Words Matter Pod w/ Akil Pinnock

We’re back. In the second and final part of episode 42, Mr. Allen and I speak about Hip-Hop being the most honest genre of music, the difference between public relations and journalism, why he made the subject of the project turtablism instead of any of the other three elements of Hip-Hop. He spoke about creating a DJ septet as a Hip-Hop re-imagining of a big band, the erasure of the DJ in rap gro...

We got another two parter y’all! We have Harry Allen, one of three of the 2024-2025 Nasir Jones Hip-Hop Fellows from the Harvard Hip Hop Archive. Mr. Allen is a longtime Hip-Hop journalist, media personality, educator, and member of the legendary Public Enemy. Today, we’re here to speak about his fellowship project harbanger. In his own words, harbanger is a turntablist septet, and an experimental...

This week’s guest is James Pitt, founder of American Felon TV. American Felon TV is a social media and YouTube platform that documents crimes and landmark events in his life and Rockland County, NY. While I understand many in the comments may interpret the existence of American Felon TV as a platform that’s stuck in the past and glorifies crime, to Pitt, he’s telling these stories as a method to d...

Welcome back. As promised, we’re back with part two of  Crunk as a Resistance  w/ Dr. Kevin C. Holt. In part two, Dr. Holt speaks about the Memphis sound of Three 6 Mafia and Miami Bass being the forefathers of Crunk, Atlanta’s local Bass artists becoming local celebrities, how Atlanta’s version of Bass turned into Crunk, Lil Jon being the face of Crunk, Atlanta’s wealth gap, Kendrick Lamar’s last...

We got another two parter and it’s very nerdy! Today’s guest is Dr. Kevin C. Holt, Assistant Professor of Critical Music Studies at SUNY Stony Brook University,  one of three of Harvard Universities 2024-2025 Nasir Jones Hip-Hop Fellows, and author of  I Bet You Won’t Get Crunk! The Performative Resistance of Atlanta Hip-Hop Party Music . In part one of this interview, Dr. Holt and I speak about t...

Today’s guest is Brian ‘Z’ Zisook. Co-founder and Senior Vice President of Global Operations and head of Artist and Label Services at Audiomack, an artist first music streaming platform that allows artists to upload music and fans to stream and download songs. He is also one of the founders of DJ Booth, a mixtape hosting streaming service and later, an industry leader in music journalism that ente...

In part two, Dr. Boyd and I discuss the complicated legacy of Sylvia Robinson, founder of Sugarhill Records and if The Sugarhill Gang are “industry plants,” the kinship between hip-hop and jazz and why ultimately, hip-hop will be heard in the same prestigious cultural venues as jazz music. He also spoke on why MCing and DJing are the only elements of Hip-Hop that can be commodified, lyrics being u...

Today’s guest is none other than The Notorious PhD, Dr. Todd Boyd. Outside of his informative cultural commentary on basically every documentary ever made, Dr. Boyd has been a tenured professor in The University of Southern California's Cinematic Arts department for over 30 years. He’s written various articles and essay’s, co-wrote and produced 1999’s cult-classic, The Wood, and is the author of e...

For the second time, we have Blvk H3ro. By the time this episode is released, H3ro will be on tour for his debut album, On A Mission, so I was happy he was able to sit down with Words Matter Pod before he got super busy on the road. In this week’s episode, we spoke about what it feels like to release your debut album, his music reflecting his personal growth, bridging the gap between the younger a...

It’s good to be back! This week we have licensed psychotherapist, public speaker, podcaster, stand-up comic and author of Solution-Focused Brief Therapy with Clients Managing Trauma, The Solution Focused Marriage: 5 Simple Habits That Will Bring Out the Best in Your Relationship, Solution Building in Couples Therapy, The Art of Solution Focused Therapy and the Solution Focused Brief Therapy Diamon...

And we're back for part two. In the second and my favorite part of "The only thing constant is change," w/ film and tv editor Kristin Valentine. Valentine spoke about the intricacies of editing process as well as her favorite part of the process. She had a long list of editors she admires, she brought up a common but accurate cliché regarding editing being the final re-write of the s...

Sorry for the hiatus y'all, but today's episode is worth the wait. We had the pleasure of interviewing film and television editor, Kristin Valentine. Hailing from Indianapolis, Indiana, Valentine spoke about being a mathematician by trade as a data analyst for the Department of Defense before moving to Los Angeles to pursue a career in Hollywood. In part one of this interview, we spent som...

We’re back at CREATIVE SOUNDZ RECORDING STUDIOS, this time with owner, overall renaissance man, Grammy Award winner, Pusha Rod. Rod spoke about growing up on the East Side of South Central Los Angeles, but never allowing the negative stereotypes about his community define him, while also taking accountability for the roles he's played in his life. After spending so much of his youth involved i...

Carl LeGrett is Senior Director of A&R/Publishing at Create Music Group, an independent data-driven media and technology company, that focuses on transparency with its creators. Aside from his work of finding talent, LeGrett has uncovered millions of dollars in unclaimed royalties for Create's artists, a practice not often synonymous with traditional record label structure. Last week, I sa...

As promised, we’re back with Part. II of Rebel with a Cause w/ Grammy Award nominated reggae artist, Blvk H3ro. In the second and final part of this episode, H3ro speaks about what it means to be an independent reggae artist in this digital age, the Jamaican music business, non-Black artists making Black music, what it takes to be a professional musician, smoking a spliff with Sir Paul McCartney a...

It's only right that the longest Words Matter Pod episode thus far is a reflection of host, Akil Pinnock's Jamaican roots. Today's episode features reggae artist Blvk H3ro, who at the 65th Grammy Awards, was nominated for Best Global Music Performance for his feature on Ghanaian artist Rocky Dawuni's "Neva Bow Down." In part 1 of the almost 2 and a half hour interview, Bl...

Last week we took a trip to Creative Soundz Recording studios in the heart of L.A. to speak to Brandon Brown, Vice President of A&R at Interscope Records. Brown, a native of Compton, CA, a city with a rich Hip-Hop history recalls seeing Eazy-E drive down the street, growing up a half a mile away from where Straight Outta Compton was recorded, and learning what an A&R was through the popula...

A few weeks back we took a trip to East LA College where I interviewed John Mosley Jr., Head Coach of their Men's Basketball team. For two seasons, Mosley and crew have been the subject of Last Chance U: Basketball, a Netflix original series that covered the lives of these student athletes, the coaching staff and all the moving parts of the team. Fresh off an unfortunate State Final Four Loss,...

We're back for part 2 of "The Visual Language of Photography," with longtime New York City street Photographer, Jamel Shabazz. In the second part of our two hour interview, Mr. Shabazz spoke on the intent in which he traveled with as he walked the streets taking photographs, giving visibility to a community that was often invisible, a time in New York before and after The War on Drug...

After months of communication, this past November we finally had the honor of interviewing Jamel Shabazz. Shabazz, a Brooklyn, NY native, is a renowned fashion, fine art, documentary and street style photographer as well as the author of Back in the Days, The Last Sunday in June, Seconds of my Life, Sights in the City: New York Street Photographs, Back in the Days: Remix, and most recently, A Time...

Quaz Degraft is an actor, director, writer and entrepreneur from Yonkers and West Haverstraw New York. Degraft explained how his career started by tagging along with his girlfriend at the time who joined an acting workshop, then going on to studying at various acting schools in New York after growing a love for the art form; all while working as an accountant at Ernst & Young. We later spoke a...

On today's episode we had the pleasure of interviewing Vikki Tobak, culture journalist, curator and author of Contact High: A Visual History of Hip-Hop, and most recently, Ice Cold: A Hip-Hop Jewelry History . We spent the first half of this interview speaking about Tobak's upbringing as an immigrant child from Kazakhstan in 1980s Detroit, falling in love with Black music prior to Hip-Hop, moving...

Words Matter Pod w/ Akil Pinnock is back and better! Last month we interviewed then, Senior Reporter for Law & Crime News Meghann Cuniff. In a time where anything uploaded online can be perceived labeled as news, Cuniff's fair and unbiased coverage of the The People of the State of California vs. Daystar Peterson, a.k.a. Tory Lanez made her a viral star, affectionately earning the moniker, "Me...

Back in July we interviewed photographer Claudio Abreu, creator of the popular YouTube Hip-Hop archival channel, HipHopVCR. Abreu speaks about how his appreciation for life led to him archiving every possible moment from his earliest memories, such as 1990s Chicago Bulls games, up until adulthood. Abreu also goes into how he started archiving footage for selfish reasons, and that developing into s...

We're doing something a little different this week. Last weekend we had the pleasure of attending the ENVY of NY 4th Anniversary Brunch hosted by Lips Cafe in Flatbush, Brooklyn, NY. There, we interviewed key members of the brand's growth like Jodi, partner and all hands on deck member of ENVY, Mango, one of the brands go-to models, and Manuel, videographer for ENVY. And of course, what's a brand...