Can you picture Biggie with a lightsaber? Hard to imagine, huh? Well, it looks like producers Richie Branson and Solar Slim have created an auditory aid to help fans visualize such epic imagery. Putting their spin on the Brooklyn rapper’s album Life After Death, Branson and Slim smoothly mash up two legends of cinema and music by introducing Star Wars elements to Biggie’s aesthetic in such a seamless manner. With the upcoming release of the latest installment in the Star Wars series, Star Wars: Episode VII, listening to this project is a great way to get ready for the seventh chapter and further celebrate Biggie’s timelessness.

Listen to the Star Wars rendition of Biggie’s Life After Death,  Life After Death Star below:

The post Biggie’s ‘Life After Death’ Gets a New Spin From the Dark Side appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

Christopher Wallace, better know to the world as Notorious B.I.G., was gunned down on March 9, 1997.

While it’s important to mourn the loss of one of the most influential MCs ever, it’s just as important to celebrate the life. The good people over at ego trip scored an interview with Ebon Heath, who lead the design team responsible for the above album cover. You can read the full interview here, and take a look at the two unearthed concept covers down below.

And then it was crazy because once we were doing all the comps we still didn’t know [the graveyard photos] would play such a part in the branding of it. When we were doing all the comps we were still going for the bright shit. And we did rounds and rounds and Puff just wasn’t happy. We had this one that I really thought we’d gotten it, where we were doing a whole clear jewel-case and just silk-screening the packaging on there so everything was clear. And it was just [Big] sort of walking in silhouette through the clouds, like really simple. Even the disc was on silver. Everything was really subtle and beautiful. We did the whole comp like, that’s the winner, that’s the winner!

And yeah, nah. [Puffy] finally wound up choosing that [eventual] shot [from the graveyard], and we just switched to dark. Once he chose that for the cover we just went dark. We went with blind embosses, and we started burning all this type and we did all this shit with ash. Just really trying to push that sense of the fire and the ash. And then even that was pulled back to what it finally became. But this was all still before [Big] passed. All this shit was done before he passed.

The post Unreleased Alternate <em>Life After Death</em> Album Covers appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

Spike Lee‘s newest project is sure to have some serious hip-hop ties.  You’re Nobody ‘Til Somebody Kills You, the newest Spike Lee joint, isn’t set to premiere until September, but an obvious rap influence has helped create some buzz.  In addition to appearances from hip-hop staples Doug E. Fresh, Big Daddy Kane and Ed Lover, the title of the movie is drawn from Notorious B.I.G.’s track, “You’re Nobody“, off his album Life After Death.  The film pits two NYC homicide detectives at odds with a serial killer who is murdering some of the hip-hop game’s brightest stars.  I’m sure y’all don’t need any impetus to go see a Spike Lee production, but if it helps the film debuts at the Williamsburg International Film Festival.  To be fair Spike is executive producing the film, while Michael A. Pinckney will handle the directing, but I’m game either way.

The post New Film: Spike Lee – You’re Nobody ‘Til Somebody Kills You appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

Da Brat (AKA Shawntae Harris) has dropped her new mixtape, Life After Death, and her collaboration with some big names have only increased the hype.  Hopefully, Da Brat will recapture some of the notoriety that helped her debut album, Funkdafied, make her the first female rapper to go platinum.  Jadakiss and Twista decided to get involved and each worked with Da Brat on tracks 4 and 9 respectively.

Check out the mixtape HERE

The post Da Brat’s New Mixtape: Life After Death appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.