Wikipedia Commons

See also:
*Our Adam Yauch Obituary
*Adam Yauch, RIP: A Life in Photos

Adam Yauch, better known as MCA of the Beastie Boys, died last week. His group was a big deal in hip-hop, not just because they were the first white act to break through, but because they helped establish both the sample-based production and rambunctious lyricism that made rap an international juggernaut.

Within the act, Yauch stood out as well, as noted by our writer Chaz Kangas, for bringing them early credibility. "[H]is grizzled voice -- between Ad-Rock and Mike D.'s higher-pitched wails -- made for their most conventional element, allowing them to connect to a more traditional hip-hop audience."

But from the string of memorials that have come out since his death, one could get the impression that a single stanza came to define his career, from the group's 1994 track "Sure Shot":

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See also: Pop Bottles: Glasses Malone's Debut Album Finally Drops

A few months ago, Watts rapper Glasses Malone stopped by LA Weekly to chat about his oft-stalled debut album on Cash Money Records. When asked about the delay, his theory was, "I'm not willing to make a fool of myself to get attention. I just make really good music. This is a big success for me 'cause I didn't make a fool of myself to get to this point. I retained my dignity."

Then he released "#Rihanna" last week and lost it.

The song begins innocently enough. Over droopy synth keys and soul claps, Glasses growls that a girl has called and told him she dumped her boyfriend. She wants to be with him. But then things get murky.

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Illustration by Jena Ardell

Last week, we received the following press release:

"Curious on how Conan O'Brien maintains his lean physique? It takes hours and hours in the gym -- and to keep his energy up, Conan needs the right kind of music. We we cornered Coco and got him to reveal what's thumping in his headphones while he works out."

The first thing that ran through our heads was, "Why do we care about stars and their starvation methods? We work at LA Weekly, not US Weekly." Our next thought was, "Wait, 'hours and hours in the gym' -- e tu, Conan?!" And finally, "Bet it's the whitest workout mixtape imaginable."

And it is!

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Mike Schreiber

Thirty-three-year-old Robert Glasper has been putting out fairly straight-forward jazz records since the mid-'00s. Last month, however, Houston-bred, New York-based pianist released a R&B and hip-hop indebted album, Black Radio, under the moniker the Robert Glasper Experiment. This has some jazz fans feeling left out.

"I like Robert Glasper's new CD," tweeted critic Ted Gioia. "But it has about as much jazz content as the Utah Jazz."

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Rebecca Haithcoat

People who record shows on their iPhones baffle me. At the Jay-Z and Kanye West show in November, a dude took it to a new level by recording practically the whole thing on his iPad.

I was reviewing the show and had a seat on the floor, which went for $250. The guy with the iPad was in front of me, close enough that Ye's sweat was almost flung on him. And yet, there he was, holding his damn iPad above his head. What, was he planning to upload it and watch it on his YouTube site later?

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Illustration by Sam Washburn

By Kiernan Maletsky

Friday night, Ryan Adams performed at Walt Disney Concert Hall. Check out our review of the show -- the opening act was Val Kilmer as Mark Twain -- you'll see that we have no photos from it.

That's because on this tour Adams' isn't allowing them. His PR is actually encouraging reviewers to bring along a sketch artist; that's what our sister paper Riverfront Times did in their review of his performance in St. Louis, and you can see some of the art in this post. (Big ups to Sam Washburn.) But here, the folks at Disney Hall wouldn't even let us do that.

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Terrorizer

Grindcore band Terrorizer formed here, and their 1989 debut World Downfall was extremely influential. After 2006's reunion album Darker Days Ahead guitarist Jesse Pintado passed away, but the rest of Terrorizer has a new album, Hordes Of Zombies, out February 28th.

Now weirdly, and out of nowhere, an unknown Canadian grindcore group called Collapse has filed is threatening to file a plagiarism lawsuit against them and their label, Season of Mist, claiming a passage in Terrorizer's song "Subterfuge" is lifted from a Collapse song titled "Mechanisms Of Oppression." We call bullshit.

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By Ross Scarano

The last two weeks have seen two significant video drops from the biggest artists in contemporary rap. With little hype, Drake released a very smart video for "Practice," one of the lesser songs from his masterful sophomore LP, Take Care; soon afterward, the partnership of Jay-Z and Kanye West offered a companion to "Niggas in Paris," one of 2011's best singles. Performance is central to both videos, but only one is worth talking about.

Drake's video, uploaded to his blog, is a single take, three minutes and fifty-eight seconds of video vixen Kyra Chaos dancing to "Practice." While it boasts crispier images than the average YouTube video, it's basically just that -- a YouTube video, something a rabid fan would post.

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Jena Ardell

See also: Dave Grohl "Clarifies" Grammy Speech After We Call Him Out For Sounding Like an Anti-EDM Geezer

We like Foo Fighters. They're the Samuel Adams beer of pop -- solid, familiar, a good call in a one-jukebox town.

But innovators they're not. Quite the opposite: If one could feed off a dying aesthetic -- long-haired white guys with guitars -- for the better part of two decades, Foo Fighters can show you how.

And so it is with some irony that the band's leader, Dave Grohl, had disparaging words for electronic dance music last night during a Grammy Awards acceptance speech for Best Rock Album:

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The corner of Figueroa in Highland Park

Over the last couple of months I've been doing a lot of what a writer does best -- hanging out in bars and listening to people talk. I live in Echo Park, and around these parts the bar banter is usually centered around one question: what's cool. In L.A., the answer to that changes as quickly as the cars speed down the 101.

Lately, a lot of people have been ragging on this fair barrio of mine. Guys with unwashed hair and paint on their jeans complain about how Echo Park is becoming too gentrified, too much like our now-grown-up neighbors in Silver Lake. (Shocking to realize it's been more than a decade since Beck was couch-surfing his way to stardom.) Someone actually complained the Gold Room isn't "dangerous enough anymore."

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