From Definitive Jux:

MP3: Yak Ballz - "DSMU"

Word on the streets is that Yak Ballz is releasing a track a month from his highly anticipated record Gas Galaxy.  Here is the first in the series and it's a banger. Check it.

Music Icon Al Bell (Stax Records and Motown Records) and New York Artistpreneur Creature (Coffee Grind Media) Partner on “Stylemakers-Rulebreakers Music Series” in New York City

The partnership between Bell and Creature will officially be announced at the new Harlem Aloft Hotel located at 2296 Frederick Douglass Avenue New York, NY 10027 on Wednesday February 23rd from 6:30pm to 8:30pm, with special musical performance by young teen rock sensation and NYC’S own Graveshift.

Al Bell received a 2011 GRAMMY® Trustees Award, the highest honor recognizing individuals for outstanding contribution to the music industry in a non-performing capacity.

Bell became a co-owner of Stax Records and grew the company into the second-largest black-owned business of the 70’s. Now at 70, he seems newly invigorated and has discovered New York artistpreneur Siddiq Booker AKA Creature.

After selling more than 12,000 copies of his debut album, “Never Say Die,” directly to fans in less than a year, Creature wrote a book about his “on-the grind” experiences in order to teach the art of independent entrepreneurship in hip-hop, “The Underdog’s Manifesto: A Guerilla Artist’s Path to Independence.” When you acknowledge that this is Creature’s daily routine, it becomes clear that this MC is the perfect example of hip hop grind. Creature hosts a monthly artist showcase call "the Coffee Grind" in Soho for new artist who seek his knowledge from across the globe.

Bell and Creature are partnering to take this live music performance platform to another level. The music series will offer patron’s access to tastemaker events featuring unsigned artists as well as special guest appearances by today’s recognized superstar entertainers and legendary artists. Bell and Booker are creating an “iconoclasts” of creative visionaries whose passion for what they do will transform music culture.

Twice a month a collection of artists will appear before their peers asking for their support and allegiance to a career that can be elevating and deconstruct in the same breath. While several hundred may witness it in person, millions around the world may capture the visual spectacle through virtual realization by many derivatives of electronic media.

We featured Creature on RapReviews in 2007.

From Future iMag:

Video: Funkmaster Flex Talks Lil Wayne, Drake, LL

Video: Yung Humma f/ Flynt Flossy - "Lemme Smang It"

Video: 8 Bit Duane vs. The Plasmas - "Contra 2010"

Video: Brentalfloss & Mega Ran - YuleCon Freestyle

From @jpizzlemusic:

Video: J. Pizzle - "Freedom"

It looks like the "Road to Redemption" had a few bumps in it. Rap star T.I. (real name Clifford Harris Jr.) and MTV are both being sued by the family of Joseph Williams for including his deceased person in an episode of T.I.'s reality TV show about turning around the lives of seven troubled teens. T.I. used the late Mr. Williams as an example of a "hustler" who had taken the wrong path, taking one of the teenagers on "Road to Redemption" to see where a life of wrong-doing could lead. The elder Mr. Williams says that the family never gave MTV or anyone else permission to use their son's body on the reality show, they disapprove of his portrayal as a "hustler," the funeral home should have cremated him long before T.I. could make an example out of him, and that they are entitled to compensation for emotional damages. The episode in question aired over two years ago. Our thanks to VladTV and Ology for confirming the details of this story. We'll let you know if T.I. settles with the family or decides to fight it out in civil court.