Editor’s Note: This is the first article in an ongoing series I will be doing called – Music and Life (M&L) which is based on lyrics in songs that have influenced my thinking or reinforce a philosophy that I live by. Many of us live our lives through song without realizing it and I hope to enlighten you on some of the best lyrics from various genres that have helped me in one way or another. It’s philosophy but it’s fun philosophy that sounds oh so good. This was my redemption song, it was a song that made me go “you know X is right, if you’re holding me back for too long I have every right to lash out and do something about it”. Granted the lyrics in their literal sense is about robbing to eat (slang for make money). “Y’all been eating long enough now stop being greedy! Just keep it real partner,… [Read more]

The 100 Man Laws – Full List Do not mistake this for another sophomorish frat-boy list of “rules” that is written for cheap chuckles. The Hall of The Black Dragon’s version of The Man Laws is not of the typical, our rules are the result of years of study, research and principle. To put it short guys, if you follow the laws then you will be a man amongst men, a gentleman’s gangster and a better man. Read and obey the Man Laws. Full Articles on The 100 Man Laws: 1 – 5 (This is Our Thing): 6 – 10 (Mano A Mano): 11 – 15 (That’s Ghey Dude): 16 – 20 (Warrior Code): 21 – 25 (No Bitch Ish): 26 – 30 (Balls and Words): 31 – 35 (Shaken Not Stirred): 36 – 40 (Men of Honor): 41 – 45 (Extraordinary Gentleman): 46 – 50 (Wisdom Logic): 51 – 55 (A Friend of Ours): Never express or show any interest in another man’s woman. A real man… [Read more]

You’ve heard the saying “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” but if you want to apply a face to the saying you could easily use the face of Caterina Sforza. Here on The Hall we have 2 main historical sections in Badass of The Month and Hotties of History, Caterina is the first woman to occupy both. How To Raise A Tigress In 1462 Galeazzo Maria Sforza made love to the wife of a friend and got her pregnant, which lead to the birth of our darling Caterina. The scandal of her birth was no big deal at the time, as her Caterina’s father was a lord amongst man-whores and ran up inside any woman that he felt was hot (seriously). Ironically her birth coming from such a rebellious act as adultery was just a pre-cursor to her wickedly dynamic life. Unlike other girls that learnt lady-like things as they grew up, Caterina’s… [Read more]

3

Barry Manilow has a wonderful song by the name of Copacabana, it is linked below this article for you younger folks who don’t know Manilow or his sound. The song details one club dancer by the name of Lola who fell in love with the bartender “Tony” at her club and ended up losing him to a gangster’s gun shot. The song is short, sweet and tragic but the tale is a familiar one for most guys who dread having to defend their lady’s honor in public. It was simple, Lola was hot as hell, gangster Rico came into the club and put down on her hardcore and for argument’s sake he probably palmed her ass as he has done 100 times before. Lola being an attractive club chick would normally melt into the arms of this made guy but she was already taken by Tony the bartender. So Tony seeing this going down, sails… [Read more]

1

Hip Hop fans and natives to Queens New York know who the legendary Pappy Mason is. He isn’t Italian, he isn’t Cuban and he’s not a creature of myth. While his reality these days is that of a poop slinging, 24hr lockdown lunatic serving a life sentence with no possibility of parole, Pappy Mason was one of the most dangerous gangsters to have ever held the streets of New York. The legend that is Pappy Mason is that of an enforcer and muscle who studied the doctrines (a whole lot of Scarface and The Godfather reruns), hated cops with a passion and never broke omerta. He was a crime boss’s wet dream because of his loyalty and he served his boss Lorenzo “Fat Cat” Nichols with Samurai loyalty. Pappy Mason was successful for one single solitary reason, he was respected out of fear. His volatile nature and bull-like aggression made it easy for him to… [Read more]

1

If there’s one thing I can say about hip-hop it’s that fashion is so fluid that in the span of five years one person dressing a certain way versus another would almost contrast in style. This is why in this top 10 list we chose rappers that have transcended the fads and always look like a million bucks whenever you see them. While most tend to look like idiots when they try to dress up like the Italian gangsters from movies that they love so much, some guys have a fashion sense and look the part whenever you see them. This list was compiled based on the degree of clean and also the amount of times these men have had a bad day. You will find that the top three or so always look good whenever you see them while the ones towards the end are a bit hit or miss. Of course the list… [Read more]

Las Vegas, city of sin, the house that Bugsy built… it was a place I knew of only from movies like Ocean’s Eleven and The Godfather, yet there we were: 4 young men, 3 of us single, being treated like kings in Sin City. We were green, opting to wear suits when everyone else was dressed for the hot desert weather. We played hard, won hard, lost hard and at the end of a week were considering extending our stay indefinitely. You know the old mantra “screw work”, well that’s how Vegas felt, why leave a king’s life to return to the reality of pauper living? Anyway, it was on the last night of our trip to paradise, I was up about 300% on what I originally brought out there, feeling good about myself, when we ran into some friends from work. Now we were about 12 deep and yucking it up by the entrance… [Read more]

6

Emasculating old women are the worst, do you guys agree? You’ve seen them before, dragging their men around, talking to them like children and acting as if they are queen for the day. Hell many of us have one as our grandmother, mother or grand-aunt. What happens throughout the lifetime of a relationship? How do you get to this point? How do you go from an upstanding male to being that quiet little old man being emasculated in the grocery store by Betty White? If there’s anything to sober you to marriage it should be the fear of becoming that little old man with the mean wife. I can imagine it happens after the guy has settled, they’ve been together forever (30+ years), it becomes what he’s used to and he imagines that at 60+ he is stuck regardless so better to stay quiet and deal. Either that or some sort of twisted Stockholm Syndrome…… [Read more]