by Geoffrey Bennett

Hiding in Hip Hop

The cover of 'Hiding in Hip Hop,' written by Terrance Dean.

In what could be described as a follow-up to the much-hyped (and in some corners, much-reviled) On the Down Low, Terrance Dean's Hiding in Hip Hop outs the music industry's secret gay subculture. Here's more from a Newsweek review:

And though Dean's intention was never to out anybody, he provides just enough information for readers to go crazy searching Google. There's a New York R&B singer who often opened for Jay-Z, caught the ears of Death Row Records and has worked on Broadway. A member of a rap group that changed hip-hop with its "philosophical rhymes over hard-core beats" who then went solo to achieve chart-topping success, eventually landing the lead in a movie. (He's also married.) "Men who have secret love affairs have separate homes and apartments, and separate phones strictly for their romantic flings," writes Dean. "No one ever suspects a thing, and they go to great lengths to keep it that way."

Are you surprised by Dean's claims? What impact, if any, will this book have?