Words & Flicks by Anthony Campusano      Edits by Lucas Alvarado Farrar

To say he is a genius is an understatement. At the age of 16, Ryan Leslie enrolled in Harvard University and began his pursuit of music, and the rest is history. With the help of McDonalds and 98.7 Kiss Fm, a sold-out crowd was able to rock out and enjoy Ryan Leslie as well as some poets.

Kiss Fm held a poetry competition for $1,000 and other prizes. Followed by an hour and a half of music by the house DJ, the crowd did not lose a bit of energy as they awaited Ryan Leslie. Ryan rocked the crowd for about 2 hours with tracks from all his projects.

With his band backing him up, Ryan Leslie played the keyboard as well, occasionally matching his guitarist. In the middle of his set he brought out Red Café who helped him out with Fly Together and Cafe’s track I’m Ill. A couple songs later he brought out Lloyd Banks to do So Forgetful & Start It Up. The sold out crowd devoured Ryan’s energy.

Set List for Ryan Leslie at SOBs

’Glory’
‘Smothing That I like’
‘Quicksand’
‘Zodiac’
‘Maybach Diamonds’
‘Guardian Angel’
‘Valentine’
‘Beautiful Lie’
‘How It Was Supposed To Be’
‘Fly Together’
‘I’m Ill Remix (ft Red Cafe)’
‘Gibberish’
‘Joan Of Arc’
‘Christian Dior Denim Flow’
‘So Forgetful’
‘Start It Up’
‘Addiction’
‘Breathe’
‘Diamond Girl’

To see more pictures by Anthony check out GRIME

Follow @str8nyc @LexAve, @amc4eva1 & @FarFetchdFuture

Straight out of Harlem is Diamond District Ent. x Money Management Group’s self-made artist Riz has the streets buzzing and the ‘net going crazy! Having been featured on several Hip-hop documentaries including Smack DVD, Real Talk DVD and countless others Riz is on his way to becoming a star. with his new track. Check out his new track “Put The Street On”.

DOWNLOAD/LISTEN–>>RIZ- “PUT THE STREET ON”

Peep Riz’ video for “R.A.C.K.S.” featuring Brooklyn’s own Red Cafe

For more info about Riz check him out on MySpace!

ON DECK or OFF DECK?!

Last night, Alicia Keys celebrated the release of her new album The Element of Freedom at Greenhouse in NYC. A few of her buddies including dancehall king Beenie Man, former Hot 97 on-air personality DJ Envy, and Brooklyn’s own Red Cafe came through to show her some love.

Sidebar: Hm…where was Swizz?!

If you weren’t important enough to party with Miss Keys last night, no need to worry ’cause she’ll be at M2 Ultra Lounge tomorrow night!

It’s apparent that Hip-hop definitely isn’t what it used to be, but who is to blame?! New York City gave birth to the genre and now you can’t even find a single New York rapper who’s murdering the charts. Wondering why?! According to Jadakiss, New York rappers are the ones to blame for Hip-hop’s tragic decline. Apparently, egos kept getting bigger which in turn allowed rappers to completely lose sight of what Hip-hop actually meant, thus allowing the South to completely takeover the game. He tells HipHopGame,

“New York took a hit when everybody started getting money. Everybody was doing alright in record sales. Everybody had some success but then the ego started playing a part. From then, nobody wanted to do songs with each other. N*ggas were on some, ‘I’m not f*cking with that n*gga. I’m not doing that!’ That hurt everybody in a whole and everybody stopped dropping albums”.

He adds, “…Wherever, the South, the West came, linked up, and collected that money for certain amount of years. I just feel like this is going to give everybody some sense of inspiration to come. You got coming. You got more North artists that’s gon’ come back. You know Red [Cafe] is doing his thing. Maino is doing his thing. This gon’ give everybody motivation to put music out, so then, nobody has to sit down and complain”.

I completely agree with Jada. New York really fell off the map and it’s time we take the throne back!