Five stories that have North Texas talking: Dallas and Houston-bred rapper Lecrae is the first artist to top the Billboard 200 and the gospel album charts, Fort Worth arts groups will help the Arlington school district develop two fine arts academies, and more.

Sometimes-Dallas-based Christian rapper and UNT alum Lecrae has topped multiple charts with his latest album, Anomaly. It’s his first album to top the Billboard 200 charts, his sixth to top the gospel charts, and his fifth to top the Christian charts. The New York Times reports Lecrae is the first artist to top the Billboard 200 and the gospel album charts at the same time. The rapper recently performed on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.

• Fort Worth-area art groups will help the Arlington school district develop two fine arts academies. The Star-Telegram reports experts from the Cliburn, Kimbell Art Museum, Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Casa Manana, UT Arlington and the University of North Texas will team up for formal planning for two dual language/fine arts academies at Corey and Roquemore elementary schools. The programs are expected to be running by August 2016.
• Gov. Rick Perry’s attorneys asked a judge Monday to excuse the governor from a pretrial hearing because of out-of-country commitments. The special prosecutor on the case, Michael McCrum, has reacted strongly to the request. “In my 30 years of practice, I’ve never had a defense lawyer show up and say, ‘Can my client just not appear for all these pretrial conferences,’” McCrum told the Austin-American Statesman and KVUE TV. An Austin grand jury indicted Perry in August on two felony counts of abuse of power for threatening to veto state funding for a public corruption investigative unit. The judge on the case hasn’t determined yet whether he will be excused from the Oct. 13 hearing. The governor visited Asia this month and plans to tour Europe in October to promote Texas economic development.
• Dallas Fed president and CEO Richard Fisher plans to retire next year. The Dallas Business Journal reports Fed presidents can serve for 10 years or until they reach the age of 65. Fisher must step down next year, according to that rule, but he hasn’t set a specific date. KERA vice president of news, Rick Holter, spoke to Fisher back in May.  
• A Dallas City Tour bus has paired an image of slain President John F. Kennedy with an unfortunate slogan. D Magazine’s Chris Mosley writes, “Coupling a giant image of the President’s head with the Dallas Conventions & Visitor’s Bureau-derived slogan, ‘Big Things Happen Here’ [is] simply in bad taste. Beyond that, there is the rather unfortunate placement of the bus’s back door handle in the center of Kennedy’s forehead.”