Parliament / Funkadelic guitarist Garry Shider has passed away aged just 56.  The NJ born guitarist co-wrote a number of classic tracks including 'Cosmic Slop' (1973) and 'One Nation Under a Groove' (1978). Shider, who was known as 'Diaperman' due to his wearing of a loincloth on stage, reportedly died at home in Upper Marlboro, MD.  Shider has been diagnosed with brain and lung cancer earlier this year.  R.I.P. Garry Shider.

Jay-Z's autobiography has been written for four years now but the rapper is loathe to see it hit the shelves as he claims it is too personal. Jay-Z revealed that the book, which was co-written with Dream Hampton, details many things he has already spoken on in songs, "It’s too much. For the book, I was interviewed, people close to me were interviewed, so I was learning a lot of things I didn’t know as a child," Jay added, "It’s not anything I haven’t said in the past, in songs. It’s just more detailed… You can say exactly how everything went." Jay-Z went on to reveal that while the book is unlikely to ever be released the experience of writing it gave him a fresh perspective on his father, who walked out when Jay was 11, "It was still wrong… that he left, but he did stick around at a time when it wasn’t cool or popular. He married my mom at a time when guys were just leaving, and you’d never even meet your dad." Jay-Z concluded, "So it (the book) made me ease up a little bit in how I felt about him."

Rapper Lil Boosie has officially been indicted on a 1st degree murder charge and now could face the death penalty if convicted. Boosie, real name Torrance Hatch, has been charged for his alleged role in the murder of Terry Boyd. Police say that Boosie and two men, Michael Louding and Adrian Pittman, fired shots into Boyd's home and allegedly were also in possession of ecstasy, codeine and marijuana. Louding and Pitman have also been charged with first degree murder while all three men were charged with conspiracy for their part in the act. In addition to Lil' Boosie, Pittman, and Louding, District Attorneys say that Jared Williams, Kendrick Johnson, Johnathan Rogers and Ryan "Sneaks" Carroll have all been charged with first degree murders. Carroll and Rogers are both minors, but will be charged as adults. A district attorney said the death penalty was not out of the question. Boosie, who is currently incarcerated after a judge ordered him to serve time for probation violation, has also been indicted for conspiring with a girlfriend, another inmate and a former correctional officer of smuggling synthetic marijuana, marijuana pills and codeine into the prison. Court records show the charges that Lil Boosie faces:
 
TORRENCE HATCH, A/K/A "LIL BOOSIE" 27, 1132 POMPEY
Status: already incarcerated at Dixon Correctional Institute
1st Degree Murder of Terry Boyd, 35, shot to death inside his residence at 16837 Vermillion Drive on 10/21/09. The shots were fired from outside home through a window.
3 counts PWITD Narcotics (Schedule II-Codeine, Schedule I-Ecstacy and Schedule I-Marijuana)
3 counts Conspiracy to commit PWITD Narcotics
2 counts Conspiracy to Introduce Contraband into a Penal Institution
 
Things aren't looking good for Lil Boosie...spoke to him not too long ago, and would not ever have imagined...

Word has it that Keyshia Cole is expecting her second child with basketball player Daniel 'Boobie' Gibson. The pair welcomed a baby boy into the world on March 2nd but a member of Keyshia's family has revealed that the singer may be pregnant again, "I can't say whether [Keyshia and Daniel] planned it like this or not. All I know is that I'm hearing that she's pregnant." Congratulations?

A new book, titled, 'The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black Leaders: U.S. Intelligence’s Murderous Targeting of Tupac, MLK, Malcolm, The Panthers, Hendrix, Marley, Rappers & Linked Ethnic Leftists,' claims that Death Row Records was used to undermine Black activism and particularly Tupac Shakur. The book’s author, Baltimore area native and Columbia University graduate John Potash, claims that 2pac was deliberately targeted by the government, like other black leaders, due to his growing influence in the African-American community, through Hip-Hop music. Potash asserted, "What I think it was was that he had become the most influential black man in the black community in the country. The CIA and U.S. intelligence, what they have to do is win the hearts and minds of the people. They don't want to control us by force, they want us to control ourselves by having us believe in a certain way - that we don't need national health care, for example. And here, Tupac was threatening to win over the hearts and minds of people, he was able to counter so much of the propaganda in the black community." The book followed ten years of research and drew on court testimony, FBI documents and a number of previously unseen documents provided by The Black Panthers to Potash. Potash went on to claim that the government was definitely involved in the operation of Death Row Records as part of a continued attempt to harass Shakur and derail his career, "I believe that Death Row Records, which included dozens and dozens of police officers at all levels, according to a high-level police officer that investigated them, was a front company and was trying to continue penal coercion and mess up [2Pac's] head."

Dr. Dre has addressed a track which features Jay-Z that was leaked onto the Internet. The song, called 'Under Pressure,' has drawn criticism from various sources but Dr. Dre has revealed that the song is not yet finished. Dre used his official website to issue a s statement, "I want to set the record straight for everybody who's been waiting to hear my music, the song that's on the Internet is an incomplete song that I'm still working on. When it's ready, you'll be hearing it from me."