According to Billboard, Bow Wow is turning his focus away from music to acting, and has a string of acting gigs in the pipeline. Check out the report:

Actor-rapper Shad Moss, aka Bow Wow, is focusing on acting full time. Moss has joined the upcoming fifth season of HBO’s “Entourage” in a recurring role, playing Charlie, a new stand-up comic client of E (Kevin Connolly).

Additionally, he has landed a role opposite Forest Whitaker, rapper Lil Wayne and Isaiah Washington in the Weinstein Co.’s sports drama “Patriots,” about a high school basketball team in post-Katrina Louisiana.

“After 16 years in the music industry and six successful albums, I’ve decided to shift my energy to something else I’m passionate about, acting,” Moss said. “I’m going to try to be the next Will Smith.”

Like Moss, Smith started off as a rapper before segueing into acting.

I’m pretty sure the news will be greeted with joy by many. For someone who’s music and sales leave a lot to be desired, he really does come across overly cocky.

The quote did make for an interesting read, though. Six successful albums, huh? I would beg to differ. After serving up one of the biggest flops of last year with his joint ‘Face Off’ Lp with Omarion, he may just be ‘shifting his energies’ elsewhere before inevitably ending up like his (collabo) partner O – dropped from his label.

Your thoughts?

R&B singer Amerie was snapped at the Maxim Hot 100 party earlier this week rocking a new look. Though her natural beauty is hard to deny, something looks kinda off with her latest look – I can’t put my finger on what it is though.

What do you think of the pics?

After a year long spell in the slammer and having parted ways with longtime label Atlantic, Lil’ Kim has returned to the music scene with new single ‘Respirator’. I’m kinda on the fence about this one, the first release from her still untitled independent debut. For the most part I’m feeling it – the production is point etc-however her sliding in and out of the vocoder effect on the verses make for an awkward listening experience at times. Having really enjoyed her last LP, 2005’s ‘The Naked Truth’, I’m definitely keeping an open ear to see what she’ll be serving up with the next record.

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Terrible. Whoever gave him the ‘ok’ to do this obviously doesn’t care for him that much, as that was painful – just as expected. Ray J’s voice is distinctly average at best, so performing such a weighty song made no sense at all. Pitchy, strained and an overall mess. SMH…

What do you think of the performance?

The boys of Pretty Ricky are back, following the departure of lead member Pleasure last year. Having added singer 4Play to their line-up, the group are set to release their third studio album ’80’s Babies’ in early August; ‘Cuddle Up’ is the first single to be lifted from the LP. Granted the group’s fixation on the same subject matter (sex) is becoming rather tiresome, the song is a pretty good effort – particularly on the production front as well as the hook. Good stuff.

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As Hip-Hop veteran LL Cool J preps his new album ‘Exit 13’ – his final LP for longtime label Def Jam – for its July 8th release, a cut from the set has surfaced. ‘Cry’, featuring R&B songstress Lil Mo, sees the rapper re-embrace the sound that made him such a prominent feature of the 90s music scene. Liking this one, I must say.

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The video for Usher’s 2nd single ‘Moving Mountains’ premiered just a few hours ago. A continuation from the crooner’s ‘Love In This Club’ clip, the video is real impressive. Usher’s much anticipated LP ‘Here I Stand’ drops May 27th.

What do you think of the video?

As some of you may already know, the child molestation trial of R&B crooner R. Kelly began this week; it didn’t take long for what will inevitably be a courthouse and media circus to commence. Check out the report via TMZ:

Could a skin doc end up saving R. Kelly’s hide? Looks like it, since his lawyers are basing pretty much his entire defense on one mole – the dark, irregularly-bordered kind.

The pisstastic singer’s trial finally began yesterday, and openings were just as lurid as the tape at its center. The defense claims that the guy in the video doesn’t have a mole, but Kelly does. Maybe the most shocking moment came when the defense claimed that the woman in the tape was a prostitute: “[The alleged victim is sweet and nice,” said Kelly’s lawyer. “The woman in this tape is a prostitute.”

Among other interesting sexual curiosities, the girl calls the man in the vid “daddy” and he apparently pays her at the end.