Legendary singer Etta James endorsed Beyonce playing her in the forthcoming biopic Cadillac Records. “It’s a privilege and an honor to have somebody like that girl. I don’t think she looks like me, but that’s all right. They can fix that up,” James told the New York Post. She even said she’ll advise the pop singer with musical and character notes. “I kinda have a man’s voice. It’s a contralto, more bluesy, religious. I would really like to work with her on that,” she said. “...I wasn’t as bourgie as she is, she’s bourgeois. She knows how to be a lady, she’s like a model. I wasn’t like that... I smoked in the bathroom in school, I was kinda arrogant, so those are some of the things I would want to tell her.” The movie is expected to begin filming Mar. 10 in New Jersey.

Last we saw Kelis she was on this year’s Grammy red carpet sporting a jacket promoting her husband Nas’ forthcoming Nigger album and schooling a CNN reporter on the John Lennon and Yoko Ono song “Woman is the Nigger of the World.” Now the Harlem-bred singer is releasing her own album, a “greatest of” simply titled, The Hits. The 14-song compilation is due Mar. 11 with songs dating back to her 1999 Neptunes produced debut, “Caught Out There” to collaborations with the late Ol’ Dirty Bastard as well as singles only released overseas that feature Andre 3000 and Nas (found on her Grammy-nominated Tasty).

In another type of release, rapper Jamal “Shyne” Barrow (now going by the name Moses Michael Leviy) is expected to be out on good behavior this year. He’s currently serving a 10-year sentence at Woodbourne Correntional Facility in New York for a 1999 incident where Shyne opened fire after a man confronted his former mentor Sean “Diddy” Combs in a nighclub. His early release will come the same year that his father, Dean Barrow, was elected as the first Black prime minister of their native Belize.

Rapper/actor Mos Def will be at the 92nd Street Y in NYC tomorrow (Feb. 28) to discuss music, movies, and how artists can inspire positive revolutions of the world. He will appear with Rolling Stone contributing editor Anthony DeCurtis who recently authored the book “In Other Words: Artists Talk About Life and Work.” The conversation begins at 8pm. For more information, visit 92Y.org.