By Jayson Rodriguez\n
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\nLil Wayne\n
\nPhoto: Andy Kropa/ Getty Images\n
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\nLil Wayne, easily the hardest-working MC in hip-hop, will have his career come to a screeching halt when a Manhattan judge formally sentences the rapper to a one-year prison term Tuesday (February 9).\n
The move is the final process in the case, which dates back to July 2007, when Lil Wayne was arrested for gun possession in New York following his first headlining concert in the Big Apple. In October, the Cash Money superstar struck a deal with prosecutors that saw him plead guilty to a reduced charge of attempted gun possession. He's now expected to serve up to 10 months in prison with the possibility of an early release after eight months for good behavior. The rapper was originally facing as much as 15 years behind bars; New York is among the toughest states in the country when it comes to gun laws for individuals not affiliated with law enforcement.\n
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Lil Wayne will appear before Judge Charles H. Solomon on Tuesday morning, where he will formally enter his plea and likely turn himself in to immediately begin his sentence.\n
The firearm in question was registered to Wayne's manager, Cortez Bryant (and not found on Wayne by police), and the rapper's attorney attempted to have the case dropped through DNA challenges. Wayne's defense also sought to have the case dismissed after authorities handling the case misprinted information on the arrest report.\n
The rapper eventually decided to reach a plea deal with the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. In New York, stringent gun laws were enacted during former Governor George Pataki's administration. In a different state, the rapper could have been levied a fine and probation for the same offense.\n
Wayne pleaded guilty in the case because attempted possession carries almost the same threat of punishment as full possession. \"Possession is defined as actual possession or dominion or control. ... We said it was dominion and control,\" Joan Illuzzi-Orbon explained to MTV News after the deal was announced.\n
The distinction is that the weapon was potentially something available for immediate use. In other words, the threat of controlling the weapon is just as much of a crime as actually controlling one in New York. \"Basically, the old law [prior to Pataki's tenure] required someone to have a loaded weapon and intend to use it [before] the mandatory minimum would kick in,\" said Scott Leemon, a defense attorney in New York who has represented G-Unit's Tony Yayo in the past. \"And basically, what they did is they took that out of the law. So the mere possession of a loaded weapon in New York State is a felony.\"\n
Lil Wayne has been busy in the weeks leading up to his sentencing. In December, he performed his final hometown show before his jail time. The rapper has also furiously been at work on the forthcoming Tha Carter IV, which will likely see a release by the end of 2010. He also is still facing charges in Arizona, and his trial is set to begin March 30.\n
Despite the challenges the rapper is facing, experts expect Lil Wayne to quietly serve his jail time and continue leading one of the biggest careers in music afterward. \"Wayne is from the streets, from the Magnolia Houses in New Orleans, so I'm sure those guys have been in jail or locked up at some point,\" retired NYPD Detective Derrick Parker told MTV News. \"So being in prison is no big deal to them.\"\n
\n\n\nRelated Videos\n- \n
- \nLil Wayne Goes To Jail\n \n
By Shaheem Reid\n
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\nGame\n
\nPhoto: Interscope\n
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\nThe O.D.: A Mixtape Daily Exclusive\n
Just a few years ago, the Game was throwing straight lava at Ja Rule, Irv Gotti, Ashanti and the rest of Murder Inc. during the G-Unit wars with \"the world's most talented record label.\" Since leaving the Unit, Game has become friends with Ja and Irv and even recently collaborated with Ashanti on a track for his upcoming The R.E.D. Album. Dr. Dre, who produced the track, suggested the pairing.\n
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\"Hey, man, it's 'No beef 2010.' That's the trending topic on this interview, man,\" Game laughed. \"Dre called me and he was like, 'You got any current-day problems with Ashanti?' I was like, 'Nah. I ain't got no problems with Ashanti.' She can sing like mutha----a and you put her on a hook, it's automatically radio. So he was like, 'I'mma have her come down.' \"\n
Within an hour, Game, Dre and Ashanti where in the studio working on music.\n
\"Dre was going through beats and I picked one. I was like, 'Let's try her on this hook.' Me and Ashanti wrote the hook, I went in on the verses and that was it,\" he explained. \"The song me and Ashanti did, it don't even have a name for it yet. It's crazy. We just did that a week ago and I ain't even name it.\"\n
Ashanti seemed excited about the record as well, posting a photo from the session on her Twitter page.\n
\"Awwwwwww sh-- it's a problem!!!!!\" she wrote. \"Me DRE & GAME in the lab ohhhhhhh booooooy this is a SMMMMIZAAASHHH!!!!!\"\n
Game's R.E.D. LP, which also features production by Pharrell Williams and a collaboration with Justin Timberlake, has a tentative release date of March 23.\n
\"I got so many amazing records, I don't know if I should go hard to the streets or go radio,\" he said about the first single. But before the album there will be a mixtape with DJ Drama, Red Everything.\n
\"Red Everything mixtape — it's a bunch of tracks I did specifically for Drama,\" Game explained. \"They're full songs mixed with a few freestyles. I'm trying to finish up '400 Bars' and get it on there. Ain't nobody piss me off that much. But even if that ain't on there, the mixtape is still gonna be crazy.\"\n
For other artists featured in Mixtape Daily, check out Mixtape Daily Headlines.\n
\n\n\nRelated Videos\n- \n
- \nMixtape Daily: Ludacris\n \n
By Shaheem Reid\n
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\nNicki Minaj\n
\nPhoto: MTV News\n
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\nBefore he had to return to New York to face his one-year prison sentence, Lil Wayne gathered those close to him on Sunday night at the Miami club Dolce.\n
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The Young Money family, including Nicki Minaj, Drake, Gudda Gudda and Mack Maine were in the building, as well as Wayne's Hot Boys partner B.G. and, of course, the Birdman. While the crew celebrated the Super Bowl victory of their home team the New Orleans Saints, the mood at the party had an undercurrent of sadness, as everyone was aware of Wayne's fate. Last week, Minaj discussed her feelings about Weezy's sentence with MTV News.\n
\"It's sad, because he doesn't deserve to go to jail,\" Minaj said about Wayne's legal situation. \"I'm a crybaby,\" she added, fighting back tears. \"You shouldn't ask me stuff like that. Reality hasn't set in that he has to go to jail. He shouldn't have to go to jail.\"\n
However, Wayne has been making sure that he will still be heard from while he's gone. Rap's hardest-working MC shot recently videos for Young Money's \"Roger That\" and \"Girl I Got You,\" as well as clips for Rebirth's \"Drop the World\" and Shawty Lo's \"WTF.\" According to a source close to the Young Money camp, Weezy shot an astounding 10 music videos during Super Bowl weekend in Miami.\n
\"He's such a strong person, and it's weird — he's sitting there doing videos,\" Nicki continued. \"I found myself e-mailing him about something I wanted him to do for me. When I thought about it, I was like, 'It's so selfish,' 'cause it's, like, what is the mind frame of somebody that's supposed to go to jail for months and never served that amount of time in jail? I don't know. I'm always amazed at Wayne's dignity. Everything he does, he does with dignity. No matter what you throw at him, you can't take away his confidence. Something about him is always like, 'I am still who I am.' That's just dope. This dude is a legend.\"\n
\n\n\nRelated Photos\n]]>By Gil Kaufman\n
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\nEllen DeGeneres\n
\nPhoto: FOX\n
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\nOn Tuesday night (February 9), we find out what kind of chemistry — if any — talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres has with the rest of the \"American Idol\" judging panel as the comedian makes her debut as the fourth judge during the start of Hollywood Week.\n
In the early going, DeGeneres reportedly clashed at times with lead judge Simon Cowell, who is departing at the end of the current season, a move that has set off rampant speculation about who might fill his opinionated shoes next season.\n
DeGeneres has some pretty big sneakers to fill herself, as she steps in following the departure of beloved loopy ex-judge Paula Abdul, who quit the show last year after failing to reach a new contract settlement. The ninth season of \"Idol\" will be the first without Abdul's lovably loony and predictably supportive commentary. Fox is hoping the cuddly and quick-witted DeGeneres can make fans forget about Abdul's exit and boost slowly eroding ratings on what is still the #1 show in prime time.\n
\"Ellen brings a huge fanbase and people will be curious to see how she does. But if she performs poorly, that is bad for the show's long-term health,\" Entertainment Weekly senior writer Michael Slezak told Reuters.\n
MTV's resident \"Idol\" expert Jim Cantiello couldn't agree more. \"I am super excited to see it for several reasons,\" he said. \"One, it's a new element to a show that's been on the air for nine seasons, and we heard rumors there might have been tension on the first day because Simon showed up late, so it's fun to watch that episode with that filter. Also, she's one of the most famous people out there, so anything she does warrants attention.\"\n
Like a lot of \"Idol\" followers, Cantiello said he was a bit nervous about the addition of DeGeneres to the expert panel following her poorly received guest stint on \"So You Think You Can Dance\" last summer, where detractors faulted her for making jokes, but not really commenting on the dancing. \"That was really bad, and if she does that on 'Idol,' the show will die a horrible death this year,\" Cantiello said. \"When the news first came out about her, people freaked out, but that's subsided, and once I saw the promos Fox cut, they did a really good job teasing it.\"\n
In particular, Cantiello pointed to the most recent teaser, which appeared to show the amiable DeGeneres putting her foot down and giving some tough love to a Hollywood contestant. \"I'm really excited and I was anti-Ellen at first,\" he said. \"So if I'm excited, I think other people should be too.\"\n
\"Idol\" has ruled the ratings for the past six years, easily besting every other show in prime time during its winter run, while churning out superstars like Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood and solid pop singers like Fantasia and Jordin Sparks. Part of the reason was the fire-and-ice repartee between Cowell and Abdul, which typically consisted of harsh words from the Brit and soothing platitudes from the former pop star/ choreographer. With the addition of professional songwriter Kara DioGuardi last year, who sits alongside longtime producer/musician Randy Jackson and music-industry veteran Cowell, the panel has plenty of cred.\n
And though DeGeneres doesn't have experience in the industry, former finalist Kimberly Caldwell thinks she could add that \"it\" factor Abdul brought to the show.\n
\"I'm a massive Ellen fan,\" said Caldwell, who finished in seventh place in season two. \"One of my dreams is to just be on 'The Ellen Show.' ... I think that she's gonna be really great, especially with Paula gone. There's not gonna be ... a little sensitive side. I think she's gonna give constructive criticism, which we don't see from other people.\"\n
Caldwell defended the show's resident crank, explaining that her experience in the music industry has taught her that Cowell is just keeping it real. \"If you think he's mean, then you haven't been in the music industry, because he really is like a little cupcake compared to people I've dealt with, what most people deal with,\" she said.\n
With Cowell bowing out after the finale in May to focus on his other talent show, \"The X Factor,\" the pressure is on for DeGeneres to pull her weight on the panel and perhaps emerge as the new go-to voice the audience loves to hate — or, as might be the case for her, loves to love.\n
\"If Ellen works, it puts [producers] in a much better position when they replace Simon. The dynamic is the thing I am curious to watch. I think some people will miss Paula's 'camp mom' spirit,\" Brian Mansfield, who runs the USA Today Idol Chatter Blog, told Reuters.\n
And, if all else fails, there's always the possibility that shock jock Howard Stern could step into the Cowell seat next year and really shake things up.\n
Get your \"Idol\" fix on MTV News' \"American Idol\" page, where you'll find all the latest news, interviews and opinions.\n
\n\n]]>By Gil Kaufman\n
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\nMichael Jackson's parents Katherine and Joe Jackson arrive to the Los Angeles Airport Courthouse on Monday\n
\nPhoto: Gabriel Bouts/ Getty Images\n
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\nAfter appearing together at Monday's arraignment for Dr. Conrad Murray, Michael Jackson's family issued a series of statements decrying the doctor's not-guilty plea to the charge of involuntary manslaughter.\n
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\"He's lying. He's guilty. Nobody was there but him,\" Jackson's mother, Katherine, told the assembled media while leaving court. \"He's just trying to save his own behind. ... He killed him. He wasn't monitoring him.\"\n
Murray, who faces up to four years in prison if convicted, didn't make a statement following his court appearance, during which he did not interact with the Jackson family members, according to reports. The Houston-based doctor is expected to leave Los Angeles after posting $75,000 bail.\n
\"Dr. Murray is doing fine. ... He's in good spirits,\" attorney Edward Chernoff said during a press conference after the hearing.\n
As one expert suggested in an interview with MTV News, it could be hard to find an impartial jury in Los Angeles, a reality Chernoff said he was ready to deal with. \"It's going to be tough, but I think if we get the right jury, the right result will come in,\" he said. \"This has been a nightmare for [Murray] for many different reasons, and one of the reasons is that he lost a friend.\"\n
Murray was hired as Jackson's personal physician several months before the singer was slated to leave for England to begin his planned 50-show residency comeback stint at the O2 arena. The cardiologist told investigators that he administered the surgical anesthetic propofol, as well as other tranquilizers, to Jackson several times in the hours leading up to his June 25 death. The coroner has ruled that the singer died of lethal levels of the drug. Murray obtained propofol legally, but is accused of negligence in the administration of the drug, a stance prosecutors came to after speaking with more than 10 medical experts.\n
Outspoken family patriarch Joe Jackson went on CNN's \"Larry King Live\" following the hearing and called Murray a \"fall guy\" in a wider conspiracy. Speaking to King after attending the hearing with his estrange wife, five of his children and a number of grandchildren, Jackson reiterated, \"I was looking for justice, and justice, to me, would be a murder charge.\" According to legal experts, Murray was charged with involuntary manslaughter because there was no proof the doctor purposely acted in a fashion intended to cause death or serious injury to his patient.\n
\"To me, he's just a fall guy,\" Jackson claimed. \"There's other people, I think, involved with this whole thing. But I think that he's interrogated — he would come clean and tell everything he knows.\" According to Joe, Michael Jackson told his mother that he feared he would be killed in the lead-up to his London shows.\n
\"He was afraid to even do all of these shows, because he was afraid that he wouldn't get a chance to finish all of the show,\" Joe Jackson said. \"He couldn't do all those shows back-to-back. Even his kids say that he had told them that he would be murdered.\"\n
Sister La Toya Jackson issued a statement later in the day, which read, \"Michael was murdered, and although he died at the hands of Dr. Conrad Murray, I believe Dr. Murray was a part of a much larger plan. There are other individuals involved, and I will not rest and I will continue to fight until all of the proper individuals are brought forth and justice is served.\"\n
La Toya and Joe Jackson have not elaborated on their allegations and neither has named any other suspected conspirators. Police have not named any other suspects in Jackson's death, after focusing almost exclusively on Murray during their nearly eight-month investigation.\n
\n\n\nRelated Artists\n- \n
- \nMichael Jackson\n \n
By James Montgomery\n
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\nYeasayer\n
\nPhoto: MTV News\n
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\nThose in the know have been buzzing about Yeasayer's Odd Blood for months now, ever since the Brooklyn avant-pop aesthetes released the first single, a delightfully loopy slab of weirdness called \"Ambling Alp.\"\n
Since then, both the band and the album have slowly started picking up accolades (we highlighted them last month during MTV News' Rock Week), and now, it's not inconceivable to think that Blood might be this year's version of Merriweather Post Pavilion, the Animal Collective effort that was already being hailed \"The Best Album of 2009\" from the day it was released in January.\n
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Blood hit stores Tuesday (February 9), and so, to highlight an album that we really think you ought to hear, we sat down with the three men behind Yeasayer — Anand Wilder, Chris Keating and Ira Wolf Tuton — and had them tell us the stories behind the 10 wonderfully weird tracks that make up the record. From in-flight make-out sessions and ridiculous riddims of Haddaway to Moroccan dance music, here's their take on what very well may be the best album of 2010.\n
\"The Children\"
\nChris Keating: We were pretty determined to have it first on the record. I like the idea of starting the record like that, as a departure point from the last record [2007's All Hour Cymbals], especially the last song on the last record, which was very choral, and then all of a sudden, you're transported to further into the future, and you're on some off-world colony that has crazy percussion and slowed-down vocals. We sang harmonies through a fan, sang into the pitch thing and tried to sing it live.\n
Ira Wolf Tuton: I couldn't get through the mixes. It kept making my CD player skip because of the low end. I loved that.\n
Keating: Yeah, we definitely buried some sub beneath the sub.\n
\"Ambling Alp\"
\nTuton: That song probably existed between the three of us longer than any other song on the album, so just psychologically, it made sense for us to release it first and try to get it out of the way.\n
Keating: I think the hardest thing about writing a song is getting that initial idea: \"What's an interesting thing to write about?\" And once you get that, you roll with it. You get excited ... so I kind of came up with this idea to write about boxing, and that's where the title came from; it was [the name of] a 1930s Italian boxer. I was reading about Joe Louis at the time, and my grandfather was a professional boxer in the late '30s, early '40s, so all these things kind of started tying together.\n
\"Madder Red\"
\nAnand Wilder: It was a kind of quiet, folky, acoustic lullaby that I worked on. I think I stole a lyric out of, like, a Celtic book of verse for the first line and kind of went from there. I kind of wanted to write a song in the vein of \"Jealous Guy\" by John Lennon, a song about being a weak man, a gambler or something like that. So we had that basic structure for the opening, and then Chris had the idea to drop this really heavy beat on top of it. And it completely changed the feel of the song.\n
\"I Remember\"
\nKeating: It was a demo recording, made in the basement — the same setup we had when we were making the All Hour Cymbals record. And I just had my busted-up Nord [keyboard], and I just kind of worked out these weird sounds that I thought were interesting together. And a lot of stuff I do like that, I'm trying to achieve a sound I like. And you get that tone, then it's cool. You lock it in, you write down all the numbers and all the dials, and from there, I know I can write something on top of it. And I had just met my wife, and I started writing a love song, so I kind of just ran with it. I'm afraid of flying, but the first time I met my wife, we made out on a plane.\n
Wilder: My only input was to try and steer us away from adding too much to it, because I think Chris did a really good job of getting these tones that really sat well in the mix. And it was just this demo that really sounded almost finished. And slowly we began adding on to it, and we did a live version and made it twice as long, and then we made compromises, and eventually it became the four-and-a-half-minute-long mixtape love ballad of 2010.\n
\"O.N.E.\"
\nWilder: I was trying to explore the idea of a song that didn't just have one chord in it. Because a lot of songs on the first album had maybe just one chord in it, or maybe just two chords. Maybe we'd go to three in the chorus. So I created this really long riff that went on for about 16 bars and had chords that were changing along with the riff. And then I had this idea about writing a song about addiction — alcoholism — but kind of relating it to a way you'd get rid of a girlfriend or something. So we worked on that song for many months Upstate, in Woodstock, and threw a big beat over it. It became kind of like a early-'90s era Beck song, with a break beat over it. And then when we brought it to the live setting, with our new bandmates, Chris kind of said, \"It's not a dance song,\" and we were talking about how, on this album, we wanted to commit to certain styles for an entire song and not jump around. So, finally, I caved in. I only caved in after the Bonnaroo audience was so excited by our live version, and I was like, \"OK, I guess I lost that argument.\"\n
Keating: That was a cool experience, because we hadn't finished the record. ... We were able to play some songs at different festivals. And the ones we'd be really excited about, it was like, \"Why does no one care about this song?\" ... And that one, the way we were doing it live, with a funkier vibe to it, we were all psyched on, everyone was really, really into it. ... They were singing the words to an MGMT song over it. [Laughs.]\n
\"Love Me Girl\"
\nWilder: I wanted to do this loopy thing that would go over and over again, kind of like that final scene in \"Trainspotting,\" and then it would just drop into this R&B, Justin Timberlake-y kind of thing, which I made the melody by just creating MIDI notes on GarageBand with just a flute. That had some acoustic guitar on it ... but then when we brought it Upstate, we added more synthetic elements, and we kind of decided the beat was going to be a dancehall thing, because we were listening to a lot [of it] and just kind of straight ripped off those songs.\n
Tuton: It was exciting to do, another new thing to rip off.\n
Wilder: We added some Real McCoy elements and some Haddaway elements.\n
\"Rome\"
\nKeating: That's the song with the Coldplay reference [in the lyrics]. That's not a Coldplay reference. But that's cool, because we're trying to start a little beef with Coldplay.\n
Wilder: We're trying to rip off Coldplay so they would sue us, so they would have someone to sue.\n
Keating: That song sort of rips off certain Moroccan dance music, Syrian dance music, that my wife had on her iPod, and when she hears the song now, she sort of shakes her head like, \"It's such a rip-off.\" She feels like she's responsible for that one.\n
\"Strange Reunions\"
\nKeating: That song gets sh-- on in the press, and I don't know why, because I think that song is awesome. It's so crazy. Like \"And the throwaway track ... \" and it's like, that song is so weird and crazy.\n
Wilder: We got really stoned and listened to the album once it was pretty much fully mixed, and that was the one song where I was like, \"This is awesome!\" ... That was based on the idea of a really short song that had many different parts in it ... and it would all be done in under three minutes and would also explore these weird time-signature shifts that bands like the Dirty Projectors do so effortlessly. And we're so unskilled that we still haven't figured out how to play it live. And we probably never will.\n
\"Mondegreen\"
\nKeating: That's a song that I had been working on for a while. ... It's really old. I set up a bunch of samplers and plugged them all into the TV for a whole Sunday, and I got, like, four channels, didn't have cable or anything, so it was all, like, daytime Sunday weirdness, bad commercials, infomercials, soap operas, I don't know what. And I recorded four banks of sound and started to structure a song out of it. And I sang on top of it. I thought it was cool to make this real paranoid. ... I liked the late-'70s era of David Bowie that's very paranoid, where he's, like, so coke-addled and crazy, and I like that kind of feel, and mixing it with the sort of 24-hour news cycle, and Glenn Beck and Hannity, the sort of absurd, psychotic rants that those guys go on. I sort of think it's amazing, because it just seems like something out of the movie \"Network.\" I don't know; the world is going to end in a year.\n
\"Grizelda\"
\nTuton: I kind of think of \"Grizelda\" in the same way that I really like \"Children\" being the first track. I thought of it for a long time as being a real nice benediction for the whole album. It just seemed a nice way to close an album. It lulls you into sitting back in your chair, puts you in a trance a bit, although the subject matter might be a bit dark.\n
Wilder: The subject matter is this woman Griselda Blanco. We had watched the movie \"Cocaine Cowboys,\" and it was kind of all about the cocaine industry in Miami and how it was relatively violence-free, until this woman Griselda Blanco came around and just started ordering murders. And she's responsible for hundreds of murders. ... So the main interview of the whole movie is this guy who was a hit man for her, so I thought it would be nice to write a song from his perspective. Maybe he's in jail, and he's writing a letter to her, just as she's been extradited to Colombia, and all these people are coming to kill her. He's kind of afraid of her, but he's also kind of in love with her.\n
Keating: She's like the Colombian connection to America's cocaine industry in the '80s, just ruthless. So it's like this female mass murderer and had all these guys working for her who were kind of in love with her.\n
\n\n\nRelated Videos\n]]>By Gil Kaufman\n
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\nWhite Stripe's Jack White\n
\nPhoto: Ethan Miller/Getty Images\n
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\nThat extreme \"Grab Some Air\" Air Force ad during the Super Bowl with the wicked snowboarding, skiing, surfing and skateboard moves did feature a surfy guitar riff that sounded an awful lot like the White Stripes' \"Fell in Love With a Girl.\"\n
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That's certainly what Jack White thinks, and judging by a message on the band's Web site, he's not too pleased about it. Under a side-by-side post of the original \"Girl\" video and a link to the Air Force Reserve ad, the site read, \"We believe our song was re-recorded and used without permission of the White Stripes, our publishers, label or management. The White Stripes take strong insult and objection to the Air Force Reserve's presenting this advertisement with the implication that we licensed one of our songs to encourage recruitment during a war that we do not support.\"\n
While the band pledged their strong support for the U.S. military \"at home and during times when our country needs and depends on them,\" the message added, \"We simply don't want to be a cog in the wheel of the current conflict, and hope for a safe and speedy return home for our troops.\"\n
The letter ended with a promise to seek legal advice on the matter. \"We have not licensed our song to the Air Force Reserve and we plan to take strong action to stop the ad containing this music,\" White said.\n
A spokesperson for the Air Force could not be reached for comment at press time.\n
The White Stripes have been on hiatus since 2007, when drummer Meg White's acute anxiety forced the duo to cancel their tour. They have reportedly been working on a new album, though Jack White has promised that a second disc by his most recent side project, the Dead Weather, would be released first.\n
\n\n\nRelated Artists\n- \n
- \nThe White Stripes\n \n
By Shaheem Reid\n
\n\n\n\n
\nDrake and Lil Wayne party over Super Bowl weekend\n
\nPhoto: Julia Beverly\n
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\nLil Wayne got the most out of Super Bowl weekend, spending two days working around the clock and enjoying the big game on Sunday before having to report for his jail sentence on Tuesday. According to a source close to his camp, Weezy shot around 10 videos over the weekend — five on Friday and five on Saturday. The productions were rapid-fire, with Weezy shooting some videos in front of a green screen and some on location.\n
Miami's Marlin Hotel served as the backdrop for the \"Da Da Da\" clip.\n
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\"It was crazy,\" said Plex, of Wayne collaborators ¡Mayday! \"They was trying to re-create, spin off of 'The Streets Have No Name' by U2 — the one where they were performing on the rooftop and people start gathering around. [Wayne's video] was doing something parallel to that on the rooftop of the Marlin. They had helicopter shots and all.\"\n
Boxing contender Sugar Shane Mosley made a cameo appearance.\n
\"It was a whole mess of people. I didn't notice who was there, but I saw Shane because I'm a big fan. Then, you know, the whole Cash Money/ Young Money clique was there. A few NFL players were there. It was crazy. [The video] was set up like a reality show. They followed us out of the tour bus, up the stairs and then we jumped on the stage and started playing. It was fun, man.\" ¡Mayday!, who back Wayne up in the \"On Fire\" video, also shot a clip for \"Get a Life.\"\n
So with visuals for those songs in the can, Wayne enjoyed watching his hometown New Orleans Saints take the championship from the Indianapolis Colts at Super Bowl XLIV. Afterward, Weezy was the guest of honor at a farewell party at Miami club Dolce. Drake, B.G., Nicki Minaj, Bow Wow, Wale, the Birdman and more were among those who came to see Weezy off in style.\n
¡Mayday! were the house band of the night at Weezy's request.\n
\"They called us during the Super Bowl and said, 'We want you guys to rock tonight,' \" Plex explained. \"I had to cut my Super Bowl party short and go get my gear.\"\n
\n\n\nRelated Videos\n- \n
- \nLil Wayne Goes To Jail\n \n
- \n
- \nLil Wayne's Weekend In Miami\n \n
- \n
- \nLil Wayne\n \n
By Gil Kaufman\n
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\nDr. Conrad Murray arrives for his arraignment on Monday\n
\nPhoto: Frederick M. Brown/ Getty Images\n
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\nMichael Jackson's personal physician, Dr. Conrad Murray, faces a steep uphill battle in fighting off the involuntary-manslaughter charges lodged against him Monday (February 8) in Los Angeles. That's according to L.A.-based attorney Shawn Chapman Holley, who told MTV News that the combination of the doctor's discussions with police following Jackson's death in June and the reported admission that he supplied the singer with the surgical anesthetic that the coroner's office has said caused his demise make for a very difficult defense.\n
\"I'm not surprised by the charge, no,\" said Chapman Holley, who worked as part of the defense team for O.J. Simpson, as well as representing Lindsay Lohan, Nicole Richie, Paris Hilton, the Kardashian sisters, Reggie Bush and Tupac Shakur. (Chapman Holley is not involved in the Murray case.) \"It's really the only thing it could have been. It's the only charge under the heading of homicide that does not require an intent element.\"\n
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The district attorney's office charged Murray on Monday, saying that the Houston-based cardiologist \"did unlawfully, and without malice, kill Michael Joseph Jackson.\" An arraignment was taking place at press time, where Murray was expected to turn himself in and enter a not-guilty plea. If convicted, Murray faces a possible four-year state prison term.\n
\"There's no question in my mind that he didn't intend for Jackson to die or be hurt,\" Chapman Holley said. \"A murder charge would require that intent, but it becomes involuntary manslaughter when a defendant did something that posed a high possibility of death or grave injury. The issue will be whether or not administering the drugs he administered in the manner he did was likely to cause death or serious injury.\"\n
Chapman Holley predicted that Murray's legal team will mount a spirited defense based on a lot of expert medical testimony, which will include physicians who will say that what Murray did should not have caused injury or death and that his actions were not unreasonable. They will also likely bring up allegations that Murray was not the first physician or medical worker to provide Jackson with propofol or other sedatives. Murray has reportedly told investigators that he provided Jackson with the powerful anesthetic propofol several times in the hours leading up to the 50-year-old singer's death in June as part of a nightly regimen of anesthetics and sedatives that the singer allegedly used to combat chronic insomnia.\n
One of the hardest factors for Murray's defense team is the fact that the doctor spoke to investigators several times in the days after Jackson's death, a move Chapman Holley said might have been ill-conceived. \"You usually don't want your client to talk to the police in order to not be locked into a timeline,\" she said, suggesting that by giving investigators a minute-by-minute account of what he was doing prior to Jackson's death, Murray might have committed himself to an account of events that he will not be able to deviate from. \"People who feel like they didn't do anything wrong naturally want to talk to the police, but it's almost always not a good idea from a criminal-law standpoint. You lock yourself into that timeline, and the police are trying to build a case against you, so they act real nice, but really they just want to hear what happened as they're gathering evidence against you.\"\n
Another complicating factor will be finding a jury to try the case, which Chapman Holley said might actually be the most time-consuming part of the trial, which she predicted would likely last a month. \"I'm not a doctor, but based on what I've heard, [what Murray did] sounds crazy. A jury won't know either, so you'll have these doctors coming in to testify of the risks of doing this, and while his experts will say there was not a tremendous risk, the DA's experts will say there was,\" she said. \"Obviously, it did cause his death, but that's not the question here. You have to look at what the person did and what they knew at the time. It's almost like the outcome [of Murray's actions] are not irrelevant, but not really important to the case. Plus, everyone loves Michael Jackson, so it will be tough to find a jury without bias.\"\n
The sight on Monday of a large portion of the Jackson clan going into the courtroom to watch the charging, coupled with the much-derided trip Murray took last week to mourn near Jackson's grave in what was seen as a blatant plea for sympathy, will also likely make things hard on a defense team looking to change the tarnished image of the doctor.\n
Facing a possible two to four years in prison, Murray will probably be sentenced to the lesser term, Chapman Holley said, but she doubted he would emerge from the trial without serving some time. \"He could get probation, but it doesn't sound like there will be a plea in this case,\" she said, noting the intense pressure on the Los Angeles District Attorney's office to put together a very strong case in light of such difficult celebrity cases as the O.J. Simpson trial and the two Robert Blake murder trials.\n
\"As I understand it, part of the reason the DA's office took so long was because they really, really wanted to be sure the evidence was there to get a conviction,\" she said, citing discussions with members of the DA's office.\n
As for whether she would put Murray on the stand, Chapman Holley said if the defense's medical experts did a good enough job, it wouldn't be necessary. \"But he seems like the kind of guy who wants to take the stand,\" she said. A spokesperson for Murray's lawyer, Edward Chernoff, said he would release a statement following Monday's arraignment. Before the charge was filed, Chernoff said, according to The Associated Press, \"We'll make bail, we'll plead not guilty and we'll fight like hell.\"\n
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By James Montgomery, with additional reporting by Gil Kaufman\n
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\nHoward Stern\n
\nPhoto: Jim Spellman/ WireImage\n
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\nOn Monday (February 8), Howard Stern not only confirmed reports that Fox is interested in hiring him to replace departing \"American Idol\" judge Simon Cowell, but that the interest is mutual.\n
\"There's not a better job on the planet than judging a f-----g karaoke contest,\" Stern told his satellite radio listeners. \"It might be possible, we'll see.\"\n
Stern, who frequently dissects \"Idol\" on his radio program, joked that the deciding factor in the negotiations might be the size of the paycheck show producers are willing to shell out for his services.\n
\"They'd have to pay me a ton of dough, because I already make a ton of dough,\" he said.\n
Stern's five-year, $500 million contract with Sirius XM is set to expire in January of next year. And according to some reports, \"Idol\" producers are prepared to match that deal.\n
\"A $100 million to judge a karaoke contest? Yeah, I think I would do that show for $100 million,\" Stern said. \"It would be the best thing that happened to me. What a cush job: $100 million for four months. Who wouldn't take that?\"\n
Stern added that he wouldn't do a radio show if he landed the \"Idol\" job, and said that, while the show is \"nothing\" without Cowell, he had read reports that it was the acerbic Brit himself who suggested the longtime shock jock take his place at the end of this season.\n
\"I'm not going to comment about any discussions I might or might not have had,\" he said. \"I watch 'American Idol.' ... people seem to think that if I was on it, because I'm such a foul-mouthed, miserable f---, that I would get them thrown off the air. I know how to judge.\"\n
And to that end, he said that, really, he's the best man for the job, since he'd be able to replace the acerbic wit the show would be missing without Cowell.\n
\"If I do say so myself, I can't imagine anyone else but me replacing [Cowell],\" Stern said. \"I mean, how else are they going to make that show work? Who knows how to broadcast and who knows how to be interesting? And who's not afraid to speak their mind?\"\n
And what else would Stern bring to the table? Well, judging by the jokes he made about current \"Idol\" judges Randy Jackson and Ellen DeGeneres, he wouldn't be opposed to sparring with his fellow judges. And when asked about the kinds of critiques he'd offer up to auditioners, he replied with this hypothetical nugget.\n
\" 'Hey Fantasia, you're not getting little boys hard. You look like you stepped out of a cartoon. ... They want a Britney Spears or a Rihanna,\" Stern said. \"Little boys are scared that you are going to sit on them. You're out. ... You've got to go clean up your act. Get a haircut like Rihanna if you want little boys [to get excited about] you.\"\n
Should make for an interesting show! A spokesperson for 19 Entertainment, which produces \"American Idol,\" told MTV News there was no comment on the Stern situation.\n
Would Howard Stern make a good replacement for Simon Cowell on \"American Idol\"? What do you think? Sound off in the comments below!\n
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