These hip-hop and R&B superstars first collaborated on their 1997 single “Love is All We Need,” topping the charts with wholesome verses sung by Blige in her trademark soulful tone. The duo linked up earlier this year on another single, “Thriving,” to announce their co-headlining summer “Royalty Tour.” Their vastly influential careers began in the ’90s, with legendary albums like Nas’ Illmatic and Blige’s What’s the 411? Today, the artists are still going strong. Nas’ 11th studio album, Nasir, was released in 2018, and Blige’s The Strength of Woman dropped in 2017.

Nas & Mary J. Blige
Wed, 8pm, $31+
Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View

In 1996, Nas dropped “If I Ruled The World (Imagine That),” a utopian vision, free of police harassment and racial injustice, with Ms. Lauryn Hill providing one of hip-hop’s all-time greatest hooks. The track would become the rapper’s first mainstream success, just as Hill was finding her first taste of international stardom with The Fugees.

More than 20 years later, the duo is partnering again with a vision to change the world—or at least an attempt to improve it—with the PowerNomics Tour. The outing takes its name from Dr. Claud Anderson’s book “PowerNomics: The National Plan To Empower Black America” and his steps for achieving educational, political and economic growth.

The aim of the tour is to “magnify the beauty of cultural amalgamation,” according to Hill, with performances from comedians Dave Chappelle, Hannibal Buress and roots reggae revivalist Chronixx. Each stop on the 17-date tour is also raising funds and providing exposure for a variety of charities and initiatives.

The Shoreline Amphitheatre date could hold extra weight for Nas, given the venue’s proximity to Google headquarters. The veteran rapper targeted the tech industry and its lack of diversity in a statement announcing the tour.

“We are here to lend a hand where it is needed and hopefully to inspire,” Nas said in a press release. “I’m a part of a mission to help build a more diverse tech industry and to encourage my people to see beyond what they believe is in their reach.”

And Nas isn’t fronting when he calls out tech. The rapper, who was unavailable for further comment, is a founding partner of QueensBridge Venture Partners (ironically, based in L.A.), which has supported more than 40 startups, including Lyft, Dropbox and Waze.

Meanwhile, headliner Ms. Lauryn Hill continues to defiantly follow the path she forged in the wake of her breakout album The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, a five-time Grammy winner that helped define the ’90s neo-soul movement. The 1998 release remains her only solo studio record, but it continues to transcend its timestamp.

Hill has successfully accelerated her touring schedule over the last few years after several years of shunning the public eye, with sometimes erratic behavior and legal issues surrounding tax debt. It all sounds like a hot mess, and that sometimes holds true at her shows. However, tracks like “Doo Wop (That Thing),” “Ex-Factor” and “Everything Is Everything” still deliver the kind of substance and soul that only a handful of other artists of her generation have tapped.

We’re still singing along. Imagine that.

Ms Lauryn Hill & Nas
Oct 7, 7pm, $42+
Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View
livenation.com

For five years running now, Rock the Bells has been the South Bay’s biggest rap show. It’s also the strangest megatour of the 21st century; since its debut in 2004, it’s reinvented itself almost every year, and this one is no exception.

With the return of headliner Nas (making his sixth RTB appearance), Common, Curren$y, Immortal Technique, Murs and other festival favorites, there’s a string of continuity, but the addition of acts like J. Cole and 2Chainz, and a whole new set-up for the tour, has led to some controversy, or just plain confusion. Here are answers to some key questions about the ever-evolving hip-hop festival as it returns to Shoreline this weekend.

Is Rock the Bells getting bigger or smaller?

Both, sort of. Rock the Bells has a convoluted history of shapeshifting: after starting out as two SoCal festival dates (summer and fall) in 2004, it went to a single day in 2005, then blew up into a hybrid festival and multi-city club tour in 2006. The next year had three festivals, 15 single-stage shows and 5 two-stage shows across the country. In 2008, organizers took Rock the Bells international in what was probably its biggest year, with 16 festival dates. The next year, it contracted a little, and 2010 saw only 4 dates. Last year had three, and this year also boasts three shows, but all three are two-day festivals. So a much smaller number of cities will be seeing Rock the Bells than in its heyday, but those select cities will have their bells rocked for twice as long. So it all depends on if you’re lucky enough to be near one or not, which brings us to…

Why Mountain View?

The festival started in San Bernadino, so it’s no surprise that Rock the Bells launched there this year. A second date, in New Jersey, was clearly meant to shore up that East Coast presence the festival established five years ago with its much-hyped storming of New York City (the reunion of Rage Against the Machine as headliners didn’t hurt). Mountain View’s Shoreline may seem like a strange third choice for a festival that established itself in Chicago, Detroit and Boston. But in fact, NorCal has been a huge part of the festival’s success since 2006—first in Concord, then SF, and, since 2008, at Shoreline. Organizers from Guerilla Union and Live Nation, who co-produced the festival this year, indicated the tour will have a home in this area in the future, as well. “The Bay Area music scene has always had a thriving and diverse hip hop community. Be it music from The Team to Souls of Mischief or Del The Funky Homosapien to 2 Pac and Keak Da Sneak, various sub-genres of hip hop are represented well in this market,” they wrote in response to my inquiry. “This is evident in the success that Rock The Bells has had in the past and what we see doing in the future now that we are holding this event as a two-day festival.”