This Week In Hip-Hop: Chuck D, Drake, Jay Electronica & Jay-Z, The Beastie Boys

Record Store Day 2014 is just around the corner and Billboard got a chance to sit down with this year's ambassador of the event, Chuck D. In the interview, he talks about the future of music, his views of the past and his hopes for his role as Record Store Day Ambassador.

"I hope to be somebody who comes up with a very succinct conversation that connects the past, present and future," says the Public Enemy founder. "I really think the future of record stores is connected to its past."

Jay Electronica released his second song this month, a remix of Drake's "We Made It". This version features Jay-Z who takes a moment to comment on Drake's dislike for his lyrics. "Sorry Mr. Drizzy for so much art talk/ Silly me rappin' 'bout **** that I really bought/ Why these rappers rap about guns they ain't shot?/ And a bunch of other silly *** that they ain't got."

This is in response to Drake's comments in an interview with the Rolling Stone, expressing his disdain with art becoming a popular topic for rappers."It's like Hov can't drop bars these days without at least four art references! I would love to collect at some point, but I think the whole rap/art world thing is getting kinda corny."

Listen to the song on Soundcloud.

According to the Rolling Stone, the Beastie Boys and toy-maker, GoldieBlox have finally reached a settlement. The dispute began back in November when the Beastie Boys accused Goldieblox of copyright infringement for the use of “Girls” in one of their advertisements. Goldieblox then filed a lawsuit against the Beastie Boys, claiming that the use of the song, with revised lyrics, was a parody and was within the fair-use constraints.

The Beastie Boys then countered Goldieblox’s claims by clarifying that GoldieBlox was the first to take legal action. Their decision not to allow the song to be featured in advertisements was supported by a specification in Adam Yauch’s will that stated “in no event may my image or name or any music or any artistic property created by me be used for advertising purposes."

This was followed by the Beastie Boys’ counter-suit in December. Now, three months later, they’ve come to a settlement. GoldieBlox will have to issue a public apology to the Beastie Boys and donate part of it’s revenue to a charity chosen by the Beastie Boys that supports education.

Lastly, Drake's OVO Fest has received funding from the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport. The Rolling Stone reports that the $300,000 grant comes from a program call Celebrate Ontario. The initiative funds events that bring tourism into Ontario like the Toronto International Film Festival and Field Trip.

This year, Drake and Outkast will headline the festival. It will be held at the Molson Canadian Amphitheatre on Aug 3-4.

image: NBC Universal

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