When's hype not just hype? When it's HOVA. And because it's Jay-Z, you've probably already heard most if not all of his eleventh official album, The Blueprint 3 -- sorry, Jay. People just couldn't wait. But people just couldn't wait for keys to the Roc Nation. This is the OFFICIAL MTV.com Blueprint 3 full-length album leak.

Jay-Z's obviously the CEO of The Blueprint 3, but the board also features Alicia Keys, Kid Cudi, Kanye West, Mr. Hudson, Drake, Swizz Beatz, Young Jeezy, Pharrell, J. Cole, Rihanna, and Luke Steele of Empire of the Sun. That's more guests than your last Thanksgiving dinner. When Jay-Z asks you to guest, the answer's yes.

+ Listen to every track of Jay-Z's The Blueprint 3 right now on MTV.com's "The Leak."

And don't miss Jay-Z's live performance at the 2009 MTV VMAs on Sunday, September 13.

(Credit: Brian Appio)

Maxwell Drummey and D.A. Wallach -- AKA Chester French of "She Loves Everybody"/"Jimmy Choos," Pharrell, Kanye and Harvard fame -- shared their prom memories, and they're simultaneously the funniest and most depressingly unromantic prom tales probably in the entire history of prom-going.

With Chester French's prom tales, you get and unambiguous mix of:

+ Total and inexplicable nudity

+ A discussion of the economics of prom

+  An As Hard As They Come reference

+ Pinch-hitting for psycho boyfriends

+ Bow ties

+ Various Rachels

... Plus confusion on absolute grandiose levels, Abba, and ODB. In sum, Taking Back Sunday's Matt Rubano, who referred to the magical night as a "crapfest," and Chester French -- Maxwell Drummey especially, agreed.

+ Watch Chester French discuss prom after the jump, and get more celebrity prom stories.

Read more...

Who are you, Tokin' Black Guy, if that's even your REAL name! Are you a semi-incognito Pharrell Williams? A way WAY underground lost Dungeon Family artist? Some kind of viral marketing single dropped by Swatch? And should I feel weird about your name? (Though we are pretty much living in post-white America, after all.)

Your tracks magically appeared in my inbox (maybe that's why you call yourself a rocket scientist), and while I can't find any evidence that corroborates your "produced by Kanye West" subject line, I like the Kanye-minus-the-mortifyingly-bad-singing-habit/ low-fi feel, complete with MS Paint flair.

+ Listen to Tokin' Black Guy's "Body Clock" and the extremely-Andre 3000-ifici "Turn My Music High," and tell me who YOU think Tokin' Black Guy REALLY is...

Much as I fully embrace old-school "Respiration"-era Common, and boho/ Bob Dylan/ not-afraid-to-love-out-loud "Come Close" Common, and socially conscious/pensive "Drivin' Me Wild" Common and all the Commons in between, it's nice to see the dude dish out a hot-ass, swagger-centric booty-dropper, like the Neptunes-produced "Universal Mind Control."

Unless you have a fear of robots (that's Pharrell, by the way, who you'll also see in Fall Out Boy's "I Don't Care" video) watch the new video, directed (somewhat obviously, no?), by the legendary Hype Williams -- which is exactly why the video will remind you a bit of Lloyd's "Girls Around the World" clip and Kanye's "Stronger."

Avert your eyes, kiddies! Joe Trohman got nothing but a raincoat on (I knew there was a solid reason for the Old Testament hair -- to look EVEN CREEPIER and more authentic as a flasher) in Fall Out Boy's new video, "I Don't Care." (Check out behind-the-scenes photos here.)

The "I Don't Care" video -- directed by Alan Ferguson with assistance from Pete Wentz's talented dog, Hemingway, who's smarter than your dog, clearly -- is the lead single off FOB's upcoming fifth album, Folie à Deux, which sees Fall Out Boy training a lens on the celebrity circus and all its effed-up glory.

Look for surprise walk-ons by Pharrell Williams, Gabe Saporta, and Mark Hoppus. (Well, I guess they're not really surprises since I just told you.) And that Spencer Pratt cameo you were promised? Totally the money shot -- nice to see Mr. Montag taking one for the team, dealing himself the KO blow you so wish you could deliver yourself.

Also awesome: Spaghetti Cat!!! AND, the best face-morphing scenes since Michael Jackson's "Black or White" video.

+ Although Travis Barker and DJ AM sustained significant second and third-degree burns from Friday night's plane crash, both are slated to make full recoveries. Hospital officials delivered the good news at a press conference held yesterday, adding that the two men are currently in "critical but stable" condition. (MTV)

+ Meanwhile, famous pals like Fall Out Boy, Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson want AM, Barker and their fellow crash victims to know their thoughts and prayers are with them. (MTV)

+ Radiohead is challenging fans to remix "Reckoner" from their latest album In Rainbows. Let the games begin! (Radionhead Remix)

+ George Michael reenacts his infamous lavatory arrest! This time, the bathroom bandit (who was once slammed for soliciting stall-sex from an undercover officer) was nabbed on more boring charges of drug possession. (Scandalist)

+ Is Pharrell Williams the next Jerry Seinfeld?? (MTV - UK)

+ What do Metallica and Run DMC have in common? Not much, other than both might be headed for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. (Rolling Stone)

+ For those of you who (wisely!) missed the 2008 Emmy Awards, here's the 3-minute recap. (Best Week Ever)

+ It's Ashanti, like you never heard her before ... literally! (Billboard)

People like to think that working at MTV is totally anything-goes -- the halls are filled with girls dressed like Katy Perry or lounging around in bikinis like they stepped out of a Shwayze video, and the dudes all look like either Pharrell or Trace Cyrus. Not exactly (though we have seen the Shwayze dudes around here from time to time.)

We do often wear jeans and ironic t-shirts and stuff, but we also have standards. Like -- for starters -- not coming to work dressed as Osama Bin Laden.

Just ask Russell Brand. He got fired from his VJ gig at MTV UK when he showed up, high out of his mind on heroin, dressed as the evil bearded one on September 12, 2001. No one -- including Kylie Minogue, who he was set to interview on the MTV UK equivalent of TRL -- was amused. He was fired quickly thereafter. But, life's about second chances, right? And MTV hired the now-sober comic back to the host the 2008 VMAs.

Watch Russell explain his relationship with MTV and to the VMAs in this exclusive clip.

+ Plus, check out Russell and Britney Spears' elephant VMA promos, watch more promo spots starring Russell and Britney, and find out more about the badboy Brit.

+ FNMTV host Pete Wentz divulges his extensive role in Fall Out Boy's creative song-writing process: "I'll go over to Patrick's house, and he’ll kind of just sit there and play songs, and I’ll be like, ‘Ah, that one’s awesome!'" (Rolling Stone)

+ Rumor has it Taylor Swift and Joe "The Middle One" Jonas are "goin' steady." (The Evil Beet)

+ Nas to Jesse Jackson: "We don't need [you]; I'm here. I got this." (MTV)

+ Radiohead's new video does not employ cameras but lasers. Or something. Science is confusing. (Tripwire)

+ VH1's tribute to the Who shaping up to be a veritable "Who's Who" of rock legends. (Billboard)

+ The Strokes, Santogold and Pharrell Williams are all officially playing for the same team. (NME)

+ Amy Winehouse walks into a nightclub, walks out with a table lamp. (MTV)

+ Kerli's debut album, Love is Dead, lives up to the hype. (Neon Limelight)

+ MGMT: A coming of age story. (New York Magazine)

+ Normally dance remixes make us want to hurl ourselves in the path of the closest, speediest bike messenger, but the Masterbeat.com (insert self-love joke here) dance remixes of Jennifer Hudson's "Spotlight" make up for the travesty of dance mixes past.

+ Still funny: "Makin' Music With John Mayer" video on FunnyorDie.com. Plus: new pix of John's "O-face." (Metromix)

Check your iPod. If you don't have any N.E.R.D. tracks (and if that's true, then you need to get on it, so read on to avoid further pitying), then dollars to donuts, you've got something they've applied their Midas touch to as the Neptunes -- their production operation. Madonna and Britney, Ludacris, Snoop, and Kanye -- they're currently backing him on his much-lauded Glow In the Dark tour. Hell, they've even remixed Sade.

Or, put another way: open up the Billboard charts, close your eyes and randomly point to an artist. Now open them. There's an excellent chance the brain trust behind N.E.R.D. produced, remixed or will remix and/or produce that artist, taking already solid material to a new dimension you didn't know existed but suddenly need a whole lot more of -- the flavor of dream you're not sure is the good or bad type, but you know it tastes better than being awake.

N.E.R.D. is Pharrell Williams, Chad Hugo and Shae Haley. Like a giant squid fused with a set of conjoined octopus twins, the end result of N.E.R.D.'s time spent behind the controls sounds like they've got a lot more than just six hands and 30 fingers on deck. And the tracks snap, crackle and pop with the hyperstimulated sizzle of sticking all 30 into 30 different electrical sockets.

“With the Neptunes,” N.E.R.D.'s Chad Hugo told Hamptonroads.com, "we have that ability to collaborate with artists, and they have their vision and we’re there to paint different scenarios. As N.E.R.D., what we put out is directly from our brains to the stage. We’re in our own shoes. We have the ability to be ourselves." Right. Which is why they're about to drop their third N.E.R.D. album, Seeing Sounds, (out tomorrow), named for the neurological phenomenon synesthesia, where your senses basically swap shoes for the day. The album's a celebration of their genre-resistant, chopped-and-screwed, tilted-and-twisted sound, complete with that hypnotic sawtooth bass swagger, dirty-ass drumming, superfunked, sexed-up, spaced-out blips, beeps and bumps.

We always suspected these guys saw things we don't. Turns out they see everything we don't. And with N.E.R.D. -- forever the sickest and coolest kids you know -- piloting their musical spacecraft into complete sensory overload, we get to explore a whole new galaxy of songs, sounds and sights we'd never otherwise hear... or taste.

Watch N.E.R.D.'s new video, "Everyone Nose (All the Girls Standing In Line for the Bathroom)," plus a few all-time N.E.R.D. classics, check out their MTV.com live peformances, watch an exclusive Buzzworthy interview with the Va Bee three, watch their exclusive Artist of the Week videos -- including performance clips shot at Special Sauce in Bayshore, New York -- and road trip clips, featuring Donnell Rawlings (Ashy Larry of Chappelle's Show.)

When you talk to Chester French, the young pop duo won't mention how they signed with Pharrell Williams' label over Kanye West's. And they might not say that their song "She Loves Everybody" was featured in HBO's "Entourage," or that they collaborated on a track with Common on his new album.

Instead, the two Harvard alums will tell you how much they're inspired by White Zombie's masculinity and Kevin Costner's films, and that they're aspiring chefs and Pilates instructors.

But don't take our word for it: Watch the tongue-in-cheek 23-year-olds give Buzzworthy the runaround in this exclusive (and exceedingly sardonic) interview, and check out their acoustic mtvU performance too:

+ Plus, for those of you on the West Coast, you can catch the saucy pair tonight at 7:30pm at L.A.'s UNDFTD Silverlake for an acoustic session, and then later at 9:15pm performing at the Viper Room in West Hollywood.