Subject: Z-Ro

• Pop Numerology: How High Can You Go?

  October 10, 2007

• Last Night: The Straight to DVD Movie Premiere of Mike Jones’s The American Dream

  November 9, 2007

• Two Nights Ago: Bun B and Other Members of the UGK Family

  February 10, 2008

• Ten Great Hip-Hop Breakup Songs (Because Valentine’s Day Is for Suckas)

  February 13, 2008

• Artist of the Week: Niho

  August 6, 2008

• Five Spot: Five Reasons Not to Mess With Trae

  August 15, 2008

• Aftermath: Z-Ro Listening Party For Crack

  August 29, 2008

• Turning the Screw: Chamillionaire, Z-Ro, Suge Knight, KRS-One, Snoop, Lil’ Kim, Yung Berg and More

  September 2, 2008

• Rap-A-Lot's J Prince Wins SEA Image Award

  September 9, 2008

• Los Magnificos: Like a Live H-Town Mixtape

  Los Magnificos 2008 bounces into Reliant Center Sunday. Bun B Whip, ride, slab, some bit of street slang Rocks Off won't even hear for another eight months - cars are as essential to hip-hop as crossfaders and lyrics that rhyme. But no city's rappers place their wheels on a higher pedestal than Houston, so it's no surprise that Sunday's Los Magnificos auto show, sponsored by 97.9 the Boxx, features as many local rap luminaries as gleaming Cadillacs hopping all over the place. Get a load of

  November 21, 2008

• Five Spot: Greeting 2009 Z-Ro Style

  Welcome back to The Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and list five reasons why it's either brilliant or dumb-assed. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Just because you probably missed it, we'd like to take a second to bring to your attention that 2008 is over. Crazy, right? It seems like only 365 days ago the year was just getting started. While 2008 brought us a ton of good things, we're already deeming 2009's arrival to be Brilliant. And simply because

  January 2, 2009

• Five Spot: Slim Thug is Back

  Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and list five reasons why it's either brilliant or dumb-assed. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Photo by thebestbradley Numerous emails from PR people over the last two or so months have informed us that but a scant four years after his first official solo album dropped, Slim Thug is prepping for the release of his sophomore effort. While the inappropriately titled debut left many disappointed (Already Pla

  March 20, 2009

• Five Spot: Flipperace Is Magically Delicious

  Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and, sometimes awkwardly, tie it to a bit of Houston rap. It's five videos and occasional cussing. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Last year (around September or October, we think), The Game and Lil' Bow Wow held a video-game football battle with $100,000 on the line. (Recession? Don't be absurd.) It was cool for a second, until you realized that you were just watching two guys play video games. At

  March 27, 2009

• Young Mammals Chow Down on First LP Carrots

  Dynamically Yours

  February 26, 2009

• Scarface: Emeritus

  January 1, 2009

• A New Class of Rappers Finally Bucked Houston's Syrupy Stereotype This Year

  It Is What It Is

  December 25, 2008

• Single File

  November 27, 2008

• Z-Ro: Crack

  November 6, 2008

• Boheme Cafe and Wine Bar Has an Open-Mike Night That Doesn't Suck?

  July 31, 2008

• Grand Theft Auto X: The Screwston Chronicles

  May 15, 2008

• Strapped-a-Lot

  Local mogul J. Prince wants Houston to cover up

  March 6, 2008

• Texas Albums

  2007's best Texas albums, from Houston, Austin and beyond

  January 3, 2008

• Trae

  January 3, 2008

• Trae Cool

  An underground legend teams up with Rap-A-Lot in a bid to break nationwide

  June 22, 2006

• Scarface

  My Homies Part 2

  April 6, 2006

• Farewell to the Twenty Nickel

  Looking back on the '05 and dreaming in the '06

  December 29, 2005

• On Da Lingo, Part II

  Confused by what all our hometown rappers are talking about? We’re here to help.

  November 17, 2005

• Bun B

  Trill

  November 10, 2005

• Z-Ro

  Let the Truth Be Told

  May 26, 2005

• Z-Ro

  The Life of Joseph W. McVey (Rap-A-Lot)

  October 7, 2004

• Slim Thug: Boss of all Bosses

  May 7, 2009

• Turning the Screw: Slim Thug Associates, Willie D, Jay-Z vs. Auto-Tune, 50 Cent, Paul Wall, Big Hawk, Jazzy Jeff, Trae & Z-Ro and More

  Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: "Associates" Wire To Wire Poor, poor Willie D. We were excited the other day when we read this thing about how vinyl sales had ballooned up to nearly 3 million(!) in 2009 - ever since Chris Gray's vinyl feature ran in 2007, we've been stoked about the increasing possibility of being able to build up a

  June 15, 2009

• Ask a Rapper: Yung Redd of Swishahouse

  The hip-hop world is a less than sensible place - lots of times, you're even required to clarify when bad means bad and when bad means good - so once a week we're going to get with a rapper and ask them to explain things. Have something you always wanted to ask a rapper? Email introducingliston@gmail.com. This Week's Rapper: Yung Redd of Swishahouse This Week's Subject(s): Inappropriate restaurants to eat in if you're a rapper; would Z-Ro lose credibility if he liked to macramé; whether or not

  June 23, 2009

• Turning the Screw: Archie Lee & Coota Bang, R.I.P. Michael, Lil Jon, Jae Millz, Drake, 50, Tupac, Chris Brown and More

  Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: "Down For My Block," Archie Lee and Coota Bang Wire To Wire Michael passed. Three thoughts: 1. Michael was one of the greatest, most innovative musicians of all time, loved immensely by (it seemed) the entire world for the better part of his youth. So we're very curious to see how much the molestation

  June 29, 2009

• The Last Roundup: Broken-NCYDE, Jenny Lewis, H.A.W.K. & Z-Ro, Something Fierce and More

  29-95's Joe Mathlete introduces the world to "crunkcore" artist Broken-NCYDE. Prima Donna meltdown or not, Jenny Lewis still has talent. If only she had manners. We Wore Masks screens her "See Fernando" video. Southern rap is still alive. Thankfully, Cocaine Blunts knows this, giving us H.A.W.K. and Z-Ro's "Diggin' the South." Houstonist remembers Dave Rask.

  July 14, 2009

• Five Spot: Houston R&B Collaboration King Billy Cook

  Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and, sometimes awkwardly, tie it to a bit of Houston rap. It's five videos and occasional cussing. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com.This weekend, Bun B and Mya are shooting the video for "Show Me Something," the electro-wispy "Upgrade You"-ish single from her forthcoming album. We used to be a fan of Mya back in the late '90s. We listened to "Movin' On" for a good three hours straight when it first came out

  July 17, 2009

• Turning the Screw: All-Houston Edition with GT Garza, Trae Day, Trouble Sum, Jay'Ton, Paul Wall, Z-Ro, Letoya vs. Slim Thug, Coast, Z-Ro, Juan Gotti and More

  Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: GT Garza, "52 Pick Up" (We've listened to a bunch of GT's stuff, but this remains to be the rawest thing we have ever heard from him. He is in full beast mode.) Wire To Wire Likely because Trae Day is this week, we're feeling especially Houston-y. Thus, all of the items in this edition of Turning the S

  July 20, 2009

• Why Rename Hillcroft Only Once? A Modest Proposal

  View Larger MapThe proposal to rename the stretch of Hillcroft  that courses through the heart of Little Bombay is ginning up a surprising amount of aggro in the blogosphere. (Or is it a surprising amount of blogs in the aggrosphere -- sometimes it's hard to tell.)Under the headline "We'll give up Hillcroft When You Pry It From Our Cold Dead Fingers," Slampo first touts the famous Indo-American work ethic before he thunders on thusly: Yet the great, great majority of the "members" of these

  July 20, 2009

• Turning the Screw: Chamillionaire & Z-Ro, UGK, Slim Thug, Trae Day, Chris Brown, Meth & Red, Diddy, MCA, O.G. Style and More

  Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: Chamillionaire feat. Z-Ro, "Denzel Washington" Wire To Wire Slim Thugga cut off his braids. Not sure how we feel about that just yet. Check back with us next week. Been listening to UGK's Ridin' Dirty a lot lately. What Bun B does on "One Day," "Murder" and "Pinky Ring" might be the best three-song set

  July 28, 2009

• Five Spot: J-Dawg, Z-Ro's Lyrical Match (Seriously)

  Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and, sometimes awkwardly, tie it to a bit of Houston rap. It's five videos and occasional cussing. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com.​You know, prior to the three seconds of gunshots that unwound all the good will, Trae Day was actually a solid event. As expected, there were the usual concert-day shenanigans that kept us entertained before Trae, Bun, Ross, and Shawty Lo (finally) took the stage - seriously

  July 31, 2009

• The H-Town Countdown, No. 24: Pimp C's Post-Prison Pimpalation

  Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. Pimp C Pimpalation Asylum, 2006​As fun as it is for us music writers to pick obscure or obviously lacking albums by artists and lionize them when we make these types of lists, everybody in the world knew this album was getting a spot here. Worry not, naysayers, there ar

  August 13, 2009

• Five Spot: The Proper Way to Phrase a Cop-Killing Song

  Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and, sometimes awkwardly, tie it to a bit of Houston rap. It's five videos and occasional cussing. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. How much does this suck: Antavio Johnson, some no-name rapper from a place that isn't Houston, just got sentenced to prison for two years for his song "Kill Me A Cop" (Listen to the song here.) The song is standard stuff really, save for one unfortunate mistake. See, you can

  August 14, 2009

• The H-Town Countdown, No. 20: Z-Ro's The Life of Joseph W. McVey

  Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. Z-Ro The Life of Joseph W. McVey (Rap-A-Lot/Asylum, 2004) ​Five albums in and we get our first effort fromZ-Ro. Yes, he is one of six artists who makes the list twice, but it's completely justified. You'll see. You should just be glad we didn't go with reader AR's

  September 10, 2009

• Five Spot: Whatever Happened to Z-Ro's New Album? Well, We'll Tell You...

  Welcome back to The Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and list five reasons why it's either brilliant or dumb-assed. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com.​Okay, let's get you all caught up. Back at the end of the summer, word spread that Z-Ro had been jumped outside of Houston's classy, classy hangout High Rollers. We were hesitant to believe it happened at first, because how does someone even go about beating up a nightmare, but Ro later put up a video on Y

  October 2, 2009

• Turning The Screw: Z-Ro, Cham, Plies, 50 Cent, The Kanye, Lady Gaga, Jay-Z, DJ Mr. Magic, Fabolous, T-Pain, The Undergods and more.

  Welcome back to Turning the Screw, Rocks Off's weekly rap post. It probably won't rhyme, at least most of the time. E-mail tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. Thanks, homies. Single of the Week: "Haterz Got Me Wrong," Z-Ro feat. Gucci Mane and C-Ward [This is another leaked single from the phantom Z-Ro album we wrote about last Friday. If this does happen to be Heroin repackaged, do not be surprised to find Ro in a dumpster somewhere very soon. J. Prince does not fuck around.] Wire To Wire:

  October 5, 2009

• The H-Town Countdown, No. 16: Bushwick Bill's Little Big Man

  Roughly 84,000 rap albums that have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. Bushwick Bill Little Big Man (Priority, 1992)​"Get to the house, all I'm thinking 'bout is shootin' her/ 'Cause shootin' her would be sweet/ But you know what'd be sweeter/ if I made her shoot me." Scarface will always be the best rapper from the Geto Boys, but the

  October 8, 2009

• Five Spot: We Would Very Much Like Someone to Send Us an Advance of Swishahouse's New The Usual Suspects Comp

  Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and, sometimes awkwardly, tie it to a bit of Houston rap. It's five videos and occasional cussing. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com.​First, a bit of housekeeping: In this space last week, we wrote about the rumored Z-Ro album, Cocaine. It is, in fact, real and we were able to get our light-brown little hands on a copy. After listening through it, we're 100 percent certain it isn't the Cracc mixtape everyo

  October 9, 2009

• The H-Town Countdown, No. 15: Chamillionaire's Original Mixtape Messiah, or 20-Plus Ways to Dis Mike Jones

  Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. "You drop one track, he's still alive." - Chamillionaire, on why he aimed an entire dis album at Mike Jones rather than just one track Chamillionaire Mixtape Messiah (self-released - it's a mixtape, duh - 2005) For the most part, we've tried to avoid including mixtapes

  October 15, 2009

• The H-Town Countdown, No. 14: Trae's Restless

  Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. Trae Restless (Asylum, 2006) ​Disclaimer: We dissected this album without referencing "Swang," the album's best song and possibly the finest representation of what it is that makes Trae Trae. We did this in part because we wanted to see if we could do it, but mostly be

  October 22, 2009

• The H-Town Countdown, No. 12: Street Military's Don't Give a Damn

  Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. Street Military Don't Give a Damn (Wild Pitch, 1999)​Surprise. Kids, meet Street Military. If you know who they are, then you no doubt sing their praises at parties, business meetings, funerals, whatever. If you don't know who they are, don't feel too badly. They've som

  November 5, 2009