Will Smith’s business partner Charles “Charlie Mack” Alston was the victim of an attempted robbery on Friday (June 18thth) at a gas station in Philadelphia.

Smith paid direct tribute to Charlie Mack on the song “Charlie Mack (1st Out the Limo)” on his breakout hit 1988 album He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper.

A bandit approached Charlie Mack, who is 6’7 and 280 pounds with a handgun attempting to rob him at a West Philadelphia gas station, according to the Philadelphia Daily News.

Charlie Mack was filing up his convertible BMW at a Sunoco gas station at 38th and Girard Avenue and talking on his cellphone to his 21-year-old daughter, when a thug jammed a pistol to his stomach and began rifling through his pockets.

The towering promoter told the would be robber that he had $3,000 in cash in the right pocket of the pants he was wearing.

“I already got two thoughts in my mind: That this dude is not going to let me leave if he gets the money, He’s going to shoot me,” Charlie Mack told the Philadelphia Daily News.  “And, I’m not going to let him leave.”

As he pulled out the money, Charlie Mack grabbed the man’s gun and forced him to the ground. The man screamed for help and bit Charlie Mack’s right hand and scratched his face.

The man also made off with about $2,700 in cash during the robbery.

Will Smith and Charlie Mack have been involved in a number of business ventures together in the entertainment and film industry.

Charlie Mack’s annual Party For Peace Celebrity Weekend has been a staple event in the Summer in Philadelphia for at least the past decade.

This year’s annual event will take place July 23rd-25th.

“We never know what the circumstance is,” Charlie Mack stated. “He could be a bad seed, or trying to feed his seed. To me, it’s sad.”

Dr. Dre has verified the leak of his Detox first single “Under Pressure” is unmastered and remains a work in progress.

A little over 2 minutes in length, “Under Pressure” leaked Wednesday (June 16) and featured a noticeable sample of Kraftwerk’s “Trans Euro Express,” no chorus, 2 Dre verses and one from Jay-Z.

“I want to set the record straight for everybody who’s been waiting to hear my music,” Dre posted on Interscope’s official website. “The song that’s on the internet is an incomplete song that I’m still working on. When it’s ready, you’ll be hearing it from me.”

In April Dr. Dre and Interscope CEO Jimmy Iovine confirmed the song would be Detox’s lead single. “Under Pressure” was also expected to debut by the end of that month, but was pushed back to make way for Eminem’s upcoming Recovery LP.

Renowned by his production work on classic albums like The Chronic and Doggystyle, Dr. Dre revealed the German-based band Kraftwerk as a strong inspiration for his latest album.

Kraftwerk songs have been sampled consistently since Hip-Hop’s inception, ranging from pioneers such as Afrika Bambaata (“Planet Rock”) and the Fearless Four (“Rockin’ It”), to De La Soul (“Ghetto Thang”) and Jay-Z (“It’s Alright”).

“I’m just keeping my ear to the concrete,” Dre explained this past Spring. “I’ve been listening to a lot of old 60s and 70s music. Things like Kraftwerk and Parliament Funkadelic. I’ve really been listening to a lot of Kraftwerk… Kraftwerk had a really big inspiration on the beginning of Hip-Hop. My tastes change with the season. Right now it’s Kraftwerk. I’ll see what happens this summer.”

In 2009 Dr. Dre was the victim of early leaks when two songs featuring Nas and T.I. (“Topless,” “s**tPopped Off”) hit the internet before Dre could add his vocals.

At press time, Detox is still tentatively scheduled to be released this year.

Last Friday, “We Do It B.I.G.,” a Game and Yung Joc track featuring a sample from a line Notorious B.I.G.’s “Juicy” for the hook, premiered online. XXLMag.com recently spoke with Joc to find out how the song came about.

The two were hanging out in Joc’s hometown of Atlanta when an aspiring producer approached Game. “Basically, a kid walks up, hands him a CD and shit and [Game] tells his partner to go on the bus and listen to the CD,” he said. “While me and him sitting, chopping up business, he comes back, like, ‘Oh, the CD was garbage.’” That’s surely a standard enough response from someone who is often handed a lot of music, but soon, Game listened to the track himself.

“We part ways, cause we gonna meet up later to go to the club,” he continued. “The dude never ejected the CD, so [Game] heard the song, like, what the hell is that?” The Cali-native then hit Joc back up so the two could lay verses for the record.

“By the time he got from the bus to my studio, he had his two verses wrote,” he shared. “I put part of the hook on, he did his two verses, I did my verse. Within an hour, hour and a half, the song was mixed. We were in the club with it, at Luckie Lounge, they ran it back like three times. Left the club about 5 a.m., I’d say by 9 o’clock [it was on the radio].”

Game is preparing to release The R.E.D. Album later this summer, while Yung Joc is preparing to release his new single, “Yeah Boy.” —Adam Fleischer

Sean “Diddy” Combs has weighed in on the feud between Lil’ Kim and Nicki Minaj during an interview with BBC’s Tim Westwood.

The mogul responded to Lil Kim’s growing criticism of Nicki Minaj, who has been accused of slighting the veteran Brooklyn rapper backstage, in addition to borrowing her look.

Over the past few weeks, Lil Kim has called out Nicki Minaj for her alleged transgressions, prompting a reply from fellow Young Money artist Drake.

In a recent interview with Thisis50.com, Lil Kim chastised Combs for his support of Nicki Minaj.

Now, Diddy himself has weighed in, explaining the two artists are in two different “lanes” and completely different types of lyricists.

“I love Lil Kim and I’m sorry that she’s mad,” Diddy told Tim Westwood. “I never thought that by me working with another artist that she would take it the wrong way. But if she’s taking it the wrong way, it aint meant like that. Nicki never did anything to her. Nicki aint trying to swagger jack or say nothing negative about her.”

Despite Lil Kim’s recent boasts of being ready for a battle with Nicki Minaj, Diddy said the newcomer had “no beef” with Lil Kim.

“Emcees when they coming back out, a lot of times they like to talk crazy and do what they do,” Diddy explained. “At the end of the day, everyone respects Kim for being the Queen Bee. I am always going to love her and remember the good times I had with her. But I aint gonna make no apologies for working with Nicki Minaj. Especially somebody who has never said anything negative to Kim, or somebody in my eyes, who has paid homage to Kim.”

In related news, while Diddy aims to continue producing hit records, he has revealed there is one thing he is done producing for now – children.

During on the UK’s Friday Night with Jonathan Ross Show, Diddy urged fans to wait until they are married to have children.

“I don’t condone having children out of wedlock, but they were my circumstances and I’m a proud father [of six]. I take care of them…I’m not gonna have any more kids until I get married.”

It’s being called the biggest music release of the year. Indeed, Drake’s major label debut Thank Me Later, which hit shelves today (June 15), has received a level of excitement usually reserved for veteran superstar artists.

But so far the Toronto MC has managed to hit the musical sweet spot by crafting songs that appeal to hipsters, hardcore hip-hop heads and female fans.

But there is one person that has yet to jump aboard the seemingly unstoppable Drake train: Andre 3000.

“I really tried to do a song with Andre 3000, but I think it was meant for my second album,” Drake told VIBE on the eve of his release date. “Dre is one of those people that needs you to do a little more. He’s one of those people that believe in his craft so much that he needs you to do more than just be over hyped or just famous. In his mind, I have to prove myself and the truth is, I do. That’s just being real. I have a lot of work to do, so I actually respect him for that. I think on the second album I’ll probably only have two features. I have a few people in mind and Dre probably will be one of them.”

POW!

(AllHipHop News) Producer Dr. Dre was delivered a minor loss in court earlier this week, when a Los Angeles judge dismissed claims that the “new” Death Row Records illegally re-released his hit 2000 album The Chronic.

Dr. Dre was one of the original owners of Death Row Records when the legendary label launched in 1992 with Marion “Suge” Knight.

After Dre’s departure in early 1996 to form Aftermath, the label continued into a spiral, starting with the September 1996 unsolved murder of Tupac Shakur.

Knight eventually filed for bankruptcy when he lost a $107 million default judgment for refusing to show in court to answer claims that the label was funded by money provided by Michael “Harry-O” Harris and his wife Lydia.

Death Row Records and the label’s assets were sold to Wideawake-Deathrow Entertainment in January of 2009.

The label began re-releasing material from Death Row’s catalog, including The Chronic.

Dr. Dre sued Wide-Awake/Death Row in February 2010, claiming they released the classic album without permission.

Dre also claimed he had received no royalties from the sale of the record since he left Death Row in 1996.

Reuters reports that a California court dismissed Dr. Dre’s allegations on Monday, based on a similar case in 1976, involving a comedy series by Monty Python.

The judge ruled that the changes to Dr. Dre’s album The Chronic were minor, although they ruled in favor of Dr. Dre in regards to his fight to recover unpaid royalties from sales of the album.