Pop the Trunk

The boys are back and the crew opens up talking hoops, the World Cup, and why American sports broadcasts hit different. From there it's straight into a milestone: Vinnie's debut solo album, Season of the Assassin, just passed its 16th anniversary, and the guys sit down to break down how it actually came together. Vinnie gets into why he waited as long as he did to go solo, the uncertainty of stepp...

Vinnie flies solo this week to break down Jaron "Boots" Ennis's dominant, multi-knockdown stoppage of Xander Zayas that unified the 154-pound titles at the DAZN’s Barclays Center PPV. He also covers the rest of that card (Jahi Tucker's win, a controversial Ben Whitaker stoppage loss), runs through news and notes — Usyk vacating his heavyweight belts, Floyd Mayweather's exhibition falling through a...

Vinnie and Billy hold things down two-man-band style with Brendan out this week, and crack open the mailbag for a round of listener mail and recommendations — including no shortage of opinions on the top 50 list they've got cooking. They also bring back a beloved segment from Broad Street Breakdown and things get weird from there: a debate over psychics and mediums, an unexpected detour into a hea...

Boots Ennis and Xander Zayas finally collide for two junior middleweight titles, and the boys can't wait any longer to break it all down. From the questionable promotion (thanks, Knicks playoff run and World Cup chaos) to the undercard sleepers worth watching, no angle gets left on the table — including a few overdue predictions on exactly how this one ends. Plus: news on Joshua-Fury's bizarre ven...

Hip-hop runs on competition and nothing fuels it like a good beef. In this episode, the fellas do a deep dive into the genre's most legendary rivalries, tracing the lineage from the earliest battles through the records, subliminals, and feuds that shaped rap history. Some squashed it, some didn't get the chance to. We break down who we think really won.

The boys are back, and this week there's an elephant in the room the size of Madison Square Garden. Vinnie and Billy are doing their best to ignore it, but Brendan isn't making it easy. The Knicks just won the championship and someone in the studio is way too happy about it — and it isn't the Philly guys. The debate over whether Wu-Tang's halftime performance had anything to do with the outcome is...

The crew weighs in on the NBA Finals and what it really costs to be a New York Knicks fan these days. From there, the conversation shifts into hip hop beef culture and where the line is between sport and disrespect. Then Vinnie tells the story of a journalist interview that spiraled into something far more serious — and why federal agents ended up at his show because of it. That leads to a discuss...

The crew kicks things off with a tale of restaurant frustration that snowballs into a broader conversation about bad service, false promises, and the unwritten code between businesses and their customers. From there, the episode digs into Complex's viral Top 50 New York Rappers of All Time list — and the crew has plenty to say. They debate whether the list is a legitimate ranking, deliberate rage...

Vinnie holds it down solo while his co-hosts sit this one out in lieu of other shenanigans. He runs through a loaded boxing news cycle — Lomachenko's retirement reversal, Canelo's next move, the Wardley-Dubois rematch situation, and more — before breaking down the main event everyone's been arguing about: Usyk vs. Verhoeven at the Pyramids in Giza. Was Rico closer than anyone expected, or did the...

The mailbag is back! The crew gets into the creative process behind writing rhymes, whether a perfect album is a perfect album regardless of genre, and what happens when ego convinces someone they're an expert in everything. Billy's history with Heelys comes out, fan art makes its way into the studio, and a listener writing in from Berlin has some catching up to do. Tune in for Episode 15 of Pop t...

After the slept-on rappers episode sparked a wave of responses from the audience, Vinnie and Brendan discuss names that didn't make the original list, artists whose careers took hard left turns, and a few who quietly reinvented themselves in ways nobody saw coming. From Philly legends to Long Island crews to a Queens MC who ended up writing for Beyoncé, the conversation covers artists who deserved...

The crew kicks off Episode 13 fired up, sleep-deprived, and somehow already arguing before the intro wraps. They draw battle lines on AI and Brendan drops a Mother’s Day story of a dinner gone sideways. Vinnie and Billy express their Philly sports rage and a full indictment of New York franchises enters the picture. Somewhere between an argument nobody wins, a holiday that went completely off the...

Pop the Trunk went live for the first time ever, and there was no safety net. What you heard was what it was. The crew wasted no time getting into it, from a big boxing weekend to the NBA playoffs, bad bets, and stories from the streets of South Philly that you genuinely had to be there for. From there it turned into exactly what Pop the Trunk does best: wrestling history, hip hop history, and the...

The boys are back. Vinnie and Brendan are back for a weekend of boxing you can't afford to sleep on. Before they get into the fights, there's no shortage of news — from a massive heavyweight announcement that's been a long time coming, to promotional shake-ups and signings that are quietly reshaping the landscape. Then it's fight time. Two pound-for-pound monsters. Two cards that demand your atten...

No guest, no filter. Vinnie, Brendan, and Billy go deep on one of hip hop's most unspoken rules — everybody got put on by somebody. From The Jaz (Jaz-O) opening doors for Jay, to Dre's Aftermath becoming a graveyard for careers that never were, the crew breaks down the co-sign, what it's worth, and what happens when it doesn't deliver. Junior Mafia, Wu-Tang affiliates, Two Chains betting on himsel...

Scott Vogel, frontman of Terror, joins the crew for Episode 10, before heading out on a six-and-a-half-week North American tour behind Terror's new record Still Suffer . What starts as a technical difficulty turns into an instant PTT classic moment. Once connected, Scott and Vinnie go deep on the parallels between hardcore and hip hop culture, tracing their origins from Black Sabbath and Run DMC t...

Vinnie finally gets his studio engineer and longtime collaborator Scott Stallone out of the lab and in front of a mic to talk about it all — the Ruffhouse era, the flood that destroyed his studio the night they finished Legacy of Blood , and what he's been building behind the scenes ever since. Twenty-one years in, they pull back the curtain on how their sessions actually work, why Scott barely ta...

Pop the Trunk Presents: Knock 'Em Out the Box — Bonus Episode (Ep. 206) This is not a Pop the Trunk episode — this is the one the Knocker Nation has been asking for. After a long hiatus, Vinnie and Brendan are back in their corners for a bonus round of Knock 'Em Out the Box, the boxing podcast that started it all. No guests, no hip-hop detours — just straight boxing talk, picking up at Episode 206...

Pop the Trunk is officially in the building! Episode 8 marks the first time the show records in-studio, and the crew is joined by Philadelphia legends Outerspace — Planetary and Crypt the Warchild — for a conversation 28 years in the making. They go all the way back: Puerto Rican families landing in Philly, finding each other in East Oak Lane, older brothers as the cheat code into hip hop, and the...

The guys pick up where they left off, with Vinnie settling the record on some yellow journalism that's been circulating since last episode — and Brendan may or may not be heading to HR for a pre-show text that nearly ended the whole thing before it started. From there, the crew sits down for a full Pop the Trunk Pause, watching and breaking down the music video for "Cheese Steaks" off God of the S...

In this episode of Pop the Trunk, the boys dive deep into the unwritten rules of backstage etiquette, Vinnie’s run in with a little person, the lack of respect for hip-hop's architects, and the chaotic reality of life behind the curtain.

The boys open up the Pop the Trunk Mailbag ! From the "unintentionally funny" rise of Nu-Metal to the crossover of 90s skateboard culture. The guys also dive deep into the legendary Chung King Studios , sharing a classic (and chaotic) story about Foxy Brown "wildin" over a missing turkey burger. Plus, we pay tribute to the late, great Bob Power , the sonic architect behind A Tribe Called Quest and...

In this landmark episode of Pop the Trunk , Vinnie and Brendan welcome their very first guest to the show: the legendary MC Esoteric (Czarface, Army of the Pharaohs, 7L & Esoteric). Spanning over three decades of friendship and collaboration, this conversation dives deep into the "cheat codes" of discovering hip-hop culture as outsiders and the relentless "delusion" require...

In this episode, the boys dive deep into the monumental release of Wu-Tang Forever . Vinnie breaks down the sheer impossibility of the group's lineup, comparing the collective brilliance of the nine members to finding "ten John Lennons and McCartneys" in a single project. Vinnie also shares personal stories of hearing the record in real-time while guest-hosting with Bahamadia on Phil...

The boys are back for Episode 2 of Pop the Trunk! Vinnie and Brendan take a deep dive into the bloodbath that is the music industry, reflecting on Vinnie’s 30-year journey from 1996 to the present day. In this installment, Vinnie breaks down his "no plan B" mentality, detailing how an obsession with hip-hop culture and the "unmitigated gall" to do things independently kept him...