Swizz Beatz's Son Helped Kendrick Lamar with Writer's Block

Jack Harlow announced a surprise album this week, Jackman, and unveiled the album cover which is just him shirtless. Obviously, Twitter did what Twitter does and replied with endless memes to try and humble the Jackman. In other news today:

• Song streams & revenue 📈 

• Metro Boomin teases album cover for Future collab 🔥 

• How Swizz Beatz’s son helped Kendrick w/ writer’s block ✍️ 

• Quavo’s GOAT rapper, actor, strip club & more 🐐 

• Twitter search history gems 👀 

• The Rap Madness champion is…

• Industry Insights

Song Streams & Revenue

It’s a new Thursday and a new song revenue chart with entries from Ice Spice and Nicki Minaj and Post Malone. Reported by Hits Double Daily, the numbers reflect the previous streaming week from March 31st to April 6th.

As mentioned on Tuesday, there were rumors that Ice Spice and Nicki Minaj's hit song “Princess Diana” had its Hot 100 chart position boosted by sales that producer, RiotUSA, paid fans for. HDD’s song revenue chart reports that “Princess Diana” had 84,800 sales in its first week amounting to $77,163 dollars in revenue. That’s more than the song made from streams and even Drake doesn’t make much from sales suggesting there’s some truth to the rumors.

Metro Boomin Teases Album Cover for Future Collab

Metro Boomin has hinted at many collab albums this year, J.I.D, A$AP Rocky, and Future to name a few, but the one he keeps coming back to is Future. Rumored to be titled Metro Pluto, he first mentioned the possibility on Apple Music’s The Ebro Show, by saying he didn’t appear on Future’s I Never Liked You album because he wanted to give fans a full project—rather than a few songs.

Then, in an interview with Flaunt magazine, he said he’s so sure the project will be arriving this year that “you can be on it.” This week, hidden in a series of Coachella IG stories, Metro posted a potential album cover for Metro Pluto.

This could be nothing more than repurposed Coachella footage to further feed the hype (Future was one of Metro’s special guests at the festival) but Future reposted it and the parental advisory label is giving “album otw”. I would hate for Metro to join Playboi Carti, Lil Uzi Vert, and the long list of rappers whose release dates are always cap.

How Swizz Beatz’s Son Helped Kendrick Lamar with Writer’s Block

What were you doing when you were 5 years old? Probably not getting production credits on Kendrick Lamar’s “untitled 07” song but we can’t all be Swizz Beatz’s son. The producer recently went on the Jennifer Hudson Show and recounted how his son Egypt, who is now 12, left an impression on K. Dot before he started kindergarten.

Swizz admits it’s an envy-worthy accomplishment, jokingly saying, “I’m jealous as hell of that one. I thought me and Kendrick was cool. They kicked it off at the Super Bowl game, and I looked and him and Kendrick was talking for like 40 mins.”

“I went over and said to Kendrick, is he bothering you? Should I move him? I know you enjoying yourself. [Kendrick] said No Swizz, I had writer’s block and what Egypt is telling me is helping me deal with something.”

Swizz says to this day he doesn’t know what his son and Kendrick were talking about but it proved to be fruitful because Egypt got the production credit and a cheque for his contribution.

Kung Fu Kenny has always been for the kids though, during his Big Steppers tour last summer he paused in the middle of the concert to share a heartfelt message about following your dreams to a 9-year-old boy named Kendrick in the front row.

In Other Kendrick News…

Kendrick just beat a record previously held by Drake for the highest-grossing headlining tour by a rapper in history. The Big Steppers tour earned $110.9 million from 929,000 tickets across 73 shows, according to Touring Data.

Quavo Reveals His GOAT Rapper, Actor, Strip Club & More

Quavo recently sat down with Complex and Chloe Bailey, for an episode of GOAT talk. The rapper and singer are co-starring in the movie Praise This, about an aspiring singer played by Bailey who joins an Atlanta gospel choir ahead of a national competition.

I’d watch the movie just to see how Quavo as a gospel singer compares to his regular rapper persona. Either way, he shared some interesting GOAT answers, recapped below.

1. GOAT Atlanta slang? Cap

2. GOAT Gentlemen’s Club? Magic City and Galore

3. GOAT Atlanta restaurant? Magic City, the strip club got goat Atlanta wings

4. GOAT rapper? Jay-Z

5. GOAT actor? Will Smith

6. GOAT ad-lib? Momma

7. GOAT gift received? 3-head Migos chain from Takeoff. Quavo says, “He gave the best gifts in the world every birthday.”

8. GOAT gift you’ve ever given? “Buying my momma a house, she still talking about it on Facebook ‘till this day”

9. GOAT Disney song? “Under the Sea”

10. GOAT Missy Elliot video? “The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)” 

Twitter Search History Gems

Thanks to ADHD and/or procrastination, Twitter has me in a chokehold. What started as a quick scroll to see why #TravisScott was trending (Jordan 1 Low drop) turned into an hour-long rabbit hole of tweets, weaving in and out of different threads and profiles, all filled with random rap-related information.

4 compelling finds later, including a 2012 interview with Travis Scott and an unreleased Kendrick Lamar snippet, I start thinking Twitter is a better search engine than Google. Until I inevitably find a tweet that makes me question everything about humanity and I’m reminded it’s time to touch grass. So, at the very least, enjoy my findings.

2012 La Flame

The 2 min watch time of the interview was validated as worthwhile towards the end when the interviewer asks, “What kind of person likes strippers for their personality?” and Travis Scott says, “Drake”. Also interesting to compare where Travis was a decade ago to now.

Meet Frank Ocean’s piano man: Dylan Wiggins

If you watched Frank Ocean’s Coachella set you may have noticed his piano man, who made a few cameos on the stage screen. Dylan Wiggins is a producer and songwriter whose Genius credits speak to his talent. You’ve more than likely heard music he’s worked on before by SZA, The Weeknd, Don Toliver, Logic, Daniel Caesar, and 6lack—to name a few.

He’s also part of an alt-rock group called “Hello Yello”.

Deante Hitchcock's freestyle over Kanye beat

Deante is an underrated rapper and if you’re gonna freestyle over a song as iconic as Kanye’s “All Falls Down”, you better come correct—which he did. Wordplay, bars, flow—everything 🔥 I watch out for LA Leakers freestyles but missed this, and glad I found it on Twitter.

Kendrick Lamar should’ve released this song

This is the prelude from the “Alright” music video that was never released on To Pimp A Butterfly. The video’s director, Colin Tilley, revealed in an interview with MTV that Kendrick wrote that segment specifically for the video. When they were discussing the image of Kendrick, Schoolboy, Ab-Soul, and Jay Rock sitting in the car before the cops arrive, inspiration hit and Kendrick was hearing a different sound. So he created the song snippet below.

There’s speculation the snippet was made with Thundercat, the jazzy bass instrumental definitely gives Thundercat vibes, but no confirmation.

21 Savage Becomes Champion

After taking out Drake, Kendrick Lamar, and J. Cole, 21 Savage is crowned Rap Madness champion 2023 👑 

Slaughter gang took the win by 66% gathering 187,182 votes in the final round. J. Cole got 34% of the votes ending his run with 96,011 votes in the final round. 21 arguably had a great 2022 and deserved this win against Cole but there are undoubtedly fans who think he robbed Kendrick or Drake of the crown.

• Kid Cudi to star in Sam Levinson-directed zombie movie Hell Naw. The zombie action horror-comedy takes place during Paris Fashion Week.

• Spotify plans to raise subscription prices in the U.S. The announcement comes after price increases in 46 different markets.

• Tyler, the Creator has a clause in his will prohibiting posthumous albums. Revealed at his intimate LA show where he played unreleased music.

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