Frannie Kelley
Frannie Kelley is co-host of the Microphone Check podcast with Ali Shaheed Muhammad.
Prior to hosting Microphone Check, Kelley was an editor at NPR Music. She was responsible for editing, producing and reporting NPR Music's coverage of hip-hop, R&B and the ways the music industry affects the music we hear, on the radio and online. She was also co-editor of NPR's music news blog, .
Kelley worked at NPR from 2007 until 2016. Her projects included a series on and overseeing a feature on women musicians. She also ran another series on and web-produced the Arts Desk's series on vocalists, called . Most recently, her piece on was selected to be a part of the Best Music Writing 2012 Anthology.
Prior to joining NPR, Kelley worked in book publishing at Grove/Atlantic in a variety of positions from 2004 to 2007. She has a B.A. in Music Criticism from New York University.
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The label and its founder, Sean "Diddy" Combs, helped to shape much of what we take for granted in pop culture. The new documentary Can't Stop Won't Stop tells Bad Boy's story. -
The prolific rapper and mentor recorded a song the day he got out of federal prison this May — and he's put out 10 projects this year. His secret? "Don't never drop your head," he says. -
The West Coast legend, one of the main instigators of G-funk, has seen the underside of the industry. It's not pretty, but he stays smooth. -
Our producer, David Luke, father of David Luke III, put together this podcast, in which past guests like Danny Brown, Solange Knowles and T.I spoke about fatherhood and father figures. It's OK to cry. -
"I'm a manager. I am in the service industry. The service industry. I'm Midas f* Muffler." -
"I don't want anybody to do exactly what I'm doing," says the Atlanta rapper. "I want people to look at why I'm doing what I'm doing. And if you agree with that, you go do what you do about it." -
His songs make your brain briefly unbound and unwieldy. Same goes for this conversation. -
The artist and thinker, who just released a new album, takes us from the drummers of Burundi to Adam Ant, Octavia Butler to David Bowie, Rakim to Young Thug. -
Crown Heights came to North Hollywood so we could talk about crossed signals on the highways between artist and industry.
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The new father spoke about his inspirations, including the memoirs of Rick James and George Clinton, his business acumen, what the war in the streets is really about and, of course, Gucci.
