The Roots Picnic — the once Philly-centric Black music festival, which over 16 years has become a perennial soft launch for the summer concert season here in the Northeast — can now safely be thought of as a national event. Atlanta’s Gunna graces the same stage as North Carolina’s Fantasia Barrino. St. Louis natives Smino...

Hot 97 Summer Jam, the annual mega-concert thrown by NYC hip-hop radio station Hot 97, took place Sunday at UBS Arena in Elmont, just outside the city limits. The lineup was topped by Doja Cat and Sexyy Red, with names like French Montana, Cash Cobain, Davido, Lola Brooke, Fivio Foreign, Sleepy Hallow, and Ty Dolla $ign further down the bill and...

Considering recent events, it’s important for us to recognize and appreciate our ’90s rap legends while they’re still around. With that in mind, let’s talk about the transcendent Newark goon comedian Redman, who was once the subject of the greatest MTV Cribs episode of all time and who has been spitting fi...

This past weekend, as previously announced, longtime Wu-Tang Clan comrades Raekwon and Ghostface Killah went head-to-head in the latest battle from Swizz Beatz and Timbaland’s pandemic institution Verzuz. It was made for a fun heartwarming spectacle — two old friends bantering back and forth, rapping immortal tracks at each o...

On Saturday night, the soul legend D’Angelo played the first-ever solo Verzuz battle. The event was billed as D’Angelo V. Friends, but for most of the night, the only friends onscreen were DJ Scratch and the guy who lit D’s blunts. (Method Man, Redman, and H.E.R. did put in appearances.) The event was mostly just a ...