Anyway, fast forward a few years, and 99 Problems hits my stereo again, courtesy of Mr Jay-Z (the similarities in their rap names aren’t lost on me!). Where Ice-T had a real old-school vibe, Jay-Z’s version employs big drums and crunchy, distorted guitar goodness.

Jay-Z’s is also much safer than Ice-T’s. For my money, Ice’s version takes the gold medal for lewdness and sheer brilliance. Whose version do you prefer?

Ice-T – 99 Problems

Just make sure your parents aren’t in the room when you listen to this one…

Jay-Z – 99 Problems

Jay-Z takes Rick Rubin for a drive round the ‘hood…

Onstage this week, the rapper Nas claimed that his next album will be called Nigga. From a marketing point of view, making such a controversial claim is bound to draw attention. Shame his record company didn’t agree, isn’t it?

Yeah, Def Jam Records have refuted that Nas even has an album scheduled for release, let alone one with such a controversial title.

Dear readers, was it Dumbledore or Gandalf who said “Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself”? Never underestimate the wisdom of the wizarding fraternity. I know to a lot of people, the word Nigga has racist overtones, but growing up listening to Ice-T, the word never meant slavery or racism to me. The vibe was more about gun-toting, drug-dealing, bitch-pimping dudes.

OK, so either way, the word doesn’t have much positive spin. One way, it’s a symbol of slavery, the other represents violent gang culture.

So, back to Nas. Was his stunt the other day more about self-publicity than trying to normalize a negative word? I think we know the answer to that one…

Here’s what’s currently ringing America’s bell folks: 17 year old DeAndre Ramone Way, otherwise known as Soulja Boy and his runaway hit Crank Dat.

All the buzz is focused around the rapper’s dancing style rather than the song itself. Is this guy damning himself to become the next Macarena?

The truth is, it doesn’t look like that difficult or original a style, but YouTube is buzzing with people trying their hand at those moves! AZ Central has a great interview with Soulja where he explains how the idea for the song and dance came about.

Remarkably, it wasn’t until he posted the dance moves on his website that the song really took off. It hasn’t hit the UK yet, but it’s only a matter of time before your local neighbourhood teens are playing this one non-stop!

It’s riotous, loud, stupid and fun! No-one is going to claim Bizzle is the best thing in rap, but the man deserves credit for creating one of those rare gems that actually puts a long-lasting smile on yer face.

In truth, this should be the kind of anthem for people who’ve never had the police on their back, but want to pretend for a minute that they did.

You all know the story – 50 Cent has threatened never to release another album if Kanye West’s new CD outsells his. The full 50 Cent quote is:

Put it like this, let’s raise the stakes. If Kanye West sells more records than 50 Cent on September 11, I’ll no longer write music. I’ll write music and work with my other artists, but I won’t put out any more solo albums.

Well, so far Kanye West’s in the lead sales wise. I have to say, I believe that Kanye deserves this more – he’s charismatic, he’s passionate, he’s an interesting character. 50 Cent on the other hand doesn’t interest me at all. He’s another by-product from the Dre/Eminem school of rap, but he neither matches or surpasses either of his mentors.

Kanye’s taken rap music to a new place, he’s made it interesting again. 50 is still punting out old style gangsta rap that the mainstream has been getting bored of.

so I’m betting on Kanye West to win, and I’m hoping ‘Fitty’ upholds his end of the bargain by not releasing any more albums. That’d suit me just fine.

Tell me in the comments who you’re hoping will win…

I mean, Dre’s solo albums have been high water marks in the evolution of hip-hop and rap. They’ve also given some of the biggest names in rap their big break. Snoop Dogg on The Chronic and Eminem on 2001.

I don’t understand why Dre would give away the rights to such a huge album, even if Death Row agreed to pay royalties to him.

When he handed over his 50 per cent share in Death Row Records in 1996, Dre struck an agreement with the label whereby the company retained copyrights for The Chronic – provided it continued to pay him royalties. In 2000 he canceled the agreement, claiming he had received no royalties from the company.

It just doesn’t make sense. I hope he gets it sorted though, I wouldn’t want to see Dre going hungry!

Mims – a rapper I’d never heard of before today – sets this out quite clearly at the beginning of his single, This Is Why I’m Hot:

This is why I’m hot
I don’t gotta rap
I could sell a mill
Sayin’ nothin’ on the track

..and proceeds to spend the next 3 minutes doing just that – saying nothing.

If you’re going to brag on a rap tune, you need a better argument than “I’m hot because I’m fly / You ain’t because you not“. Schoolkids could come up with better put-downs than that.

Don’t get me wrong, I love it when rappers boast on record – it’s great fun. But Mims is unoriginal here. The backing track is cool, but half-assed and Mr Mims lacks the swagger of such bling kings as Jay-Z or P.Diddy (or whatever he calls himself these days).

For such forgettable material, I dub this record crap.