Timmhotep Aku

Never underestimate the power of social media. It can be used to inform, entertain, mobilize the masses and scandalize public figures. Yet it also potential to bring people from different walks of life together. Cool Uncle, the unlikely pairing of veteran smooth pop and soul singer-songwriter Bobby Caldwell and the ...

If hip-hop songs were movies, your typical banger would be a blockbuster action flick: hyperreal, hypermasculine, heavy on stunts and special effects, light on substance. Open Mike Eagle and Serengeti (a.k.a. David Cohn) don't make those kinds of songs. Their music is the heady, darkly humorous indie movie of the ...

"[We'll bring them here through either isotopic] teleportation, transmolecularization, or better still—teleport the whole planet here through music."

The first voice you hear on Kirk Knight's album, Late Knight Special, is that of the experimental jazz bandleader and Afrofuturist philosopher, Sun Ra. It's an audio clip from Ra's 1972 ...

One of the great things about Internet-era hip-hop is the plurality in abundance: there exist different types of hip-hop for every type of fan. And for those who love rap in all its flavors—from the club banger to the headphone masterpiece—it really is quite a time to be alive. Though ...

The Internet is both an anomaly and a sign of the times. No, not the actual Internet you're using to read this text, though that Internet is pretty special, too. In this case, The Internet is an L.A. band led by Syd The Kid (vocals/production) and Matt Martians ...

On paper, the musical Hamilton sounds like a joke. But as NPR Music's Timmhotep Aku tells us in this week's +1 podcast, "Maybe you shouldn't judge things on face value."

Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda takes a snooze-worthy subject — the history of America's financial system — ...

Rappers are blues people too. Watch Deniro Farrar's moving new video for "Nostalgia" and you'll be reminded of that fact. The clip, shot by Dorsey Wesley Jr. and edited by Rico James, was filmed at a family gathering in the rapper's native Charlotte, NC.

The video is a ...

Unless you're mogul-turned-yogi Russell Simmons, hip-hop and New Age spirituality may seem like an odd combination, but for The Underachievers, rap and the quest for Enlightenment go together like Yin and Yang.

The Flatbush, Brooklyn duo of 25-year-old Issa Gold and 24-year-old AK are part of the ...

It's a new day for Mac Miller. In just a few years the 23-year-old rapper from Pittsburgh has gone from teenage Internet sensation to top-selling—albeit critically-maligned—indie artist to accepted and respected oddity. In that time he's learned that the byproducts of fortune and fame at a ...

On his debut album, Rodeo, the young rapper appropriates the sounds of his forebears, like collaborator and mentor Kanye West, to create a musical collage of his own.

Rapper Curren$y may be a stoner but he's far from a slacker. Over the past decade, the New Orleans native has earned a reputation as one of hip-hop's most prolific potheads, releasing mixtape after mixtape, and EP after EP. The steady stream of music has kept his name ...

Anderson .Paak may not consider himself a player, but he sure is good at acting like one. Before guest starring on Dr. Dre's Compton, .Paak released one of our favorite songs of 2015, "Suede." The track featured the L.A.-based vocalist's signature rasp and slick talk over a chopped up ...

These days, the word "Detroit" brings to mind images of urban blight and an impending hipster invasion. But when it comes to its rich hip-hop scene, the city is associated with local heroes and breakout stars like J Dilla, Big Sean, and, of course, Eminem.

If ...

"Yaaaoow!" On a balmy August afternoon, Melo-X is pedaling around his East Flatbush, Brooklyn neighborhood on a black-and-white Schwinn Drifter, greeting every fourth person that his bicycle approaches, then passes. The son of Jamaican immigrants, he's well-known in this Caribbean-American community — so well-known that even a "What's up?" is ...

A good songwriter knows that you can say more with less, and rapper-turned-singer Phonte Coleman understands a thing or two about the economy of words. A top-notch MC, he shined in the now-disbanded hip-hop trio Little Brother, full of witty lyrics and in-pocket flows; while giving fans a taste ...

Mick Jenkins' 2014 release The Water[s] helped establish him as one of the stronger voices in Chicago's vibrant, diverse (and crowded) hip-hop scene. While the locally popular drill and bop music often associated with that city's rap are visceral expressions of youthful energy, Jenkins' music is the decidedly cerebral and ...

This week, the All Songs team picks songs that sound like revolutions. Bob Boilen is out, so co-host Robin Hilton is joined by Katie Presley in D.C. and Timmhotep Aku in New York. The trio shares big, smashy music that lets Robin engage in his once-yearly purge of emotion.

The ...

The producer behind the West Coast gangsta rap sound looks back over his career on a long-awaited album that sounds less like one man's vanity project than a grand group effort.

"They want to know if he's still got it..."

The question, posed in Dr. Dre's 1999 single "Still D.R.E." — whether the man born Andre Young was still able to deliver the caliber of music that made him a household name — has recurred often over the course of the ...

No one is exempt from heartbreak — not the even the person who initiates the break up — just ask Golden Rules, the duo comprised of U.K. producer Paul White (Danny Brown, Homeboy Sandman, Guilty Simpson) and Florida rapper and singer Eric Biddines.

The wistful yet up-tempo "It's Over" revolves ...