Straight Up Rapping

Daryle Dirty Ryse grew up in East Oakland, California where growing up in the Hood yielded few illustrious outcomes. One indiscretion of the rapper's youth, an afternoon robbery, would come back to haunt the rapper and his cohort Richard Clean Washington, at the same time Dirty signed a muti-million dollar record deal with Sony. Handsome, smart, a straight A student, the victim's mad son never forgot what the young teen did to his mother on that fateful summer of 2007. Years afterwards while Dirty rose up to mass superstardom, revenge was the order of the day for the victim's son, Frederick. While the rapper of the century's hit tune "Dirty Ass Bitch," (DAB), became a worldwide smash, the killer stayed on his heels. He stopped at nothing to avenge his mother's early death.

Straight-Up Talk On Hip-Hop Culture

His lyrics are a lesson in history. His songs are a movement in groove theory. His book is a light out of the dark that will change the way you think about America and the world as a whole. From Rap to Hip-Hop, Gangsta to Trip-Hop, Chuck D, his Bomb Squad, and his monumental band, Public Enemy, have been a sonic, singular, and transcendental force in modern music. As a poet and philosopher, Chuck D has been the hard rhymer, rolling anthems off his tongue in an era of apathy, tapping into the youth culture of the world for more than a decade. Fight the Power, his first book, part memoir, part treatise, part State of the Union Address, is a testament to his nearly twenty years in the music business and his experiences around the world. Here is a history of one of the most important and controversial musical movements of our century, its impact on modern culture, and the heroes and victims it has created in its wake. Chuck D has never been just a rapper. He's an artist, a rock 'n' roll star who's shared the spotlight with everyone from U2 to Anthrax. He's fought to bridge the gap between musical genres and cultural differences. He is truly the voice of a generation. Startling, gripping, and uncompromising, Fight the Power is most of all the story of one man's struggle to bring about change in this difficult world at all costs. It is certain to take its place among the classics of African American experience.

A book-length poem navigating belief, black lives, the tragedies of Trump, and the boundaries of being a woman. "When Rap Spoke Straight to God is utterly transporting. In language both elevated and slangy, saucy and tender, Dawson lovingly weaves the reader around her finger.” —Jennifer Egan When Rap Spoke Straight to God isn’t sacred or profane, but a chorus joined in a single soliloquy, demanding to be heard. There’s Wu-Tang and Mary Magdelene with a foot fetish, Lil’ Kim and a self-loving Lilith. Slurs, catcalls, verses, erasures—Dawson asks readers, “Just how far is it to nigger?” Both grounded and transcendent, the book is reality and possibility. Dawson’s work has always been raw; but, When Rap Spoke Straight to God is as blunt as the answer to that earlier question: “Here.” Sometimes abrasive and often abraded, Dawson doesn’t flinch. A mix of traditional forms where sonnets mash up with sestinas morphing to heroic couplets, When Rap Spoke Straight to God insists that while you may recognize parts of the poem’s world, you can’t anticipate how it will evolve. With a literal exodus of light in the book’s final moments, When Rap Spoke Straight to God is a lament for and a celebration of blackness. It’s never depression; it’s defiance—a persistent resistance. In this book, like Wu-Tang says, the marginalized “ain’t nothing to f--- with.”

The Cultural Territories of Race makes an important contribution to current policy debates by amplifying muted voices that have too often been ignored by other social scientists.

In this fun, edgy, and essential guide, the editors of today's hottest music magazine give you the ultimate, all-access pass to the exciting world of hip-hop and contemporary R&B. From the megaselling songs to the biggest stars to the most outrageous scandals, Rap-Up gives you a comprehensive behind-the-scenes look at the revolutionary music that's transforming pop culture. Discover: HISTORY LESSON How it all started, from rappers armed with toy keyboards and ambition...to breakout groups like Run-D.M.C. and Public Enemy who brought the 'hood to the suburbs and changed music forever. THE NEW NEW SCHOOL One-of-a-kind profiles of Jay-Z, Beyoncé, 50 Cent, Usher, Ciara, and all the hottest artists. And a look at the moguls and producers who shape the hits, including urban-flow stylist Jermaine Dupri, off-center innovators The Neptunes, and techno-beat genius Timbaland. WHERE'S THE BEEF? The inside story on rap's most notorious battles, from the legendary Juice Crew vs. Boogie Down Productions duel over hip-hop bragging rights, to the Jay-Z vs. Nas battle-of-the-giants, to the 50 Cent vs. The Game take-no-prisoners faceoff. FROM HOLLIS TO HOLLYWOOD A comprehensive list of hip-hop on the silver screen-the good, the bad, and the performers (Will Smith, Jamie Foxx, Queen Latifah) who achieved box office gold and Oscar fame. Complete with takes on must-own CDs and tracks, pop quizzes, career highlights, and artist road maps, this unique, definitive book is all you need to get down with everything hip-hop and R&B.

In the Mississippi Delta, creativity, community, and a rich expressive culture persist despite widespread poverty. Over five years of extensive work in the region, author Ali Colleen Neff collected a wealth of materials that demonstrate a vibrant musical scene. Let the World Listen Right draws from classic studies of the blues as well as extensive ethnographic work to document the changing same of Delta music making. From the neighborhood juke joints of the contemporary Delta to the international hip-hop stage, this study traces the musical networks that join the region's African American communities to both traditional forms and new global styles. The book features the words and describes performances of contemporary artists, including blues musicians, gospel singers, radio and club DJs, barroom toast-tellers, preachers, poets, and a spectrum of Delta hip-hop artists. Contemporary Delta hip-hop artists Jerome TopNotch the Villain Williams, Kimyata Yata Dear, and DA F.A.M. have contributed freestyle poetry, extensive interview materials, and their own commentaries. The book focuses particularly on the biography of TopNotch, whose hip-hop poetics emerge from a lifetime of schoolyard dozens and training in the gospel church.

An “impassioned tribute” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) to the most influential music culture today, Atlanta rap—a masterful, street-level story of art, money, race, class, and salvation from acclaimed New York Times reporter Joe Coscarelli. From mansions to trap houses, office buildings to strip clubs, Atlanta is defined by its rap music. But this flashy and fast-paced world is rarely seen below surface level as a collection not of superheroes and villains, cartoons and caricatures, but of flawed and inspired individuals all trying to get a piece of what everyone else seems to have. In artistic, commercial, and human terms, Atlanta rap represents the most consequential musical ecosystem of this century. Rap Capital tells the dramatic stories of the people who make it tick and the city that made them that way. The lives of the artists driving the culture, from megastars like Lil Baby and Migos to lesser-known local strivers like Lil Reek and Marlo, represent the modern American dream but also an American nightmare, as young Black men and women wrestle generational curses, crippled school systems, incarceration, and racism on the way to an improbably destination atop art and commerce. Across Atlanta, rap dreams power countless overlapping economies, but they’re also a gamble, one that could make a poor man rich or a poor man poorer, land someone in jail or keep them out of it. Drawing on years of reporting, more than a hundred interviews, dozens of hours in recording studios and on immersive ride-alongs, acclaimed New York Times reporter Joe Coscarelli weaves a cinematic tapestry of this singular American culture as it took over in the last decade, from the big names to the lesser-seen prospects, managers, grunt-workers, mothers, DJs, lawyers, and dealers that are equally important to the industry. The result is a deeply human, era-defining book that is “required reading for anyone who has ever wondered how, exactly, Atlanta hip-hop took over the world” (Kelefa Sanneh, author of Major Labels). Entertaining and profound, Rap Capital is an epic of art, money, race, class, and sometimes, salvation.