Charley Rogulewski

April showers don't just mean May flowers. The spring month also blooms with iambic pentameters and tetrameters, marking National Poetry Month. Since it's birth in the Bronx in the late '70s, hip-hop has often been tied to poetry, with MCs often considering themselves spoken-word poets who rhythmically deliver prose over a beat...

He's called the "R&B General." While his abs of steel make him look bulletproof, Tank's true armor is in his music. Getting his start as a backup singer for Ginuwine, Tank rose to R&B stardom thanks to his sultry hit single "Maybe I Deserve," off his 2001 debut, Force of Nature. But th...

Last month, the Independent Film Channel (IFC) announced that it will air the third installment of R. Kelly's addictive, R&B-laced soap opera "Trapped in the Closet." Made up of three-minute chapters, the "Ignition" singer released the first batch of videos, Chapters 1-12, in 2005. Th...

Nicki Minaj's sophomore album, Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded, leaked a week before it's April 3 release date, and was quickly branded a mediocre LP. There is a lot to listen to. Minaj's second effort should be a double album, maybe even a triple disc...

R&B songs often tell us that love is no easy task. Sure, lyrics speak of those sexy, intimate moments in the bedroom, but twice as many describe heartaches and heartbreaks. Luckily, the driving rhythms and smooth soul of R&B are around to put our many relationships into song. Like W...

Ever wonder who your hip-hop soulmate is or which rap crew you'd be riding with? Rap, like blue jeans, comes in many different styles. Some rappers rap because they have a message, others to entertain and the rest hustle so they can live the high life...

With flamboyant pop stars from Lady Gaga to Katy Perry saturating the music scene these days, Nicki Minaj has somehow managed to steal some shine. The most recent example is her hell-raising performance at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards earlier this month...

On Feb. 20, Robyn Rihanna Fenty turns 24. It's hard to believe that seven years have passed since she told us how to "dip it low" on her breakthrough single 'Pon de Replay.' Since her 2005 debut LP, 'Music of the Sun,' we've seen the 'We Found Love' singer become a household name thanks to the 25 million records she has sold worldwide, countless hits on the Billboard 100 and rampant tab

This Valentine's Day (Feb. 14) put the red roses and boxes of chocolate aside and turn up the volume in the bedroom with The BoomBox's playlist. We've gone back in time as far as the '60s to find 10 R&B and soul albums that tickle the heart and will leave you floating on cloud nine. Fr...

The Best Rap Album category was born in 1996, during the 38th Annual Grammy Awards. To put things into perspective, that's 38 years after the Grammy Awards' inception, 12 years after Run-D.M.C. released their self-titled debut album and four years after Dr...