Hayes music will still be the soundtrack for a groovy Friday night with your foxy lady, a funky good time at a modern day juke joint, or theme music to your Saturday afternoon cleaning ritual. He is still our past and present all in one. Future generations should take notes from Black Moses’ ability to let the music speak, even though he no longer can.

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It’s very easy to talk about Mr. Mac’s cussin’ and vulgarity, but very difficult to see his evolution. He went from doing comedy on the train in Chi town to having his own FAMILY television show. And you know white folks ain’t in the business of giving too many black folks their own show!!

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What is hard to fathom, personally, is why in this era of relentless media inquest, do men like Detroit Mayor Kwame M. Kilpatrick, President Bill Clinton, Jesse Jackson, and others keep getting caught with their pants down?

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It could be the relationship needs some shaking up, but there’s nothing wrong with doing a personal inventory. On a real serious note, you shouldn’t stay with a woman just because you have history. It could be bad history in disguise. Be sure you’re in it for the right reasons..

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There is hip hop outside of the billboard charts. Artists like Killer Mike, Little Brother, Dead Prez, and Jean Grae–to name a few–are dope but rarely get their just desserts when it comes to folks ‘best rappers” lists. Lil Wayne’s flow is sick, but to say he saved hip hop discounts the contributions of so many underappreciated hip hop heads keeping the spirit alive.

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In most cases, money in and of itself is not a problem. But it’s the messages that comes with the money that can make it dangerous. For example, in hip hop, artists are praised for being thugs, gangsters and pimps…not for being scholars.

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To be frank, Erykah Badu is further from the stereotype of project baby mamas than the Pluto is to Earth. The key difference is Badu ain’t runnin’ around lookin’ for the next man payin’ for nails and hair with a car to take her shoppin’. She has built sound relationships with some cool brothers and it didn’t work out the way we, on the outside, thought it should.

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Nothing says internal confliction like the case of R. Kelly. Personally, when I hear his music, I don’t know whether to step in the name of love or call for an exorcism. Most importantly, you have to separate Brother Kelly’s genius as an artist from his personal demons.

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My late Grandma Elizabeth Lowe said it best. “you teach people how to treat you.” In your interpersonal interactions with men, you may be giving “tell tell” signs that you are willing to accept playing second fiddle.

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I wrote a poem (circa 2000) called ‘F— Jesse’ in response to his comments about the movie ‘Barbershop’. The way I remember it he took a joke from the movie completely out of context. So I called his ass out in the great city of East Lansing (Ed and BPS produced one hell of an event) and my sentiments for him have not changed. Mr. Keep Hope Alive suffers from the sense of entitlement plaguing our civil rights leaders.

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