In today’s episode of “Fiddy Checks Google Trends”: protagonist Curtis Jackson hypes his Before I Self Destruct by randomly name-checking someone with a track record of recent and bona fide commercial success in music—Susan Boyle. (This approach is also known as The Bieber Method.) While he’s at it, he’s also trashing Jay-Z, which is odd given that perhaps the one thing 50 needs to figure out more than anything else is how to age gracefully. Is he just bored not having a nemesis now that Kanye’s taking a break? More »
The suspense surrounding the John Mayer/50 Cent/Kris Allen/Norah Jones/Justin Bieber/Leona Lewis battle ended today, as Billboard has reported the Top 200 Albums chart positions for the new entries.
It’s probably no surprise that John Mayer landed at #1 after selling 286,000 copies of Battle Studies. However, Kris Allen’s chart debut might make a few of the American Idol winner’s fans live like they’re dying—or just drop dead in general. More »
You already know the end of the year/decade will bring no shortage of best-of lists from perfectly nice people who still think it’s all about the Strokes or Neko Case. But the most interesting decade-in-review feature we’ve seen yet isn’t a countdown—it’s just a smart look back at the biggest hits of the decade by the whiz kids over at NPR.
For the last two weeks, the music crew that puts together NPR’s Song of the Day segment, has taken a smart look back at the best and brightest in pop smashes from the aughts – one song and one year at a time. Check out their ten picks for the songs that summed up the 00’s, complete with a brief write-up (full song-by-song analysis can be seen at the source). Apologies to those with an aversion to Britney Spears and Idol alumni: this just wasn’t your time. More »
50 Cent showed up at the New Moon premiere on Monday for what seems like absolutely no reason, but after seeing his unusually chipper Tonight Show appearance we think we see where he’s going. More »
“Shorty, you ain’t gotta take your panties off… just move ’em to the side.” Never let it be said that Curtis Jackson isn’t a romantic! More »
From my direct-messages inbox this morning, a look at the hazards of following musicians who are willing to go to any lengths to sell their new projects. I guess I should be flattered that he thinks I have the juice to assist in his virality, but mostly I’m just irritated that he didn’t, you know, make the message personal. What happened to the love, Curtis? [@50cent / Twitter] More »
So apparently that cryptic message about Nov. 23 left on Rihanna’s Web site last night was not about anything egg-related, despite its use of “ova”; instead, it was meant to be a signal that the Barbadian singer’s still-untitled fourth studio album will come out on that day. That’s the Monday before Thanksgiving, and the Monday before the holiday-shopping season kicks in. And to celebrate, Universal Music Group is apparently readying six big-name releases for that day! The list of “Super Monday” albums, via Rap-Up: More »
Over the weekend, 50 Cent appeared on Vh1’s Top 20 countdown—yes, it is focused on music videos!—and while introducing the No. 6 video of the week, Green Day’s “21 Guns,” Curtis said to host Jim Shearer, “Man, I’d love to be able to have a song called ’21 Guns’ on VH1.” This isn’t the first time that 50 has (rightly) noted the odd discrepancies in MTV Networks’ lyric-bleeping thresholds, but it is a good moment to maybe do a rundown of what MTV and its matrix of sister networks have censored lately? (Hey, the lousy economy is resulting in all those channels playing more music videos!) A few noticeable omissions and non-omissions from recent tracks after the jump—feel free to add your own! More »
The Kanye West/Taylor Swift/Beyonce kerfuffle from Sunday night’s Video Music Awards is theratening to take over the entire work week, with the outspoken MC yesterday calling the blonde country singer to apologize after she appeared on the morning yakfest The View and people still looking for the damn thing on YouTube. (All this post-publicity, it should be said, isn’t really helping dampen my cynicism about the whole thing.) Who better to bring up the rear on a big old manufactured media event than 50 “Curtis Jackson” Cent, who in flusher times two years ago tried to hold his own against Kanye sales-wise and failed—and who yesterday appeared on Canadian music channel MuchMusic to defend Swift’s honor? More »
