Come and join an emotional story about social redemption as seen through the eyes of Donald 'Hip Hop' Berry, a teenage high school bully. After experiencing head trauma from an automobile accident Hip Hop lies comatose on a hospital gurney when a devilish nightmare transports him back to the year 1855 and thrust him in the role of a plantation slave so he can get a taste of the disrespect he slam dunked on his fellow students. Hence, our story follows his torment when he is beaten with a bull whip; branded with a red-hot poker; forced to pick cotton; and forced to eat rotting food from a pig's trough. Finally, we will follow him and his adopted family's desperate attempt to flee the plantation with a pack of hungry dogs hot on their trail. We shall see how Hip Hop is forced to learn some valuable lessons about tolerating people different from himself, lessons that are remedial to the violent breaking news we see on TV every day. So for the sake of our families let's learn Hip Hop's lesson together; after all, can't one great lesson be enough for all of us?

Suge Knight, the founder of Death Row Records, the man at the center of the gangsta rap and hip-hop explosion, is a singular combination of showman, businessman, and Godfather, and a natural-born storyteller. In American Nightmare American Dream, he delivers the most candid, unflinching, and thoughtful account of his many lives. American Nightmarechronicles the inspirational story of Suge Knight's emergence from the ghetto streets of Compton to become one of the most significant and controversial personalities in the music industry. For the first time, Knight publicly addresses such subjects as the deaths of Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls; his notorious run-ins with music executives and producers; and countless provocative incidents involving former colleagues and friends, including Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, Vanilla Ice, Berry Gordy, Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, and Jennifer Lopez. In harrowing detail, he tells of the five years he spent behind bars-the shock and sadness of arriving at a place that he already knew intimately from stories heard since childhood, and the wisdom gained from being cut off from his former life. American Nightmareis also the story of a uniquely self-made man. The success of Death Row Records turned him into a multimillionaire who crossed impossible borders. He counted himself a friend of John F. Kennedy, Jr., and paid with hard time for his alleged association with known felons. His style of doing business-"bringing the ghetto into the boardroom"-has inspired admiration and fear in equal measure. Even as some in the music business profess to be afraid of him, he is hailed as a hero in Compton, for giving back to the community. He has instituted programs for single-parent families and children of incarcerated parents. In American Nightmare, he tells young people how terrible prison is, how important it is to get an education, and that there are more ways to get out of the ghetto than by being an athlete or a rapper. Suge Knight wants them to dream about success and then make it happen. Suge Knight's life story is a contemporary, urban version of the American rags-to-riches saga. It also uniquely illuminates the most important revolution in popular music of the past few decades-the emergence of gangsta rap and hip-hop into the mainstream. With dead-on humor and bracing candor, Suge Knight pays tribute to the hard lessons of his past, and offers a powerful answer to anyone who feels trapped by circumstances beyond their control: the example of a life lived boldly.

Tragedy and triumph leaps from every page of this sensational memoir by Chauncey "Chino Dolla" Stevens. This book chronicles the personal and professional adventure of a boy, blindly chasing his dreams to become a man. After the death of his grandmother Chino Dolla finds himself lost in the city streets of Atlanta, GA surrounded by drugs, money, and murder. Trying to run from his past demons Chino Dolla enters the world of entertainment by starting a record label called MasterMind Music. Through his record label he finds a piece of himself and introduces the world to a charismatic rapper by the name of Yung Joc. After executive producing Yung Joc's 2006 Platinum debut album "New Joc City", Chino Dolla not only finds himself face to face with some of the world’s most famous stars and underworld figures like P. Diddy, Jay-Z, Rick Ross, T.I., Beyonce, Big Meech, Young Jeezy, Janet Jackson, and more. It also brings him face to face with betrayal, deceit and the most horrific tragedy of his life. This well-written, educating, and entertaining memoir delivers a powerful message pertaining to following your dreams and making the right choices in life. A Hustlers Dream 1 is a MUST READ!

Punk Rock Warlord explores the relevance of Joe Strummer within the continuing legacies of both punk rock and progressive politics. It is aimed at scholars and general readers interested in The Clash, punk culture, and the intersections between pop music and politics, on both sides of the Atlantic. Contributors to the collection represent a wide range of disciplines, including history, sociology, musicology, and literature; their work examines all phases of Strummer’s career, from his early days as ’Woody’ the busker to the whirlwind years as front man for The Clash, to the ’wilderness years’ and Strummer’s final days with the Mescaleros. Punk Rock Warlord offers an engaging survey of its subject, while at the same time challenging some of the historical narratives that have been constructed around Strummer the Punk Icon. The essays in Punk Rock Warlord address issues including John Graham Mellor’s self-fashioning as ’Joe Strummer, rock revolutionary’; critical and media constructions of punk; and the singer’s complicated and changing relationship to feminism and anti-racist politics. These diverse essays nevertheless cohere around the claim that Strummer’s look, style, and musical repertoire are so rooted in both English and American cultures that he cannot finally be extricated from either.

From the concert stage to the dressing room, from the recording studio to the digital realm, SPIN surveys the modern musical landscape and the culture around it with authoritative reporting, provocative interviews, and a discerning critical ear. With dynamic photography, bold graphic design, and informed irreverence, the pages of SPIN pulsate with the energy of today's most innovative sounds. Whether covering what's new or what's next, SPIN is your monthly VIP pass to all that rocks.

In this marvelously original book, three-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Leslie Savan offers fascinating insights into why we’re all talking the talk—Duh; Bring it on!; Bling; Whatever!—and what this reveals about America today. Savan traces the paths that phrases like these travel from obscure slang to pop stardom, selling everything from cars (ads for VWs, Mitsubishis, and Mercurys all pitch them as “no-brainer”s) to wars (finding WMD in Iraq was to be a “slam dunk”). Real people create these catchy phrases, but once media, politics, and businesses broadcast them, they burst out of our mouths as celebrity words, newly glamorous and powerful. Witty, fun, and full of thought-provoking stories about the origins of popular expressions, Slam Dunks and No-Brainers is for everyone who loves the mysteries of language.