Mos Def x UNDRCRWN. Mos Def has partnered up with street wear label UNDRCRWN for the release of his new clothing line designed in conjunction with UNDRCRWN creative director Dustin Canalin. The collection is inspired by the Dead Prez album “Revolutionary But Gangsta” and drops on the UNDRCRWN site this Wednesday. There will be fourteen pieces total in the collection. Check out a preview of the rest of Mos Def’s collection after the jump. Continue Reading…

Tupac x Morgan Creek. Seems like this Tupac biopic is going to be locked in a legal battle for some time before this ever gets made, let alone make it to pre-production stages. Afeni Shakur, Pac’s mom, has countersued Morgan Creek Entertainment for damages in regards to a Tupac biopic. Billboard states:

In a $10 million cross-complaint set to be filed Monday morning, Afeni Shakur’s Amaru Entertainment claims that Morgan Creek, CEO James Robinson and others tried to strong-arm a deal for Tupac movie rights, then sabotaged the project when Amaru attempted to set it up elsewhere.

“Instead of negotiating in good faith with (Amaru), they sought to obtain the rights by concocting a nonexistent ‘agreement’ and engaging in heavy-handed threats, coercion and intimidation to interfere with and ultimately destroy the film project,” Amaru claims.

Morgan Creek first filed a lawsuit last month in Los Angeles Superior Court claiming that Amaru, which controls the Tupac estate, backed out of a completed deal to sell life rights for a biopic about the slain rapper-actor.

For Tupac fans maybe this is a blessing in disguise. I know many out here on the West Coast don’t want to ever see this movie happen. At least we will get our NWA movie though.

Cee-Lo x Coca-Cola. Go Cee-Lo! Get some of that Coke money! As part of Coke’s new ad campaign, Cee-Lo, Janelle Monae and Travis McCoy have recorded the song “Open Happiness” which will be used as the cornerstone of Coke’s new ad campaign. Here is the latest commercial using the song. Pics from the set of the video after the jump. Props to ProHipHop for the pics. Continue Reading…

Lil Kim x Dancing With the Stars. The judges continue to love her. Here is Kim doing her thing from tonight’s episode. Looks like she will be around for awhile on this show. All that bumpin and grindin is paying off.

Kanye West x Another clothing line. We should have seen it coming with the major jean jacket exposure lately (including his performance on American Idol), but it’s official…Kanye West is launching a denim line separate from Pastelle. The UK Mirror reports that Kanye is currently in England meeting with the head of Religion clothing line which has been a hit over in the U.K. Kanye hopes to get inspiration for the new jeans label he is launching.

A source close to both the Religion clothing line and Kanye states:

He really loves British style – it’s captured his imagination. And he wanted to tap into the source to give him some ideas. Religion has developed as a trendy label among celebs and Kate Moss and Sarah Harding are big fans of the line. Kanye wants his product to have the same level of prestige. He doesn’t want his clothes to just have his name on, he wants to develop them into a credible range.

Yeti says: That’s all well and good but between the Nike deal, the LV shoe line, the bald headed girl and now this…is there any time for Pastelle to actually launch?

Common x Softwear. We have been covering Common’s clothing line deal with Microsoft for some time now and here is the latest where he talks about the collab with Bill Gates and how “Software” all came to be. Via: Think Common

UPDATED: Rihanna’s publicist told MTV that there is no truth to the story that Rihanna was in talks for this movie. Of course it’s publicist rule #1 to deny everything until it is actually confirmed. They don’t like the bad press if she does get passed up for a movie role.

Rihanna x The Bodyguard. Rihanna is literally following in the footsteps of Whitney Houston. The NY Daily News is reporting that Rihanna is in New York taking meetings with agents to play the lead in an upcoming remake of the smash hit movie The Bodyguard. The 1993 original was a global hit grossing over $400MM around the world. Nothing is confirmed though with RiRiand my sources are telling me it’s actually just VERY preliminary talks. Let’s just hope they are not going to cast Chris Brown for the role of Kevin Costner.

We also reported way back in January that Rihanna was in talks to be a new Angel in the next installment of the Charlie’s Angels franchise. Considering the movie still is also in early stages of development, there won’t be official news for awhile.

If you know want to get a crash course in hip-hop history there are a couple of key films you need to watch…Style Wars is one of them. The documentary, which covered the four elements of hip-hop, was first aired way back in 1983 on PBS. According to the film producer’s there was more than 29 hours of additional footage that never made the cut. So for the upcoming Blu-ray release the filmmakers are going back to the vaults and cutting the additional never-before-seen footage. Check out some of it from this video. Via: HipHopDx