Chessmaster LIVE's Hip Hop Weekend

Actually depends on the polka.

I've always known about the Wu-Tang/chess connection (one of my favorite albums of recent is GZA/DJ Muggs's Grandmasters), but even I have to admit that I had a chuckle at the ad on the dashboard.

When I fell in love with hip hop, the artists cared less about a hit, and more about a message. I can understand why people laugh at hip hop today, especially if it's associated with chess.

Hey, guess what, today's hip-hop is just as good as it was when you "fell in love" with hip-hop. And hip-hop back then was just as goofy as it is now. Hip-hop, like all broad pop culture genres, is simultaneously genius and retarded depending on what perspective you want to view it from. Some of the worst rap records ever came out in 1988 and 1993 and 1996 or whatever your golden age was. And some of the best rap albums of all time will come out this year and next year and the year after. Hip-hop is huge. It contains multitudes.

Etchasketchist is dead on. 1990 had new material from ice cube, tribe called quest, and public enemys fear of a black planet, but was also the same year vanilla ice was making 'hits' and mc hammer came out with a saturday morning cartoon. hip hop is great, but marketing it through xbl seems strange since most people on xbl are like jtedesco and are... well, dumb,