With his usual ambition to stay on the cutting edge of global dance sounds, Diplo dips his toes in the latest much-buzzed movement with his official Moombahton 2k11 mixtape, utilizing many of the Moombahtonized tracks he’s been spinning out lately. The summertime jammy mix features the likes of DJ Shadow, Missy Elliot, MIA, Beastie Boys […]

Blaqstarr drops his Blaqstarr The Mixtape today, featuring the talents of Lil Wayne, M.I.A., Rye Rye, Diplo, Talib Kweli, Switch, Mos Def and more. The Baltimore singer/rapper/DJ/producer displays the Renaissance man talent that makes him one of M.I.A.’s top producers — download  here from blaqstarrmusic, all you gotta do is give him your email. Fair […]

As a new year’s present to the world, on January 1st M.I.A. released a free Wikileaks-inspired mixtape titled the Vicki Leekx Mixtape. Featuring new productions from her trusty stable of producers (Diplo, Switch, Rusko, Blaqstarr et al), the 19-track 36-minute mix is a call of support of Mr. Julian Assange. This is the just-released video […]

Baltimore producer/rapper/singer Blaqstarr drops a new video today, “Rider Girl”, to celebrate his latest EP, The Divine, which also drops today on N.E.E.T./Interscope. The B-more pioneer — who penned such dancefloor classics as “Hands Up Thumbs Down” and “Shake It to The Ground” (with Rye Rye) — has never feared spreading his musical wings, and […]

Marc Jacobs expands their limited skateboard library with a set of decks featuring the photography of fashion lensmen Juergen Teller. Utilizing imagery from past Marc Jacobs advertising campaigns, the collection of limited edition skatedecks includes M.I.A. from Spring of 2009’s campaign, plus dig into the crates for Kate Moss (Fall 2000), Lisa Maria (Spring 2000) […]

Today M.I.A. dropped the latest video off her MAYA album for the Rusko-produced track “Story To Be Told”, and while I like the song the video leaves a lot to be desired. It looks like something my old college room mate would come up with after a night of Ritalin-induced “inspiration” working on his “visual […]

We’ve covered N.A.S.A. (North America South America) here many times in the past, partly because they’ve managed to corral an almost unholy stable of collaborators to work with (“People Tree” featuring David Byrne, Chali 2Na, Z-Trip and Gift of Gab, “Whachadoin?” with M.I.A., Santogold and Spank Rock, “Spacious Thoughts” with Tom Waits and Kool Keith, […]

UPDATE: Diplo’s Favela on Blast documentary on sale now for only $5, or pick up the tshirt combo pack for $25. Back in 2005 I was sent down to the favelas of Rio de Janeiro to cover what was then the burgeoning scene of baile funk for the late BPM magazine, and I could not […]