What We're Reading

The Guardian was none too easy on Cee-Lo earlier this week. Perhaps he's becoming the 21st century bluesman we imagine him becoming; perhaps not. When we saw Lightnin' Hopkins in the 70s, the miracle of his set was diminished neither by its shortness, nor how limited his singling and playing range had become after a life of being a 20th century bluesman. The miracle was that he was there at all.

We can say, though, that we love the picture, in part because it recaptures the Moment of Rick Ross live pleasure we posted about two weeks ago from they NYT, so we offer it for what it is: pleasing visual.

Worth Recording

Listen up, y'all. To the beat, y'all.

We got the Rick Ross bug a few months ago, late as usual (and as we think it should be most of the time, 'cause we are not in any part of the unnaground, or even a place where cool is the ruler). So we follow the Don's 140 character bursts, and try to follow the growth of his his crew as he grows his business, man.

We try to keep up on the unfolding story of the blues, and look to people luckier than ourselves who get to show up and write about what they see. And in this pursuit we find Jon Carmanica we worth keeping in our line of sight. His work on RickRozay is especially good. It looks long and deep without much space to do so.

We want to follow up on the last few ¶s:

As out-of-town rappers often do in New York, Mr. Ross turned his concert into a reunion, welcoming numerous guests. There was a brief, charged opening set by Pusha T of Clipse, now a solo artist on Mr. West’s G.O.O.D. Music imprint. During Mr. Ross’s set he was joined by a winning John Legend on “Magnificent,” and later, by Busta Rhymes and Akon, who made quick appearances. A fellow Miami rapper, Ace Hood, emerged for his new hit, “Hustle Hard,” the remix of which features Mr. Ross.

There was one song each from Wale (“No Hands”) and a fiery Meek Mill (“I’m a Boss”), new members of Mr. Ross’s Maybach Music Group imprint, which just signed with Warner Brothers. (No appearance by Pill, though, the best of the new affiliates.) Later came an appearance by Torch, from Mr. Ross’s group Triple C’s, on “Reala-State,” but sadly, no Gunplay, who has released a pair of impressive solo mixtapes in recent months, “Don Logan” and “Inglorious Bastard.”