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Tag: The Notorious B.I.G.

  • The Notorious B.I.G.

    Earlier this week (March 9 to be exact), hip hop fans around the world remembered one of the greatest rappers of all-time, The Notorious B.I.G. aka Biggie Smalls.

    All over Twitter, people used the hashtag #RIPBIG to show their love for the deceased rap superstar, who passed away on March 9, 1997. I can’t believe it’s been 13 years already.

    His two albums, Ready To Die and Life After Death are as timeless as ever. Not too many other modern artists were able to leave as big an imprint on pop culture with such little material. I think that, more than anything else, shows how talented the big man was.

    Check out B.I.G. dominate Bad Boy’s set at the 1995 Source Awards.

    SonicClash’s Senior Editor Money Mike put up a great post on his blog about Biggie as well, titled B.I.G. Forever.

  • The New Music Files 1/13/09: No-No-Notorious!!

    notoriousHey, we took a break for a coupla weeks and now we’re back. The music industry is slowly shaking out of it’s slumber, and while there aren’t any superstar releases for a couple weeks still, there is some interesting niche-y kinda stuff getting released. We’re gonna roll with a new format this year and see if it sticks.

    The big deal this week is the release of the Notorious B.I.G. biopic Notorious on Friday, and a few days in advance of the movie’s release, we have the soundtrack. This will be the 4th compilation of B.I.G.’s material released since his death. There’s fairly significant overlap between this CD and the Greatest Hits album Bad Boy put out two years ago,with the exception of a couple of demos, and one song featuring B.I.G.’s 12 year old son. Let’s hear it for exploitation!!

    Not much else going on. Jam band lovers can rejoice because the Derek Trucks Band is releasing their new album, Already Free today. On the R&B side, we have new releases from the bluesy Syleena Johnson and former Broadway star Heather Headley, whose first gospel album comes out today. All you jazziacs can take a listen to the new Ravi Coltrane and Joshua Redman releases, and late 90s fetishists can pick up the new (hed) p.e. album.

    A few interesting things going on as far as reissues. The Now That’s What I Call Music series turns its’ attention to Motown just in time for the pioneering label’s 50th anniversary with a track listing remarkably similar to the Motown #1s CD that came out about half a decade ago. Odessa, one of the Bee Gees‘ earlier efforts, gets the 2-disc deluxe treatment today, and Sony’s environmentally friendly Playlist series has a ton of new entries, ranging from Run-DMC and The Jacksons to Van Morrison and Dan Fogelberg.

    You can get the full list of new releases here.

  • Friday Throwback – Juicy

    I’m going to piggyback on Money Mike’s post about the trailer to Notorious, the movie about Biggie Smalls. I’m not convinced that it’s going to be good, but thankfully, good actors like Angela Bassett and Derek Luke are involved. I’m also quite worried about how the movie will handle the situation with Tupac.

    My introduction to The Notorious B.I.G. was through his song Juicy. I don’t remember hearing him on the remix to Mary J. Blige’s Real Love out here on the West Coast. There was a certain familiarity to the song because of the Juicy Fruit sample, as if the song had been on the radio forever when I had only heard it for the first time. And everyone loves a rags to riches story, and Biggie told that story so well with witty, yet very real lines. I also loved how he littered his rhymes in this song with pop culture references (Robin Leach?) without sounding corny.

    – It was all a dream …

    – Big’s look worked for him. Had he been this good lookin’ dude with all the floss, you wouldn’t have had to listen to him.

    – I love the back and forth between showing him at the pool living the life, and then flashing to the jails.

    – Please dismiss the text in the right corner that says, “Sisqo Unleashes Hip Hop’s Sexiest Videos”. It was a long time ago y’all.

    – “Super Nintendo/Sega Genesis, when I was dead broke, man I couldn’t picture this.” I wonder what Big would have to say about PS3s, Wiis, and XBox 360s.

    – That is really Biggie’s mom in the video too.

    – And if you don’t know, now you know.