Hip-hop kingpin, Timbaland, is suing his record company Blackground Records for allegedly trying to sabotage his career when he moved into producing records.

He moved from being solely a performer to being hugely successful producing records for other artists. However, he claims this isn’t thanks to Blackground. According to TMZ:

In his lawsuit, filed today in Federal District court, Timbaland claims he just got too damn successful as a producer — and the record label couldn’t contain its jealously and hostility for him.

Timbaland alleges Blackground went on a McCarthy-esque search-and-destroy campaign, contacting various record labels and giving them a million reasons why they shouldn’t hire Timbaland to produce songs.

I’m assuming that because Timbaland is selling records by the truckload all over the world that this isn’t about money. It possibly has more to do with reputation and a little payback for the alleged campaign that could have killed off his lucrative career.

Chris Cornell partnering with Timbaland was the most unlikely musical collaboration ever. If your experience of Cornell is through Soundgarden or Audioslave, you are about to hear the boldest move of his career.

Now, if you’ve been wondering where Cornell’s been since Audioslave broke up, the video reveals all: he’s been brooding in clubs in Puerto Rico, Texas and New York. Observing women flirting on the dancefloor while their menfolk look on in frustration. Oh yes, and hanging out with hordes of line-dancing women.

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It’s not often that a celebrity bothers to respond directly to rumors in the media, but that’s what uber-producer Timbaland did when he heard a ‘leak’ about the follow-up to his hugely successful Shock Value album.

He got in touch with MTV and cleared up the situation – which claimed he had secured Justin Timberlake, Usher and Gwen Stefani to appear on the album.

"It’s funny," Timbo said about the surprisingly detailed report, which claimed it was based on an advance preview of five tracks from the album. "I’m surprised people are watching me like that. I am recording the album, but I don’t know none of them joints, none of them songs. That’s just bogus."

As for an official track listing, the production wizard was mum — and he didn’t confirm or deny whether any of the artists listed in the report will appear on the album. He did speak generally about the album’s direction, however.

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Just when you think Timbaland’s run out of tunes, along he comes with a new single, Scream. And he’s brought protege Keri Hilson and Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger along for the ride.

While it’s not the most immediately accessible single from the Shock Value album, Scream will grow on you like every Timbaland single before it. The intro has a funky vibe to it, with Timbo getting out the guitars and some authentic sounding drums for a change.

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Despite spawning a number of massive singles, Timbaland’s Shock Value album hasn’t been a critical success. We’ve trawled the web for quality reviews of the album and that many music writers were left cold by the quality of the album.

Should Timbaland stay strictly backstage? Read on and find out.

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I’ve been hearing Apologize all week on the radio, and it’s got to be the best track off Timbaland’s Shock Value album.

Apologize is the first slow song to be released from the album. It’s a remix of OneRepublic’s original version, retaining Ryan Tedder’s vocal. And in keeping with anything Timbaland does, it’s completely genre-busting, avoiding any hint of cliche at all.

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It’s a well known fact that I got beef with 50 Cent, so I approach any single by the man with a healthy dose of skepticism.

And when the song in question starts with the man blathering about  being ’sumin’ special’ and ‘unforgettable’, the bullshit radar goes off the map.

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In this one, Timbaland is giving a bit of a leg up to one of the singers on his Mosley Music record label, Keri Hilson. Can’t blame the guy either, if the rumors that he’s retiring are true, he’s going to want to push his artists pretty hard to keep the dough rolling in.

The Way I Are just screams out Timbaland: you can hear that strong synth running through the track alongside throbbing beats and bass. The addition of Hilson on vocals is a departure from Ms Furtado, and you come away with the feeling that either singer could have delivered the goods on this track.

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The Proclaimers have lost the number one spot in the UK singles chart to Timbaland’s Give It To Me.

The Proclaimers recorded (I’m Gonna Be) 500 Miles in aid of Comic Relief and have held the number one for the last three weeks. But today they were knocked down to number four as Timbaland’s Give It To Me (featuring Nelly Furtado and Justin Timberlake) took top position.

Poor Gareth Gates failed to even make the top ten with his comeback single Changes, looks like he might just get dropped from another record label!