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Andre 3000 is a bit aloof at the moment (other than showing up on a Gillette commercial, for some reason) but there’s good reason why…he’s in the studio working on a new solo. He resurfaces in an interview in the upcoming issue of GQ, where he discusses his future plans, being a spokesperson for Gillette, and his collaborations with Drake among others. Although he states that we won’t be getting anything from the full OutKast ensemble anytime soon, we might soon get a longplayer from the man who has been absolutely devouring his guest appearances on other people’s tracks.

Speaking of devouring entire tracks, on this track with the Gorillaz and James Murphy (of LCD Soundsystem), commissioned by Converse for their Three Artists series, 3 Stacks goes in several notices beyond HAM. He takes over around the 1:48 mark, shouts out the members of the Geto Boys, continues rhyming doubletime (158 bpm by my count), keeps excellent breath control, and makes a general mockery of everyone. Yes, everyone, even you, because you’ll dance real awkward from this. All jokes aside, and seriously, don’t listen to this track on a full stomach. Serious.

So if you weren’t hip to the story so far, Too $hort and XXL.com made and released an interview video of questionable taste (to say it mildly) that was supposed to be jokey advice for prepubescent boys on how to “turn little girls out” that advised them to “push her up against the wall or pull her up against you while you lean on the wall and…stick your finger in her underwear”. However, in light of statistics like that 44% of all American sexual assault victims were under the age of 18 at the time of the assault, it wasn’t so much funny than downright horrific. And horrific was the backlash for Too $hort that he received via Facebook and Twitter, among of which accused him of being a misogynist and a pedophile.

$hort’s original apology was a boilerplate that read like it was written by a PR crisis team, and caused another outburst. This is where writer and filmmaker dream hampton came in, and backed by We Are The 44%, an activist group dedicated to combat rape culture, and a portfolio of statistics, she sits with $hort and discusses he situation. The dialogue was posted on Ebony Online yesterday.

The dialogue itself is quite a read. hampton doesn’t diminish the gravity of the situation, she hammers him with facts: “The number one danger that women who are serving face in the Army, the United States Army, is rape by other soldiers… by their own soldiers.” Or, “they say 1 in 4 girls are assaulted by the time they are eighteen”. Yet she stays evenhanded, giving $hort just enough of an out to repent without having to shred his dignity: “We are going to do all that shit, we just want you to have our backs once in a while…We are creating these patterns and we can stop them. That’s the bottom line.” $hort himself admits to doing the stuff he describes in the video, and that he is still learning and is willing to change. It goes beyond the original apology and We Are The 44% seems to be happy with what they’re hearing.

Teachable moment, huh. It’ll be interesting to hear what the next album (presumably the one after No Trespassing) is going to sound like.

Read More: Ebony Online

George Clinton, as we all know, the man behind Parliament/Funkadelic and one of the most sampled artist of all time, is not getting royalty checks from his oft-sampled classics because, as a Florida judge ruled last month, he does not own any rights to his recordings from 1976 to 1983. As a result, he is now embarking on a campaign on Indiegogo to save his studios. To raise the $50,000 he needs, he is giving away signed photos and t-shirts for donations as low as $35, and doing private shows and answering machine message for more generous givers. He’s also working to regain the rights to his records, which include classics like “Flash Light”, “Atomic Dog”, and “Mothership Connection”, which if you’ve never heard the originals before, you probably heard the samples in the beats somewhere…like from Ice Cube, Dr. Dre, Daft Punk even.

If you want to check out the fundraiser, it’s on Indiegogo. Check out his fundraising appeal on YouTube after the jump.

Thanks to Prefix Mag

In the wake of Washington state legalizing gay marriage, Vlad TV did an interesting interview with Too $hort the other day about homosexuals, homophobia and his attitudes on gay people. While $hort admits to being homophobic in the 90′s, it looks like just having to interact with gays in every day life has mellowed him out and broadened his perspective a bit. And though he stays coy about the subject in general because “bad things will happen to you if you talk about it too much,” he voices his support for gay marriage and probably wouldn’t mind doing a song with an out in the open gay rapper, as long as it wasn’t a “gay song”. No word if Lil B had an influence or not.

See, this is why nobody bothers to check their calendars anymore…seriously, go check it now. You’ll see something useless like Groundhog Day on it and nothing about Dilla Day. Dilla Day? As you might already have heard or figured out, it is the birthday of J Dilla, aka Jay Dee, aka James Yancy, aka Your Favorite Producers’ Favorite Producer. And while he died remarkably a few days after his 32nd birthday, it is his birth and life that we want to remember.

There’s a few bloggers today what want to talk about how J Dilla today. Larry Mizell tells us about the moment Dilla changed his life. And Damon Joy also says that J Dilla changed his life. Ru Johnson takes a more neutral approach but gives his appreciation as well.

Several tribute shows are in the works, and there’s probably one in your town today. Dilla Day Detroit takes place February 10 in the Fillmore in downtown Detroit, featuring Busta Rhymes, Jay Electronica, Danny Brown, and Phife of A Tribe Called Quest. In New York, Donuts Are Forever 6 with Neil Armstrong and Prince Paul will be on February 19, at Brooklyn Bowl.

And if you like to celebrate in mixtape form, check out What if Jay Dee Produced PCP from Race Bannon. And here’s a tribute to Big Pun and Dilla, Cooking Soul’s Big Dilla, presented by 2dopeboyz.

The Sasquatch! Festival in the hinterlands of Washington state this year will have a heavy dose of hip-hop with The Roots, Childish Gambino, Shabazz Palaces, and araabmuzik in the lineup for the multiday music festival in George, Washington. The rest of the hip-hop offerings will have a heavy Seattle flavor, as Shabazz collaborators THEESatisfaction will perform, as well as Dyme Def, Fresh Espresso, The Physics, Sol, Grynch, Fatal Lucciauno, Metal Chocolates, Spac3man, and Scribes.

Also there will be Little Dragon, Girl Talk, Pretty Lights, SBTRKT, Charles Bradley, punk/rap fusion act Don’t Talk to the Cops, and soul R&B group Fly Moon Royalty, along with the headliners Jack White, Beck, and Bon Iver. The festival runs during Memorial Day weekend at The Gorge Ampitheater, tickets are available now.

Shabazz Palaces invites an interesting crowd. The duo, who performed last night at Yoshi’s in San Francisco before departing on an European tour in a few weeks, seems to straddle that line between indie rock and hip-hop only if you look at their audience, because their music is doesn’t sound like rock at the least bit. The avant-garde duo of Palaceer Lazaro (aka Ishmael “Ish” Butler) and percussionist Tendai Mariare has pieced together a theme of bluster, black power, african diaspora, jarring beats and psychedelia, and perhaps that last part is what brought together the two different scenes.

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Don Cornelius, creator, producer and host of Soul Train, the long-running black music showcase that ran from 1970 to 2006, has died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot. He was 75.

Cornelius, who was a radio DJ in Chicago when he created the television show, brought the show national in 1971 and was instrumental in exposing new black talent to the nation, most notably acts like the Jackson 5 and Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, and Barry White. He was also a special figure for hip-hop and even while having admitted not being a fan and didn’t understand the appeal of the emerging genre, acts like LL Cool J, A Tribe Called Quest, Kurtis Blow, and Run DMC were featured on Soul Train. Questlove pens an appreciation posted on okayplayer.com, and others, including those in hip-hop, share their thoughts on Twitter.