The straight dope on what's going on in Hip-Hop, Media and Entertainment

May 27, 2004

Following Nas' who re-released Illmatic this year, Bad Boy Records is set to release a re-mastered version of the Notorious B.I.G’s debut album “Ready To Die”. The digitally re-mastered CD/DVD will not only contain a few of Biggie’s biggest hits (“Unbelievable”, “Juicy” and “The What”) but unreleased tracks that were never available for purchase, "Dreams (of fucking an R&B Bitch)" and "Who Shot Ya."

Officially, Bad Boy has decided to release this CD after remembering Biggie on what would have been his thirty second birthday (May 21st) as a thank you to his fans as well as his mother Voletta Wallace. Along with the digitally re-mastered CD the DVD will include the music videos “Juicy”,” Big Poppa”, a long cinematic version of “Warning” and a never before seen performance of “Unbelievable" at an Outkast barbeque in Atlanta. The CD/DVD will hit stores July 13th. The original album sold over 4 million copies.

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Lil Jon isn't wasting any time placing calls for guest appearances on his forthcoming LP, Crunk Juice. The pimp-goblet-toting party-starter already has an all-star lineup — and he's just getting started.

"Right now I'm recording vocals with Ice Cube and R. Kelly, and that's just right off the bat," Jon said recently from Miami, where he was laying down tracks.

Although Jon's sound is the hottest thing in music right now, he also enlisted other producers to collaborate with as well. He and Rick Rubin go in the studio in a few weeks, and Timbaland has also joined the crunk circus.

"Me and Timbaland, we're doing a track together and it's going to be some next-level sh--," he said. "I think I'm going to put me, Ludacris and Usher on that track. So that sh-- is about to be monstrous."

Jon said it was no problem collaborating with Tim behind the boards because the respect level is so high between the two. "We ain't got egos," he insisted. The process of co-producing a track was relatively simple, according to Jon. He made a track, sent it over to the studio, and Timbaland made a beat to match it.

"Actually, it's done," the king of crunk divulged. "It's gonna be the hottest club record of the year. It's gonna be monstrous because it's Usher, Luda and me on another track — with Timbaland and me producing it. It could have the wackest lyrics in the world, but the beat is gonna be incredible."

We all know what happened the last time Jon, Luda and Usher got together: The blockbuster "Yeah!" was born. During his recording sessions with Usher last year, Jon and Mr. Entertainment also recorded a song called "Red Light" that didn't make the cut for the Confessions LP, but the Atlanta producer is optimistic it'll see the light of day soon.

" 'Red Light' is kinda a continuation to 'Yeah!' " Jon said. " 'Yeah!' is like, 'I don't know if I should mess with this chick, but f--- it, I'mma [mess with her].' Then 'Red Light' is him thinking about the [girl]. Like, 'Damn, this bi--- got me at the red light thinking about her.' Everybody's been at the red light like, 'Damn, that was some good-ass [sex].' "

And if you're going to make sweet love, Jon advises you to take a couple of swigs of his energy drink, also named Crunk Juice.

"It's going crazy in Atlanta, and we just dropped," Jon said, sounding amazed. "It's going all across the country. It'll be all around the South within the next month. Hopefully we can be in New York and California in the next two or three months. For the last couple of weeks [my] porno [movie] was the number one porno. I got my own sunglasses coming out. We're working on the Lil Jon action figure. Everything is just going well for me."

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EPMD member Erick Sermon will on June 29 release his fifth solo album, "Chilltown, New York." It's the first release from a new deal the artist signed late last year with Def Squad/Universal. The first single "Feel It" featuring Sean Paul reached No. 21 earlier this month on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles Sales chart.

The 17-track "Chilltown" sports collaborations with Sermon's Def Squad colleagues Redman ("Street Hop" and "Future Thug") and Keith Murray ("Listen"). Other guests include Talib Kweli and Whip Montez on "Chillin." The video for "Feel It" can be viewed on Sermon's official Web site.

The artist's last two solo sets, 2002's "React" and 2001's "[Music]," were issued through J Records. 1995's "Double or Nothing" and 1993's "No Pressure" were released by Def Jam. "React" debuted at No. 13 on Billboard's Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and No. 72 on The Billboard 200.