It would be easy to just peg Amanda Blank as a raunch-rapper; a purveyor of sex-crazed rhymes in the vein of Lil' Kim or Trina, shot through an electro-indie prism. But there's a lot more going on here.

Blank is a Philly native who came up through the same eclectic scene that helped produced artists like Diplo and Spank Rock (both of whom she's collaborated with on her debut album I Love You).

While their certainly is a lot of NC-17 material on her album, the more interesting aspect is the way in which she delivers it. Blank's flow is super-tight; she has control over the kinetic electronic beats that she raps on. And she's not at all one-dimensional; some of her stuff veers towards feisty electro-rock in the vein of Le Tigre.

Check out Blank's video for "Might Like You Better" below. And if you like what you hear, vote for her in the mtvU Woodie Awards. She's nominated for Left Field Woodie!

As Phil Collins is prone to say, I can feel it coming in the air tonight. The leaves are falling, the college football is being played, the hayrides are being taken; it's mtvU Woodie Awards season, pumpkins.

In honor of mtvU's annual award show, honoring the music the rocked college campuses the hardest, we thought we'd get some of these nominees used to the fierce competition they will face when the show will airs on MTV, MTV2, mtvU and Palladia on Friday, December 4, at 10 pm.

Today we're pitting the D.C. rapper (and this year's MTV Video Music Awards in-house entertainer) Wale against Brooklyn dream-poppers Passion Pit. Both acts are nominated for the Breaking Woodie Award.

Arbitrarily (and vaguely), let's say we're judging on the basis of dopeness. It's something you can't define, but you know it when you see it.

The Wale video has swagger. A swooping opening shot, a Lady Gaga feature, a dope beat, and it was most people's introduction to the lovable Chocolate City emcee.

Passion Pit is all indie innovation and art. And it's gorgeous. A beautiful, lush tune full of swelling keyboards with a unique video, givinng an impressionistic snapshot of a night in the life of a young lady; tearing that snapshot up in the process.

The winner? Well the nice part is, it's up to you! Let us know who you like in the comments, and go vote for your favorite at the mtvu Woodie site (where you can vote in any of the categories being awarded at the show!).

The Woodies are coming -- mtvU's annual campus-friendly award show will air on MTV, MTV2, mtvU and Palladia on Friday, December 4, at 10 pm.

This is a truly democratic affair in which you can have a real say in who goes home with the wood. That's right, you can vote for the winners in the major categories.

To sweeten the pot to honey-levels of sweetness, the Woodies performers have just been announced. Let's get familiar shall we?

All the performers are also nominees for Video Woodie (best video, basically). First, we got the skronk-garage blues of The Dead Weather. Jack White's other, other band is nominated for their NRA-fever-dream of a clip for, "Treat Me Like Your Mother."

Then you've got some lilting, some chiming, some longing, some Death Cab For Cutie. DCFC are nominated for their video for "Grapevine Fires."

But they'll be performing their single from the New Moon soundtrack, "Meet Me At The Equinox."

And last, but least clothed, we have Matt and Kim, who will be performing their strip-tease anthem, "Lessons Learned." Will they do it in their birthday suits? You'll have to check it out to see.

In this episode of "Halloween Horrors," emcee /producer P.O.S. recalls his time on the ice planet of Hoth, also known as Minneapolis, Minnesota. In a remembrance of Halloween past, P.O.S. talks about the time he braved a serious blizzard resulted in a record candy take for the then-Spiderman-costumed youngster.

The Woodie-nominated P.O.S. goes on to discuss his dislike of salted peanut candies and, in stark contrast to the boys from needtobreathe, firmly places his support in the Vampire camp (in our ongoing Vampire v.s. Werewolves debate).

Check out more MTV Halloween Horrors here.

The leaves are leaving the trees and the kids are back in school. It's starting to look like Woodie weather out there, no?

MTVU's annual award show--held this year on December 4th--honors those artists who put it down on college campuses everywhere; celebrating the music the kids listen to while studying to become the future leaders of America, etc. And the best part about this show? You can vote to determine who wins!

This year features a really healthy crop of artists. Let's take a gander at some of the categories and nominees, shall we?

For the Woodie of the Year Award, for the artist who made the biggest splash on college campuses this year, we've got Asher Roth, Kings Of Leon, Drake, Silversun Pickups and MGMT.

In the category of Breaking Woodie, which honors up and coming artists who have made headway with the kids, the nominees are Grizzly Bear, Never Shout Never, Wale, La Roux, Friendly Fires and Passion Pit.

Probably my favorite category, Left Field Woodie, which features artists who defy classification, features nominees like Amanda Blank, Major Lazer, Janelle Monae and P.O.S.

You can also vote in the categories Performing Woodie, Good Woodie and College Radio Woodie, BMOC Woodie and Best Video Woodie.

Don't get your hoodie strings in a bunch: Just because Patrick Stump laid down a track on Lupe Fiasco's upcoming album doesn't mean Fall Out Boy's gonna fake the funk on their next LP, go early-'90s West Coast Gangsta Rap or do some off-the-wall Mannheim Steamroller New Age jonx or something. And contrary to Innernet chatter, Fall Out Boy's fifth album (not to be confused with the Infinity On High re-release out Tuesday) is NOT gonna be an acoustic-folk record. MTV News put out that FOB fire right here.

Read more...

After getting busted for weed in Norway last month, slurring through a performance at the MTV Europe Music Awards and dropping out of the mtvU Woodie Awards AND Saturday Night Live earlier this month and generally making Lindsay Lohan look like Charlotte Church, last night Amy Winehouse continued to demonstrate the perils of ostensibly unbridled recreational drug use when she staggered and slurred her way through yet another gig. Read more...

We caught up with the inimitable Rilo Kiley at the mtvU Woodie Awards, where they told us, in a word, what it was like to see themselves on MTV during their Artist Of The Week run last month: trippy.

Lead singer Jenny Lewis, who, while we talked, was preciously nibbling a tiny handful of M&Ms from her even tinier hand, relayed this anecdote:

"I live in an apartment building, and down by the laundry machines, this woman who I'd never spoken to before said 'Hello neighbor, I saw you on MTV.' (Laughing.) But I was like 'could you get your whites outta the dryer, please?'" Read more...

Before they won the 2007 mtvU Woodie Of The Year Award, Gym Class Heroes -- fresh off a video shoot with Kelly Rowland -- worked the red carpet, where we wasted no time getting down to some serious Buzzworthy brass tacks: hair care.

But before we tell you what they told us, allow us to rewind and refresh for a moment: When the band performed at the 2007 VMAs in Vegas, Gym Class Heroes lead singer Travis McCoy, who's a complete hair chameleon, rolled out rocking locks straighter than Madonna's stick-straight "Nothing Really Matters" wig, from her brief Asian phase, which you may've missed because she wedged it in between her "Om Shanti" yoga phase, her trance-light phase and her fake-goth/ English Patient phase. Read more...

We've been freaking out over and obsessively watching the new "Superstar" video by Chicago rapper Lupe Fiasco, from his upcoming album The Cool. So we had to contain ourselves to keep from hopping the gate that separated us from Lupe when we saw him rolling down the red carpet at the mtvU Woodie Awards.

Fortunately we did not embarrass ourselves thusly, but we did get our recorder all up in his face to talk to him about "Superstar," and we learned that his songwriting was partially inspired by a certain artist with a love of the junk, a propensity for wearing bloody ballet flats, and a "little bit" of a problema con los drogas. Read more...