The background music of my life (at least from 4 to 6pm) comes blaring out of my tv as a stream of hip hop videos on BET (Rap City: Tha Basement, 106 & Park, and sometimes, The Countdown). So here's snippits of what went through my head as I watched today...

>>Why is R.Kelly still doing videos? What happened to the good ol' days of shunning pedophiles? On that note, does he (or his label) really think "pied piper of rap" is the best nickname for someone who, well, uh, see the previous sentence. I'm not even going to comment on the mask.

>>Chingy has been on the countdown for 65 days. I repeat, 65 days. aaaaahhhhhhhh! This is the guy that got famous off a song that ripped off the guttural rrrr of a mediocre nelly song? (this spurred my wife and I to count up the number of songs to jack that sound (to my dismay, even Kanye did it, luckily only for a verse).

>>Speaking of originality, R.Kelly is doing another step song. wasn't that his last song? And not that Master P was ever a genius but his new song rips off, like, 3 different recent songs. And one of those songs, Salt Shaker, seems to have stolen its title from Andre's "shake it like a polaroid picture" line.

>>Wait! I'm not ready for the next item, I'm still going off on originality. J-Kwon's Tipsy video seems to be a completely un-ironic, non-homage remake of Gin n Juice. (though its entertaining that BET substituted whatever the dad actual says at the beginning of the video with an overdub saying "teenage drinking is bad").

>>Speaking of J-Kwon.. running the risk of sounding my age, what the hell is a 17 year old singing about getting Tipsy in a club for?

>>So why do I keep watching? Cuz suddenly I'll get surprised by something like Pitch Black. Nice video, good, non-bling song, and good times. nice.

>>Say what you will about him (and I probably already have said it too, the kid got issues), Eminem is funny as hell and works his image well. Whether its raging against it (The Way I Am) or the hilarious new D-12 video (My Band) he has quite an awareness of what he's putting out there.

>>I don't hate on P.Diddy like many (not that I'm a big fan either) but I thought his wave of appearing in every video was over (that torch seems to have been passed to Kanye). And of all the groups that would actually lose cred, I'd think it would be Eightball & MJG who have had a decade long hard southern reputation already in place.

>>Another reason I watch? Miri Ben-Ari playing violin in a video. That kicks ass (and makes me even sadder I missed the Kanye West/Dilated Peoples show which she opened for)

>>The excitement about the mediocracy that is Lil' Flip is everything that is wrong with hip hop.

>>OutKast's Roses: video of the year. Once again bringing something to hip hop no one else would ever have the nerve to. And and I think Farnsworth's reincarnation as an Outkast groupie may win me over to him.

>>Freestyle Fridays. Freestyle Fridays. Freestyle Fridays. (Jin should be all over the radio by now!)