of those things, man. Me and Tyga being family — both being young, new — it made more sense to head out there with him and take on the world on some YM, Young Money. Ironically, the last tour date is the day Wayne gets home.”

Actually, Wayne is slated to get out on November 5, a day before Drake’s final show in Las Vegas at the Hard Rock Hotel’s the Joint. Obviously, a scheduling conflict could have spelled disaster for the Young Money family. But Drake intends to be there to welcome back Wayne at his homecoming show.

“He’s ready. He’s just ready to come home,” Drake said of his friend and Young Money boss. “I know he’s in there counting the days now.” The Toronto native also said Wayne has been working out fanatically while inside and he’s getting “huge.”

“He’s filling out an ‘XL’ orange suit. Like, ‘What’s up?’ He’s big.”

But back to the tour. Drake said he’s excited to be going out with a more elaborate stage show, as well as more time to perform.

“This is my first time ever being able to create a world,” he said. “Prior to this, I’ve had to create my world through performance. You literally have to get lost in the music to make you feel like you were somewhere else. All I really had was like two lights or a couple of lights. My lighting guy is phenomenal. I’ve always had great colors. If you look at the photos from my shows, it’s a mirror image of my music: moody, sometimes eerie. What I did was I built a world, a dream world. It’s not based on a set, it’s based on colors; the lighting is phenomenal. I’ve got this one aspect of it where it goes from day to night. It’s really cool.”

And Drizzy promised you’ll get an ample dose of So Far Gone, Thank Me Later and his guest features.

“I’m dong an hour and 45 minutes,” the 23-year-old revealed. “For me, that’s crazy to carry an hour-and-45. I have trouble — with all the records I have — doing an hour and 15 minutes. [If] I do an hour and 15 minutes, I’m cutting out ‘Miss Me,’ ‘Light Up,’ ‘Money to Blow,’ records people want to hear. It’s gonna be a real interesting tour. I’m adding all the stuff from Thank Me Later. I’m excited to perform in a world. I’ve never done that before. I’ve got background singers now to make stuff sound sweeter.

Hip-hop’s extraterrestrial rock star dropped a new video Wednesday (September 15) for the title track from his upcoming project I Am Not a Human Being, which comes out September 27, Wayne’s birthday. The new video is mostly Wayne performing, with the lights turned low and his tats glowing in the dark.

“I don’t know why they keep playing/ They better replay it/ I’m giving them the blues, Bobby Blue Bland,” he raps on the first verse. “Together we stand and fall on y’all/ Balling with my bloods/ Call it b-ball.”

Later, he calls himself a “rhyming oasis.” “I must be sticky, ’cause them bitches got they eyes glued,” he continues. “Young Money, baby, we the sh– like fly food/ Y’all can’t see us, like the bride’s shoes/ … If you think you hot then obviously you were lied to/ And we don’t die, we multiply, and then we come divide you.”