in the cut

We can’t believe it’s already March. Last month was pretty busy. We saw the end of 50 Cent’s run with Interscope, as he is now signed to Caroline Records through an indie deal. Other big moments included an unexpected album release from Kid Cudi, a long-awaited major label debut from ScHoolboy Q, and the Air Yeezy II Red Octobers surprisingly dropped and sold out in mere minutes. Besides that, th

As the world recovers from Kendrick-mania, nearly ten full days after the verse that stopped the world dropped, we're still catching up on new music. This week, Drake—as he likely will for the weeks to come before the release of his upcoming album Nothing Was The Same—made major headlines after he pushed the release date of his LP back a week and revealed the album's cover art, which is as upbeat

What is there to say that hasn't already been said about Kendrick Lamar and his epic, industry-inspiring and headline-terrorizing verse on Big Sean's "Control"? For five days, Kendrick—who has no project or tour to promote—has singlehandedly inspired just about all of the stories posted on hip-hop websites, including XXL's. It'd be ea...

There's no sense in fighting it any longer—Drake has, is and will continue to dominate rap, and we're going to have to openly accept it. And as he showed us earlier this week with his 2 Chainz- and Big Sean-assisted new single, his peers have accepted it too, as their verses on Drake's single got them more attention than anything they've put out as of late (no shots at "Feds Watching").

As we put the finishing touches on our upcoming issue, the XXL staff is desperately trying to pick its collective head up and again immerse itself in whatever's happening in the outside world. Needless to say, we've got some catching up to do...

Yes, we know. Jay-Z over everything and J. Cole is the new God. We know, we know. What we also know is that you've most likely been listening to a very limited number of songs in these past few weeks, so we've taken it upon ourselves as curators of this hip-hop culture to make sure you're not missing out on the new tunes you might've overlooked in your hunt for the Yeezy Red Octobers MCHG... Read

Now that the dust has settled on the frenzy of the June 18th face-off, and as we look ahead to the July 4th release of the God MC Jay-Z's new album Magna Carta Holy Grail, we're trying to stay focused on celebrating the music that's going to be soundtracking our summer...

This week was an important one for hip-hop. On Tuesday, four mainstream albums (and a litany of mixtapes, singles and album announcements) dropped, marking June 18 as 2013's first major release date. So, whether you spent the last five days arguing about J...

As the hip-hop world continues its slow creep toward June 18th—a.k.a. Judgment Day a.k.a. the day Mac Miller, J. Cole and Kanye West drop new albums—we've been staying busily distracted by new music from emerging stars as well as teasers from recent XXL favorites. In the ...

It's been a busy week at the XXL offices. As we close out our upcoming issue and continue to gear up for more dates of the XXL Freshmen Live Tour—which recently stopped in New York City and saw performances from the entire Freshmen class alongside special guests like Fat Trel, Troy Ave and Riff Raff—we've also been working hard to stay up on all the new music and news that dropped this week. On t

We're not sure why, but it feels like this next week is going to be a really important one for new music. It could be Kanye's upcoming appearance on SNL, where he's rumored to be premiering a brand-new single ("I Am God"?), or maybe it's the release of Daft Punk's anxiously awaited Random Access Memories (we've heard it on the low, and it's awesome), but something's definitely in the ai

This Sunday, the staffers at XXL will be celebrating Mother's Day and honoring the beautiful women who brought us into this world, and we suggest you do the same. To commemorate the day, we compiled a list of gifts our favorite rappers are getting for their moms, in case you last-minute shoppers need some ideas...