VH1 Hip-Hop Honors Live Recap
Cue your monitors, people. The 2006 VH1 Hip-Hop Honors airs tonight at 9:00 p.m. CT. We'll be here to provide a play by play recap of the event. Stay tuned, it's going to be sweet.
-8:00: The show kicks off with a spoof of host Ice T turning up at his "Law & Order" shoot and racing back to the VH1 Honors venue, after learning that Mike D of Beastie Boys would replace him as host.
-8:05: Ice T introduces Tracy Morgan. Morgan makes a joke about lightskinned rappers or something. Five people laugh. But I'm not sure if they were laughing at Tracy's joke about the Beastie Boys or at his tight sweatshirt.
-8:13: Clad in old school style jumpsuits, Diddy, Q-Tip and Fabolous lunge into their best Beastie Boys rendition. I can't decide whether Diddy was trying too hard to imitate Mike D's gruff vocals or if he had a sore throat.
-8:24: Ice T introduces Regina King, who apparently adores MC Lyte. To prove that Lyte was her favorite rapper as a teenager, King kicks a bar from "10% Dis." Nice. She also makes it a point to say that MC Lyte wrote her own lyrics.
-8:29: Da Brat, Remy Ma, and Lil Kim all pay tribute to the greatest female rapper of all time (at least to me she is), MC Lyte, with ?uestlove on drums. Kim's verse is too high-spirited; you can tell she's only been out of jail for three months.
-8:39: Common has finally given up on weirdo fashion. Tonight, he's rocking a red t-shirt with a brown jacket, and a white scarf. No further comments.
-8:40 Common showers Rakim with praise. At least someone shares my view on Rakim being the greatest emcee alive.
-8:44: The Rakim tribute team must be every lyricist's dream session: Styles P, Talib Kweli, and Black Thought, with Kid Capri on turntables and ?uesto on drums. Their version of "Paid in Full" and "Microphone Fiend" is cool, but Rakim's rendition of his brand new song, "It's Nothing," is bonkers.
-8:54: Mike Epps said it best: "Ice Cube is the only person I know that can drop a Parental Advisory CD and a PG-13 movie in the same year."
-8:57: Like Lyte and Rakim before him, Cube tells his life story.
-8:59: Xzibit and WC do their best Ice Cube impersonation on the mic. Riveting. Ice Cube, who has the whole goth thing going on with his outfit, performs "Why We Thugs" from his latest disc, Laugh Now, Cry Later.
-9:02: Whoever decided that Lil Jon is a good fit for an Ice Cube tribute needs to get fired.
-9:11: I've just learned something new--Eazy E was the grandfather of gangsta rap, according to Ice Cube. And I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that rappers are automatically idolized in death. So, Ice T and Dr. Dre have been lying to us all along? What a travesty.
-9:15:You really do learn a lot of stuff from these shows. Young Jeezy's crack-rap debut, Let's Get It: Thug Motivation 101, was largely inspired by Eazy-E, or so says Ice T who has been out of touch with hip-hop for the past 43 years.
-9:25: Diddy, whose album Press Play dropped today (hey, I'm only quoting the VH1 announcer), says all he ever wanted to be was this guy named Russell Simmons.
-9:29: At 4 mins. and 33 secs., Russell Simmons' life story is the longest so far. Apropos, considering that he's the oldest honoree at this year's event. His is also the most inspiring. Something about a bell going off in his head, which then prompted him to start a hip-hop label.
-9:38: Oh lawd, here we go again with KRS-One's hip-hop vs rap lecture. "A lot of people think that hip-hop and rap are the same," says the Teacha. "Yawn," say the pupils.
-9:42: Afrika Bambaataa does us all a favor and keeps his life story to himself. He tells the history of hip-hop instead.
-9:44: OutKast introduce George Clinton, Fat Joe, Black Thought, Q-Tip, and Erykah Badu to pay tribute to Afrika Bambaataa. Badu, who looks she's wearing a human-size ostrich, apparently spent more time with her outfit together than George Clinton.
-9:56: Forest Whitaker introduces the Wu-Tang Clan.
-9:57: Clan chiefs Raekwon, GZA, RZA, and Method Man tell their story. RZA makes a shocking disclosure: Wu-Tang's music is rooted in hip-hop! I told you, something new.
-9:59: Kweli, Styles, and Thought reunite for an a capella tribute to thee Wu. Everything is fine and dandy until Lil Jon shows up.
-10:00: The Wu close it out with a performance of old classics, including "C.R.E.A.M." Meth takes a dive into the crowd, stumbles back on stage like nothing happened. Needless to say, VH1 saved the best for last.
Fin
Comments
Yo, my man Eazy was already widely referred to as the “Godfather of Gangsta Rap” back when he was still alive. Look it up.
RIP, Eric.
^^^ Word. Check out this Eazy E interview on the Arsenio Hall Show.
I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d94N0vJmDvA
No doubt.
Was anyone else disappointed by the people that honored the honorees. I mean how did Diddy and the Beastie Boys make a good fit, how do lil jon and ice cube fit, jsut really seemed weird.
what ever happened to the chicks that eazy-e produced? Menage a trois ( like the threesome)
If you don’t read what I have to say and then disagree with me when I say that Easy-E is NOT responsible for gangster rap, it only means that your too ignorant or lazy to read, and unfortunately your thoughts cannot be respected.
Just because lots of people CALL Easy the father or grandfather of Gangsta Rap, doesn’t mean it’s true. Go lookin’ around, while Easy and NWA popularized gangsta imagery as a subject matter in rap, they were most certainly not the first ‘gangsta rappers’.
Gangsta Rap in itself isn’t anything special either. It’s subject matter, it’s just something to talk about. If a popular rapper started talking about gardening, and then lots of other rappers appear who are all talking about gardening, would he have invented “Garden Rap?” No, he popularized talking about, making it into a trend. Believe it or not, people have rapped about gardening before. Given that, even if I knew nothing about Hip Hop’s History, I’d still find it hard to believe that there hadn’t been any rappers talking about gangsta subject matter before Easy-E.
And don’t start talking about it not just being lyrical content, that it also has to do with the sound of the music. That West Coast sound which people often associate with gansta rap was more or less pioneered and invented by Dr. Dre, or in the very least popularized. Since I can’t be certain that he invented it himself, I’m not going to make a hypocritical mistake and call Dr. Dre the grandfather of the gangsta-rap sound without proof, just because that’s the popular conception and everybody knows Dr. Dre as ‘that G-Funk guy”.
So calling Easy-E the grandfather of Gangsta Rap is not only wrong, it ignores and belittles the contributions of so many other important Hip Hop artists, such as Dre.
Go look up Schoolly D, Ice-T, and Boogie Down Productions (KRS-One’s group from back in the day.) Yes, even KRS-One, Mr. Conscious Hip-Hop himself, was rapping about gangster subject matter for two albums before NWA hit the scene. Hell, the Beastie Boys even identified themselves as gangsters before NWA did it. Early NWA songs had them rapping over Beastie Boys beats, their influence on NWA can’t be discredited. Even if Easy-E had never existed, gangster rap music would have still continued to appear. It probably would have just ended up being another group or artist that popularized it with mainstream America.
Everything I’ve said is true and unbiased. If you still disagree with me about Easy-E not being the grandfather of gangsta rap, it’s most likely because of a personal reason that’s keeping you from seeing the truth of things.
BONE THUGS!…. HARMONY!
Wow I feel like I just read the encylopedia twice after reading Ford’s comment.
I agree with you though, there’s a difference between pioneering a trend and popularizing it. Eazy-E didn’t introduce Gangsta Rap. As we all know, he wasn’t particularly a Gangsta rapper–Cube allegedly wrote most of his lyrics. But Eazy was the creative director of the group so to speak so it’s not like he was a benchwarmer.
Ford, no one ever claimed Eazy invented gangsta rap. Nobody. Not even Eric himself. He was given the “Godfather of Gangsta Rap” title (not father or grandfather) because of his huge, pivotal role in helping popularize the genre.
Henry Adaso writes:
“Oh lawd, here we go again with KRS-One’s hip-hop vs rap lecture. “A lot of people think that hip-hop and rap are the same,” says the Teacha. “Yawn,” say the pupils”.
You see….Comments like the one stated above is the reason Hip Hop is dying!
Henry Adaso, feels that KRS-ONE’s Hip Hop/Rap reference is a “Lecture” that should put us to sleep.
This is why Hip Hop is dying!
Henry, would you be yawning if KRS-ONE made his stage entrance flanked by women dotting nothing but G-Strings???
I seriously think NOT!
By making this comment on such an open forum shows your disrespect and lack of Hip Hop history and this Henry, my friend is what’s killing Hip Hop!
We should be grateful and honored that KRS-ONE is at the very least trying to keep a tiny bit of Hip Hop history alive to a few, and maybe many, who did not know about the difference between Hip Hop/Rap and trust me today there are more than less who do NOT know that there is a difference!
Henry….maybe in time as you grow older and wiser you will be begging for a voice such as KRS-ONE to “Lecture” the next genration of Hip Hoppaz since only time will tell if we will be talking about Hip Hop in past tense.
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i think i invented gangster rap
Ok Eazy-E did not start Ganster Rap I can understand that and I like you don’t think that jeezy was infolance by eazy maybe more so by 2pac. but you shoudent make it seem like u hate eazy just state the fects let the peps make that choice. if eny thing ice t started it but truly the getto boys or ice-t the first to kurse on records eaz-e was the first to start the rapper own recording lable ruthless recors,death row,bad boy,no lamit,cash mony,after math,shady,g-unit who cares but thoses are fects.