News

Black Lily Fest 2day, More New Roots, TSS Contest, Janelle Monae LA Contest, New Pharoahe Monch, We Love RZA, Congrats Atmosphere!

• Philadelphia, the Black Lily Film & Music Festival starts TODAY! The next four days will be filled with amazing films and music, so after you view the video teaser the ladies made, peep the full schedule of events (all in the post). This years Lily will feature performances by Bahamadia, Jaguar Wright, Imani Uzuri, Ladybug Mecca, Zaki Ibrahim, Emone Fela, Slick & Rose, J*Davey, Lizz Wright, Toshi Reagan and more!

• Another Roots song? You already knew “Birthday Girl” would only be out on the International release, but there’s another gem on there as well called “The Grand Return” featuring Dice Raw and Wahud Ahmad that’s getting some well-deserved chatter on the boards. Listen to Cap’n Kirk murder the guitar solo at the end!

• In case you haven’t yet copped Rising Down, get that today so you can still make it count in week 1 numbers! Okayplayer and The Smoking Section are collaborating on a proof-of-purchase contest. All ya gotta do is send us a photo of your cd, and you can win gift certificates to the OKP store (with all of our new shirts on pre-sale right now!).

• Los Angeles, today is your last day to WIN tickets to see Janelle Monae at the Key Club next Tuesday, hosted by Diddy! Okayplayer’s got 10 pairs of tix that we’re giving away at random. Winners will be announced tomorrow!

• Since his ‘07 release Desire, we’ve all been thirsty for some more music from Pharoahe Monch. Well Monch fans today your prayers have been answered. Dug up from the boards is a new song from Monch called “Broken Heart” produced by Mr. Porter.

• Bobby Digital must be really livin’ right these days. Rza’s artwork and tracklist for his album Digi Snax (droppin July 1st) has hit the net (the unedited pics are type wild). There are a number of cross genre features on it including John Frusciante from the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Shavo Odadjian from System of a Down. Interestingly enough the only official Wu member on the album is Inspectah Deck (lingering 8 Diagrams beef perhaps?).

• Congrats to Atmosphere who’s got the #5 record in the country right now with When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold. If you haven’t already, make sure you peep OKP’s exclusive interview with Slug.

-gingerlynn & shamz