Usher — the chart-topping singer-songwriter — will be this year's halftime performer. With a catalog full of bangers, how will he squeeze 30 years of music into just 13 minutes?

NPR Music presents a sneak preview of some of the interesting albums coming our way in the new year.

The singer Cassie has accused the rap mogul of subjecting her to years of abuse, in a suit made possible by the Adult Survivors Act. Can the case spark a sexual assault reckoning within hip-hop?

Themes emerge quickly when you dig into the nominations for the 66th Grammy Awards. The major categories are dominated by women and seemingly up for grabs; elsewhere, progress is not always so clear.

As the ringleader of the CHIC experience, Rodgers crams a lifetime's worth of nightlife into every strum of his guitar.

There has been yet another delay in the murder case of rapper Tupac Shakur. Duane "Keffe D" Davis, the suspect charged with the murder, did not enter a plea in a Las Vegas court Thursday morning.

The arrest of Duane Davis in the 1996 shooting of the rapper in Las Vegas is a huge development in a case that has evaded closure, as competing narratives and mythologies have emerged in its place.

Rolling Stone co-founder Jann Wenner was removed from the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame's board after sexist and racist comments. But he is, and always has been, an avatar for an exclusionary framework.

Giving rap the future it deserves means smashing the infrastructure as it is. But with the battle lines drawn, we can still take heart in the artists teasing just how much further the culture can go.

The 305's hedonistic reputation is not unearned, but there is artistry in its debauchery, and a young generation reinvesting the rewards of their predecessors' battles against censorship.

Call the melodic, countrified swing that took over early 2000s radio an overnight sensation if you like, but it didn't come from nowhere — just a city many considered to be nowhere.

As it celebrates its 50th birthday, hip-hop is a global phenomenon. But to map the music's true impact, you have to look closer. Here's a guide to rap history, charted across more than a dozen cities.

From one little resort town came some of weirdest, boldest changes to hip-hop's sound. A few hours away, flowery backpack raps and a splash of mambo sauce helped the nation's capital break through.

Faith and religion have been career-long themes for the Run the Jewels rapper — if often in a wary, ambivalent light. But on Michael, his first solo LP in over a decade, something has changed.

The poet's first recording with a band, when the poems do what they do, lends an emphatic new authority to her words, which she delivers with a hypnotist's composure.

The singer and rapper displays the subtle breadth of his music in this Tiny Desk (home) concert.

A longtime hero of the underground rap scene for his worldly, wily lyrics that are erudite and streetwise, billy woods has made his clearest, most engaging album yet with Maps.

The rapper's third album is a string of prickly songs that spend more time exposing his neuroses than truly analyzing them.

The joyously chaotic rap team-up Scaring the Hoes is less Watch the Throne and more Wedding Crashers: a pair of motormouthed eccentrics running wild trick plays and daring you to stick around.

The first six albums from hip hop group De La Soul are finally out on streaming platforms after years being tied up in legal disputes.