TMZ Hip Hop - Page 50

A $345K+ factory Rolls-Royce wasn't enough for Floyd Mayweather ... "Money" upgraded his whip with an authentic mink fur-lined car seat for his little baby grandson that cost $18,000!

TMZ Sports has learned the undefeated boxer hit up his longtime car guy Obi Okeke -- aka Doctor Bugatti -- who arranged to have the seat lined in the real fur ... and then they installed it in the 2022 Rolls-Royce Cullinan.

Luckily, we have video of the finished product ... and you can see the seat perfectly matches the interior of the luxury car.

And, that's because the car's also mink ... though the interior was done previously. Floyd wanted the car seat to match the interior ... and that's exactly what he got!.

The car seat also features "Kentrell Jr." stitched in highlighter yellow thread ... the name of Floyd's grandson. His daughter Yaya and NBA Youngboy are Kentrell's parents.

Ever since Kentrell Jr. was born, Mayweather's clearly been loving the role of grandpa -- from spoiling the baby boy with gifts to bringing him to the boxing gym.

Issa Rae's latest HBO series "Rap Sh!t" is about to debut, and she says you can expect to see characters spitting lyrics written by her favorite rappers ... all women!

Issa shouted out PineappleCITI, NCognita and Dreezy, who tells TMZ Hip Hop ... writing for the show was a breeze, seeing as how she's written for hip hop and R&B artists in the past.

She's sworn to secrecy as far as naming any co-collaborators for the show, but Dreezy assured us a few upcoming hot tracks have her fingerprints all over them.

"Rap Sh!t" -- which drops Thursday on HBOMax -- is centered around 2 Miami women looking to get ahead with their music, and, naturally, they also experience all the sinful spoils of the industry.

It looks and feels much like the life of City Girls Yung Miami and JT ... mainly because they're co-executive producers with Issa and several other people.

Dreezy also tells us the backlash behind women rapping about their bodies is a moot point, mainly because sex sells everything ... including rap, and "women are sexy AF!!!"

She claims women rappers have just as much variety as men, citing love songs, party songs, get money music, heartbreak and bad bitch music as different subgenres.

French Montana is accusing record labels of embracing street violence related to their artists, and actually capitalizing off rappers’ deaths.

Comparing his entry point to today’s star rappers, French told Akademiks ... record labels are now taking life insurance out on artists in anticipation of them being killed in action.

French says when he began buzzing in the late 2000s through NYC aficionados Max B. and Dame Grease, labels and artists actually distanced themselves from street drama but now they’ve learned how to monetize the murders.

Over the past few years, rappers such as Pop Smoke, King Von and Drakeo The Ruler were all killed … and subsequently had albums released posthumously to the public.

French also says today’s rap game is more dangerous than in the past, and blames social media for escalating the beefs saying, “One day a full war [can] go on.”

Fellow NYC-bred rap stars Nas and Jim Jones have both sided in the past with French and his notion that being a rapper is the world’s “most dangerous” j-o-b.

We recently caught him in NY as he broke down the complicated culture ... reacting to his friend/collaborator Lil Tjay’s shooting. His message: urging all hip hop artists and entourages to stay safe.

If Aaron Judge seems to be moving just a tiny bit slower at Tuesday night's All-Star Game ... now ya know why!!!

The New York Yankees superstar was spotted partying in L.A. the day before the mid-summer classic on Monday ... hitting the Fanatics ASG bash in downtown -- and rubbin' elbows with Travis Scott and some NBA superstars while there!!

TMZ Sports has some pics from the festivities -- and you can see Judge, rockin' a custom blazer with a white shirt underneath, seemed to be enjoying himself big time as he chatted with the celebs at the venue.

AJ was grinnin' ear to ear while talking with Scott and Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin -- and he later posed for a pic with the two plus Joel Embiid and James Harden.

No word on what time Judge left the venue ... but don't worry, Tuesday's game doesn't start 'til 5 PM PT -- so dude's got plenty of time to recover if it did happen to be a late night.

Jason Derulo and Jena Frumes are co-parenting their son without a hitch, under completely different roofs -- and she's doing so under a brand new one ... TMZ Hip Hop has learned.

The R&B/pop star leveraged his Billboard and TikTok success to purchase a $3.6 million, nearly 5,000 sq foot fortress back in March, but it wasn't for himself. We're told Jena and their son Jason King live there exclusively, with plenty of room to, ya know ... wiggle.

The swanky pad checks off 5 bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms and features a pool with built-in spa and waterfall features, a soundproof movie theater -- plus an outdoor farmhouse and BBQ area.

Jason copped the house this past March amid a career resurgence that saw his TikTok following and bank account swell substantially.

Fans were initially shocked to see Jason support Jena at her recent runway gig during designer Luli Fama's Miami Swim Week show ... especially after cheating allegations fractured their relationship last September.

Drake's brand new home apparently already had an unwanted visitor ... cops arrested a man there who claimed the rapper was his dad.

LAPD tells TMZ ... cops were called to the rapper's Beverly Hills-adjacent mansion last Friday after an employee saw someone near the pool house.

Police questioned the 23-year-old ... the man claimed 35-year-old Drake was his dad and he was just waiting for him to come home ... but obviously cops weren't buying it.

The man was arrested for misdemeanor trespassing ... we're told the guy never made it inside the house.

Drake plunked down $75M for the estate a few months back, buying the property from "Take That" singer Robbie Williams.

We're told Drake wasn't home during the incident. As we reported, he's been spending time in Sweden, where he apparently had his own run-in with police.

Lil Durk says he’s taking a break from social media, but that’s not why the Chicago rapper is trending -- that's all about a wild casino brawl, where some folks think Durk got slept!

The viral footage shows a man with blonde dreadlocks KO’d. There's no doubt the guy goes down, but the ID has definitely been in question.

Well, turns out it’s neither Durk, nor his doppelganger, Perkio who caught the viral haymaker.

The man on the receiving end of the bruising is actually a self-proclaimed Houston venture capitalist by the name of James Lett IV, who, by the looks of things is enjoying his newfound fame -- posting his face to prove the punch left no dents, and bragging about his increased social traffic.

Judging from the OG poster’s timestamp, the fight appears to have gone down over 4th of July weekend inside a Florida casino -- but it got hot online following announcements from both Durk and Perkio.

Durk announced an Instagram and Twitter hiatus Monday just as the video began to trend … which only fueled rumors it was him.

Durk gave a shout-out to his fallen brothers King Von and D-Thang and also reiterated the same timeout speech to his Twitter legion.

It appears he’s just focusing on making his next hit, and not ducking comments about the fight video.

DaBaby’s heinous remarks about HIV patients cost his Dua Lipa feature maximum exposure, but according to one of his Billion Dollar Baby artists ... he still made off with a pretty penny.

Stunna 4 Vegas poured the tea, revealing -- at least according to him -- DaBaby got $350,000 last year for appearing on DL's “Levitating (Remix).”

In his VladTV interview, Stunna went on to vouch for DaBaby’s character, saying he was in good standing with all his fans and funds.

During DaBaby’s “cancelation” period, he says DB’s cash and car flow didn’t stop. They say there's no such thing as "bad" publicity, and that's totally true in this case ... if Stunna's stats are accurate.

Remember, as that controversy was exploding ... DaBaby had dropped a Lil Wayne collab that got him back on the Billboard chart. The song peaked at No. 2 and went 4x platinum.

But he eventually had his credit snatched from the Billboard charts after the July 2021 backlash from Rolling Loud engulfed the internet.

Dua immediately ripped into DB … citing how she was “surprised and horrified” at her collaborator’s words and distanced herself from the situation in a fiery response.

Boosie Badazz is back to his happy place -- his own personal car lot -- after nearly blowing a gasket following his now viral run-in with Georgia law enforcement.

In a video posted to his newly minted Instagram -- yes, he's back -- Boosie reminded himself he’s overcome hard times, and basked in his beautiful collection of mostly black cars.

Boosie is clearly in a good mood … rapping along to Louisiana classic hip hop Mac and Soulja Slim’s “Can I Ball.”

Throughout his car tour, you can see a Chevy Corvette, Ford Mustang Mach-E, Cadillac Escalade, a Rolls Royce Phantom and several more-high end vehicles

Boosie was just the passenger when he and another man were pulled over and cuffed last week on the side of the highway -- and cops claim they were following safety protocol when they handcuffed the men.

Kanye West is no longer headlining Rolling Loud Miami, and while many thought Travis Scott would have been the perfect fit to replace Ye, the festival's founder says it wouldn't have been possible after the deaths at Astroworld.

Ye was scheduled to perform as Friday night's headliner, but Rolling Loud announced over the weekend that he would no longer be taking the stage due to circumstances out of RL's control ... Kid Cudi, who has his own beef with Ye, was named as the replacement.

Fans got pissed, demanding Travis Scott should've subbed in ... but RL co-founder Tariq Cherif posted a comment on social media saying, "venue won't allow travis because of astroworld deaths."

What Tariq didn't make clear, why would the venue, Hard Rock Stadium, feel Astroworld was Travis' fault? An RL spokesperson tells us, "All artists are in consideration for the event. But, in this case, each situation had logistical challenges and Travis wasn’t an option for this upcoming week."

We spoke with sources familiar with the festival's planning who tell us there simply wouldn't have been enough time to arrange production logistics - like security and get insurance - to cover Travis' performance. We're told it's just not possible to land someone of Travis' level with such short notice.

As we've told you, Travis and his team have maintained he didn't know the severity of what was happening in the crowd -- and video of cops calmly watching his performance while chaos was unfolding in the audience seems to support Travis' claim of not knowing how bad things actually were.

The Astroworld music festival resulted in 10 deaths, but the investigation into the failures that led to those deaths continues ... there's also billions of dollars worth of open litigation in connection to the festival.

As for Rolling Loud Miami, Cudi, Future, Lil Durk, Latto, Kendrick Lamar, Lil Baby, Curren$y and several others are still scheduled to perform ... so even without Ye and Travis, there's still plenty of talent for fans to get excited about.

Better get to your seats early for the Nick Young vs. Blueface boxing match later this month ... 'cause Swaggy P tells TMZ Sports the fight is going to be over in a matter of seconds!!

The ex-Lakers star made the prediction to us out in L.A. earlier this week ... saying it'll only take him about 15 ticks to knock out the "Thotiana" rapper.

Nick said he's confident for a myriad of reasons ... but explained he believes Blueface's lifestyle is ultimately why he'll dump the 25-year-old in Round 1.

"He's a rapper," the former hooper said. "They've got to be in the studio all night. You've got to drink, you've got to smoke. We don't do that type of stuff."

Blueface, meanwhile, was just as confident that he'd beat Young when we spoke to him out in L.A. this week -- telling us he has plans to actually toy with the 37-year-old in the fight to make him "look bad."

As for post-fight plans, Blueface says he's going to box further after the Young tilt, telling us he's already got a match planned for late August.

Young, meanwhile, says if the money's right ... he'll continue boxing -- adding, "I'm just going on a knock-a-motha-f***as-out tour."

Ne-Yo just dropped his first album in 4 years, and he says the hiatus is largely because COVID took a massive toll on his emotional state and creativity.

The R&B singer joined "TMZ Live" to talk all about his 8th studio album, titled "Self Explanatory" ... an album that was put on the back burner when the pandemic hit. Ne-Yo says music was not on his mind nearly as much as survival -- the survival of his family.

He says even after quarantine was lifted, it took time getting the "funk" removed from his psyche.

The album does not reference COVID ... he says he has nothing new to offer since we all went through it. Ditto the Black Lives Matter movement ... he says it has been so well-documented that the album would not move the ball forward.

The album is much more about his personal life ... especially the ups and downs he experienced with his marriage. We get into all of that, and more, in the full interview, which airs on Monday's "TMZ Live."

Ne-Yo has been in an on-again, off-again marriage to his wife, Crystal Renay. You'll recall, the two got remarried in Vegas back in April ... nearly 2 years after she filed for divorce and then withdrew the petition.

Kanye West is out, and Kid Cudi is in at Rolling Loud Miami -- an interesting swap, considering the two have been beefing these past few months.

Festival organizers made the announcement Sunday, saying that -- for reasons beyond their control -- Kanye wouldn't be performing at their event later this month as one of the three headliners ... and in his place, Scott would be stepping in to take up the mantle.

Rolling Loud Co-Founders Tariq Cherif and Matt Zingler further tell TMZ ... "We were looking forward to Ye headlining Rolling Loud Miami 2022. We spent months working with him and his team on the performance. Unfortunately, Ye has decided that he will no longer be performing. This is the first time a headliner has ever pulled off our show and though we don’t take it lightly, we wish him the best."

They add, "We look forward to welcoming Kid Cudi as a headliner in Miami and we can’t wait to see what he has in store."

Kid Cudi himself confirmed the news, posting the new lineup on his IG story. It's unclear why Ye bailed, but that's kinda his M.O. lately -- you'll recall, he also pulled out of Coachella last minute, with no explanation. There, too, they had to scramble last minute for a new act.

The backdrop to this latest news, of course, is the fact that Cudi has officially disavowed Ye ... publicly declaring that their friendship is over, this after Ye took some swipes at him for being friends with Pete Davidson.

He even clarified afterward that he and Kanye still weren't cool, despite the fact they collaborated on a song of Pusha T's -- which KC said would be the last time they worked together. So, him being the guy to fill Kanye's shoes is almost coming full circle on all that.

Kanye West may have been hit by the supply chain crisis, because his floor-to-ceiling renovation of his Malibu home is far from completion.

Ye paid just a skosh over $57 million for the Malibu beachfront home. He's using a famous architect ... Tadao Ando, but even he can't seem to accelerate the process. Then again, Kanye is famous for coming up with a plan and then changing it until it's exactly to his liking.

The home is 4,000 square feet ... which is huge by Malibu standards for beachfront property ... thus the hefty price tag. BTW, when Kanye bought it it was listed for $75 million.

It's pretty austere ... which is Kanye's thing. The house he designed for his family -- which Kim Kardashian now owns -- is also minimalist.

Amber Rose knows Kanye West, and she opens up about his divorce from Kim Kardashian ... short story, she's not surprised at all.

Amber sat down with Raquel for the "It's Tricky with Raquel Harper" podcast and Amber -- though circumspect -- seems to know of what she speaks. She makes it clear ... she saw the divorce coming, and it's all based on her experience with Kanye.

Amber acknowledges she had her own issues with Ye, but she's still wished him nothing but the best. Amber, who's always been rock solid, says she's focusing on her own life and not what her exes are doing.

Amber and Kanye dated from 2008 to 2010 ... before he moved on to Kim a year later. So, she had a fresh look at Kanye's new relationship with lots of experience to lay odds. And, her odds are that it just wouldn't last.

Raq makes a point of saying Amber and Kim share the same birthday and therefore they have something in common, but Amber makes it clear ... the birth date is where similarities end.

Kodak Black's weekend is off to an unfortunate start … the "Super Gremlin" was arrested after cops say they found a bunch of oxycodone pills in his car.

Law enforcement sources tell TMZ Kodak was traveling in a Dodge Durango Friday in Ft. Lauderdale with what cops believed was an illegal window tint.

After pulling the rapper over, cops say they smelled a strong odor of marijuana and eventually searched the car. Officers claim they found 31 oxycodone pills and $74,960 in cash during the search.

Our sources say Kodak's license and tags were also expired.

Kodak was then arrested and hauled off to Broward County jail.