The biggest go-go bands can be like small companies: Personnel comes and goes, but the overall brand generally retains its standing. Occasionally, however, a lineup change is a Really Big Deal in go-go circles, like rapper Killa Cal's recent decision to leave the WHAT? band and take his firm verbals to Rare Essence, one of the [...]

The world's Wu-nerds can sort out the particulars of The Ghostface Beat Tape Project, a 28-track collection of high-quality instrumentals "inspired by the Wally Champ" and created entirely by DMV producers. There's plenty to chew on at the micro level. At the macro level, though, it inspires one question: Why put all that DMV effort [...]

1. SmCity featuring Pro'verb, "My Own Boss"
Of all the rap videos that prominently feature Malcolm X imagery, at least 99 percent are sincere.

Arts Desk has written a lot about Kokayi over the years, because he's talented and prolific and all that jazz. The D.C. rapper/singer/producer even did a Snow Day Session. But his latest gambit—offering a free house concert to the 1,400th person who Likes him on Facebook—seemed a bit outré, even for a guy who is [...]

At first glance, D.C. rapper SmCity seems all confused in this video for "Twilight," a track from his upcoming The Indie Life: Hate, Love & Money. He's sportin' a limited-edition Nats hat, but that hometown W kinda gets lost in all those Brooklyn Bridge shots. And his sideman is Brooklyn MC Skyzoo. Why shoot the [...]

D.C.-based rapper/producer Gregory "Grap Luva" Phillips grew up around hip-hop royalty in New York, and is probably best known for his appearances on 1992's Mecca And The Soul Brother, by Pete Rock (Grap's actual brother) and C.L. Smooth. (That's Grap at the beginning of "On And On.") We had a hunch that he'd want to [...]

The Flame (Def Dee Remix) by DTMD
While you were sorting out your feelings about Wale this morning, P.G. County's DTMD was releasing this thumped-up remix of the first chunk of "The Flame," the track that wraps up its nifty DTMD: Makin' Dollas album. The original is all huggy synths and hopefulness; the remix by Seattle's [...]

The Fader (mostly) took Andrew Noz from us, but that's OK, because the music mag is obviously trying to make up for it by showing love to X.O., one of our favorite D.C. rappers. He and several other locals did a show in May that was sponsored by the magazine and a soft drink brand; [...]

The firehose of DMV hip-hop videos at D.C. Mumbo Sauce sometimes spurts out a hidden gem, like Ike Da Kid's "Fast Life," which, beyond its big-ass beat and general good-natured-ness, left us with more questions than answers. So we posed five of them directly to Ike himself, a recent University of Maryland graduate and Hyattsville [...]