According to Los Angeles Times writer Chuck Philips, recently surfaced police records prove the LAPD’s assertion that Christopher Wallace, or the Notorious B.I.G., was not murdered by rogue cops on behalf of Death Row head Suge Knight. That theory, first floated by former detective Russell Poole, alleges that Knight hired corrupt officer David Mack to kill Wallace in retaliation for the shooting of Tupac Shakur...

The documents recently surfaced when Mack included them in a motion challenging the unrelated conviction for bank robbery he is currently serving time for. Philips writes that the police records disprove several aspects of Poole’s theory including the notion that Mack had a shrine to Tupac in his garage, and that he offered another officer a job working security for Knight. Much of the information that Poole used to build his theory came from two other LAPD detectives, Brian Tyndall and Greg Grant. Grant has since retired and Tyndall now heads a task force created last year to reinvestigate the murder.

Poole has also left the police force and testified as an expert witness on behalf of the Wallace family in a wrongful death lawsuit they filed against the City of Los Angeles. That suit ended in a mistrial in July 2005 when the presiding judge expressed concerns that the LAPD had withheld evidence. Mack and associate Amir Muhammad were originally named as defendants in that case, but were later dropped when both the LAPD and the FBI dismissed them as suspects. The Wallace family has since refiled the lawsuit and it is scheduled to move forward in federal court this summer. Chuck Philips has written extensively for the Los Angeles Times on the murders of Tupac Shakur and Biggie.

Source: XXL
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"First, I want to say that Little Brother has not been dropped fromAtlantic," Rapper Pooh told HipHopGame. "At this time we are in theprocess of negotiating our release from the label due to a difference in philosophies."

"We asked to be released," Manager Big Dho added. "I think we may just put the album out on Asylum to close our deal, but it's definitely a wrap for us at Atlantic. We weren't happy with how things were going and we decided we wanted to leave and on their end, they decided that they didn't want to deal with that either."

"It's no big deal though," Dho added. "Nobody on our end is mad or has any ill feelings towards their company."

"It wasn't a situation where they decided to drop us due to lack of sales," Pooh said. "If that was the case, they never would have opened up the budget for us to record Getback ."

Getback, Little Brother's third album, is close to completion but has no release date yet.

"We as a group just felt that it was not in our best interest to remain in a situation where our needs were constantly being overlooked. We didn't have an A&R for The Minstrel Show. We don't have any type of relationship with our current A&R. There are just a lot of internal issues that ended up working against us.

"Pooh also addressed the rumors regarding producer 9th Wonder's involvement, or lack thereof, in Little Brother's Getback. "LittleBrother has decided, in the best interest of the group, for LittleBrother and 9th Wonder to part ways. There are no hard feelings and no beef. This is just a decision that had to be made so all three of us could move forward and continue to provide the world with dope music.

Little Brother's latest mixtape, And Justus For All, mixed by DJ Mick Boogie, will be available for download February 13. "The decision to release And Justus For All via download was a decision made by us. After the Drama situation, we felt it was in the best interest of all of us to just give this mixtape away with the current climate of the mixtape scene."

And Justus For All will be available for download February 13. More details on where to download it will be given closer to the release date.
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Sean 'Diddy" Combs and Jay-Z are reportedly in negotiations with Comcast to launch a Video On Demand channel with urban themed programming.

According to the New York Post, the two hip-hop entrepreneurs along with Harvey and Bob Weinstein attended a meeting at the cable giant's head offices in Philadelphia last week.

A source close to the Post described the meeting as "a getting-acquainted session and a chance to bounce around ideas about urban programming."
Comcast currently has a 50 percent stake in BET's leading competitor, TV ONE, but the outlet lacks an on urban on demand video channel.

The source also revealed that if the channel was to materialize, Hov and Diddy would function less as operators than as magnets to attract talent to the new channel.
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It's been a long time coming, but it looks as if Redman's long-overdue return to the game, Red Gone Wild: Thee Album, will see release on March 27th, via Def Jam. The album will be the first of a proposed two albums to be released in 2007, with Muddy Waters 2 to be released in November, much like Ghostface did with Fishscale and More Fish. Red Gone Wild will see production support from Timbaland, Eminem, Erick Sermon, Rockwilder, and Scott Storch, as well as added contributions from the Def Squad and the Gilla House family, which consists of E3, Melanie, Saukrates, Icarus, Ready Rock, and Runt Dog. Ludacris and Ghostface have also been mentioned as guest artists (in the original 2005 solicitation), however it's unclear if these songs will be included on the final release of the LP.
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As reported today in the New York Times, legendary producer Rick Rubin - who's creative body of work began with the co-creation of Def Jam and most recently wrapping production for the forthcoming LP from Linkin Park - has been offered the position of co-chairman of Columbia Records. For almost 20 years now, Rubin has headed up his own imprint, American Recordings, which just in the last two years has just been moved under the Warner Music Group family tree, while Rubin has produced for a wide variety of artists for a number of different labels, including The Beastie Boys, Jay-Z, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Dixie Chicks, and countless others. Speculation suggests that an executive position for Rubin at Columbia could be looked at as a potential conflict of interest with Warner, forcing them to sweeten the deal to encourage him not to take the job. As of right now, niether WMG or Columbia were able to comment.