Donda’s Baby Boy graces the cover of the December/January issue of Complex magazine. For the cover story, Editor-in-Chief Noah Callahan-Bever provides a rare look inside Kanye’s “Fantasy Rap Camp” in Hawaii and the making of My Dark Twisted Fantasy.

The sun sets, and Q-Tip and Consequence arrive, straight from the plane. Kanye asks RZA if he’d voice the hook—”Champagne wishes and 30 white bitches/You know the shit is, fuckin’ ridic’lous”—and the Abbott steps into the booth and obliges, immediately transforming from sedate and stoned to amped and aggressive. It’s enough to make us all chuckle on his first take; wrapped around those words, his thick and bizarre drawl just sounds so perfectly…RZA. But Kanye notices something off in the delivery, and he presses the intercom button to talk to RZA: “Um, fam, it’s actually ‘thirty white bitches,’ not ‘dirty white bitches.’” RZA laughs. “I’ll do it again,” he says, “but to be real, the way I be saying words, you ain’t gon’ be able to tell the difference.” Ha! At Rap Camp, the shit is fuckin’ ridiculous.

The rest of the trip settles into a fairly routine pattern, if by “fairly routine” you mean “a succession of both magical and mundane moments starring the musicians who defined your adolescence alongside the most exciting artists of today.” Each morning begins with a 10 a.m. breakfast at Kanye’s Diamondhead residence. Pusha, Tip, RZA, Cudi, Cons, and Kanye’s crew slowly assemble to enjoy the absurdly tasty cooking of Kanye’s in-house chefs. If you’re smart, you order the French toast with the flambéed banana. An hour later, Kanye pulls up in his Porsche Panamera, fresh from the studio. That’s right, from the studio. During my five days in Hawaii, Kanye never slept at his house, or even in a bed. He would, er, power-nap in a studio chair or couch here and there in 90-minute intervals, working through the night. Engineers remained behind the boards 24 hours a day.

You can read Noah’s full story, as well as some testimonials from some of the album’s stars (Pusha, Pete Rock, Nicki, Bon Iver) here. There are also a good 40 or so never before seen candid photos from the studio sessions that you can peruse here. A couple samples:

Read Noah’s 2004 piece on Kanye (post-College Dropout) that inspired the line “it takes more than a magazine to kill my Vibe”.

Off the upcoming Year Of The Blacksmith community mixtape.

Jean Grae – Bridge (Prod. by RJD2) | Usershare

Week #5 of Swizzy’s Monster Mondays.

Swizz Beatz & Busta Rhymes – Bad One

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Last Week: Swizz Beatz ft. DMX & Busta Rhymes – Y’all Don’t Really Know

A-Mafia takes you around Harlem in this video for “Shine On Em” off DukeDaGod’s D.I.P. Agenda, out today.

The D.I.P. Agenda features Dipset members; Cam’ron, Freekey Zekey, Hell Rell, J.R. Writer, 40 Cal. and Katt Williams and guest appearances by Jadakiss, Lil Flip, Sheek Louch and production by AraabMUZIK, and DukeDaGod.

Previously: Dukedagod ft. HellRell, Freeky Zeekey & Sin City – D.I.P Agenda Ep.1 (Video)

Directed by Nicholas Heller, off Sandman’s The Good Sun, in stores now.

Co-Producer of J. Cole’s “Who Dat” and more recently “See World” off the Friday Night Lights mixtape – Elite offers a glimpse into his world as an artist. “Judas” from Elite’s upcoming mixtape, is an exploration of the creative psyche. Working his way through the industry over the last ten years, “Judas” serves as an introduction to Elite’s story.

Spotted @ Complex (shouts to Damien Scott.)

Related: Words with Elite

Previously: Elite – Judas (prod. Omen) | Elite – Touch The Sky

Kendrick Lamar joins Top Dawg‘s Jay Rock for his mixtape Black Friday.

Jay Rock ft. Kendrick Lamar & Giddy – Diary Of A Broke Nigga

Bonus: Jay Rock – Kush Freestyle

Previously: Kendrick Lamar – Look Out For Detox

CyHi spits over “A Million” for DJ Moondawg’s WGCI radio show in Chicago.

Right before Tip reported back to prison, he sat down with Erik Parker to talk about his drug habit, conversing with Eminem about his addiction & more.

How did you get a drug habit?

I had a lot of work done to my teeth. Oral surgery, extractions, six, seven, eight root canals. Between January to February. As soon as I got out, I had a lot of stuff done. In the joint, you eat shit that is unhealthy for you. I had fillings that fell out and stuff that had to get dealt with. Of course for the pain they gave me oxycontin and hydrocodone. And, mind you, on October 13, 2007, I had cut off everything―weed, alcohol. Then I get these pills and I start taking them for the pain at first. And then I’m like, Wait―this shit makes me feel good. And it’s legal. After the pain went away, I kept taking it. I had like five, six prescriptions. So I had, like 80 pills. Everybody else might have a drink or smoke a blunt, I took a pain pill. Times when I had 18, 20-hour days, I’d take a pain pill. And eventually I developed―I guess―the beginning stages of dependence.

Have you talked to Eminem about addiction?

Sure. We got a record together, and we talked a lot. I asked him how he knew he was an addict. Basically if you put yourself in harm’s way… if you risk that, you’ve got to assume that there is something fundamentally wrong with your thought process.

via VIBE