TMZ Hip Hop - Page 50

Omarion's been a hot topic since his Verzuz battle with Mario -- where the other B2K members deemed "he got served" -- but now ya could say Omarion's hitting back with some docuseries tea.

The singer appeared Monday on "TMZ Live" and let us in on his secret to handling all the shots his ex-bandmates have been throwing -- not to mention all the drama from their infamous Millennium tour -- and he says it's all about staying "unbothered."

Omarion says his upcoming docuseries "OMEGA: The Gift & The Curse" will shine the spotlight on the truth of the band's nasty breakup, which came to a head when Lil Fizz began dating Apryl Jones, the ex-girlfriend and mother of Omarion's 2 kids.

Talk about must-see -- following his Verzuz, Omarion hopped on Instagram to thank Mario for the competition, but also fired back at the B2K crew, calling them little more than "backup dancers."

For their part ... Raz-B, J Boog and Lil Fizz ordered a side of extra petty with their responses. They unified to post a scene from the cult classic R&B flick "The Temptations" ... the one that depicts the lead singer looking like a sucker.

Fizz later followed with receipts proving there's no longer an "O" in B2K. At least legally, anyways.

Despite it all, Omarion says he doesn't hate his old crew, and revealed his inclusion in B2K has always been a point of contention -- having been the last member to join -- and he blames older music execs for pushing them to the breaking point.

This year's already given us the return of the reclusive Kendrick Lamar, and now there are strong signs Frank Ocean is getting set for his own grand return.

The R&B phenom debuted 2 new episodes of his "Blonded RADIO" show Sunday on Apple Music … cryptically discussing psychedelic drugs with Dr. James Fadiman on the episode titled, "Blonded Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" -- a play on The Beatles' ode to LSD.

The rollout happens to mark the 10th anniversary of his Grammy-winning "Channel Orange" album and he decked out his website with new merch and memorabilia ... which fans treated like $3 gasoline, snapping up ALL of it with the quickness.

During the recent Apple Music broadcast, Frank also hinted he had been working on new music in Malibu … something that has clearly worked for Anderson .Paak in the past.

Of course, he's already been announced as a headliner for Coachella 2023, so some fresh tracks would be well-timed and highly appreciated by fans.

R. Kelly is engaged to be married to one of his alleged victims, Joycelyn Savage ... at least that's what she's saying in a letter to the judge -- and her family says they had no idea.

According to legal docs, obtained by TMZ, Joycelyn revealed the engagement by writing, "I'm Robert Kelly's fiance" ... in her correspondence with the federal judge right before Kelly was sentenced. The letter, which she wrote asking the judge for a lenient sentence, doesn't say when they got engaged.

In the letter, she says ... "I’m not the victim that the government has portrayed me to be."

She goes on to say her relationship with Kelly is "amazing," noting he's the best thing that's ever happened to her. She claims he always made sure her needs were met, as well as "any other women he was with."

Obviously, she wasn't too successful in swaying the judge, who hit Kelly with a 30-year sentence.

Gerald Griggs, an attorney for Savage's parents, tells TMZ ... she never made the engagement known to the family, and they've never even spoken about the possibility beforehand.

Griggs tells us he finds it odd Savage didn't testify about it under oath, and instead slipped it into the letter submitted to the court. Savage's family "strongly doubts" the engagement story ... and are wishing to reconnect with her to get the full story.

Russell Wilson is clearly doing all he can to make sure he ain't the last NFL QB to come out of his household ... revealing Monday he's training Future Zahir to be a signal-caller too!

The Denver Broncos QB posted video of a recent workout sesh he had with Ciara's 8-year-old son ... and you can see, the kid appears to be a natural!

As Russ dictated how he wanted the boy to manipulate the pocket, Future Zahir complied with ease -- and then delivered a dart to the 33-year-old NFL star.

Russ also showed he's giving some quarterbacking lessons to the son of famous choreographer Jamaica Craft as well.

"Post workout work with the young fellas!" Russ said of the drills. "Future & Kingston young legends. Watch out @NFL."

Craft was appreciative of the time Wilson was spending with her son, penning a sweet thank you note to him on her IG.

"Kingston was learning from a living legend!!!!" she said. "Let’s Go God! So appreciative."

FYI, Wilson and Future Zahir -- Ciara's 1st child with rapper Future -- have been dabbling in QB drills for a couple of years now ... and in 2020, the 9x Pro Bowler called him his "best teammate" and a "QB in the making!"

Meek Mill and Jay-Z's Roc Nation are breaking up -- Hov's firm is no longer managing Meek's career after 10 years together.

Meek first linked with Roc Nation management back in 2012, and they nabbed plenty of triumphs and trophies together, collaborating on deals within the music biz.

The bombshell breakup comes shortly after the rapper vented extensively about his label situation with Atlantic Records.

Back in February, Meek lit up Atlantic on Twitter for allegedly dropping the ball on his last album, “Expensive Pain” and apparently ... it’s been downhill ever since.

The Roc unit was instrumental in helping him get out of jail in 2018, naming him a co-head for the social justice non-profit, Reform Alliance and putting him in rooms with tons of important people.

Billboard was first to report Meek's departure from RN.

As for why things soured between the 2 parties -- we're talking to sources on both sides, and we'll update this post as soon as we hear back.

Some tweets live forever -- a tough lesson Soulja Boy and Wizkid are learning the hard way, thanks to some ancient posts from the Afrobeats music star, and they ain't pretty from Soulja's perspective.

This tweet from May 10, 2010 popped up on Soulja's timeline -- “I swear soulja boy is wack!..jeeeezzzzz!”

The now-viral diss originally dropped about 3 years after Soulja's iconic “Crank Dat” hit, and nearly a decade before Wizkid linked with Drake to blow up on the American side with his “Come Closer” collab.

SB later launched an animated 15-minute Instagram Live session explaining “30 minutes or 30 years” still warrants a response ... and added that when you become rich and famous ... you should delete your old tweets that could lead to moments like this.

He’s not mad … just a lil mad. 😬

Kanye West's left his mark on a ton of industries -- shoes, clothing and even stem players -- and now he's laying the groundwork for what could be a retail store for all his wares.

Ye and his legal team recently filed to trademark "YZYSPLY" for retail stores, online ordering services and online retail store services. Fans might already be familiar with Yeezy Supply, a website Kanye has used to sell limited-release shoes or clothing in the past -- but the new trademark suggests he's going bigger ... possibly opening brick-and-mortar stores.

Kanye's latest filing, obtained by TMZ, includes just about every clothing item you can wear -- G-strings, shirts, socks, hats, visors and tennis wear -- and leaves plenty of creative room for "accessories" headwear and footwear.

Of course, he's already got a deal in place with GAP, and they recently dropped their first release of mostly black items ... including his now-famous full-face masks.

As more overzealous fans get handsy with rappers, the more consequences they face -- just ask this poor guy, who got ejected off stage through the force of Lil Baby's burly bodyguard.

The Atlanta MC was performing in Switzerland this week -- at the Openair Frauenfeld Festival, no less -- when at one point during his set ... some bloke crashed the performance and seemingly tried making contact with LB by rushing him.

You can see Lil Baby bracing for the dude, putting his arm out in what looks to be a deterrent move -- this while he was mid-rap -- but luckily ... security swooped right in the nick of time, and did so with some oomph.

As you can see, a guard bodied the intruder ... and sent him hurdling toward the front row barricade -- which he eventually slammed up against only to be left flailing on the ground.

Unclear what ended up happening to this man ... we imagine he was taken to a hospital, but may have also gotten rung up for the stunt. Interestingly enough, this isn't the first crazy encounter with a brave spectator. Roddy Ricch went through something similar this week.

That's not all ... even Cardi B had to unload on someone from the crowd who made contact during a performance of hers as well. In that instance, she handled the grabber herself.

All this going-up-on-stage-and-attacking-performers has been happening a lot more lately ... or at least we seem to be seeing it a lot more, anyway.

Nicki Minaj says she was just trying to make a funny ... and instead made all her fans believe she's pregnant again. Spoiler alert -- she's not.

Here's how it all went down ... before Nicki got on stage at London's Wireless Festival, she went Live on Instagram for a little pre-show chat with the Barbz. When one of them asked if she and Kenneth Petty were expecting their 2nd baby, she immediately responded, "I'm not fat, guys, I'm pregnant. Sorry" ... and then she rolled her eyes.

Of course, her screen was immediately flooded with congratulations and that's when Nicki realized ... "Oh wait. Did I say it wrong? I'm sorry. I think I said it wrong. I meant to say, I'm not pregnant. I'm fat."

Hmmm ... we're thinking Nicki's too social media savvy for that kinda screw-up. We smell a troll job, but a funny one. Nicki and her husband had their first kid, a baby boy, back in September 2020 -- and they still haven't revealed his name.

As we reported, Kenneth is gonna have a lot of face time with the kid, as he was sentenced to one year of home confinement -- in their luxurious Calabasas mansion -- for failing to register in California as a sex offender.

Travis Scott has the antidote for all the controversy surrounding his Coney Island concert -- a simple dinner date with Kylie Jenner ... 'cause no one could fault him for that. Right?

The couple was holding hands Saturday night in WeHo as they left Catch LA -- and while Kylie smiled for cameras, Travis seemed less than thrilled with the attention. He was rocking shades and a knitted cap, and kept his head down with zero facial expression.

As we've reported, Travis has been under fire for what went down at his show with Meek Mill over the 4th of July weekend at Coney Island. He stopped the show when some rowdy fans climbed up on a lighting truss, and made sure they got down safely.

That move set off some of the Astroworld victims ... in particular, attorney Alex Hilliard criticized the rapper, saying it showed he does know when to prioritize fan safety ... but chose not to do that during the tragic festival in Houston.

A rep for Travis fired back, though, saying, "It's beyond disappointing to see that - in a desperate bid to influence potential jurors – plaintiffs' legal team is criticizing Travis for pausing Monday's Coney Island show to ensure that fans can have fun safely. This is exactly the wrong message to send to fans and to artists."

Polo G's lawyer thinks cops in Miami did the rapper dirty by only releasing parts of his 2021 arrest that make him look like the bad guy ... but Miami PD is denying it released the bodycam footage.

Polo's attorney Bradford Cohen tells TMZ this is something he's never experienced in his decades of work ... law enforcement releasing what he calls "heavily redacted" body cam footage, and only "the parts that disparage the defendant."

Cohen says there are crucial moments in his arrest that were left out of the released video -- "They didn't show him getting slammed to the ground or the reason why was pulled over. Of course, they wouldn't show that."

The video does show Polo verbally berating one of the arresting officers, but Cohen says that is "part of being a police officer out in public, people are going to say things you are not going to like."

He thinks Miami PD was embarrassed because it had no probable cause to stop him or arrest him last June, and the case has been largely dismissed after Polo completed anger management classes.

Here's the wild card, though -- we asked Miami PD why it only released portions of the arrest, and a spokesman told us the department did NOT release the footage ... which first popped up Thursday on Twitter.

Guys and gals, take notes ... Russell Wilson and Ciara just put on a clinic for how to celebrate an anniversary -- getting in a romantic dinner in Italy AND personalized fireworks for the occasion!

TMZ Sports has learned ... the couple -- who have been across the pond for the last few days -- hit a swanky restaurant on Lake Como on Thursday to celebrate their sixth year of marriage.

The two looked very much in love as they dined ... but we're told they had to jet out of the place in somewhat of a hurry -- as they had a fireworks show to get to.

According to witnesses at the scene, the fireworks -- which lasted several minutes -- were shot out of a boat that had a sign reading, "Happy Anniversary."

Russ had made it known he was stoked for the day prior to the romantic evening ... writing in an emotional Instagram post, "God has blessed us for the past 6 years of Marriage with our 3 beautiful children and an overflow of laughter, love, & life."

"Cheers to forever. Happy Anniversary my love @Ciara ❤️ I Love You Mrs. Wilson."

Cardi B isn't standing, or sitting, for anyone getting handsy with her -- even her fans -- because she went off at the end of her show in London Friday night.

Cardi had just wrapped up her performance at the Wireless Festival, and was in the front row amongst fans. She was sitting on the shoulder of a security guard when she looked down into the crowd and started using her microphone to fend off someone.

We can't tell from the video exactly what was happening that pissed her off so much, but she got in a few good shots with the mic before dropping it on the crowd.

Seems like there was no further conflict after that. We've reached out to Cardi's camp to get some more detail about what went down.

This was her second consecutive night performing live -- just last night she was in Norway ... the first of several European dates she has coming up.

Russell Simmons and Boyz II Men singer Shawn Stockman are not seeing eye-to-eye when it comes to the current state of R&B -- and one thinks the other just has to get on board with the changing times.

We caught up with the OG hip hop mogul in West Hollywood to pick his brain on Shawn’s recent Twitter rant about R&B losing its identity, and blending into the rap world. Well, the Def Jam co-founder says it's not a matter of blaming one genre or another ... it’s simply a cultural shift.

You can hear Russell start to get peeved as he slams the notion of grouping rappers and singers together. He explains there are subgenres of rap and singing that fall underneath the same umbrella for commercial purposes.

Translation: hit records are blending the genres -- that's the culture right now -- but the unique genres of R&B and rap are still out there too.

We didn’t stop there ... Uncle Rush -- who was instrumental in the careers of Jay-Z, DMX, Method Man, Foxy Brown and many more -- also touched on the overnight wealth many rappers are enjoying lately.

Earlier in the week, we spoke to Yo Gotti’s new artist GloRilla after she received a $500K signing bonus for joining the CMG Squad.

At 64, Russ says he’s lived long enough to know shiny trinkets and lavish spending won’t make him whole.

While he advised GloRilla and other young rappers to save their bread, Russ also recognizes Gen Zers have to experience life on their own terms.

Ciara is back in her dance bag with her new single “Jump” … this is after fans have spent weeks debating whether Drake and Beyonce are abandoning their core sound to crossover into the dance scene.

Directed by music vid ace Dave Myers, the R&B princess showcases her jumping magic moves with body-positive dancers ... between shots of pop-locking on telephone wires, twerkin' in traffic, or doing cheers with the Winston-Salem State cheerleaders — who flew into Los Angeles just to be part of the shoot.

Cici’s new song comes on the heels of her signing a new label deal with Republic and Uptown Records weeks after she called out her former home Epic Records for “not believing” in her vision. The label let her walk hassle-free, though, with her masters.

The video also sports the high-energy talent of the new Los Angeles-based rap group Coast Contra, who tell TMZ Hip Hop ... the song will live “in the heart of every living creature with some rhythm!”

Consisting of twin brothers Ras and Taj Austin, Eric Jamal and Rio Loz, Coast Contra has been attracting famous co-signs from Swizz Beatz, Questlove, LL Cool J, Timbaland, Kevin Hart and now Ciara. It's a great follow-up to their debut album, “Apt. 505,” which dropped in March.

The Weeknd is being forced to postpone his first stadium show in his hometown of Toronto ... the result of a phone and Internet outage causing major issues north of the border.

Abel was supposed to have a big show at Rogers Centre Friday night in Toronto, the start of his After Hours til Dawn tour ... and he says he’s crushed and heartbroken by a factor totally out of his control.

Rogers Communications, one of Canada’s largest telecommunications companies, is experiencing a major outage affecting millions of wireless phone and Internet customers ... and Live Nation says the outage makes it impossible to put on the show until cell and Internet service are restored.

The Weeknd says he’s been at the venue all day and the last-minute postponement is out of his hands due to the outage. Abel says he tried his best to have the show go on but says operations and safety are compromised.