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Young Mr. Cole gave a small group of writers a first listen of his debut album Cole World: The Sideline Story (Sept. 27) last night at Roc the Mic studios in NYC. For anyone already familiar with Cole’s body of work (The Warm Up, Friday Night Lights), expect an album that remains impossibly true to his own aesthetic (in other words, he didn’t get the Lupe treatment). For new listeners, get ready for the full Cole experience -- fine-tuned, polished, with some exorbitant displays of his ever-improving production skills.

If you’ve been paying painstakingly close attention to Lenny Kravitz’s musical career (his last release was 2008’s Is It Time For a Love Revolution), you probably know that Drake has been rumored to appear on his upcoming LP Black and White America since February. In case you haven’t been paying painstakingly close attention: Lenny Kravitz has a new song called “Sunflower,” which features a verse from Drake.

When you’re Anne Hathaway, and when you're playing the role of Catwoman in Christopher Nolan’s upcoming blockbuster The Dark Knight Rises, it’s to be expected that the paparazzi will pay just a little more attention than usual. But meltdowns and therapy be damned! This level-headed actress resorted to “songwriting” to vent her frustrations. During an appearance on Conan last night, Hathaway delivered her own original rap song, taking aim at the stalkarazzi. And if the flow sounds a bit familiar, well, “it’s in the style of Lil Wayne.”

Two years ago - almost a decade in Hollywood years - James Franco and Robert Pattinson were top contenders for the role of Jeff Buckley in the then-sole Buckley production in the works. But fast-forward to 2011, and there are now three upcoming Buckley biopics, and no mention of Franco or R-Patz. This week, it was confirmed that Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark actor Reeve Carney will star in director Jake Scott’s version, while Gossip Girl’s Penn Badgley was recently cast in Greetings From Tim Buckley.

Excuse us for making the headline about Aziz Ansari when Kanye and Jay-Z take a chainsaw and a blowtorch to a Maybach in this video—we weren’t sure which of the two was more ridiculous, but we laughed more at Ansari’s 5-second cameo and his silly dance. In the Spike Jonez-directed clip for "Otis," Ye and Jay hack apart a Maybach so they can drive donuts in a deserted lot, with a few models in tow.

This past spring, all it took was a tweet from Drake to send downloads of The Weeknd’s wonderfully raunchy R&B album House of Balloons skyrocketing. Since then, the Toronto artistes have been spotted together at numerous shows and events, including Drake’s recent OVO Fest. They’ve also been spending a lot of time in the studio -- and while it was at first unclear exactly whose album the resulting tracks would end up on, Drizzy has confirmed that The Weeknd will be singing on his sophomore album, Take Care. A lot.

It’s been a long time coming, but here we are, just a month shy of J. Cole’s Roc Nation debut, Cole World: A Sideline Story. Jay-Z’s 25-year-old protégé kicked off Heineken and Roc Nation’s Red Star Access Tour at the Bowery Ballroom last night, and though he’s yet to release an official album (Cole World hits September 27), he still had enough popular tracks to run through onstage, screaming out, Hov-style, I've got a million of these! If he wanted to, that is.

Remember Tom Hanks’ rapping son Chet Haze? Well, meet Chet’s competition for the king of “rich white boy rap,” Tommy Hilfiger’s son Rich Hil. Last month, Hil jumped a step ahead of Haze by landing a record deal with Warner Bros, and via an in-depth Observer profile, we learned a few, er, interesting things about the 21-year-old. For example, he lives in the fancy schmancy Plaza Hotel with his model fiancée and he reps Connecticut in his raps (that pains us in more ways than one).

For the remainder of the week, the running commentary, criticism, and praise of Kanye and Jay-Z’s monster album, Watch The Throne, will continue to pour out on Twitter, Facebook, via e-mail and text, and maybe even over a few live discussions, but the critics have already passed their final judgments. As to be expected, there’s a mixed consensus on the collaborative album, though numerous mentions of the word “ego” appear across the board.

This all began last fall when Justin Bieber tweeted a video of himself rapping over Vado’s “Speaking in Tungs” under the alias Shawty Mane. Some people were excited—Vado included—and some were horrified, but when Biebs announced in December that he was working with Chris Brown, the result was one mere track only, the poppy “Next To You.” We thought it was over. Wrong. Chris just dropped his first rap mixtape Boy In Detention, which happens to feature the track “Ladies Love Me,” and guess who's rapping on it?