Victor Flavius

Long before Snoop Dogg became one of the most recognizable entertainers in the world, there was Calvin Broadus, a lanky young man from Long Beach with an unmistakable voice, a little bit of awkwardness and a presence that somehow made you pay attention. Fans have watched him grow exponentially in real time.

Angola sits on land with one of the darkest histories in America. During the 1830s and 1840s, Isaac Franklin, one of the nation’s largest slave traders, pieced together several plantations into a massive cotton operation worked by hundreds of enslaved Africans. The plantation’s name reflected a common practice at the time: naming the land after the African region where many of the enslaved people had been taken from.

There are few artists whose music can instantly transport an audience back to a specific chapter of their lives. On Friday night, Bobby Brown proved that his catalog still possesses that rare power as he celebrated the 35th anniversary of Don’t Be Cruel, the groundbreaking album that transformed him from a member of New Edition into one of R&B’s most influential solo stars. The evening wasn’t simply a celebration of an album—it was a celebration of an era.