February 2nd – Lil` Wayne released his seventh album “Rebirth” on Young Money Records on this day in 2010.

“Rebirth” was Wayne`s foray into rock and punk and featured Eminem, Nicki Minaj, Kevin Rudolph and Shanell as guests.

“Rebirth”, which spawned the hit single “Prom Queen” was originally set to be entitled “Rebirth Of Auto-Tune” in response to Jay-Z’s recent hit song “Death Of Auto-Tune” and because of Wayne’s heavy usage of the vocal effect on the album.

Simon Cowell has reportedly offered Beyonce a staggering $100 MILLION to appear on the next season of The X Factor.

The media mogul is carrying out a major overhaul of the Fox talent show, and has already got rid of judges Paula Abdul and Nicole Scherzinger, as well as Welsh presenter Steve Jones.

Media Takeout quotes a so-called source as saying: “He wants a big name female star on the panel. Mariah [Carey] is good, but she’s not that hot today.

“He wants Beyoncé because that would immediately give him the bounce needed to beat American Idol.”

The report adds that, though Beyonce’s people have not responded to the claims, the star is expected to make a “major career announcement” very soon.

Beyonce is currently enjoying the first weeks of motherhood with newborn daughter Blue Ivy Carter.

A web entrepreneur who had it all by the time he was 21 managed to blow his staggering $2.5million fortune in just 12 months.

Andrew Fashion dropped out of high school to live the high life – his monthly $100,000 pay packet seeing him buy a plush Los Angeles house and several top-of-the-range sports cars.
He played high-stakes poker in Las Vegas, jetted away on a whim to London, Florida and Hawaii, and bought all the latest gadgets going.
But within just one year his websites, which gave users the tools to ‘design’ their MySpace pages, fell out of favour and the cash dried up.
Bankrupt and suffering from depression, he admitted: ‘I was young and stupid. The money was coming in so strongly, but it went out just as fast. A lot of the money just disappeared.’
Fashion, whose real surname is Thompson, built his business through months of shrewd marketing which saw his sites topping Google’s search rankings.
But a radical 2007 overhaul of the website meant Google believed it was a brand new page. It lost its Google ‘reputation’ overnight and plummeted to the engine’s eighth page.
Now not so visible, visitors dwindled and the income stopped. But Fashion still had overheads to pay, and a $400,000 tax bill he had not counted on.
He told Business Insider how it all went wrong: ‘I bought my first car, in cash. I bought my house and had $80,000 dollars of renovations done to it. I ended up buying seven cars total, a few for my friends.

For the 18th week now, Adele reigns atop the charts with “21″ selling an additional 116k this week. Will she ever get knocked out of the top 10?

2. Tim McGraw – Emotional Traffic 68k
3. Lamb of God – Resolution 52k
4. 2012 Grammy Nominees 52k
5. Ingrid Michaelson – Human Again 40k
6. Kidz Bop 21 33k
7. Kellie Pickler – 100 Proof 27k
8. Seal – Soul 2 27k
9. Drake – Take Care 26k
10. Kari Jobe – Where I Find You 25k

Looks like X-Factor is doing a little Spring cleaning!
Not only have judges Paula and Nicole been given the ax, but host Steve Jones has as well! I guess they’re going to be bringing in a whole cast of new people. Question is…why? Ratings I’m assuming, but it sucks when they have to be delivered the news via a lawyer and the show couldn’t even tell them themselves. Ouch! Are you sad to see them go?

Drake has clarified online hype he created off a line from his “Stay Schemin’” record and said a reference to NBA star Kobe Bryant’s divorce was not a shot toward his wife.

“That line came from a conversation about being this young and making this much money and the fear of losing it all. I just used his potential situation to address my own life. I never intended to offend Vanessa or anyone else. That line had everything to do with me and what goes on in my head as a 25 year old man with this much income flowing in. Kobe is and always will be a friend and an icon to me.”

Drizzy questions why Bryant is required to fork over millions of dollars his wife did not contribute to.

“Kobe bout to lose 150 M’s. Kobe my n*gga. I hate it had to be him. B*tch, you wasn’t wit me shootin in the gym,” he raps. (“Stay Schemin’”)

Tickets for Jay-Z’s two Carnegie Hall concerts to be held on February 6-7 are now officially on sale.

Tickets for the concerts will benefit both the United Way of New York City and the Shawn Carter Scholarship Foundation.

According to Carnegie Hall’s website, “Concert goers will get a once in a lifetime experience as Jay-Z takes the stage at the New York landmark to raise dollars that will help fight poverty, boost on-time graduation rates in underserved New York City schools, and put college within reach for low-income students across the five boroughs.”

The tickets, which range from $150 to $15,000, can be purchased two ways. For high-end boxes starting at $15,000 and tickets priced from $2,500 to $5,000, contact www.jayzconcerts@uwnyc.org. For all tickets under $1,500, visit the Carnegie Hall website.

Simon Cowell’s Syco Entertainment is partnering up with Sony Pictures and Will & Jada’s Overbrook Entertainment for a new DJ-themed reality competition show.

Here’s what Simon had to say about it:

“We have been working on this show for over a year and we wanted to partner with the right people. As soon as I met Jada and Miguel from Overbrook, I knew they would be our ideal partners. DJ’s are the new rock stars, it feels like the right time to make this show.”

More from Jada:

“This show will comb the world to find a new breed of talent. I am happy to be creating it alongside Simon Cowell, the Sony team, and my partner Miguel Melendez, on behalf of the Overbrook family.

And here’s more from Sony Pictures Television president of international production Andrea Wong:

“We are thrilled to be working with Simon Cowell and our partners at Overbrook on what we know will be a tremendously successful global format.”

Toronto native Drake will perform at this year’s 2012 NHL All-Star Game, slated for Ottawa, Ontario, on this Sunday, January 29, according to an announcement made today (January 25). Joining Drake will be New York’s Outasight, as well as singer Javier Colon, who recently was crowned champion on NBC’s first season of The Voice.

Currently, Drake is to perform during the game’s second intermission, while Outasight will perform his single, “Tonight Is The Night” during the player introductions, according to Billboard.

Both the United States and Canadian National Anthems will be sung and handled by Colon and Ottowa Senators anthem singer Lyndon Slewidge.

Currently, three players from Drake’s hometown team, the Toronta Maple Leafs, will be playing in the All-Star Game: Phil Kessel, Joffrey Lupul, and Dion Phaneuf.

The 2012 NHL All-Star Game will air live on NBC this Sunday, January 29 at 4 PM EST.

Chris Rock has been inspired by Jay and Kanye’s mega Watch The Throne tour last year, and wants to have a collaborative tour of his own. Who better than fellow comedian Dave Chappelle?! Only problem is, Dave has been kind of MIA for years, so you know that’s not going to be an easy task. Check out what Chris told Vulture about the tour.

“I’ve been talking to Chappelle a lot. Been trying to get Chappelle to go on tour. You know I’m not the hard one laughing. But I’m trying to make that happen. After seeing Kanye and Jay-Z, I was like, ‘Me and Dave should do this.’ Hell yeah! Rock doesn’t have a name for the tour yet, but he’s probably open to suggestions, right?”