Nicki Minaj is gracing the cover of Billboard Magazine for the month of November 2010. Nicki recently sat for an interview with BILLBOARD Magazine to promote ‘PINK FRIDAY’.
Check out a few excerpts from her interview after the jump….
On her last job:
“The last job I had was as an office manager in a little, tiny room where I literally wanted to strangle this guy because he was so loud and obnoxious,” Minaj recalls. “I would go home with stress pains in my neck and my back. That’s when I went to my mother and said, ‘Look, I’m not going back to work.’ I’d been fired like 15 times because I had a horrible attitude. I worked at Red Lobster before that and I chased a customer out of the restaurant once so I could stick my middle finger up at her and demand that she give me my pen back. I swear to God I was bad.”
On being a NY rapper:
“When I started rapping, people were trying to make me like the typical New York rapper, but I’m not that,” Minaj says. “No disrespect to New York rappers, but I don’t want people to hear me and know exactly where I’m from. I wanted the album to be universal and versatile. It really feels like it speaks for every one of my personalities.”
On getting respect in a male-dominated field:
“When I do songs like “Monster,” when I’m on a record with Jay-Z and Kanye West, when I’m on a record with Wayne and Em — I definitely think the dudes give me respect,” Minaj says. “They haven’t come easy but I think people are starting to give me more props.”
On “Your Love”:
Although first official single “Your Love” reached No. 4 on Billboard’s Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, the track wasn’t even meant to be released.
“I didn’t like the song and I didn’t put it out,” she says. “Someone stole it out of the studio and put it on the Internet and I cried because I was mortified. I was humiliated and remember telling Drake, ‘This is going to ruin my career.’ ” On her work ethic:
“I push people around me but I don’t push anyone more than I push myself,” she says. “I tell people all the time, ‘You want to work for me? You have to give 250,000%,’ because when I’m in the booth, I don’t half-ass it. I demand perfection from everyone around me and if you can’t live up to that, then bye-bye.”
The Young Money rapper will be releasing her debut album ‘Pink Friday’ on November 22nd.
Soulja Boy is crediting a recent session with Kanye West for expanding his mind as a musician.
Last month, Soulja Boy visited New York City for media rounds and to shoot a cover for XXL magazine.
During his time there, Soulja worked with both 50 Cent and Kanye West.
While his work with 50 was released as a video, “Mean Mug”, Soulja Boy’s music with Kanye West has yet to be heard.
He revealed that Kid Cudi joined them, and they completed several verses for an undisclosed amount of tracks.
Working with Kanye, and hearing an advanced copy of ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’, helped Soulja Boy to different creative possibilities he can attempt with his own music.
“We got in the studio: me, Kanye and Kid Cudi. That was dope,” Soulja Boy told AllHipHop.com. “He played some dope beats and we worked around a couple of samples and got a couple verses in. I listened to the finished product that Kanye is on, and that really opened my mind. I don’t even want to say as a rapper, but as a musician. It really opens your mind to different sounds and drum kicks.”
With the music still in the vaults, and Kanye’s album tracklist confirmed, the next logical question is whether Kanye and Soulja’s work will be showcased in an upcoming G.O.O.D. Friday drop.
Kanye’s celebrated series runs until January, and has already featured artists ranging from Charlie Wilson and Keri Hilson, to Jay-Z and Nicki Minaj.
“We’ll have to see,” Soulja said with the laugh of someone caught red-handed. “There’s been some leaking going on. Kanye was kind of mad about that. Wait for those Fridays…”
Soulja Boy’s third solo album, ‘The DeAndre Way’, is set to be released on November 30.
Kanye West has officially canceled his scheduled performance on NBC’s “The Today Show” shortly after his interview with Matt Lauer.
He tweeted the following…
“I’m not performing on the Today Show for obvious reasons.” “I’m so happy the world got to see just a small piece of ‘the set up.’…I blatantly said I’m not performing on a tweet and to everyone around me and the next day they still announced a performance….Do you guys see what I’m saying now?”
It wasn’t a surprise that West backed out of the performance after airing his concerns with Lauer’s interviewing techniques.
“I don’t hate Matt Lauer,” he added on Twitter today. “We don’t promote hate. That’s the whole point!!! I promote love and truth!…All positive energy … all smiles. Much love to Matt and the whole Today Show. I accept ya’ll future apology in advance LOL!”
In related news:
Kanye West Tweets His Frustration Over Matt Lauer ‘Today Show’ Interview
Kanye West is fighting mad, but this time it’s over “how they did [him] at the Today Show,” he chose his Twitter account to fight back.West sat down for an interview with Matt Lauer to, as he tweeted last night,“express how I was empathetic to Bush because I labeled him a racist and years later I got labeled as a racist.” But things didn’t quite go as West would have liked.
Kanye was referring to the flak he received after the talked-about-to-death 2009 MTV VMAs Taylor Swift interruption—something, according to West, the Today Show decided to dredge up visually while he was speaking. (His full interview has yet to air on the morning program.)
“While I was trying to give the interview they started playing the ‘MTV’ under me with audio!!!!!!!” Kanye tweeted. He then added, “I don’t mess with Matt Lauer or the Today Show … and that’s a very nice way for me to put it!”
West’s rants spanned through a further series of tweets, which found him alluding to the fact that Matt Lauer attempted to stage the G.O.O.D. Friday MC’s reactions to the questions. “He played clips of Bush and asked me to look at his face while I was trying to talk to him,” he wrote.
Here’s more:
“HE TRIED TO FORCE MY ANSWERS. IT WAS VERY BRUTAL AND I CAME THERE WITH ONLY POSITIVE INTENT… I feel very alone very used very tortured very forced very misunderstood very hollow very very misused… I don’t trust anyone but myself! Everyone has an agenda. I don’t do press anymore. I can’t be everything to everybody anymore… I can’t be everybody’s hero and villain savior and sinner Christian and anti Christ!… I can’t take anymore advice!!! I create, I’m creative, I have a good heart, everyone will see and understand one day.”
In the end, he capped things by cryptically tweeting, “Everything sounds like noise!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! EVERYTHING SOUNDS LIKE NOISE!!!!!!! I don’t trust anyone!”
Here’s a small portion of Kanye’s Today Show sitdown, which was aired when Lauer spoke to George Bush.
We’ll have to wait and see how it all plays out when Yeezy’s full Today Show interview runs. And when it does, if things went down as West says, one thing’s for sure—it might be someone else other than Kanye, for a change, who’s under scrutiny.
“Yo I really wonder if Matt Lauer thought that shit was cool to play the ‘MTV’ clip while I was speaking about Bush?” West tweeted toward the end of his rant. “This is rock and roll life my people… you can’t stop the truth you can’t stop the music and I have to be strong or ‘they’ win!!!!”
Check out the video below…
Source: OTRM & idolator
“I saw a bit of the interview. He was really upset when they played back the video of him snatching Taylor Swift’s award in the middle of him trying to answer the question Matt Lauer asked about the whole incident.”
Jay-Z and Kanye West are working on a full album together.
The pair previously announced they were to collaborate for an EP called ‘Watch the Throne’, but Kanye has since revealed this will now become an album.
He told MTV:
“We’re putting out a whole album now. We had done five songs so far, but then a few of them kind of were out there – and I put them on my album. Sorry, Jay!”
Although Kanye used some of their initial ideas for his forthcoming ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’ album – including the track “Monster”, a version of which featuring Jay-Z has been released – he added the pair have set a date to record again, and he doesn’t expect Jay to have any problems coming up with lyrics.
He added:
“We’re going to the South of France at the end of this month just to record new ideas. We’ll probably be done with the album in like a day or whatever. If you think about it, it’s really easy for Jay: He only has to think of, like, 10 verses!”
Kanye has a long association with Jay, working with the star as a producer on his breakthrough album ‘The Blueprint’ in 2001.
Jay-Z to Stump for Obama Again in 2012
During the 2008 presidential election, Jay-Z made it known that he was rooting for now-President Barack Obama. The rap superstar appeared at campaign rallies with Obama and even sang his praises during (typically sold-out) shows.
Jay-Z hasn’t been involved in the upcoming mid-term elections, but that doesn’t mean he’s done with politics. While speaking with the New York Post, Deputy White House Press Secretary William Burton made it sound like the Obama camp is expecting Jay-Z to help out in 2012.
Burton joked about the rapper taking over a key economic post before admitting his appeal to the Democratic party.
“In all seriousness, keep in mind he was pretty active during the 2008 election, so I don’t think it’d surprise anyone that he would be involved again,” Burton said. “But it’s a little premature.”
I’m A Business, Man! Jay-Z’s 10 Smartest Business Decisions According to Vibe Magazine
Guess who’s bizzack? Less than a month before the release of “Decoded”, a book that breaks down the meanings behind many of his most complicated lyrics, Jay-Z is proving once again why he landed atop of the Forbes “Hip-Hop Cash Kings” list late last summer.
Last week, Hov teamed up with Microsoft‘s search engine Bing to launch an advertisement campaign that will see pages from his upcoming book plastered to billboards throughout the country as well as surfaces like the bottom of a pool and the top of a pool table. Jay-Z fans are encouraged to use Bing to find and locate these pages, and the first fan that locates all of them and “decodes” them properly will win a chance
to catch a Jay-Z concert in Las Vegas on New Year’s Eve.
It’s already proven to be an incredibly deft business move by Jay-Z. The promotion has given the book a ton of free press and a good chance of moving off bookshelves quickly on Nov. 16.
In honor of Hov‘s latest deal, VIBE looks back at 10 of his smartest business decisions. If you’ve ever wondered how he managed to take his life from Marcy to Madison Square, look no further.
“I think the list is a bit bogus. Nothing against VIBE by all means they are a great magazine. I just feel the list could have been put together more for his Business/Investment ventures, rather than what kind of champagne he prefers, but that’s just me.”
Here’s one from wikipedia.org:
Jay-Z has also established himself as an entrepreneur like his fellow hip hop moguls and friends, Russell Simmons, Dr. Dre and Sean “Diddy” Combs, who also have business holdings such as record companies and clothing lines. In an interview, he stated that “my brands are an extension of me. They’re close to me. It’s not like running GM, where there’s no emotional attachment.” He is the founder of the urban clothing brand Rocawear along with Damon Dash. Rocawear has clothing lines and accessories for men, women and children. The line was taken over by Jay-Z in early 2006 following a falling out with Dash. In March 2007, Jay-Z sold the rights to the Rocawear brand to Iconix Brand Group, for $204 million. Jay-Z will retain his stake in the company and will continue to oversee the marketing, licensing and product development.He also co-owns The 40/40 Club, an upscale sports bar that started in New York City and has since expanded to Atlantic City and Chicago. In 2008, the 40/40 club in Las Vegas was closed down and bought back by the hotel after attendance steadily declined. Future plans will see 40/40 Clubs in Tokyo and Singapore. In 2005, Jay-Z became an investor in Carol’s Daughter, a line of beauty products, including products for hair, skin, and hands, as well as fragrances.
Jay-Z serves as co-brand director for Budweiser Select and collaborates with the company on strategic marketing programs and creative ad development. He provides direction on brand programs and ads that appear on TV, radio, print, and high-profile events. He is a part-owner of the New Jersey Nets NBA team paying a reported $4.5 million for his share. He is interested in relocating the team to Brooklyn. In October 2005, he was reported in English media as considering buying a stake of Arsenal F.C., an English soccer team. He has also invested in a real estate development venture called J Hotels which recently acquired a $66 million mid-block parcel in Chelsea, New York. Jay-Z and his partners are contemplating constructing a high-end hotel or an art gallery building on the newly acquired site which has the potential to go up about twelve stories. Through his company Gain Global Investments Network LLC, had an interest estimated between 2 and 7% in the Aqueduct Entertainment Group (AEG) consortium which in January 2010 was awarded a contract to operate a 4,500 slot machine racino at the Aqueduct Race Track. Jay-Z became interested in the project after New York Governor David Paterson who awarded the contract said there had to be an affirmative action component to the ownership. Jay-Z initially approached Steve Wynn who was also bidding on the contract. On March 9, 2010, Jay-Z and Flake withdrew from the project and Paterson recused himself from further involvement.
Jay-Z’s Interview With The Wall Street Journal
Here are excerpts from an interview from The Wall Street Journal with Jay-Z in his office.
WSJ: This book puts a frame around your career. When did you really start thinking about how you wanted to present your legacy?
Jay-Z: You think about legacy before you even start. When a kid is practicing on the basketball court, it’s “5-4-3-2-1 and the crowd goes crazy!”
As you start realizing your dreams and it’s tangible, you think about it in a real way. But I think that emotion happens from the beginning, from record one.
The legacy, I think about that as I make the music, all the time. How can I make the best album of all time? You always fail. But every time I go up to bat, I’m thinking how can I make an album better than “Thriller.”
WSJ: I’ve talked to some of your friends who say that when you guys make personal career decisions, you’re taking into account how the decisions will move hip-hop culture forward overall. Can you give me an example?
Jay-Z: For us, this is the music that saved a generation. So there’s a big responsibility for those who it saved to make sure that thing is intact for the next generation. We’re the first generation that really took advantage of it, starting with Puff [Daddy] and Master P, guys who really made a name and became successful as entrepreneurs.
Even more than that, when you’re under attack so much as a genre [as hip hop is], you’re forced to come together. But probably the last time we really came together on something was working for Obama, lending our voice and the people we had toward that campaign. Whether he does a great job or not is almost secondary to what it did for the dreams and the hopes of an entire race. Just based on that alone, it’s a success, the biggest we’ve had. Period. To date. It’s Martin Luther King’s dream realized. Tangible. In the flesh. You can shake his hand.
WSJ: What would you change about hip-hop if you could?
Jay-Z: We have to find our way back to true emotion. This is going to sound so sappy, but love is the only thing that stands the test of time. “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” was all about love. Andre 3000, “The Love Below.” Even NWA, at its core, that was about love for a neighborhood.
We’re chasing a lot of sounds now, but I’m not hearing anyone’s real voice. The emotion of where you are in your life. The mortgage scandal. People losing their jobs. I want to hear about that.
WSJ: What’s the most important decision you made along the way to help keep your career in your own hands?
Jay-Z: We got lucky. In the beginning we couldn’t get a deal. We had to work our own records in the beginning. It gave us a different way to negotiate when we came to the table. Most people get excited and take the first deal they’re offered. We had a little bit of success already, so we were stubborn enough to think that we could really do it at that point. They offered us a deal and we asked for a co-venture. That pretty much ensured that we’d have control from the beginning, from album one.
WSJ: You don’t hand out awards. Are there other things you say no to automatically?
Jay-Z: That doesn’t have anything to do with building the myth. I’m just uncomfortable speaking. I can do a stadium show for two hours and I’m in my comfort zone. But if you look at any of my acceptance speeches they’re maybe seven seconds. I want to get off the stage.
Check out a video below of an exclusive Amazon.com interview with Jay-Z about his book “Decoded”
Jay drops some book knowledge in this exclusive interview for Amazon.com. He gives more detail about what we can expect from “Decoded” when it hits stores on November 16th.
Prior to Bruno Mars performing on Saturday Night Live, he sat down with ELLE Magazine and got into depth about his new album, what he thought about Kanye West‘s SNL Performance, and what his future plans are.
Check it out after the jump…
If you don’t recognize Bruno Mars, then just turn on the radio. He’s the R&B mastermind writer/producer behind practically every ounce of DJ-fuel: Cee Lo’s snappy Motown kiss-off “Fuck You,” B.O.B’s sultry single “Nothing On You” and Travie McCoy’s catchy ode to capitalism, “Billionaire.” On Tuesday, the 24 year-old Hawaii native released his solo debut, ‘Doo-Wops & Hooligans,’ anchored by the melodic “Just The Way You Are.” And this weekend, he’ll provide the soundtrack to Saturday Night Live.
ELLE: Even though you were behind some of the biggest songs of the summer, was going solo always your goal? Bruno Mars: I got signed at a young age, and, it’s not like the movies—you don’t get signed and all of a sudden hit songs falling into your lap, so I had to learn and see the way things were behind the scenes. Luckily, I got a chance to sell one of my records. That helped pay rent, so I figured that I’d just start producing for other acts and then hopefully, one day labels would hear me sing these demos and take a chance.
ELLE: You famously wrote Cee Lo’s “Fuck You.” How did you two meet? BM: We’re label mates, and I knew that he was working on his album so I just kept putting it in everyone’s ear, like, “Yo, I need to work with him. It’d be a dream come true.” We hooked up at the studio, we started working, we did a couple of records together. We did a record on Travis McCoy’s album called “Dr. Feel Good,” which he’s singing on; he’s on my album, “The Other Side,” so it’s only natural. We all got to the studio and came up with one of our favorite songs.
ELLE: Were you worried “Fuck You” wouldn’t get airplay because of the lyrics? BM: You know sometimes, you just gotta do things that feel right. And Cee Lo’s the type of artist who’ll say whatever the hell he wants to say.
ELLE: What are you going after sound-wise on your solo album? BM: I’ve been a songwriter and a producer for a while now and I’m always hopping around from different genre to genre, and I’m hoping “Nothin’ On You,” “Billionaire,” and “Just The Way You Are,” were a warning to people that I might not just stick to one sound. So on [Doo-Wops & Hooligans], I was just really trying to be open. I would just sit down in the studio, pick up a guitar, and write a song, whether it called for a reggae beat or whether it was a ballad. It was kind of a free fall. Let me just do what I want; let me get this out of my system. And I’m already thinking about my second album.
ELLE: You must be excited to perform on SNL this weekend. BM: Geeze. The first time you’ll see me singing “Just The Way You Are” on TV is on that show, live.
ELLE: Will you try to weasel your way into a skit? BM: I don’t know how those things work. I’d love to, but I’m fine with just performing.
ELLE: And you’re following the Kanye performance from last week. Did you see it? BM: Yeah, wasn’t that incredible? That was my idea! I was gonna wear a red suit and have ballerinas dancing to “Just The Way You Are.”
ELLE: You better talk to your stylist, ASAP.
BM: No, I’m just kidding. He was amazing though, definitely, he definitely woke me up. Now you’re making me nervous. What the hell is going on? This is supposed to be a nice, sweet interview.
ELLE: Oh no, didn’t they tell you we just try freak you out here at ELLE?
BM: Right, like, “This is your first big moment. Good luck following Kanye.”
Plus check out Bruno Mars performs “Grenade” in this extended session of Billboard’s Tastemakers series LIVE at Mophonics Studios NY.
Kid Cudi peers out from the shadows on his album art for his upcoming sophomore album titled, ‘Man On The Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager’. Proceeded by his Kanye West assisted lead single “Erase Me”, Cudi’s new album is set to be released November 9th.
Check out the video for his single, “Erase Me” featuring Kanye West below….
Kanye West just revealed the cover art for his upcoming album, ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’, due to come out later next month (November 22nd). While presenting the cover, the artist also communicated that the cover was banned in the USA. You can expect an alternative cover, at least for the US market. One can for sure say that the cover suits the title of the album!
This is what West had to say about his album cover via his twitter….
Mr. West claims the powers-that-be won’t allow this to be the cover image of ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’. Back to the drawing board.
According to RadarOnline.com, they have claimed to have seen the two “NUDE” image of Kanye West.
One of the images show a nude West from the chest up, wearing sunglasses and a gold chain, while the second photo shows the singer’s genitals provocatively exposed from his boxer briefs.
According to the website, West has been sending the nude photos of himself to women around the internet.
It’s also been said, that the current owner of these photos, is currently shopping the photos around to different media outlets to see who will cough up more cash for them. WTF!! SMH!
I don’t know if this is all true, but if it is, all I can say to Kanye is, WOW!!! That’s a damn shame! Shit that’s even low for him.
As for the person who has them I don’t know if in fact they are in desperate need of some cash money or they just want to be the next media “It Girl.”
Someone is calling for some serious media attention. I don’t know if it’s West or the person selling the pics. Hell maybe even both of them?!
British duoLa Roux calls on Kanye West to collaborate for their latest single, “In for the Kill.” In the remix version, lead singer Elly Jackson icily coos over cut-and-paste synths, allowing Kanye to show off his skills midway through the tune. “The Thriller version of Michael,” raps West, who will also appear in the music video.
“He’s a very exciting person to be around. He’s a special breed of person. He’s not quite like anyone I’ve ever met before.” “He’s very, very, very creative. He comes up with ideas every five seconds. We’ve had a very interesting three days. It’s a very interesting mix of things.”
Kanye West joins forces again with Lupe Fiasco and Pharrell also known as the supergroup “Child Rebel Soldier (CRS)” for another “G.O.O.D Friday” record.
JNEL & J. Magazine 