Fans of Biggie will remember that the late but relentlessly beloved rap icon often remarked on his hardscrabble younger years in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, where he grew up in an apartment with a single mother. Now, 41 years after Christopher Wallace was born, and 16 years after he was murdered, the…

On Friday, the Los Angeles Police Department released the Notorious B.I.G.'s autopsy report, more than 15 years after the rapper's murder. But, in keeping with their thus far stellar work on the case, they failed to first notify Biggie's family. Now, of course, they've apologized for the incident, blaming an…

In the early morning hours of March 9, 1997, Biggie Smalls was shot and killed while sitting in a car at a stoplight in Los Angeles. Despite a profusion of theories, his murder has never been officially solved. That's fucked up.

We do too, AARP. We do too.

Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, we now have access to a thick FBI file detailing the agency's investigation into the 1997 shooting death of Christopher "Notorious B.I.G." Wallace. The case, which now falls under the jurisdiction of the LAPD, has famously run cold. But these documents, though heavily…

All right, so maybe you aren't Rebecca Lanier old. You're still old. How old? Let's put it this way: You know that baby with the afro on the cover of The Notorious B.I.G.'s Ready to Die? His name is Keithroy Yearwood, and he's now 18. In the video, Yearwood and his folks recount how he was plucked from child model…

Biggie Smalls, the illest, was murdered in L.A. in 1997. Thirteen years! And not one arrest yet! There have been documentaries and posthumous albums and one million R.I.P. graffiti walls, but no arrests. But: the investigation's being "reinvigorated" (again).

The Library of Congress is adding Tupac's "Dear Mama," along with 24 other recordings, to its National Recording Registry today for their cultural significance. The program coordinator said the song was chosen because it is "relatively tame." What, no Biggie?

The Notorious B.I.G.'s birthday was this past Thursday. I wonder, him being so beloved and all, if it will ever get the Martin Luther King treatment? That'd be kind of funny. But also, cool.

Rappers have been dropping brand names in their lyrics for cash for years; it's tasteless, but widespread. But why would you turn a memorial track for your dead friend into a Coogi ad?

If you were a totally unknown rapper who suddenly appeared in a documentary rhyming alongside the late Biggie Smalls, one of the greatest and fattest men to ever pick up a microphone, wouldn't you be happy for the publicity? (Yes, if you were smart). Not if your name was Supreme, a Brooklyn rapper who is suing some…

Ramping up the Oscar-season stakes following the exploitation of Abigail Breslin's dimples in 2006 and Diablo Cody's clothes-allergic antics in 2007, Fox Searchlight appears to have gone the way of using low-cost (read: free) young acting hopefuls in its early push on behalf of the Biggie Smalls biopic Notorious.…