TMZ Hip Hop - Page 50

Kanye West can't seem to get enough of his wife Bianca Censori ... grabbin' about as much as he could while the two were out in L.A. to grab some dinner.

Ye and Bianca were spotted outside The Lobster in Santa Monica Tuesday, as Ye squeezed his new wife on the booty as they chilled at the valet.

At one point, he even buried his face in Bianca's chest -- seemingly without any concern about who might be around them ... including their fellow dinner guests.

KW and BC came to dinner with two other guys -- unclear if the reason for this meal was business or pleasure, but all four took off together in the same ride.

As we reported, Kanye recently celebrated his 46th birthday, and Bianca showed up to the massive birthday bash hand-in-hand with Ye's daughter, North ... seemingly a sign the two are gettin' a lot more comfortable around each other.

As for Kanye and Bianca, it's obvious they're pretty comfy with each other, too.

Anita Baker's decision to erase Babyface from her tour doesn't surprise R&B singer CeCe Peniston all that much ... she calls it showbiz!!!

We caught the "Finally" singer out in NYC following the R&Beef heard 'round the world ... she attested she's seen her fair share of egos sinking ships before they leave the dock.

As we reported, AB claimed her boundaries were being violated by Babyface's fans, who were mad he didn't have more stage time. However, CeCe doesn't Babyface is guilty of any wrongdoing.

She also seemed to give AB a pass for being angry, which basically gets us to where they are now ... the stars going their separate ways.

One person who's not giving out passes is Tank, who gave AB a piece of his mind for his one million Instagram followers to see.

Babyface also didn't admit to any wrongdoing on his part ... but he's still out of an opener job!!!

Boosie Badazz is getting some heat for showing up to support YNW Melly in his double homicide trial from one of the alleged victim's fathers ... accusing Boosie of being a cheerleader for murder.

Christopher Thomas Sr., the father of YNW Juvy, one of the two men Melly is accused of killing, lashed out at Boosie for supporting Melly, someone he doesn't even know!!!

Chris says Boosie should focus his attention on his ex-friend Marlo Mike, who was sentenced to life in Baton Rouge

The trial's getting deeper already. Christopher Sr. has a daughter who's the sister of both YNW Juvy and Melly's alleged co-conspirator ... YNW Bortlen.

50 Cent and Rémy Martin are no longer beefing ... the famous alcohol brand settled its lawsuit over the rapper's cognac bottle design.

According to new legal docs, obtained by TMZ, 50 Cent’s company and Rémy Martin reached a settlement June 1 but asked the court to keep terms of the settlement under seal.

The beef dates back to August 2021, when Rémy Martin sued 50 Cent's Spire Spirits in Manhattan federal court ... claiming the rapper’s Branson cognac brand ripped off their distinctive bottle design.

In the suit, Rémy Martin claimed 50 Cent's cognac copied their famous jewel-shaped glass bottle design. Rémy Martin claimed the design was synonymous with their brand and could cause confusion.

Reps for Rémy Martin tell TMZ ... they're pleased to resolve the trademark and patent dispute, and the brand respects 50 Cent’s entry into the cognac market.

Tank couldn't bite his tongue after Anita Baker fired Babyface as the opening act on her tour, fiercely defending his friend and mentor, while still trying to be as respectful as possible.

While Tank admits he's biased toward Babyface, he just sang backup at the R&B legend's "Tiny Desk Concert," he claims Babyface is an innocent victim of AB's rage who he says is acting irrationally.

As we reported, AB officially pulled the plug on Babyface Tuesday, removing him from her Songstress Tour after she felt attacked by his fans.

The two R&B legends had been clashing over stage time, and Babyface was even barred from hitting the stage at the tour's New Jersey leg in May ... a fail Tank notes Babyface apologized for despite it being no fault of his own!!!

Tank says Babyface is too meek to issue a proper response to AB ... but not him!!!

To rectify the situation, Tank says the people need a "Protect Black Men" movement to counter what the women have going on. We'll see if it sticks.

Dillon Brooks continues to catch strays after his trash talk blew up in his face this season ... 'cause the NBA hooper is now a punchline in Polo G's new freestyle -- and it's harsh!!

The Chicago artist dropped the vicious bar while appearing on "Justin Credible's Freestyles" with Power 106 in L.A. ... where he flowed over Ja Rule's classic "New York" beat.

It only took a few seconds for Polo to name-drop the former(?) Memphis Grizzlies player ... saying, "If he a lame like Dillon Brooks, I take him straight off the roster."

Justin immediately started cracking up ... but Polo was just getting started, freestyling for another two minutes before it was all said and done.

Of course, Brooks has been the butt of many jokes after calling LeBron James "old" and washed up in the middle of Memphis' first-round matchup against the Lakers ... which L.A. ended up winning in six games.

After the Grizzlies were sent packing, there were reports Memphis had no interest in bringing Brooks back "under any circumstances" ... which was later refuted by his agent.

Anita Baker and Babyface's rocky road out on tour has come to an end ... as Baker made the decision to boot him off her Songstress Tour.

AB revealed she reached her breaking point Tuesday, and felt the best course of action was to go about the tour alone. AB says for the past 24 hours, she was forced to put up with violent threats on behalf of Babyface's fans and felt she needed to cut him for her own personal safety.

Anyone salty about his absence for the remainder of the tour dates will be allowed to refund their tickets. The week kicked off in shambles as AB and Babyface fans engaged in online unpleasantries.

Fans demanded AB bill Babyface as a co-headliner, but the tour is designed to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Anita's debut album "The Songstress" ... so she wanted to stay on as the project's headliner on her own.

We reached out to Babyface to see if he's stressed out over the news ... or if he's just gonna let it flow. Nothing yet!

We covered the drama in the latest episode of The TMZ Podcast, available on all podcast platforms.

Ja Morant gave Lil Wayne the cold shoulder when the rapper tried to lend a helping hand following his recent gun controversy ... so says Skip Bayless, who claims he was given the information from the Young Money honcho himself.

The FS1 host shared Wayne's apparent side of the story on the "Skip Bayless Show" podcast this week ... saying the "Kant Nobody" M.C.'s personal experiences influenced his decision to reach out to the All-Star guard.

According to Skip, Wayne reminisced on his own time spent on Rikers Island for gun possession ... and made it known he didn't want Ja to end up in the same cell.

Skip says the message was delivered ... but claims Ja and his team never got back to Wayne.

Wayne isn't the only rapper concerned about Ja's well-being.

Cam'ron, who says he dashed his own basketball dreams to pursue moves in the streets, has also been publicly telling Ja to revert course ... especially since the Dipset rapper doesn't think a career in hip-hop is in the cards for the Grizzlies star.

Skip's gonna need to map out a game plan to discuss more of Ja's plight -- he's currently without a debate partner at "Undisputed" after Shannon Sharpe announced his departure on Tuesday.

André 3000 may be an outcast to his Outkast faction ... but like Sleepy Brown recently told TMZ Hip Hop, he's still down by law with the Dungeon Family life!!!

The elusive MC just popped up to support Killer Mike's new track "Scientists & Engineers" ... no different than he did when Mike released his debut album back in 2003 when he was signed to Aquemini Records.

On the new track, André vents about wayward society atop the electronica beat ... rapping how he wishes he had "scientists to engineer friends" and how smoking hookah is a waste of time.

Future also adds color commentary on the hook ... and IYKYK, adds the perfect cherry on top of the Dungeon Family collab!!!

"Scientists and Engineers" will appear on the upcoming album "Michael" ... which is KM's first solo offering in over 10 years after carving out a separate legacy with Run The Jewels.

The verse is par for the course for 3 Stacks, according to Sleepy Brown ... who recently told us that Dré is on another journey and although an Outkast reunion was out of the question, the hip hop legend would still be there for his Dungeon Family crew any day of the week!!!

Ice Spice isn't taking too kindly to internet trolls who think her rap career only blew up because she's light-skinned, the 'Munch' rapper thinks everyone loses as a result of the conversation.

Ice Spice graced the newest cover of "Teen Vogue" Tuesday and addressed the social media backlash from last week's Hot 97 Summer Jam performance where she brought out Flo Milli.

Rabid fans stirred the pot and claimed colorism was the reason Ice's career usurped Flo's career, despite Flo entering the rap game several years prior ... but Ice tells the publication the issues are bigger than her.

"I feel like that's not something personal to me," Ice explained before adding ... "I feel like that's been the conversation for generations and forever, since the beginning of time. I try not to feed into negativity because I also see that when people are trying to make that point, it's not out of a good place. [They end up putting] somebody else down."

Ice's career is poppin' — she currently has the most Top 5 Billboard 100 Entries of any artist this year, catapulted by her recent collabs with Nicki Minaj and Taylor Swift ... but fame has brought out the crazies all the same.

The Bronx-born rap star says her social security number got leaked and seeing frequent photos of herself as a kid weirds her out.

The Drake curse may officially be over. The hip-hop superstar hit on two massive bets when the Denver Nuggets secured the 'chip in 5 games, profiting over 800 grand!

The 36-year-old superstar placed two bets on the Denver Nuggets back on June 1, before game 1 was played. The first wager ... risking $1 million on the Nuggets to win the series outright (pays 1.23 mil total). The second ... Drizzy put up $250K on the Nuggets winning the series in 5 games (pays $850K).

All told (assuming Drake isn't holding back any losing tickets), the rapper, minus what he risked, won $830K!

It's a good sign for many of the most popular teams across the sports landscape. Of course, Drake's notorious for rooting for, and betting on teams or athletes ... who have then had a reputation for losing.

Thus, the Drake curse.

The Kentucky Wildcats basketball team fell victim to it, and so did the Alabama Crimson Tide football team. Conor McGregor, too (though Khabib probably deserves the credit here).

Not all have fell victim. Drake's beloved Toronto Raptors won the title in 2019, Tyson Fury, who the rapper supported against Deontay Wilder in 2021, also won.

Now, you can add the Nuggets to that list.

Put away the celebratory joints ... Snoop Dogg will not be the next owner of the Ottawa Senators after all -- the NHL franchise announced Tuesday it's opted to sell its team to another bidder.

Snoop had been a part of the group that L.A.-based entrepreneur Neko Sparks had put together in an effort to buy the hockey team ... but the Sens revealed they ultimately chose to go with the offer that Toronto billionaire Michael Andlauer had made instead.

Reportedly, Andlauer and his backers will fork over right around $1 BILLION for the team as part of the sale.

Snoop has yet to comment on the matter ... but it's no doubt got to be disappointing for the rapper -- you'll recall, back when he initially became a part of Sparks' group, he said in an Instagram post that he desperately wanted the squad.

Andlauer, meanwhile, said Tuesday he was fired up to have beaten out the rest to become the team's next owner.

"I believe that the Senators' fanbase is one of the most passionate in the league," he said, "and I'm excited to take the franchise's success both on and off the ice to the next level."

Outkast will go down as one of the best hip hop duos in history ... but don't cross your fingers for a reunion cuz Sleepy Brown says the group is done for good.

TMZ Hip Hop caught Mr. Brown out at LAX Monday ... and with the 20th anniversary of Kast's monster album "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below" approaching, we wanted to see if there's any chance they use that milestone to slip back into the music mix.

The Organized Noize producer laid out the obvious for us ... André 3000's cosmic defection from the group caused their indefinite end, and not even a celebration of one of the only rap projects to win Album of the Year at the Grammys can resurrect the movement.

Sleepy and Big Boi have since joined forces ... releasing their joint album "Big Sleepover" in 2021 and still wooing audiences past with their chart-topping classic "The Way You Move!!!"

Outkast has one of the best catalogs in rap music history as well. When it comes to ranking their albums, Sleepy feels the group's 1998 album "Aquemini" holds the 👑.

The eclectic LP spawned the classic records "Rosa Parks," "SpottieOttieDopaliscious" and was the first album from southern rappers to get a perfect rating in "The Source" magazine back in the day.

Tupac's father Billy Garland is showing he's not above buying into a juicy conspiracy theory, and wholeheartedly believes the United States government killed his son.

In his latest interview bit with "The Art of Dialogue," Billy claims his son was tailed by the government for years including September 7, 1996, when Pac was shot in Vegas.

Rap fans have heard the stories a million times ... Pac and members of Death Row Records' entourage stomped out Los Angeles native Orlando Anderson following the Mike Tyson vs. Bruce Seldon fight, only for him allegedly to return hours later, guns a blazing.

Billy condemned Pac's behavior that night, citing his need to prove himself to the Death Row team. He also scolded Suge Knight and the security team for not protecting the label's money maker and being too comfortable with him leading the charge.

Orlando's uncle Keefe D has implicated his nephew (and himself) in the Tupac shooting for years ... but Billy thinks his self-snitching has been a part of the government's master plan and doesn't think either of them had anything to do with the murder.

YNW Melly's career essentially came to an end in 2019 after he was arrested and charged with double homicide ... but his streaming has seen a resurgence as of late.

On Monday, Melly's trial kicked off in Florida's Broward County court, where it was uncovered the 24-year-old rapper had absolutely zero RIAA certifications on his wall at the time of his arrest on February 13, 2019 ... but now has 10 platinum plaques and 6 gold.

Fans have especially been running up the numbers for Melly's more sinister tracks ... "Suicidal" sits at 4x platinum while his signature hit "Murder on My Mind" is fairly close to Diamond status at 6x platinum.

Melly and Kanye West's 2020 collab "Mixed Personalities" is also double platinum.

The Florida rapper, born Jamell Demons, stands accused of gunning down his own friends YNW Juvy and YNW Sakchaser.

Travis Scott's "Utopia" album recently founds its way into the mix of his new Nike campaign, revamping the Nike Mac Attack kicks worn by John McEnroe during his fiery heyday.

The two longtime Nike ambassadors appeared in a new TV spot Monday to preview the Mac Attacks in their OG colorways of Light Smoke Grey/Black-White. In the accompanying photo shoot, the patented briefcase containing the master copy of "Utopia" can also be spotted.

John's been down with Nike before Travis was actually born ... but Travis has loads of Cactus Jack merch collabs underneath the Swoosh umbrella, so their ties with the brand are both deep-rooted at this point.