Leading with a retro electronic warmth that tips its hat to trip-hop and the late Mac Miller alike, R. Choppa’s Animal Behavior is a project with a creative set of soundscapes and a quickly recognizable, identity-loaded string of vocal performances.
R. Choppa is an artist with a clear love for music in all of its forms, his rhythmic vocals bring a level of personality from the offset – a tone and style that’s easy to pinpoint. Meanwhile, the musical aspects pour through, complete with their multiple layers and their fine fusion of jazz-cafe delicacy and classic hip hop grooves. OG is all of this and starts things off well.
Cyntoia Brown-Long was 16 when she was sentenced to life in prison for killing a man who solicited her for sex. After 15 years behind bars and a celebrity-backed campaign to reconsider her sentence, she's free. Brown-Long, who shares her story in a new book, "Free Cyntoia," joins TODAY to open up about her future. "I'm here by the grace of God," she tells Craig Melvin.
The DL Hughley Show is required viewing. One one of his recent episodes he talked about the Atatiana Jefferson case --- the young black woman who was shot and killed in her own home by a white Fort Worth police officer.
For years, a mourning Troy Castaneda said she wouldn’t go near her son’s music. But she couldn’t ignore his legacy.
“I woke up one day and I decided to just bring him back,” she said, adding, “He had this huge book of material.”
Johnny Castaneda aka “Johnny Ca$h” was a Richmond resident, a rising hip hop star, and a protege to the slain Mac Dre, when he was fatally shot in Vallejo on March 29, 2007.
His mother, Troy aka Mamma Ca$h, is understandably still crushed by the loss. But even in his death, Troy is proving her son’s vast potential can still be realized.
HONG KONG (AP) — When the ball smashed into a photo of LeBron James’ face stuck above the hoop and dropped into the basket, the Hong Kong protesters cheered.
They also trampled on jerseys bearing his name and gathered in a semicircle to watch one burn.
James’ standing among basketball fans in Hong Kong took a hit because of comments the NBA star made about free speech. Fans gathered on courts amid Hong Kong’s high-rise buildings Tuesday to vent their anger.
The player for the Los Angeles Lakers touched a nerve among protesters for suggesting that free speech can have negative consequences. They have been protesting for months in defense of the same freedom that James said can carry “a lot of negative.”
The protesters chanted support for Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey, something of a hero among demonstrators in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory for having tweeted in support of their struggle, infuriating authorities in China.
What the crowd of approximately 200 people chanted about James wasn’t printable.
“People are angry,” said James Lo, a web designer who runs a Hong Kong basketball fan page on Facebook. He said he’s already received a video from a protester that showed him burning a No. 23 jersey bearing James’ name.
He expects more, given the backlash from protesters who’ve been regularly hitting the streets of Hong Kong and battling police because of concerns that the international business hub is slowly losing its freedoms, which are unique in China.
“Students, they come out like every weekend. They’ve got tear gassed and then they got gun-shot, like every weekend. Police beating students and then innocent people, like every day. And then he (James) just comes up with something (like) that. We just can’t accept that.”
James made his comments in response to a question about whether Morey should be punished for his tweet that reverberated in China and had consequences for the NBA.
“Yes, we do have freedom of speech,” James said. “But at times, there are ramifications for the negative that can happen when you’re not thinking about others, when you only think about yourself.”
He added: “So many people could have been harmed, not only financially but physically, emotionally, spiritually. So just be careful what we tweet and what we say and what we do. Even though yes, we do have freedom of speech, it can be a lot of negative that comes with it.”
Protesters said James’ comments smacked of a double-standard, because he’s used his clout as a sports headliner to press for social causes in the United States.
“Please remember, all NBA players, what you said before: ‘Black lives matter.’ Hong Kong lives also matter!” one of the protesters, 36-year-old office worker William Mok, said in addressing the applauding crowd.
Others said LeBron’s comments made it seem that he’s more worried about money than people.
“James was trying, you know, to take a side, on the China side, which is like ridiculous,” said Aaron Lee, a 36-year-old marketing director. “He was being honest, financially. Financial is money. Simple as that. LeBron James stands for money. Period.”
Danny Brown’s full of laughs and new music. After a three-year hiatus, the Detroit rapper released his new album, uknowhatimsayin? Outside of the booth, Danny’s turned his sights on television with his Viceland series, Danny’s House. Here Danny speaks on music, hometown love, Q-Tip, and new artists.
Joe Budden is not a fan of Logic. On his latest podcast the former Slaughterhouse member says "Logic is one of the worst rappers to grace a microphone."
Dark Lo taps in with singer Dajah Monae to bring you the official video for “American Made” – the title track from his latest album. The new 12-track album features Benny The Butcher, AR-AB and Dajah Monae and is now available everywhere music is streamed and sold!
LaLa Anthony stopped by The Breakfast Club to chop it up about being killed off of 'Power,' letting her son watch the episode, balancing work and her home life, parental guidance, upcoming roles and more.
Dipset Capo Jim Jones was a recent guest on the Angie Martinez Show. The Harlem native chopped it up about his latest album, upcoming music, experience with gang culture, legally selling weed and more.
FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — A white Fort Worth police officer who shot and killed a black woman through a back window of her home while responding to a call about an open front door was charged with murder on Monday evening after resigning from the force.
Aaron Dean, 34, was jailed on $200,000 bond after the police chief said he acted without justification and would have been fired if he hadn’t quit.
Police bodycam video showed Dean approaching the door of the home where Atatiana Jefferson, 28, was caring for her 8-year-old nephew early Saturday. He then walked around the side of the house, pushed through a gate into the fenced-off backyard and fired through the glass a split-second after shouting at Jefferson to show her hands.
Dean was not heard identifying himself as police on the video, and Interim Police Chief Ed Kraus said there was no sign Dean or the other officer who responded even knocked on the front door.
“Nobody looked at this video and said that there’s any doubt that this officer acted inappropriately,” Kraus said.
Earlier in the day, Jefferson’s family had demanded that Dean, a member of the force for 1½ years, be fired and arrested.
“Why this man is not in handcuffs is a source of continued agitation for this family and for this community,” family attorney Lee Merritt said, hours before Dean was booked into jail.
Police went to Jefferson’s home about 2:25 a.m. after a neighbor called a non-emergency line to report a door ajar. In a statement over the weekend, the department said officers saw someone near a window inside the home and that one of them drew his gun and fired after “perceiving a threat.”
The video showed Dean shouting, “Put your hands up! Show me your hands!” and immediately firing.
Jefferson was staying up late, playing video games with her nephew, when she was killed, according to the family’s attorney.
As for what, exactly, led Dean to open fire, the police chief said: “I cannot make sense of why she had to lose her life.” The chief said Dean resigned without talking to internal affairs investigators.
The video included images of a gun inside a bedroom. Kraus said he did not know whether Jefferson was holding the weapon. But he said the mere fact she had a gun shouldn’t be considered unusual in Texas.
“We’re homeowners in Texas,” the police chief said. “Most of us, if we thought we had somebody outside our house that shouldn’t be and we had access to a firearm, we would be acting very similarly to how she was acting.” Kraus said that, in hindsight, releasing the images of the weapon was “a bad thing to do.”
Mayor Betsy Price called the gun “irrelevant.”
“Atatiana was in her own home, caring for her 8-year-old nephew. She was a victim,” Price said.
Texas has had a “castle doctrine” law on the books since 2007 that gives people a stronger legal defense to use deadly force in their homes. The law was backed at the time by the National Rifle Association and is similar to “stand your ground” measures across the U.S. that say a person has no duty to retreat from an intruder.
Fort Worth is about 30 miles (50 kilometers) west of Dallas, where another high-profile police shooting occurred last year.
In that case, white Dallas officer Amber Guyger shot and killed her black neighbor Botham Jean inside his own apartment after Guyger said she mistook his place for her own. Guyger, 31, was sentenced this month to 10 years in prison.
A large crowd gathered outside Jefferson’s home Sunday night for a vigil after demonstrations briefly stopped traffic on Interstate 35. A single bullet hole was visible in the window of the single-story, freshly painted purple home, and floral tributes and stuffed animals piled up in the street.
The police chief said Dean could face state charges and that he had submitted a case to the FBI to review for possible federal civil rights charges.
Dean has not yet hired an attorney but will have one provided with financial support from the state’s largest police union, the Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas, according to Charley Wilkison, executive director.
Relations with the public have been strained after other recent Fort Worth police shootings. In June, the department released footage of officers killing a man who ignored repeated orders to drop his handgun. He was the fourth person Fort Worth police had fired upon in 10 days.
Of the nine officer-involved shootings so far this year in Fort Worth, five targeted African Americans and six resulted in death, according to department data.
Nearly two-thirds of the department’s 1,100 officers are white, just over 20% are Hispanic, and about 10% are black. The city of nearly 900,000 people is about 40% white, 35% Hispanic and 19% black.
Calling the shooting “a pivotal moment in our city,” the mayor said she was ordering a top-to-bottom review of the police force and vowed to “rebuild a sense of trust within the city and with our police department.”
Jefferson was a 2014 graduate of Xavier University in New Orleans and earned a bachelor’s degree in biology. She was working in pharmaceutical equipment sales and was considering going to medical school, according to the family’s lawyer.
Report via TMZ -- DMX has canceled shows because his addiction struggles have forced him back into rehab.
DMX's team says, "In his ongoing commitment to putting family and sobriety first, DMX has checked himself into a rehab facility. He apologizes for his cancelled shows and thanks his fans for their continued support."
The New York-born rapper was scheduled to perform Saturday at the reunion concert for Three 6 Mafia in Memphis and Day 2 of Rolling Loud in New York on Sunday. Both appearances have been canceled. The Ying Yang Twins replaced X Saturday night.
DMX has had a long, difficult struggle with addiction. He's been jailed numerous times in the past over drug-related offenses and has spent time throughout the years in rehab.
X was released from prison in January after serving time for tax evasion. Just before his release, he talked about how badly he wanted to see his youngest son, 3-year-old Exodus Simmons, who at the time had serious health problems. X has 15 kids.
He also said he was getting offers from movie producers for a biopic.
Dave East rates Benny The Butcher, O.T. Genesis, Max B, Snoop Dogg, Nas, Lil Nas X, Cam'Ron and more in this episode of Rate The Bars! Whose bars is he feelin'?
ABC News -- The police officer who fatally shot a Fort Worth, Texas, woman in her home while answering a call for a welfare check abruptly resigned on Monday just before he was about to be fired for allegedly violating multiple department policies, the police chief said.
"I certainly have not been able to make sense of why she had to lose her life," Fort Worth Police Chief Ed Kraus said at a news conference in reference to the early Saturday morning killing of Atatiana "Tay" Jefferson. "On behalf of the men and women of the Fort Worth Police Department, I'm so sorry for what occurred."
Kraus identified the officer who shot Jefferson, 28, as Aaron Dean, who joined the police force in April 2018.
The police chief said he was scheduled to meet with Dean on Monday morning, but the officer tendered his resignation before they had a chance to meet.
"Had the officer not resigned, I would have fired him for violations of several policies, including our use of force policy, our de-escalation policy, and unprofessional conduct," Kraus said.
He said an internal investigation and a criminal investigation of Dean will proceed, and that he has sent a preliminary report of the shooting to the FBI to launch a civil right's investigation.
The chief also said Dean's separation paperwork will be sent to the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, the agency in charge of licensing and certifying qualified individuals as peace officers, "will reflect that he was dishonorably discharged from the Fort Worth Police Department."
Kraus made the announcement after Mayor Betsy Price expressed outrage over the shooting and berated the police department for releasing a photo of a handgun found in Jefferson's home, saying, "there is nothing that could justify what happened on Saturday morning. Nothing."
"The gun is irrelevant. She was in her own home caring for her 8-year old nephew. Atatiana was a victim," the mayor said.
After spending the weekend hearing from outraged community residents, and friends and relatives of Jefferson, Price apologized on behalf of the city of Fort Worth.
"We are all heartbroken today. Atatiana was a beautiful, smart, amazing young woman by all accounts, who was unjustly taken from her family," Price said. "The entire city is in pain. As a mother, grandmother, a sister an aunt, I can't imagine anything worse and I'm so sorry."
Calling the circumstances a "pivotal moment for the city," the mayor said she has ordered the creation of a "third-party panel of national experts to review this department."
Fort Worth City Manager David Cooke announced he will assemble an independent review board for the police department and will begin interviewing candidates for an independent police monitor.
Earlier Monday, loved ones of Jefferson demanded the officer be immediately fired and arrested, and that the federal government take charge of the investigation.
Jefferson's family spoke out at a news conference to demand justice.
"This man murdered someone. He should be arrested," said Jefferson's brother, Adarius Carr, a member of the U.S. Navy.
"I've served my country for the last 12 years. In that time, I've been trained and taught that there are preplanned responses for everything you do. Everything you're trained about, there's a way to do things. And when you don't do it the way you've been trained or the way you've been taught, you have to answer for that," Carr said. "The Fort Worth PD cannot investigate themselves. The U.S. Navy is not allowed to do it, they should not be as well."
Lee Merritt, a civil rights attorney representing Jefferson's family, said the shooting shows that the Fort Worth Police Department is "in need of serious systematic reform."
"Of course this family is calling for the firing of this officer. That's benign. That's the least that we should expect," Merritt said.
Merritt said the family is calling on the Department of Justice or the FBI to investigate the killing, adding that the officer, whose name had not been released, should be "vigorously prosecuted."
"We expect this to happen immediately," Merritt said. "This (the shooting) happened Saturday. Why this man is not in handcuffs right now is a source of continued agitation for this family and for this community, and it must be addressed."
The shooting unfolded about 2:30 a.m. on Saturday after a neighbor of Jefferson's called the police department's non-emergency line to asked that a welfare check be conducted on Jefferson's home because the lights were on and the back and front doors were open.
Lt. Brandon O'Neil said at a news conference Sunday afternoon that two officers were sent to the home on East Allen Avenue. He said the officers arrived at the house at 2:29 am. and parked near Jefferson's home, but not in front of the residence.
O'Neil said the officers walked around the back of the house, and that one of the officers observed a person through the rear window of the home and opened fire.
Body-camera footage released by the department shows the officer approaching a rear window of the home with his gun drawn. The officer sees the woman through the window, shouts, "Put your hands up, show me your hands," and fires one shot.
"Perceiving a threat, the officer drew his duty weapon and fired one shot striking the person inside the residence," a statement from the police department reads.
Responding officers entered the home, located the shooting victim and began providing emergency care.
Jefferson died at the scene.
O'Neil said the officer who opened fire on Jefferson never identified himself as a police officer.
"What the officer observed and why he did not announce 'police' will be addressed as the investigation continues," O'Neil said.
Merritt said that Jefferson and her 8-year-old nephew Zion were playing video games when they heard someone in the bushes outside their home and went to a bedroom window to investigate. He said Jefferson stopped her nephew from looking out the window, that she was shot when she peered into the darkness.
"It was less than a second," Merritt said of the shooting. "I had an expert slow it (the body-camera video) down. It was .6 second between the command and the shot. There was no time for them to perceive a threat from a weapon. There was no time for her to respond. It was reckless, deadly behavior."
One aka 1 n da Chamber debut album given you his versatile music. Houston representa bringing the heat for the world. From the family CEO of Gloc Nation Entertainment working hard as a artist/producer. The debut album is one of his crossover into main stream music getting love from around the world. With hits Taken It, Light up, and Purple Passion has really brought in his own sound hip hop.
On this episode of People's Party, Talib Kweli and Jasmin Leigh sit down with multi-Grammy Award-winning jazz/R&B/hip-hop pianist, performer, and producer Robert Glasper. The conversation is wide-ranging -- the trio discusses his early days playing a broken organ at his local church, his time in the Brooklyn scene working with artists like Bilal, Erykah Badu, Common, Mos Def, and Kweli, and his later collabs with Lupe Fiasco, Q-Tip, J Dilla, Slum Village, Kendrick Lamar, Anita Baker and countless other industry legends.
Later Kweli and Glasper speak about Robert's famous interview on 979THEBOX, where he called out Lauryn Hill for stealing material for her album 'The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill,' while mistreating her musicians along the way. They also talk about Robert collaborating with Mac Miller and the deceased rapper's vast talent for instrumentation.
The show ends with an acapella freestyle from Mr. Glasper, a People's Party first.
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