1) The Throne (Jay-Z & Kanye West)
     Watch The Throne Deluxe (Def Jam) 

2)  The Game The R.E.D. Album (Geffen)

3)  Elzhi & Will Sessions Elmatic (Over The Counter)

4)  Ski Beatz 24 Hour Karate School Pt II
      (Dd172)

5)   The Cool Kids When Fish Ride Bicycles (Green Label Sound, C.A.K.E. Recordings) 

Thanks once again to E-Lit at the Berkeley Amoeba Music store for taking time to talk with the Amoeblog for this week's Hip Hop Top Five chart and also for running down (in video above) some of the cool new releases and recent arrivals in the Telegraph Avenue, Berkeley store. The new  Watch The Throne Deluxe  version of Jay Z and Kanye West's The Throne project now joins the original regular Watch The Throne CD version, both on Def Jam.  A close second place on the chart is the latest from Left Coast rapper The Game, The R.E.D. album, which is produced by Dr. Dre and Pharrell and features the the single cameoing Chris Brown --"Pot Of Gold."

          


Were he alive Tupac Amaru Shakur (aka 2Pac), who was fatally shot in Las Vegas in September 1996, the phenomenally popular rapper & actor would be celebrating his 40th birthday today, June 16th, 2011. At the Rockit Room in San Francisco tonight Sellassie and a bunch of other local hip-hop artists will celebrate the event in a concert honoring the slain local rap hero who, while born in Harlem & raised in both NYC and Baltimore before relocating West in the late 80's, began his rap career in the Bay Area. And many others will be thinking of Tupac Shakur today too, from the millions of diehard 2Pac fans all over the world, to family and friends including his former crew members in Digital Underground; the legendary Bay Area hip-hop crew that Shakur came to fame in. 2Pac joined Digital Underground, at a young age, first as a roadie and backup dancer and then as a rapper which, in turn, helped kick start his extremely successful, illustrious, and ultimately tragic solo career.

This week I caught up with both Digital Underground's Jimi "Chopmaster J" Dright, who along with Shock G and Kenny K co-founded the group in 1987, and with  Money B, who along with DU's DJ Fuze also formed the side-project Raw Fusion,  to ask them each about Tupac. After all it was their ever-talented & most unique P Funk-fueled hip-hop crew, that took Pac under their wing and into their fold when he was a mere bright young teenager from the Marin City projects with a knack for writing poetry.