Man, Snoop is larger than life, but he’s backstage walking around with no security. There’s just a few of his homies, including Daz trailing him as he exits the stage.

“Snoop, Snoop,” someone yells abruptly. It’s Monica, whose show, Still Standing premieres the same night as the BET Hip-Hop Awards on BET by the way.

So Monica and Snoop are chopping it up about God knows what, when someone suddenly shouts, “watch out, Snoop!” They were just moving the car that was onstage during his performance, offstage. They were pretty effective, I must say.

Next, they moved the drum set back onto the stage.

And that’s all for today, kids. Tune back in tomorrow and see what Mike Epps is up to minutes before he gets his jokes on.

Make sure to tune into the 2009 BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

I don’t know about you guys, but the first thing I thought about when I heard that Missy Elliot was being honored at this year’s BET Hip-Hop Awards was: Where has Missy been?

It’s already been five years since her last release, The Cookbook. Since then, she’s been relatively quiet. So I’m walking backstage, sniffing around looking for something to do when I bumped into the homie Q45 conducting an interview with  Missy right by her dressing room. I wish I knew what they were talking about. All I know is Q had her rolling.

“Can I get a pic with you two together,” I asked after Q finished his interview. The two quickly obliged as seen above. Stay tuned, ’cause there’s much more to come. Next I’ll tell you how Mike Epps prepares for his jokes and how Snoop Dogg almost got ran over by a car.

Make sure to tune into the 2009 BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

So it’s showtime and I’m alternating between the production office and backstage.

I’m never really nervous when working these shows, but one thing currently has me worried: missing the cipher. This year, Eminem, Black Thought and Mos Def will be spitting in one of the ciphers together. To see all three in the same room visually is just gonna be interesting. The funny thing is, they share more history than most realize. Em is a Lyricist Lounge type of kid, so I’m sure they’ve met in the past.

In any event, I’m backstage now and it’s interesting to see how close these people are from one another. There goes Mario having a full blown conversation with some random women.

One of our cameramen runs up on Mario, at which point he reveals the nature of the conversation. “You just missed it,” he says. In short, Mario and the young ladies were talking about the importance of a nice face Vs. a nice body. There’s much more to it, but you’ll have to use your imagination.

Make sure to tune into the 2009 BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

Frankie Takeover

I wasn’t too sure what to expect when I heard that Frankie would be hosting a red carpet segment for us. Truthfully, hosting is no picnic. Whenever I stop on the set of 106 & Park and see Rocsi and Terrence deliver near-perfect readings through all the screaming fans, I can’t help but think, “I could never do that.” Plus, you have to keep it going. It can’t be awkward. It has to flow. There can’t be any dead air. Well, Frankie sure kept it going…from beginning to end. There were so many moments, there’s no way the edited version will do it justice.
Read the rest of this entry »

I always make sure I sit towards the back whenever I go to comedy clubs. I guess I just have a fear of being cracked on by these comedians.

Well, I inadvertently caught the wrath of Mike Epps during his rehearsal reading. I was walking towards the stage trying to get a closer shot when I apparently stepped in front of the teleprompter. “Hey you, sit down,” Epps told me. “Brother with the pajama top.”

Hilarious! But I must say, I didn’t have a pajama top on. I had a Lacoste polo. Get it right, Mike!

Make sure to tune into the 2009 BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

Soulja Boy Rehearsing

So Soulja Boy is onstage bouncing all over the place and I can’t help but feel like following suit.

I can’t lie, the kid has grown on me over the past two years. “Gucci bandana, Gucci, Gucci bandana!” Funny thing is, an unidentified white person came over and asked me, “what are they saying? Gucci what?”

Gucci mane isn’t here, but Shawty Lo is. By the way, I’ve never seen him without shades on. Interesting!

Shawty Lo

15 Minutes Later…
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Luda tweaking his stage show

As previously mentioned, some performers go all out even during rehearsal. DTP head Chaka Zulu is looking on carefully and giving Scrappy pointers on his performance.

Lil Scrappy fills out paperwork after rehearsing

Meanwhile, Luda is seemingly having some technical difficulties. “How low can you go, how low can you go,” the high-pitched vocals say on Luda’s instrumental. Apparently, it’s a single he’s set to premiere off his Battle of the Sexes album with Shawnna. Uh oh! Mike Epps just got here. We should be in for some funny moments.

Ludacris and Mike Epps

Make sure to tune into the 2009 BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

It’s always interesting to see various artists’ approach to rehearsing. Some take it easier while others give their all as if it was a full-on performance.

The-Dream, who is presently tweaking his vocals for his appearance on Fabolous’ set, does a little bit of both. In one instance, he’s bouncing all over the stage, in the next, he’s sitting on the stairs doing his best Michael Jackson impersonation.

The-Dream

“Why, why, tell them that is human nature!”

10 Minutes later…

Phew! I thought I may have gotten into trouble or something. I thought this woman gave me a look ’cause I was using my flash when taking pictures or something, it turns out she, the choreographer, was getting aggravated because one of the dancers was getting the steps wrong.Tell you what, I respect the hell out of those dancers. I couldn’t do all that dancers, especially with a choreographer grilling my every move.

5  Minutes later…

So I’m talking to Fab’s people about taking pictures and notice that Christina Milian, Dream’s lady, was sitting two steps away from me the whole time. I tried documenting her presence for you guys, but she politely declined. I must say, she looks just as good in person.

5 Minutes later…

“Grab your bag, grab your bag, grab your bag!!!!” It looks like the dancers are still having trouble with the steps. Apparently, they were supposed to grab a  shopping bag as part of a “Throw It In The Bag”-like routine, but they forgot. Let’s see if they get it right come show time.

Fab and his dancers

Make sure to tune into the 2009 BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

Things are gonna be a tad different this year. I have to update the Music Channel on BET.com, so I’m not free to roam as I was during previous specials P.O.V. blogs. Still, stuff just seems to fall in my lap, so I’m sure I’ll have plenty to tell.

So I walk into rehearsals at the Civic Center, look left and see Fabolous glued to his phone, look far right and see Wale eating some food.

The first thing that came to mind was, “I wonder why their camps are so far from one another? I wonder if they know each other? If so, I wonder what the greeting was like?” Five minutes later, I get called over to conduct an interview with Wale. He’s apparently not quite ready yet, though. Like Fab, he’s also glued to his phone.

CChery: Let me know when you’re ready, Wale.

Wale: I’m just trying to see what Fab is talking about. I just looked at this little comment he made on Twitter. Oh my God, this n***a’s crazy, son.”

CChery: You do know Fab is sitting right over there, right?

Wale: I know.

How funny, Wale was checking Fab’s tweets. Meanwhile, the two were sitting less than 50 feet from one another. After some investigation, I tracked down a few of Fab’s rehearsal tweets. I think I know which one made Wale laugh out loud.

“Just showed up at BeT Hip Hop Awards rehearsal.. @spthehost jus snuck a uzi on the island.. @wale on stage now” 3:33 PM Oct 8th from UberTwitter

“The announcer on stage jus called @wale..whale! But yall gotta see the announcer..” 3:37 PM Oct 8th from UberTwitter

“http://twitpic.com/kqzr6 – Look at this Sonic the Hedgehog lookin nigga.. This is the announcer!” 3:47 PM Oct 8th from TwitPic

Make sure to tune into the BET Hip Hop Awards on BET October 27th 8/7c.

And that’s a WRAP!!!!!!!! Read the rest of this entry »