Big Daddy Kane has signed on as an executive producer for “The Vapors,” the forthcoming movie about his former hip hop collective, The Juice Crew.

“I got a call from Marley Marl one day and he and some people was trying to get this film together,” Big Daddy Kane told AllHipHop.com. “Now we finally got it happening and I got involved. Now it seems like it’s very realistic and it’s actually gonna happen in the next two months.” (more…)

Residents of a Bronx building where a young DJ pioneered hip-hop in the 1970s say they have a plan to buy it so that they can keep it affordable. They say the plan would entail purchasing each apartment for only a few thousand dollars each.

Tenants at the building on Sedgwick Avenue received word last year that the current landlord wanted to leave the Mitchell-Lama program that has kept apartments affordable, leaving open the door to rent increases. (more…)

Bill Maher crossed with “Meet the Press” for the hip-hop culture — that’s the potent formula behind “SpitFire,” a new talk show hosted by rap pioneer Kool Moe Dee.

The show is an offshoot of IAmHipHop.com, a recently launched social networking site. Concentrating on all things hip-hop, the portal (http://www.iamhiphop.com) will also begin posting three- to five-minute segments of various “SpitFire” episodes at the end of November. (more…)

Their breakthrough album was called “3 Years, 5 Months and Two Days in the Life Of …,” a nod to the long struggle fledgling rappers Arrested Development faced between the day they formed and the day they signed a record deal.

Now, it’s been 13 years since their last U.S. release. And the Atlanta group that topped charts and earned a pair of Grammys with their upbeat, socially conscious brand of rap in the early ’90s is back — hoping to again find a place on a drastically changed musical landscape. (more…)

Hip-hop might not be the first style of music that comes to mind when you think National Folk Festival. Think again.

Wild Style 25th Anniversary — a reunion event that tips its cap to the mother of all hip-hop films — promises to rock River City come October.

GrandWizzard Theodore, Grandmaster Caz and Chief Rocker Busy Bee, all of whom were in the movie, will appear, as well as hip-hop and break dancers Kwikstep and Rokafella of New York. (more…)

In its first two years, Sedgwick & Cedar, a vintage-inspired hip-hop clothing company that pays homage to the music’s founders, has been embraced by high-profile rappers, DJs and moguls such as Jay-Z, Russell Simmons, Ice-T, Ice Cube and Funkmaster Flex, and has been featured in magazines ranging from The Source to Vanity Fair.

But while the name is spreading among the hip-hop industry elite, few people here realize that the business — which its founder says is on the brink of a huge expansion — is based in 1,300 square feet at 101 Whitney Ave. in New Haven, run by two brothers who grew up in the Elm City. (more…)