Monday, July 7, 2008

HIP HOP CONGRESS NATIONAL CONVENTION 2008 JULY 24th - 27th in Biloxi and New Orleans

Hip Hop Congress header image 3

HIP HOP CONGRESS NATIONAL CONVENTION 2008 JULY 24th - 27th in Biloxi and New Orleans

Press Release
Schedule Updated 7/3/08

REGISTER TO ATTEND THE CONFERENCE!!!
Announced Performers
Want to perform? Artist Submission located here!

Aaron Berkowitz
PR and Marketing Director
Hip Hop Congress
berkowitz@hiphopcongress.com
http://www.hiphopcongress.com

Hip Hop Congress Announces it’s 7th Annual Conference to be hosted by the Mississippi Artists and Producers Coalition
Energize, Organize, Revolutionize: Taking it back to the Roots

DATE, LOCATION: The 7TH Annual National Hip Hop Congress Conference will take place in Biloxi, MS from July 24th through the 27th at the Treasure Bay Hotel and Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi. This year the conference will focus on building internal capacity and direction of the organization with a goal of improved service, clarified action and plans to further influence local communities where we have a presence as well as national. Special addresses will be also be given by Bakari Kitwana of Rapsessions and Cheri Honkala, National Coordinator of the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign.

This conference will include a variety of activities and workshops in the elements of hip hop, use and development of media coalitions, direct action, digital distribution, music industry knowledge and detailed plans for HHC in the next two years. Hip Hop Congress will also be announcing the roll out of several new initiatives including increased resources for artists through the website and cultural services for schools, after school programs, and communities. Individuals and organizations interested in learning more about HHC are welcome to attend, enjoy the activities and learn more about HHC without any obligation to join. As always, there will be shows every night featuring artists on the cutting edge of Independent music as well as a headliner yet to be named.Previous artists who have performed at the National Conference are Blueprint, OneBeLo, Zion I, Jurassic 5, and Brother Ali.

Shamako Noble, HHC President, stated, “Last year we gave an open invitation to Hip Hop organizations, partners and interested folks to attend in an effort to expand our bases. This year, we want to focus on refining our strengths while addressing our weaknesses. We’ve been able to survive conditions as an organization that many said shouldn’t have allowed us to exist. Our hope is that at this conference we can return to the formula that has allowed is to survive for so long, while troubleshooting issues that could hinder our development . This means refocusing on the mission, streamlining our communication, and redefining our programs. We are also very excited to be in the South, where a lot of Hip Hop Organizations either don’t go, are afraid to go, or only go when it’s convenient. We’re looking to build something lasting here, and connect it to the rest of the practical Hip Hop movement.”

Cheri Honkala commented, “I’m honored to be a part of this event. I attended my first HHC conference in 2004 and we’ve been developing a relationship ever since. This year, our collaborative focus is in Minneapolis at the March for Our Lives where HHC is taking a clear stand on Housing, Health Care, money and programs for the poor and not for this ridiculous war in Iraq. I think that anybody that is serious about utilizing the potential of Hip Hop at a grassroots level should be looking at HHC.”

When President of the Southern Progressives, Southern Regional Director, and top flight artist Kamikaze was asked to comment, he replied, “The Mississippi Artists and Producers coalition is proud to be hosting this year’s annual conference. I personally lobbied for Hip Hop Congress to be here and connect with the South in an organic way that we hadn’t really seen in Mississippi. As the defender and protector of all things Mississippi, I expect nothing but the best results from this conference.“

Announced Performers (Check Back for constant updates on this list)

Performing:

DLabrie
Kamikaze
Shamako Noble
B-Girl Media/Knox Family
Silent Lambs
Darkside
Quanstar
F.E.W.
Truth Universal

Parters and Participants (Past and Present):

* RockRap Confidential
* Poor Peoples Economic Human Rights Campaign
* Seattle Youth Council
* 206 Zulu
* B-Girl Media
* Global Fam
* Silicon Valley De-Bug
* Golden Mean Music
* Mississippi Artists and Producers Coalition
* Iron Fist Recrods
* African American History Museum
* The Ruckus Society
* Rondavoux Records
* Chicago Zulu Nation
* Hip Hop Association
* Hip Hop Caucus
* Soundslam.com
* RubyHornet.com
* Hip Hop Chess Federation
* Reclaim the Media
* The League of Young Voters
* Rapsessions
* First Team Music
* VividUrban Magazine
* Pastors for Peace
* The Cipher
* F5 Records


To View the most updated schedule of events please Click Here


Remember to register to attend


Artist submission information

If you would like to be considered for a performance spot at the HHC National Conference in front of an audience that books shows in every major city and on dozens of college campuses, please email 2008HHCSubmission@hiphopcongress.com with the following information:

*A one - two page bio that includes current contact information
*1-3 current press links (if you have them)
*1-2 video links (if you have them)
*1-2 mp3 links (use a program such as divshare.com or zshare.com to upload your mp3s, if you don’t know how to do this then you can email the mp3 directly but that method will take us longer to review)
*Anything else you would like us to see, such as myspace links.

Not everyone will get a spot but we would like to accommodate as many acts as possible. It is free to submit and remember we get tons of requests so please forgive us if we don’t get back to you right away. Email 2008HHCSubmission@hiphopcongress.com with this info and any other artist related questions you may have.

ECSMG HIP HOP BUSINESS SUMMIT WELCOMES ALLHIPHOP & GLOBAL GRIND

Hip Hop Business Summit -aka- "Hood Economics" will be held on Saturday, August 23 at Symphony Hall, Newark, NJ, from 9am - 2pm. The Summit will be held in conjunction with the Celebrity Golf Classic Weekend.

The panelists of Industry Executives, Business Leaders and Celebrities will discuss diversification of business in urban culture through music, clothing, movies, gaming and communications, Newark's re-development, succeeding in entertainment, health, successful competition & winning at an executive level, help in starting a business and facts of successful business ownership in today's changing economy (i.e. barbershops, hair salons, carpentry, electricians, restaurants, spas, clothing stores, and web based & digital businesses). There will be a Q&A session, along with a variety of give-aways. Hip Hop Business Summit Tickets are $55 pp.

The weekend of events from August 21-23, includes an exclusive Welcome Reception for Celebrities, Sponsors and Invited Guests, a Welcome to Newark Dinner, Golf Classic Awards at Weequahic Parks Golf Club with remarks by Newark Mayor Cory Booker, and a Golf Classic VIP "White" Party at The Spot on Commerce St. Tickets needed for weekend events. To purchase tickets visit http://www.ecsmg.com.

Confirmed guests include "Grouchy" Greg Watkins, CEO & Founder of AllHipHop.com, Navarrow Wright, CEO & President of Global Grind.com, Ed Lover, Morning Radio Host at Clear Channel Power 105.1 FM, Lance Smith, Walter Briggs, RW McQuarters, Dwight Hicks and Harry Carson from the NFL, Kurt Thomas, Eric Williams, Norm Nixon, Greg Anthony, Brevin Knight, Brandon Knight, Ira Bowman, Steffond Johnson and Randy Smith from the NBA, Actors Brian White ("Stomp The Yard") and Michael Kenneth Smith (HBO's Hit Show "The Wire"), Karen Hunter, Publisher, Hip Hop Artists Bun B, "Pepa" of the legendary group Salt -n- Pepa and Loose Cannon, Def Jam Comedy Artist Queen Aishah, and many more. Golf Classic proceeds benefit Newark Youth Golf, Inc.

Media Partners: The Star Ledger Newspaper, Clear Channel Power 105.1 FM, AllHipHop.com, Global Grind.com, Game Sports Magazine, with support from Urban Sports Talk & Entertainment & BlackGivesBack.Blogspot.com.

AllHipHop.com was founded and launched in 1998 by CEO's "Grouchy" Greg Watkins and Chuck "Jigsaw" Creekmur. AllHipHop.com has become a valuable resource for hip-hop on the internet, featuring daily news, interviews, reviews, multimedia and other interesting content. AllHipHop.com is the most widely read Hip-Hop entity in the world, reaching millions of unique visitors per month.

Global Grind.com was started by Navarrow Wright, CEO & President and Hip Hop Mogul Russell Simmons. Global Grind.com is the place to explore multimedia that matters to you. It is a community based website allowing people to discover and share content from anywhere on the web, by linking, voting, and commenting on each others content, in a social and democratic way. Voting submitted content up and down is the cornerstone function of the website, and is respectively referred to as grinding and trashing. Russell Simmons currently sits on the board of Global Grind.com.

ECSMG Consulting, LLC
The mission of ECSMG is to provide the highest quality of service to clients, by performing at a maximum level. The business strategy is to leverage expertise in providing business consulting services to professional athletes and entertainers, as well as managing and hosting celebrity golf tournaments globally. ECSMG is rapidly becoming the leading firm in the industry with a specially designed transition for athletes and entertainers. ECSMG also hosts charity events, which assists clients in improving global communities.

For celebrity confirmations and event info contact Ernest Ruffin at 973.573.2505 or eruffin@ecsmg.com. For media credentials, interviews & event itinerary contact Tafia L. A. Pringle @ 202.575.7774 or tafia@tlapr.com. For tickets, visit ECSMG

Judge Orders 50 Cent to Forfeit Guns

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NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. rapper 50 Cent was ordered to surrender any guns he might have after a judge on Friday issued a temporary restraining order requested by the rapper's ex-girlfriend, lawyers said.

A lawyer for the rapper, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, said he would contest the order and that 50 Cent did not have guns or access to guns. "To my knowledge, he has no guns," said lawyer Brett Kimmel.

The order bars 50 Cent from being in contact with Shaniqua Tompkins, the mother of his 10-year-old son, without the court's permission, lawyers said.

50 Cent and Tompkins have been locked in a legal fight over money. Tompkins has argued that she is entitled to half of 50 Cent's estate, based on an oral agreement.

The dispute escalated last month after a fire destroyed the rapper's $2.4 million Long Island home, where Tompkins lived with their son.

Police said they were investigating the fire as suspicious.

The Stamford, Connecticut-based rapper has denied any involvement in the fire and separately on Friday filed a $20 million defamation lawsuit in a Connecticut Superior Court against Tompkins for statements she made to the media.

"It's completely baseless and it's retaliatory," Tompkins' lawyer, Paul Catsandonis, said of the defamation suit. "It's nothing more than an attempt to rehabilitate his image."

Since his debut album in 2003, 50 Cent has built a business with a record label, a clothing and footwear line, ringtones and video games. He has also starred in a movie based on his life, "Get Rich or Die Tryin'."

NAS TO RELEASE ‘UNTITLED’ NEW DEF JAM ALBUM ON JULY 15TH




NAS TO RELEASE ‘UNTITLED’ NEW DEF JAM ALBUM ON JULY 15TH

FIRST SINGLE, “HERO,” PRODUCED BY POLOW DA DON,
LEADS OFF CONTROVERSIAL NEW ALBUM;
PRODUCERS INCLUDE GRAMMY WINNER MARK RONSON, STARGATE,
COOL & DRE, JAY ELECTRONICA, AND STIC.MAN OF DEAD PREZ

Long-awaited follow-up to first Def Jam album, 2006’s Grammy-nominated
Hip-Hop Is Dead

(June 10, 2008 – New York, NY) Surrounded by controversy at every stage of his long and influential career as the conscience – and often most severe critic – of hip-hop, Def Jam Recordings artist Nas has returned to the headlines, declaring that his new 9th album, arriving in stores July 15th, will be untitled. The untitled new album follows-up Nas’ Def Jam debut, the Grammy nominated Hip-Hop Is Dead, which entered the Soundscan chart at #1 in December 2006, on first week sales of more than 350,000 copies.

“It’s important to me that this album gets to the fans,” Nas said of his newest project. “It’s been a long time coming. I want my fans to know that creatively and lyrically, they can expect the same content and the same messages. It’s that important. The streets have been waiting for this for a long time. The people will always know what the real title of this album is and what to call it.”

In advance of the untitled new album, which will be issued on the Def Jam/Jones Experience imprint, the first official single will be “Hero,” produced by Polow Da Don.

Over the past few weeks, two tracks from the album have been leaked: “Black President” (produced by DJ Green Lantern) and the album’s closing track “N.I.G.G.E.R. (The Slave and The Master)” (produced by DJ Toomp), containing the provocative lyric, “They say we N-I-double-G-E-R/ We are, much more/ But still we choose to ignore the obvious/ Man, this history don’t acknowledge us/ We were scholars way before colleges…”

One of the albums highlights is “Fried Chicken” featuring Busta Rhymes, produced by the Grammy winner for Producer Of The Year, Mark Ronson. “Fried Chicken,” finds Nas and Busta in top form, mixing elaborate metaphors over a decidedly throwback Ronson track. “When I was young, sitting in my room hammering out beats on my MPC, Nas was one of those truly legendary artists that you daydream, ‘One day, I’ll get to do a track for…,’” says Ronson. “We finally met Grammy night in LA, and he said he wanted some stuff from me for the album. I started thinking to myself, as a Nas fan, ‘What kind of beats would I love to hear him over?’ That’s how the Dapkings and I came up with the track for ‘Fried Chicken’, and I reckon it sounds like a stone cold classic.”

The untitled new album will also include collaborations with producers Stic.Man from Dead Prez, Jay Electronica, Stargate, DJ Cool & Dre, and others.

Hip-Hop Is Dead, the third album by Nas to enter the charts at #1, got started with the lead title track single “Hip-Hop Is Dead,” produced and co-written by and featuring will.i.am. of Black Eyed Peas. The cut (which sampled ’60s hits “Apache” and “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida”) made it inside the Top 40 on the Hot 100, Pop 100, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, Hot Rap Tracks, and Hot Digital Songs charts. It was followed-up with “Can’t Forget About You,” featuring fellow Def Jam artist Chrisette Michelle, a jazz inspired Top 10 Rap track also produced by will.i.am, that riffed off a sample from the classic “Unforgettable” by Nat King Cole.

Time Out New York stepped out early in January 2007, and picked Hip-Hop Is Dead as “rap record of the year.” Pitchfork’s reviewer called it “the album I’ll give to people in 20 years when they ask who Nas was.” The album release set up the “One Man, One Mic, One Night” 26-city North American tour, one of the biggest ever by Nas, from March through May 2007.

* * *

An influential hip-hop culture icon since the early 1990s, Nas (Nasir Jones) emerged from the Queensbridge neighborhood of Long Island City, a hotbed of rap artist since the ’80s. Son of jazz trumpeter Olu Dara, junior high school drop-out Nas apprenticed with such local crews as the Devastatin’ Seven (at age nine) and Main Source (“Live At the Barbecue,” 1991).

Nas first reached an international audience when his track “Halftime” was tapped by producer MC Serch as the opening cut on 1992’s Zebrahead movie soundtrack. Signed to Columbia Records, the first full-length album by poet and rhyme-master Nas arrived in 1994, the RIAA platinum Illmatic, featuring the singles “It Ain’t Hard To Tell,” “The World Is Yours,” and “One Love.” 1996 brought the breakthrough double-platinum It Was Written (#1 R&B for 7 weeks, #1 pop for 4 weeks), with his first major crossover singles “Sweet Dreams” and “If I Ruled the World (Imagine That).” The streak continued with the double-platinum I Am in 1999 (again #1 pop and #1 R&B), containing the chart singles “Nas Is Like,” “Hate Me Now” (featuring Puff Daddy), and “You Won’t See Me Tonight” (featuring Aaliyah).

Subsequent albums by Nas included: the RIAA platinum Nastradamus (1999, #2 R&B, #7 pop, with “Nastradamus” and “You Owe Me,” featuring Ginuwine); the platinum Stillmatic (2001, #1 R&B, #5 pop, with “Got Ur Self A…,” “Ether,” “One Mic,” and “Rule”); the platinum God’s Son (2002, #1 R&B, with huge R&B/pop crossover hits “Made You Look” and “I Can”); the platinum double-CD Street’s Disciple (2004, #2 R&B, #5 pop, with “Bridging the Gap” and “Just a Moment”); and Hip-Hop Is Dead in 2006.

Over the years, Nas has also been the featured guest on a number of crossover hits by other artists, among them: Allure (“Head Over Heels,” 1997); R. Kelly (“Did You Ever Think,” 1999); Missy Elliott (the #1 “Hot Boyz,” 1999); fellow Queensbridge rapper Mobb Deep (“It’s Mine,” 1999); Nature (“The Ultimate High,” 2000); Jagged Edge (“I Got It 2,” 2002); J-Lo (“I’m Gonna Be Alright,” 2002); Kelis (“In Public,” 2003, and “Blindfold Me,” 2006); Kanye West (“Classic (Better Than I’ve Ever Been),” 2006); and others.

In addition to his successful career in music, Nas has pursued a career in motion pictures that began with his co-starring role (alongside DMX) in 1998’s crime drama Belly, a film by director Hype Williams (with whom Nas has done several video clips). Subsequent appearances include Albert Pyun’s action crime thriller Ticker (2001, with Tim Sizemore and Steven Seagal); Carl Seaton’s Sacred Is the Flesh (2001, also co-written by Nas); a cameo as himself in Boaz Yakin’s comedy Uptown Girls (2003, with Brittany Murphy and Dakota Fanning); Lawrence Page’s Murda Muzik (2004, with Ron Artest and Chinky); and the fictional hip-hop group bio-pic The Vapors (upcoming in 2008, with an all-star cast of Roxanne Shanté, Kool G Rap, Marley Marl, Biz Markie, and others).