Illa J and Ash Walker are Jaywalk and The Cadillacs.  “Dream,” featuring Belle Chen, is the latest single from their album, Whitewalls & Harmonies. The mostly instrumental single is an arrangement of a soft piano, a fading snare drum and a looming synthesizer. The music has the ethereal quality of an actual dream, with Illa J’s vocals coming in almost as an afterthought. The duo started releasing music earlier this year and have received warm responses to “In Love” and “Y.M.H.D.W.” Illa J’s most recent solo album was Traffic, which came out in 2023 and he also released Second Record that year, which was a collaboration project with UK singer Harleighblu. Ash Walker released his fourth solo album, Astronaut, in 2023. Whitewalls & Harmonies drops on September 26th. 

Is the Billboard list of the current 10 Hottest Female Rappers accurate? 

Grandmaster Flash and Tierra Whack will co-headline a Hip Hop 50 concert presented by The Broad this Saturday (Aug.26th). The concert is happening in conjunction with the exhibition Keith Haring: Art Is for Everybody and a tribute to J.Dilla by DJs Monalisa and Wyldeflower with an appearance by IIIa J.  The concert is the last event of the summer celebrating hip-hop at The Broad that featured monthly screenings of the PBS series “Fight The Power: How Hip hop Changed the World” and a conversation between Chuck D of Public Enemy, Lisane Basquiat, sister of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Gil Vazquez, Director of The Haring Foundation, and Lorrie Boule, writer and producer of Fight The Power: How Hip-Hop Changed the World about Hip-Hop and visual art.

The Keith Haring exhibit shows how hip-hop influenced the late artist with visuals of boomboxes, DJs and breakdancing figures. Grandmaster Flash’s foundational contribution to hip-hop on classics like “The Message” and “White Lines” changed the course of hip-hop. Tierra Whack, who can be currently seen in Netflix’s Ladies First, is a Grammy-nominated rapper known for her slick wordplay. She will perform music from her critically acclaimed Whack World, Whack History Month series and her Rap? EP as well as new material. 

DJs Monalisa and Wyldeflower will play a set dedicated to late hip-hop production genius J.Dilla with an appearance from his brother IIIa J. 

More Information about the event can be found at www.thebroad.org. 

Today would have been J. Dilla’s 47th birthday and it is also the 15th anniversary of Donuts, the album he was working on before he passed. It is well known that Dilla’s dedication to his craft had him working on Donuts from his sickbed. The instrumental album was named after his favorite dessert and was a bittersweet ending that elevated his legend. 

On Friday, the 20th-anniversary edition of his solo album Welcome 2 Detroit was released to the streaming platforms. There are instrumentals and never heard alternate versions of the songs. The producer’s short life is still being felt in his music that continues to astound and cause serious head-nodding 15 years later. Busta Rhymes who worked with Dilla, used one of his beats on his current Extinction Level Event 2: The Wrath Of God album. 

This year rapper Frank Nitti who also worked with Dilla hosted the first digital Dilla Fest to celebrate his life. Ma Dukes talks about her son’s childhood love of music and how they recognized his gifts early. There are appearances from Amp Fiddler, Robert Glasper, his brother Illa J, Pete Rock, Guilty Simpson, DJ Rhettmatic, Terrace Martin and T3 of Slum Village. DJ Spinna closes the event with a DJ set.