Mike Bookey

How do you go from posing for pictures with an assault rifle, rapping about gangbanging and belonging to one of the most profane (yet pioneering) hip-hop groups of all time to a producer of family-friendly comedy? To get an answer, you'd have to ask Ice Cube, because he's done all of that.
The former N.W.A. member, who has also enjoyed a wildly successful solo career in the gangsta rap world, is somehow the same dude who served as producer for the family film Are We There Yet? and now is executive producer of the TBS sitcom of the same name. But this isn't to say Ice Cube has sold out. He really hasn't. In fact, his last album, I am the West, hit the streets last fall and was surprisingly awesome and a great throwback to the glory days of West Coast rap.

For the past decade, Jay Tablet (real name: Joseph Taveres) has been a key player in the Oregon hip-hop scene as half of Cloaked Characters, along with Rory Oneders. But now, Tablet is breaking out on his own with his first solo disc, Put It On The Tab.
Here, Tablet keeps the upbeat Cloaked Characters' vibe alive, but does venture out into his own stylistic territory, experimenting with more electronic and dance sounds than we're used to hearing from CC. The album features plenty of familiar guest rappers and vocalists, including Mosley Wotta, Caitlin Cardier and even an appearance by Madchild of Swollen Members, but Tablet manages to keep his stamp on the record by anchoring each track with his own swagger.

It's a Friday afternoon in New Orleans and Jeff Raines is taking it easy. Well, kind of. He's playing with some musicians that night somewhere downtown, but compared to earlier that week, things are pretty tame. You see, Raines is only two days removed from Ash Wednesday – three days from Mardi Gras – and given that he plays guitar in Galactic, one of the city's most hard-charging bands, it's OK that he's taking a little down time.
But there is no vacation on the horizon for Raines and his band. Within a week, Raines and the four other members of Galactic will be back on the bus for a month-long tour, doing what they've been doing for nearly 20 years – playing some of the funkiest instrumental jams in the business while also accompanying an eclectic array of performers, from rappers to soul legends. Then this summer, like most summers before in the band's history, the group hits the festival circuit, where Galactic's distinctively New Orleans roots mix well with the party atmosphere found at such mass gatherings.

Of all the things Tim Bluhm could be excited about, beer doesn't seem like it would be at the top of the Mother Hips front man's list. But on a Monday afternoon amidst discussion of the rootsy rock band's 20th anniversary, a forthcoming box set and a new studio record, he spends some time chatting about brewing.
The following day, Bluhm would be heading from his home in the Bay Area to Chico, the California college town where the Mother Hips originated, to visit Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. This is huge for Bluhm, a self-admitted beer fan, because the brewery is making a special beer for the band's upcoming Family HipNic music festival in Big Sur.