For one week only, over on NPR, you can stream the entire new Gorillaz album called Plastic Beach.
It’s a great opportunity to check it out and see if you love it.  NPR has this to say about it
Plastic Beach unites Albarn and Hewlett with a huge list of guests, creating yet another well-crafted and dance-friendly set of songs. Here, Albarn and company’s songs demonstrate a genre-bending collection of glitchy club beats and hip-hop grooves, augmented by brass, glitzy synthesizers and Asian- and Arabic-tinged orchestral harmonies.

They’ve got a whole bunch of …

Maura Johnston, famous from writing for Idolator, has given a little radio interview to NPR talking about some upcoming acts.
Frankly, I don’t really agree with some of her choices but she does make some good points  She pumps up Jay-Z’s release, and the new Raekwon album, and has some time for a couple of smaller releases.
Stream the Best of Fall Hip Hop here.
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]

NPR, the venerable public broadcaster, appears to have a bit of a thing for T.I.  The article is a bit of a joke, though it does contain a couple of good nuggets.
Andrew Noz, the author, makes the following claim:
When Jay-Z speaks, the rap world listens. So when, around the turn of the decade, he began publicizing that neither he nor his late friend The Notorious B.I.G. wrote their rhymes on paper, many rappers followed suit. Tattered notepads turned obsolete, as many artists instead began committing raps to memory or constructing …

Arturo O’Farrill took over the baton of the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra from his father, Latin jazz pioneer Chico O’Farrill.
He’s listed his top 5 jazz albums here, and I’ve got to say he’s got some pretty amazing taste.  Here they are:

Relaxin’
Artist: Miles Davis Quintet

Now He Sings, Now He Sobs
Artist: Chick Corea

Head Hunters
Artist: Herbie Hancock

A Love Supreme
Artist: John Coltrane

Mingus Ah Um
Artist: Charles Mingus

Al Green has just released his new album Lay it Down.  He’s really gone out of his way to make a pretty killer record.  He’s recruited some top-notch talent, getting ?uestlove to produce some tracks.
He’s also featured John Legend,  Corrine Bailey Rae and others, trying to get the best of the “new soul” movement on his side.
I can’t even begin to tell you how unreal Al Green is, or was, in his classic days.  “Let’s Stay Together” has to be one of the most classic tracks I’ve ever heard …

It’s a simple way to start an incredibly powerful article.
Laura Hall has lived a pretty tough life. She had to drop out of college to take a factory job. Yeah, that part doesn’t sound that bad, I guess. But she had to do this just to be able to afford to take care of her husband who was diagnosed with bi-polar disorder.
She’d hated hip hop before this. Apparently she hated it so much she used to give her husband the silent treatment when he’d make her …

NPR radio has just run a pretty interesting look at hip hop and its tie to US Politics.
So, NPR has run this interview with “interviewer Farai Chideya, Robert “Biko” Baker (the executive director of the League of Young Voters); Sonia Murray, a music reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution; and DJ Drama, an Atlanta-based recording artist and DJ.” (I just copied and pasted this little paragraph from the NPR website).
Sadly, I can’t find a way to link directly to the audio stream, so you’ll have to listen from the NPR website …