Music
Common and Pete Rock’s Collaboration Album ‘The Auditorium Vol. 1’ Is the Hip-Hop Album I Never Knew I Was Waiting For

There was a time when the pairing of rapper Common and producer Pete Rock would have easily been my most anticipated album of the 12 months. Common, a Chicago rapper turned multi-dimensional rapper, has long been one in all the most beloved MCs in hip-hop; he commands the respect of his hip-hop peers and has produced quite a few commercially successful albums and songs. “Light,” Common’s track, produced by the late GOAT producer J Dilla, is now hip-hop canon.
Likewise, Pete Rock is one in all the most praised and respected producers of ’90s boom-bap, hip-hop. He too has productions at the level of the hip-hop canon; “They Remember You (TROY)” Pete’s record along with his former bandmate CL Smooth might be the best beat in hip-hop history. It’s my favorite record of all time, no matter genre, and while “best” of anything often becomes a matter of taste, there’s no conversation about best production without this song.
When the news broke that two of the best artists from the golden era of hip-hop were collaborating on a project — the recently released “The Auditorium Vol 1” — my interest was piqued. As some extent of reference, Nas is currently working on a collaboration with DJ Premier — clearly, the GOAT level artists of the 90s have decided to collaborate. Now, I need to admit that while my interest has piqued, I do have some reservations. Listen, I’m incredibly comfortable that so a lot of my favorite artists are still capable of make work and make a living off of hip-hop. Hip-hop fans my age (mid-40s) often complain about the newer era of hip-hop and rap music, or whether hip-hop is what younger individuals are doing. As might be the case with any genre of music, as newer and younger artists enter the arena, the sound changes and evolves, and the music becomes less consistent with previous generations. This also often signifies that when older people proceed to create, their work seems outdated and less interesting, even to the core audience.
While each Common and Pete Rock are accountable for classic material, I think it’s fair to say that their best days have been behind them for many years. I’m sure neither of their egos would allow them to confess it, but I am a consumer, fan, and sometimes apologist who still listens to Common’s Like Water for Chocolate (1999) and each of Pete’s instrumental albums like they got here out yesterday. I love these artists and haven’t been as involved with any of their recent output beyond just a few listens. I will all the time pay them respect by paying for his or her projects and downloading them and listening to them because I appreciate what they’ve given to the culture and to me as a fan.
So I got excited when the first album I heard from the duo, Wise Up , had a vintage feel but sounded the better of each: Common spitting with the same drive that’s kept him in so many conversations as one in all the best rappers, and Pete with the form of groove that just… works. It’s an indicator of the entire album — vintage but on-point Pete Rock production with a ton of melodies and basslines that feel as impressive in 2024 as they did in 1992. Common sounds inspired, too. It’s almost like Common and Pete decided to be their best possible selves for a dream collaboration that each hip-hop fan still arguing about the top 5 didn’t even know we would have liked.
For example, Pete may need my 4 favorite lines on the album when he starts rapping on “All Kinds of Ideas” with the words, “I’m a soul brotha uno, Black from the future/make beats on my table if I spoil my computer/I still make hits like I used to/keep your top 5, I’m God’s favorite manufacturer.” I can’t let you know how excited I am about that; Pete has never been my favorite producer on the mic, but lines like that put a smile on my face. Not to say that the beat itself is the form of production that has made Pete Rock my favorite producer in the genre. The entire project is filled with beats which can be different enough to indicate Pete’s range while still staying true to his talents. “Fortunate,” “Now and Then,” “When the Sun Shines Again,” and “Dreamin’,” amongst others, are the explanation why anytime Pete Rock is a component of a project, whether solo or with others, I need to a minimum of take heed to it. Pete gon’ Pete and that is excellent news for each hip-hop fan.
And then there’s Common. I’ve criticized Common as a rapper for years. Mainly because I think Common was, for some time, one in all the best rappers to ever do it. He was a minimum of a part of the conversation about the top 10 rappers to do it. But I felt like Common’s growing success had polished him just a little bit. One of my favorite things about Common has all the time been his willingness to talk truth to power, regardless of whose feathers it would irritate. That led to his high-profile feud with Ice Cube and led him to repeatedly call out rap and hip-hop as an entire for being “shiny suits.” But all that modified sooner or later as his platform and profile grew. That’s not a foul thing, and even unusual — no pun intended. I just think it sometimes made Common the least compelling a part of his own albums. Still a superb rapper and songwriter, just different. It looks as if a silly thing to complain about or indicate — far be it from me to need to stifle anyone’s growth and evolution — but the conversation surrounding Common has modified from legendary rapper to rap megastar, if that is smart. Namely, Common is only a Tony Award away from a highly coveted EGOT, having won an Emmy, multiple Grammys and an Oscarfirst rapper to do it.
Music
Common on “The Auditorium Vol. 1” feels like the perfect mix of the old Common who wanted you to care about his verses and the present Common who knows he’s one in all the best to ever play and has nothing to prove to anyone, like the Common in the song “To be” from his 2005 album of the same name. I found myself reconnecting with Common’s verses in a way I haven’t been shortly. Which may say more about me than him as a rapper, but that’s just the way it is. All I know is that I enjoyed listening to Common over this Pete production.
Speaking of Pete producing (again), one in all his calling cards has all the time been using snippets of songs at the starting of records. The most famous example is The Beginning of The End “She promised me” which opens “They Reminisce Over You (TROY)”. On “The Auditorium Vol. 1”, Pete follows the same practice, but places snippets of songs at the end of the records, which either open the next song or end the previous one. I do not know, but I’m glad the snippets are there, adding to the vintage feel I have for the record.
The Auditorium Vol. 1 just isn’t an ideal record, but perfection is overrated and should never be the enemy of excellent. Two of the most respected talents in hip-hop history have created an album I didn’t know I’d be serious about in 2024. But not only am I interested, they’ve released a project that’s value listening to over and another time, not simply because it jogs my memory of 1997, but because, because it seems, 1997 still sounds amazing in 2024.
I hope Pete and Common still have loads of ideas, because if that’s the case, I’ll be waiting for the next installment in the middle of an auditorium.
Music
The prosecutor says that Sean “Diddy” Combs “lawyers are looking for reasons to delay his May trial

The Federal Prosecutor in New York said on Monday that lawyers with a mogel of Sean “Diddy” Combs are looking for reasons why he delays the sexual trade process, which is to start in three weeks.
This month, the most recent version of the accusation against Combs, 55, added two latest allegations this month, but he still didn’t request, said prosecutors. This, in addition to possible delays from the routine means of sharing evidence with each side, called Discovery, meant that prosecutors thought that he could get stuck in time, said the assistant of the American prosecutor Christa Christa Slavik.
Combs has been closed and not using a deposit since his September arrest. He again handled the guilty accusation at Monday’s hearing, but in addition remained dispassionate within the courtroom.
Judge Arun Subramanian told COMPS lawyers that they’d on Wednesdays to ask for a break within the trial to devote time to discovering.
“We are a freight train heading for the trial,” he said.
Marc Agnifilo, representing Combs, said that defense may ask for a “very short” two-week postponement over the problems of discovery, including the shortage of presidency of asking a key witness to transfer 200,000 its e-mails, and never only permission to emphasize those that they think were essential.
The latest version of the indictment, filed on April 4, added two latest allegations and accused the comb of using force, fraud or coercion to force a lady to engage in business sexual acts from no less than 2021 to 2024.
He also claims that Combs was involved within the transport of a lady who was only as “victim-2”-and other people, including business sex employees, in the identical period engaging in prostitution.
The latest allegations have strengthened the indictment, which has already charged him with a conspiracy of racketeers and sexual trade.
Federal prosecutors stated that the allegation of a crunch of racketeers covers the accusations that the Combs-SEX-Traffish three victims and compelled to the fourth, considered one of his employees, to sexual intercourse with him.
His lawyers responded to the most recent version of the indictment, saying that she didn’t add any latest allegations or prosecutors and anxious only former long -term girls involved in consensual relations.
Prosecutors say that Combs forced and used women for years because he used his “power and prestige” as a music star to draw a network of colleagues and employees to help him when he silenced the victims through blackmail and violence, including kidnapping, arson and physical bits.
They say that the founding father of Bad Boy Records prompted drug victims, intricately produced sexual performances with men’s sex employees in events called “waaks”.

(Tagstranslate) @Ap
Music
Sean’s lawyers “Diddy” Combs want sworn at the hearing questioned for sex, drugs and violence

Sean’s lawyers “Diddy” Combs call a judge to permit potential jurors in the upcoming hip-hop Mogul process about the sexual trade process about their views regarding sex, drugs and violence.
Lawyers approached that they submitted a proposed questionnaire, which was filled in by individuals called to the trial on May 5 at the Federal Court in Manhattan.
In a letter to the judge at the end of Friday, lawyers said that they want to know the readiness of the would -be sworn to look at movies which can be sexually clear or show a physical attack. They also say that they want to know their views on individuals with many sexual partners.
In their very own list, prosecutors criticized the proposed defense questionnaire for too long and touching entities that the judge would ask higher personally, if at all.
They said that a few of the proposed 72 defense questions, some containing subjects, were “completely irrelevant to the ability to perform the jury.”
Prosecutors also cited the Ghislaine Maxwell sexual trade process for instance of how long a questionnaire could be.
After Maxwell was convicted of sexual trade in December 2021, the jurorz admitted that he didn’t reveal that he was a victim of sexual abuse, blaming his supervision after “he” dispersed when he accomplished the questionnaire “and” too fast “, causing that she understood the questions badly.
Judge Arun Subramanian told lawyers that questionnaires could be separated to a whole bunch of potential jury at the end of April, in order that the interrogation of potential jury could start on May 5, and opening declarations probably on May 12.
The 55-year-old Combs didn’t plead guilty that he had subjected to sexual abuse inside 20 years. The founding father of Bad Boy Records remained trapped with no deposit since the September arrest.
The indictment accuses the comb of using “power and prestige”, which he ruled as a musical tycoon to intimidate, threaten and lure women in his orbit, often under the guise of a romantic relationship.
The indictment stated that he then used force, threats and coercion to cause victims, including three women laid out in court documents, to interact in industrial sexual acts.

He said that he gave his victims of violence, threats of violence, threats of monetary and reputational damage and verbal abuse.
Prosecutors said that a key element of evidence at the trial could be a movie showing Combs, which hit his former protagonal and girlfriend, the singer of R&B Cassie and throwing her to the floor in the hotel corridor.
Defense lawyers argued that prosecutors built their case on charges that attempt to demonize sexual acts between adults.
They told the judge that they were unable to realize consensus with prosecutors regarding what potential jury needs to be asked about questionnaires.
“Defense believes that it is important that we allow potential jurors to be honest about the unprecedented and negative attention of the media, which they could be exposed to, related to Mr. Combs,” lawyers wrote.
Defense lawyers also asked that the jury could be asked to say in the event that they were watching programs on television entitled: “The Fall of Diddy”, “Diddy is?” “Downfall of Diddy” and “Diddy: The Making of A Bad Boy”.

(Tagstotransate) Diddy
Music
Coachella continues the appearance of Weezer, T-Pain and Bernie Sanders

The second day of Coachelli took place, well -known guests from Hollywood and Washington, DC, the emotional performance of Weezer and calm power transfer between the stars of Elektropop. Then Flava Flav joined the character of Yo Gabba Gabba on the stage to rap “I love mistakes!”
The cultural width of the influential Coachella Valley music and art festival was fully presented on Saturday at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California.
Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont and Rep. Maxwell Frost from Florida went from the rally in Los Angeles to the desert to introduce Clairo, praising the political activism of a 26-year-old singer and writer.
Less than an hour earlier, Charli XCX ran a minimalist scene during which Troye Sivan and Billie Eilish joined her, with an audience, which included the Oscar nominee Timothée Chalamet nominated in the first row in a giant smile and backpack.
As for this power transfer: after last 12 months’s “brother Summer” the English pop star ended her “girl, so misleading” performance with the New Zealand Elektropop Star Lorde, declaring “Lorde Summer 2025”.
Sanders’ appearance was not the only dose of the policy of the day. Billie Joe Armstrong adapted the lyrics opening Green Day “American Idiot” to declare that “is not part of the magician program” and modified the lyrics into “Jesus of Suburbia” to “escape from pain like children from Palestine.”
T-Pain brought mash-ups and covers to the most important stage, singing “Don’t Stop Be Believin” by Journey and “Tennesee whiskey” by Chris Stapleton.

Earlier, Weezer provided a dozen songs in a well -adopted performance with the participation of “Undone (Sweater Song)”, “Buddy Holly” and the cover of “Enter Sandman” Metallica.
The band played 4 days after Bassist’s wife Scott Shriner, Jillian Lauren, was shot and wounded by the police in Los Angeles. Lauren, the writer of two memories, was arrested and later sent a deposit after the police said that she aimed a weapon at them.
The team members didn’t turn a special incident to this incident, but the frontman Rivers Cuomo told the crowd: “It’s good to get here and spend these emotions.”
Coachella began on Friday, and Lady Gaga began to perform the crowd, extravagant theatrical, five times. The star of K-Pop Lisa attracted an enormous crowd to the Sahara tent, and Benson Boone announced his second album and sang “Bohemian Rhapsody” with Queen Brian May on the guitar.
The festival will last until Sunday, and the next round of performances on April 18-20. Travis Scott entitled Saturday evening on the most important stage of Post Malone appeared in the final machine on Sunday evening.

(Tagstranslate) @AP
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