Michael Jackson, 1958-2009

You knew it was coming — here are the latest news updates surrounding the death of Michael Jackson.

A public memorial service is scheduled to take place on Tuesday, 10 a.m. PST, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, following a private service at an undisclosed location. Fans will have the opportunity to register for free tickets to attend the public memorial, with 11,000 tickets said to be available. More information on how to register for the tickets will be announced tomorrow.

It was also announced today that a hearing to decide if Michael’s mother, Katherine Jackson, will remain the temporary guardian of his three children has been pushed back a week by a judge.

Debbie Rowe, Michael’s ex-wife and the mother of his three children, is said to have told KNBC in Los Angeles that she “wants her kids.” Michael’s will nominated his mother as the guardian of his children and nominates Diana Ross as guardian if his mother were unable to take over guardianship.

Rowe is intentionally left out off the will.

Now, on to what made him the King of Pop — the music.

Michael Jackson is reported to have broken multiple records this week on the Billboard charts. Albums featuring Jackson will take up the top nine spots of Billboard’s Top Pop Catalog Albums chart, and he will have six of the top 10 spots on the Top Digital Albums chart.

His albums sold 422,000 copies this week, and he is rumored to have sold 2.6 million single downloads this week. Absolutely incredible.

So which would you rather taste — an A-hole or a B-hole? Check out this new Hardee’s (known as Carl’s Jr. on the West Coast) commercial for a quick laugh.

I didn’t get a chance to post this premiere yesterday. Here’s Pleasure P’s video for his latest single, “Under.”

The video features The Game star Tia Mowry as the leading lady. Mowry updated fans on the status of The Game today via Twitter, stating that BET is very interested in the show, but they are currently waiting on CBS to give up the rights to the series.

Earlier today CNN released this footage of Michael Jackson in a dress rehearsal for his 50-date tour, which was to kick off in London in the next few weeks.

The rehearsal occurred just two nights before the King of Pop died of an apparent cardiac arrest.

He rocked this performance; the dance was great and those were live vocals — no lip-syncing at all. It’s still so hard to believe that he’s gone.

I will be posting some more Michael Jackson updates — including confirmed funeral plans — later on this evening.

Here is the premiere of Drake’s huge single, breast, I mean “BEST I Ever Had.”

The video — directed by Kanye West — features Drake as the coach of an all-woman basketball team, but basketballs are clearly not the only things bouncing in this video. I’m just saying…

In other Drake news, the Canadian rapper is said to have just signed a multi-million dollar deal with Lil Wayne’s Young Money label.

“Best I Ever Had” currently sits at number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100, and the Young Money cut “Every Girl,” which also features Drake, sits at number 10. He is the first unsigned artist to have had two songs reach the top 10 in the same week.

The former Degrassi star is definitely doing big things here in the States.

In today’s WTF files, some lady in Ohio was being interviewed by the police when a squirrel suddenly crawled out of her crevices. I have no more words; just watch the foolishness.

Artwork promoting the 2009 BET Awards

So if you’re like me, last night you sat and watched the entire 2009 BET Awards — from pre-show, to main show, to post-show.

I watched it not because I thought it was amazingly awesome, but because it was a hot ass mess disaster that was too bad and too funny to turn away from.

Did a guy really get up on stage and thank his co-workers at Sears? Yes. Were there minors dancing on stage while Lil Wayne, Drake and others rapped about having sex with every girl in the world? Yes. (Chris Hanson, did you see that?) Did Don Cornelius‘ speech really occupy the entire third hour of the show? Hell, just about.

Since BET advertised the Awards these past few days as a tribute to Michael Jackson, much more people had their eyes on the show than ever before. Hell, even CNN was live at the red carpet, and they had better celebrity coverage than BET did. Ridiculous.

I was upset after watching the show — not because of how awful it was (that actually made me laugh) — I was upset because it was very apparent that BET basically used Michael’s name to get ratings. Why do I say that? Because the little tributes that were there were thrown together messes. Other than the Jamie Foxx/Ne-Yo tribute after Janet’s moving speech, the Rick James tribute from the show a few years back was better than what BET put together for the King of Pop.

BET, I know that Michael’s death was sudden, but that’s really no excuse. You had time to put together one excellent, all-star tribute to the King, and you had all eyes watching. But you failed — miserably.

You guys have got to do better, BET. And by better, I don’t mean editing out little girls from a To Catch A Predator-esque performance on the encore presentation.

The network may have won according to ratings, but BET will not have a future if it keeps putting out such a terrible quality of programming.

P.S. Joe Jackson, did you really shout out your record label on the red carpet? You are so fired. SMH.

ABC 13 reporter Steve Ryan was trying to get live fan reactions to Michael Jackson’s death in Downtown Las Vegas when some random drunk got in his way.

Ryan and the camera man tried to ignore the situation; however, things got a little out of control and the cameras eventually cut back to the anchors — but not before Ryan turned ghetto and bitch-slapped the drunk guy (OK, not really but “bitch-slap” sounds better).

Some people are saying that Steve Ryan didn’t handle the situation professionally. Watch the video and tell me what you think.

Check out the video for “She Ain’t Got…”, the second single off LeToya Luckett’s sophomore album Lady Love, which is due in stores and online on August 25th.

I’m not a fan of the video, but I am convinced that this single is going to blow up this summer! This will be the song of her career; she’s gonna have heffas swinging bats like it’s the World Series.

Check out her new album cover after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Guess what? I’m back from my massive hiatus!

To kick things off, here is the video for Jay-Z’s “D.O.A. (Death of Autotune),” which premiered last-night after the disastrous 2009 BET Awards.

I’m still pretty indifferent about the song, but I’m glad to see that Jay FINALLY got that haircut in the video.

Jay-Z’s new album, The Blueprint 3, will be available in stores and online September 11th.

In case you haven’t noticed, THA DOGHOUSE has not been updated in… MONTHS! But don’t worry; there’s good reasoning behind this.

The main reason: I HATED the direction this site was going in. Celebrity photos, rumors & gossip… YUCK! Don’t get me wrong, I like reading sites that have that kind of stuff every now and then, but I don’t want to be one of those sites.

So I spent the past few months considering ideas to make this site better and more like me. It needed more depth, and that’s what’s about to happen.

All the old posts are gone; I’m about start this piece over from scratch!

It will basically have the same design and a few of your old favorites, but the content will be something completely reinvented with REAL news, entertainment, and pop culture, and a REAL blog format.

Check back later this month to see the brand new site.

OMG, finally! The video for the Black Eyed Peas’ hit single, Boom Boom Pow, debuted tonight. Check it out above!

The song currently sits atop the Billboard Hot 100, and it is the group’s first-ever Billboard number one. They’re on that next ish now!

What do you think of the video?

Obama takes the Oath of Office, becoming the nation’s 44th president.

Shortly after noon E.S.T. today, history was made. President Obama was sworn into office, becoming the nation’s first African American president just one day after the Martin Luther King, Jr. memorial holiday.

Many of you are probably thinking that this is a very late post, and it is, but I was too busy observing history on my television screen in amazement, honor and pride.

This is not just a victory for Blacks or African Americans, it is a victory for women, Latino Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans, Gay Americans, people all across the world; it is a victory for everyone.