Monica & Shannon Brown Secretly Wed

Monica & L.A. Lakers NBA-Star, Shannon Brown, had a secret wedding on November 22nd.  The couple won't have an official wedding and reception until June. 

"It's true," Brown, 25, confirmed to http://www.hiphopnonstop.tv/ Wednesday. "That's my wife, I'm her husband, you know. We're going to continue to make positive things happen."

There's been a few secret weddings going on lately; there's definitely nothing wrong with this!!  Congrats to Monica & Shannon!  Wishing you many years of happiness!

Jennifer Hudson Looks Amazing!

Jennifer Hudson has been the new spokesperson for Weight Watchers for months now.  She looks absolutely amazing (she looked amazing before)!  J. Hud is currently promoting the new Weight Watchers "Points Plus" program.  Check out the video:



Here are some pics of J. Hud "Feeling Good" after her weight loss:

Keep it up, Jennifer!!!  Very inspiring.  Looking forward to what's next!!  Can't wait for your next album.

Photos from Jenniferhudson.com

Monica is Engaged!

Monica recently got engaged to her boyfriend, L.A. Lakers basketball player, Shannon Brown.  Monica posted the following on Twitter:

"Material things have never mattered to me. I prayed for inner peace that would attract a man who would love me mind body and soul. And see."  She also stated, "We realize people will have their opinions. That's the way of the world. But we know who we are&who's we are.We pray 2 an awesome God 2gether."

Congrats to the couple!

Photo from Twitter

J. Hud and Leona Lewis Have Upcoming Duet

According to the British newspaper, The Sun, Jennifer Hudson and Leona Lewis have recorded a song that may be considered the theme song to the new "Sex and the City 2" movie.  The movie is due in theaters May 28th.

Eurweb.com reports, “The pair has recorded the song and it’s being discussed as either the main theme or to feature on the soundtrack,” the paper quoted a source as saying.

Both singers are veterans of Simon Cowell-judged singing competitions – Lewis a winner of Britain’s “The X Factor,” Hudson a finalist on “American Idol.”

“They each have incredible voices and will appeal to both the UK and the US. It’s perfect for the next ‘SATC’ film,” the source added.

This is definitely a powerful combination!!  Looking forward to hearing the song.

Image from: Jackson, Walker/Getty

Mario featuring Brandy: "Boom In It"

Here's Mario's song, "Boom In It", featuring Brandy. Nice Sound!!!!

Whitney Houston's: "I Didn't Know My Own Strength"

Here's Whitney's lastest, "I Didn't Know My Own Strength". Guess the comeback is on the horizon!!!

Click here to listen.

Ruben Studdard's "Together"

Ruben's back! Heard his latest song on the radio the other day. Here's the video for his song, "Together".




Nice song!!!! Good to see him doing his thang!!!!

Black Celebrity News: Usher to miss the Grammies

Seems like there are going to be a few big time artist missing from this years Grammys. Chris Brown won't be in attendance because of his investigation, Rihanna won't be either, and now it looks like Usher won't be. Usher canceled his performance at Clive Davis's Annual Pre-Grammy party due to a "family emergency", which involved his wife Tameka. It has been reported that Tameka is experiencing complication from her recent plastic surgery, but these reports haven't been confirmed. Now I usually don't have anything nice to say about her but I hope she has a safe and speedy recovery.

Technorati Tags: usher,black news,african american news,black celebrities,african american celebrities,black celebrity gossip

Heather Headley's Album Tops Charts

Songstress Heather Headley's latest album, "Audience of One", is topping the charts. The album holds the number one slot on Billboard's Top Christian and Gospel Charts and number six on the R&B chart.

Headley has had a number of appearances lately: the "We Are One" concert & is a featured performer on BET's "Celebration of Gospel" show.

Here's "Jesus is Love" with Smokie Norful from her album:



Congrats Heather!!!

Dr. Boyce Watkins Views on Lil Wayne and Hip Hop Music

Dr. Boyce Watkins
http://www.boycewatkins.com/

Brought to you by GreatBlackSpeakers.com, the #1 African American Speakers Bureau in America.

Those who know me also know that I love hip hop. Yes, there are some negative elements in hip hop, but many people forget that it's ultimately the corporate monster that makes it difficult for positive hip hop music to reach the light of day. I think that healthy debates on the nature of hip hop are relevant, and I am not referring to Oprah's town hall meeting on the topic last year, which really wasn't fair to the genre. I told her so in a CNN appearance with Roland Martin and Wendy Williams.

To join our Black Money advice list, please click here. My thoughts on the Lil Wayne and hip hop issue are below. I don't hate Lil Wayne, I actually feel sorry for him. He reminds me of Tupac, with the same energy, creativity, brilliance, productivity and incredibly self-destructive behavior that led to his legendary status. The difference, however, is that there was an element of social conscience Tupac could bring to his music that Lil Wayne does not. I am not interested in bashing the brother, but I must call it for what it is. Hip hop does not have to be an empty genre, with every song about sex in the club, smoking weed or blinging out of control. There's more to life than that. We should be teaching our kids to pursue "intellectual bling", so that we can search for true meaning in our lives and to be intelligent enough to stop being pimped. Hip hop can be (and has been) a part of that journey. Again, I love hip hop, and I even love Lil Wayne.....sometimes.

Respect peeps, see you next time.

Dr. Boyce Watkins
===================================================================

Hip Hop Commercialized? Buffoonery or something more complicated?
By Dr. Boyce Watkins

I am not a huge fan of Lil Wayne. I don’t hate him, I just don’t love him. His music doesn’t make me move, but it doesn’t make me sick. The thing that challenges my ability to love Lil Wayne is the environment within which he is operating.

Lil Wayne can be considered, by some, to be a modern day minstrel show: gold chains, diamond grills, 10,000 tattoos on parts of his body that have no business being tattooed, you name it. He engages in the stereotypical rock’n roll/hip hop lifestyle: guns, drugs, alcohol and random women. I fear for Lil Wayne, because at this pace, he might be dead before he turns 35. Lil Wayne makes Tupac Shakur and Eazy E look like conservative school kids.

Lil Wayne impacts the world in which he lives, sells records by the boat load and impacts far more young men than he probably should. It’s not that he chooses to be a role model, he just is one. But when we see Lil Wayne and express justifiable disdain for his behavior and persona, there is certainly more to be said.

You see, Lil Wayne is a product. The corporate executives pulling the strings and making the decision to sign deals with Lil Wayne also see him as a product. A product has to sell to its target audience, or it will not reach the sole objective of any capitalist venture: to make a profit. Not just any profit, but the highest possible profit within legal constraints. The corporate model doesn’t care about the community; it doesn’t care about health, workers, the environment or anything else. Like the financial machine that led to the breakdown of our global economic system, cogs in the wheel that pursue any objective other than pure profit maximization are quickly punished and replaced.

The target audience of hip hop is not black teenagers in the hood…..they don’t have any money, relatively speaking. The target audience for hip hop consists of middle and upper class kids in the suburbs, and those on college campuses. Those are the kids who line up at the record store and cause server outages at I-tunes when new albums are released. That is who the executives are trying to impress, and that is who Lil Wayne must impress in order to get a record deal.

The problem with Lil Wayne is that the transfer of commodities taking place between the recording industry and white America is one that lies over the economic heads of many African Americans. It doesn’t mean that those in the hood play no role in public consumption, but we are certainly not the biggest players in this game. Like a big bridge in the sky, we don’t impact the transactions, but we closely observe them. We don’t always buy the albums, but we watch the videos, read the articles, and hear the news stories about whose album sold the most copies during its first week. Due to the fact that there is a lack of diversity of images of black men in media, we have children who see the image of Lil Wayne and transform him into an involuntary role model. White kids don’t have to use Lil Wayne as a role model, since they see 50 new white men on TV every single day. Black youth don’t see doctors, lawyers and professors on TV: they see criminals, thugs, athletes and entertainers.

Lil Wayne’s environmental impact on the black community is what we in economics would call “a negative externality”. The fact that he makes it cool to use drugs, carry guns and engage in anti-social behavior does, in my opinion, cause irreparable harm to the black community. The problem is that the black community has little leverage to control these externalities, since we are neither the dominant consumers of hip hop, the controllers of media or the owners of record labels. Like the bridge in the sky I mentioned above. The presence of networks like BET or magazines like Essence and Ebony is relatively minor when compared to the dominance of CNN, Universal Records or Time Magazine. It’s like bringing a knife to a fight between nuclear superpowers.

Those of us upset about negative images in hip hop can protest all night at the next Lil Wayne concert and perhaps even have an intervention with Wayne to get him to see the err of his ways. The problem with this logic is that even if Lil Wayne does change his behavior, there is a long list of starving kids in the projects that the record label executives can find to replace Lil Wayne after he has been dropped from the brand. Also, getting Lil Wayne to invoke a more positive image will not change the fact that the consumers and producers of his product (gangster rap) are more willing to purchase albums made by black men when they feel that the performer has indulged their need to enjoy a stereotypical "thug-nificent" fantasy. Wayne may have some degree of industry power, but it is not as much as we might think. The in-studio recording of Lil Wayne’s product is not what creates the magic. The magic of a product is created through the marketing, distribution, financing and purchase of that product. That is done by the labels, and none of the large label owners are African American.

So, does Lil Wayne represent a modern day minstrel show? My answer is yes. He and others like him are told to behave more “thug like” and in more ridiculous and extravagant ways in order to get the attention necessary to sell records. It is, unfortunately, not smart business for a rapper to brag about being intelligent. Also, it is a lack of diversity of black male images in media that give black youth few alternatives for self-perception that go beyond that of Lil Wayne, 50 Cent, Flavor Flav and Juan Williams (the Fox News analyst who, along with Jessie Lee Peterson, enjoys bashing the black community). If any of these men chose to be forthright, insightful and firm in their support of the African American community, they would be fired immediately. But when we protest and challenge the system that is negatively impacting our communities, my argument is that we should look past the puppets and deal with the puppet masters.

Some would argue that by attacking rappers for the negative impacts of their lyrics, we are simply killing the messengers and going after the weaker scapegoat. While I am not one to judge whether the messenger should be killed, I am also an advocate for finding a way to get to the root of the message. Someone is controlling the messages of hip hop, and it’s not that poor kid from the projects who finally made it big.

Dr. Boyce Watkins is a Finance Professor at Syracuse University and author of “What if George Bush were a Black Man?” He makes regular appearances in national media, including CNN, ESPN, BET and CBS. For more information, please visit BoyceWatkins.com

Mary, Mary's New CD: "The Sound"

For the Gospel fans out there, Mary, Mary has released their latest CD, "The Sound". According to music reviews:


The duo sticks to the same formula on the CD "The Sound." Mary Mary churns out solid songs praising Jesus Christ alongside signature uptempo hooks on songs such as "Get Up" and "Boom." Mary Mary uses trendy vocoder vocals on "God In Me," featuring Kierra Sheard. The group also teams up with rapper David Banner on the anthem-like "Superfriend."

But the CD isn't filled with just vibrant, danceable grooves. On the guitar-driven ballad "Dirt," the sisters deliver a message that could rejuvenate anyone as they both bellow in harmony, "Champions never accept defeat/You fall and get back on your feet." And on ballad "Forgive Me," the singers talk about past failings and how tribulations helped their maturation as women.







Check out their song, "Get Up":

Get Up

Obama Introducing Kanye On Stage?

(From NME.com)

Barack Obama will introduce Kanye West onstage at Lollapalooza Festival(August 1-3) in an attempt to appeal to hip-hop fans, according to reports in the US media.

The Democratic Presidential Candidate, who has talked openly about aiming to use hip-hop to connect with his electorate, is expected to make a brief stage appearance at the festival in his home town of Chicago alongside the rapper-producer.

Speaking on US TV show 'What's In It For Us', Obama explained: "I've met with [b]Kanye [West]. And I've talked to other artists about how potentially to bridge that gap. I think the potential for them to deliver a message of extraordinary power that gets people thinking (is massive)."

The move comes after an announcement that Kanye West is going to perform at an event at the Democratic Conventionin Denver (August 25-28), alongsideWyclef Jean and N.E.R.D.

Sources close to the candidate have told reporters, that Obama has left a slot open in his schedule for the appearance at the festival in Grant Park, less than a mile from the national campaign headquarters.

Miss Jones Gets Fired from Hot 97: Big Boy is In

From Autumn Jones at yourblackhiphop.blogspot.com

Miss Jones along with her staff DJ Envy and Michael Shawn are getting the boot! (i wonder if it has anything to do with the Wendy Williams hitman controversy). But Apparently starting July 21st, nationally syndicated show Big Boy In The Morning will replace the current show.

Aretha Franklin Gets Angry with Beyonce

Beyonce and Aretha Franklin apparently don't see eye-to-eye over the use of the word "queen". During the Grammys, Aretha got a little unnerved over the fact that Beyonce introduced Tina Turner as "the queen".

Aretha, known as the Queen of Soul, apparently felt that the use of the word to describe Tina Turner was a slap in her face.

"I am not sure of whose toes I may have stepped on or whose ego I may have bruised between the Grammy writers and Beyonce," Franklin said in a statement issued by her publicist. "However, I dismissed it as a cheap shot for controversy."

Beyonce's father, Matthew Knowles, told CelebTV that the whole situation was ridiculous. "I am not taking something this ridiculous to Beyonce. Beyonce referred to Tina Turner as a 'queen.' Not queen of gospel, queen of soul, queen of blues, Queen of England. I consider my wife a queen and sometimes call her that. Does Aretha have a problem with that?"

Neither side is responding to media requests for comment.

Wyclef Jean Says Lauryn Hill Should be Locked Up

Damn Wyclef, how you gonna diss Lauryn like that?

Wyclef Jean, who has no shortage of issues of his own, had this to say about Lauryn Hill:

“Half of your face has red make-up, the other half green, and your hair is barely combed. How you gonna let people see you like that? Someone is pimping Lauryn right now. A true friend would say, ‘You have to check yourself into a psychiatrist."


Wyclef had some other interesting things to say about Lauryn, even claiming that she is being pimped.

"Someone is pimping Lauryn right now. A true friend would say, 'You have to check yourself into a psychiatrist,'" Wyclef told Giant magazine.

In November, Wyclef Jean also said that Lauryn Hill is bipolar and that he had reached out to her mother for help.

While all this is happening, Lauryn Hill is on her way to having her fifth child with the son of Bob Marley, Rohan. There are rumors that the singer has had financial troubles as well. Lauryn Hill's return tour led to her being booed by crowds and speculation that she is troubled in a multitude of ways.

The harsh words by Wyclef Jean aren't likely to help. "I am not sure how productive it is for him to diss her in public," Dr. Boyce Watkins said on CBS. "It would seem to me that Wyclef Jean would handle this behind closed doors."

Watch the Lauryn Hill video below: