A Tribe Called Quest

After 19 Years of "93 Til Infinity" Remakes, Only Freddie Gibbs Has Done It Justice

"Dial the seven digits. Call up Bridget/ Her man's a midget. Plus she got friends, yo, I can dig it..." It was 19 years ago when Tajai, Opio, Phesto, and A-Plus first upped us on how they just chill, roaming the strip for bones to pick, attackin' with the smoothness. "93 'til Infinity" still stand ... More >>

Celebrate Four Years of Debaser With This Exclusive Boyz n the Hood-Themed Mix

Editor's note: Ahead of the four-year anniversary of beloved '90s party Debaser, we invited party DJs Jamie Jams and Stab Master Arson to make a mix of some of the songs we can expect to hear at Saturday's party. What follows is their mix and commentary. By JAMIE GUZZI Hip-hop historians note that ... More >>

Justin BUA's Top Five Illustrated Hip-Hop Album Covers

"Historically, artists painted the court and the aristocracy. I'm the court painter of hip-hop -- the artists are that important." So says Justin BUA, the hip-hop generation artist who celebrates the release of his new book The Legends Of Hip-Hop with a signing session at Booksmith this Friday start ... More >>

Five Hip-Hop Album Covers That Would Make Insanely Difficult Jigsaw Puzzles

This week, a new candidate emerged for the spot of hip-hop's fabled fifth element: The jigsaw puzzle. With a canny eye on the not-too-far-off Christmas season, the Boston-based Get On Down Records has released jigsaw versions of classic rap album covers by Biz Markie, Kool G Rap, Boogie Down Produc ... More >>

J Dilla's 10 Greatest Remixes

J Dilla​ Deceased hip-hop producer J Dilla, née Jay Dee, first asserted himself on the rap radar with his group Slum Village. Lauded by luminaries Q-Tip and ?uestlove, the Detroit-based trio of Dilla, T3, and Baatin (also sadly deceased) are held in cult esteem today, and tonight, remaining g ... More >>

Celebrate the New Tribe Called Quest Documentary, in S.F. Tonight

​Beats, Rhymes, and Life -- the long-anticipated documentary about the seminal hip-hop group A Tribe Called Quest -- opens in the Bay Area tomorrow. (Check out our review.) You can celebrate this tonight at a party in San Francisco hosted by the film's director, Michael Rapaport, and a "surp ... More >>

"Beats, Rhymes, and Life": Michael Rapaport's "Love Letter" to A Tribe Called Quest

In Print: A Tribe Called Quest Finally Gets its Documentary

Andrew Roberts​Beats, Rhymes, and Life: So much petty drama has clouded the release of Michael Rapaport's a Tribe Called Quest documentary. One version of the backstory casts the first-time director as a doofus actor wannabe (arguably best known for his role as Phoebe's boyfriend in Friends) w ... More >>

The Top Ten Hip-Hop Drinking Anthems

​Hip-hop's reliance on marijuana as a creative conduit and lifestyle accessory is well documented. But beyond the genre's top tokers, there's also a bubbling batch of rappers who've rhymed about not so much getting a little tipsy as daily dalliances with the dark world of being black-out drunk ... More >>

DJ Neil Armstrong on Playing Stadiums with Jay-Z, and How Time Decides the Classics

Conquering the world. ​It was exactly decade ago that DJ Neil Armstrong's release Original changed mixtape culture. Telling a story with every song transition and lyric, he demonstrated how DJ mixes can rival artists' albums. Beginning his turntablist career in the early 90s under the directi ... More >>

Drink 2011: Party Like It's 1999 -- Or Earlier

Drink 2011: Party Like It's 1999 -- Or Earlier

Happy Birthday Deejay Jay Dee: Listen to a Full-Length Jazz Cover of 'Donuts'

​Today would have been the 37th birthday of James Yancey, the Detroit producer better known as (a) Jay Dee, (b) J Dilla, and (c) the stylistic architect for an entire generation of hip-hop heads, member of Slum Village, occasional rhymer, maker of tracks for A Tribe Called Quest and Busta Rhymes, ... More >>

Download A Rare!!! Mixtape!!! From Bay Area Crazy Person Lil B

Just... wow.​I think we can all agree that Berkeley-based loudmouth Lil B is full of surprises: last week he released a splashy watercolor Hallmark card of an album called Rain In England; this week he's dropping MF Based, a "rare" (how does that work, exactly?) mixtape of half-baked freestyles de ... More >>

The Lion Sleeps Tonight: A Musical Tribute to the Berkeley Mountain Lion

This too shall pass​The Berkeley Police Department shot and killed an errant mountain lion early yesterday morning. In the minor controversy that has ensued over whether they should have made more of an effort to tranquilize her before pulling out the patrol shotgun, we've already lost sight of th ... More >>

Rock the Bells 2010: Classic performances of hip-hop albums

In Print: Classic Hip-Hop Albums Performed Live, Wavves' Surf-Punk, and Rappers in the Shadow of Hyphy

​The lineup for this year's Rock the Bells hip-hop festival has the likes of Snoop, Slick Rick, A Tribe Called Quest, Rakim and even the Wu-Tang Clan all performing classic hip-hop albums in their entirety. In our print edition this week, Tamara Palmer takes a look back at each album's considerabl ... More >>

Gone Clubbin' at Debaser: Blunts and Broads in Dive Bars

Matthew Davis​You could blame Debaser's recent run-in with Internet flame wars (pt. 1 and pt. 2) for the massive line that stretched outside during the '90s club night at The Knockout on Saturday. But the truth is that people really like to dance to classic hip-hop on the weekends, and when Debase ... More >>

De La Soul

Hard Truth Soldiers Tour Takes Over SF, Major American Cities

dead prezGenerally, when ASD receives a press release boasting about a show with "arguably the strongest lineup of socially-aware, hardcore hip-hop talent in recent memory," we just shrug it off as pure hyperbole (and yes, to paraphrase Harry Allen, we normally don't believe the hyperbole). But holy ... More >>

PST Anniversary Party Tonight @ 330 Ritch

EKAphotographyDJ, DeeJay: Sake One and Willie Maize Has it been four years of DJ Sake One's "Pacific Standard Time" already? Apparently, time flies when you're spinning dope tunes--both classic and soon-to-be classic--and hosting legendary guest DJs, up-and-coming live acts, and otherwise putting t ... More >>

Saturday Night: Afrotek Festival at the Dark Room

Afrotek Festival The Dark Room December 20, 2008 Review by Eric K. Arnold; Photos by EKAphotography Better Than: A typically clichéd hip-hop club. Arriving at Club Six's "Dark Room" at around 11 p.m., I overhear a group of about seven people with Eastern European accents. Where are they from, I ... More >>

Last Night: Rock the Bells at Shoreline Amphitheatre

Look, We Didn't Choose the Title

The Pharcyde, A Tribe Called Quest, Nas Headline Annual Rock the Bells Festival

Common and Just Blaze Remix "The Light" in the Name of Delicious Vodka

Borat's Ho Helps Pimp Katt Williams Premiere New Movie in SF

Q-Tip and Trentemoller

Grown and Chrisette

Mixtape Shmixtape

Wherein we review Yay Area mixes of the day

It Was a Year Of ...

Well, lots of things, actually

Rock, The Boat

Art and music o'er the waves

BeatBox

1015 Folsom hosts some of the city's best house DJs; the Beat Junkies' DJ Rhettmatic stops by "Flava of the Month"

Race Relationships

Mansbach's angry young men

BeatBox

"Gay Bash" at Trax toys with your queer biological imperative; Digable Planets do the "all original members" thing

75 Degrees

The Last Great Hip Hop Album

Air Supply

Bouncer gets high the old-fashioned (and kind of stupid) way: oxygen

Fannypack

See You Next Tuesday

Approach

Ultra Proteus

Consequence

Take 'Em to the Cleaners

Lifesavas

Spirit in Stone

Brooklyn Prophet

Mos Def adds positive new dimensions to hip hop

SF Music Awards 2001

An exotic adventure into the mysterious world of sound!

Rapper's Delight

The history of hip hop, at Yerba Buena Center

Slum Village

Fantastic, Vol. 2
(GoodVibe)

Hear This

Black Eyed Peas

Hear This

Beats, Rhymes, and Laughs

A failed record deal hasn't dampened the Mountain Brothers' sense of humor

Reviews

Samples