Today's Blog of the Year Pick: Ill Doctrine.

Put simply, Jay Smooth's Ill Doctrine is the best video blog on the web. (At least the best one that's in English.) As you'd expect from the founder of hiphopmusic.com, Ill Doc starts from a base of reporting on hip hop music and culture. But from that starting point, Jay branches into ruminations on celebrity, culture, politics, and art with real feeling. I don't think anybody else could make me both roll my eyes at and empathize with Amy Winehouse in the space of just a few minutes, let alone turn "Chocolate Rain" into a non-ironic jam. And for casual viewers, nobody does a better job of breaking down complex topics like the bust of DJ Drama by the RIAA than Ill Doctrine.

The editing's tight, the videos frequently feature original music and interviews, and there's a bracing honesty to much of the conversation that really connected for me.
Pick of the Posts:

• Amy Winehouse and the Ethics of Clowning People
• Machine Guns and Stupid Choices
• Black Coach
• And Introducing the Ill Doctrine, the best place to start.

If you like this, try: Catching up on Ze Frank's archives for The Show. I wasn't kidding when I said he was our I Love Lucy.

This is one in a series of posts about Blogs of the Year for 2007. They're my subjective picks about blogs that inspired or influenced me this year, and you can check out my introductory post to find more.