January 2007 Archives
Before I rest my weary head on the pillow for the first time in what seems like decades...
I have not answered your emails yet because I have been chilling in a cozy new spot -- and when I say "chilling" I do not actually mean "chilling"; I mean "googling hot gossip and downloading mp3s of your cousin's solo gospel album." Let us all not-chill together on this one big Mars-hot internet.
Also, go get the new, revamped and extra SCRATCH MAGAZINE, which should hit stands this week, and which features Game, will.i.am and Nas on the cover. One reason you gotta cop that is because of my Polow da Don Q&A, in which Polow is wearing an amazing outfit that is part "Jim Jones on Sat. afternoon," part "let's hit Barney's Co-op before we luncheon in Chelsea," and part "I just googled this club in Midtown that plays 'an eclectic mix of vocal house and classic rock' -- Let's go!"
Nay, you should get the new Scratch because it has been completely re-envisioned, it has great features / reviews/ insight / commentary (now: newly relevant!), and it is fascinating, courtesy the imaginative and dedicated new EIC B "No longer a backpacker" Fred, aka yung stunna numero uno, aka "I was making mixtapes when I was still in my diapers.. and they were alphabetized, fool."
Special to Steve Prefontaine: Would you mind stepping back a little? Thanks.
RIP, Playa. Positive pimping por vida. You'll be missed.
My friend Kate Glicksberg is a great photographer. Her new work documenting a protest of the NYPD murder of Sean Bell is featured in the new issue of Current, which is the online magazine of the New York Foundation of the Arts, and it is excellent.
My brain feels like the friction from two flintstones, even though I got to get somebody over to defrag real quick. Memo to Papito: Don't you know I'm loco? Like:
but i'm "dale" like "pant! pant!" NOT "dale" like "ooh, what-ayyver" -- or maybe a little of both. the translation tends to bleed a little.
I forgot to tell you that Urge dot com, the MTV digital music service, and my place of employment for just a little longer, is putting on a show tomorrow to celebrate that fact that we/they are selling exclusive Carl Craig and Justice / Ed Banger mixes. The show is Carl Craig, Gamall and Tim Sweeney DJ'ing at studio B in Brooklyn. We will also be celebrating my last day at MTVN/Viacom and my future, so bright like the forehead of young jeezy
The vegetarians get a history of our own. Says the New Yorker: "Evidently on the side of history’s herbivores, [the writer] “outs” vegetarians as canonical thinkers who occasionally reduced their meat intake or advised others to do so; he judges the number of Enlightenment vegetarians to have been “incalculably large”; and he celebrates vegetarianism as the leading edge of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century thought."
I am on the leading edge of nineteenth-century enlightenment! What!
K Sanneh fleshes out the mixtape game beautifully, as usual, and Noz blogs on the topic for those already in the know. Meanwhile Shaheem Reid interviews Wayne, Duke da God, and an "anonymous DJ" for an excellent piece o'er here at eMpTyV.
Commence downloading.
[Unrelated: David Foster Wallace may have invented the footnote back in the '90s, but we must credit kris ex for refining and popularizing it.]
The RIAA's recent targeting of DJs Drama and Don Cannon, two of the most respected mixtape DJs in American hip-hop, once again proves the organization is woefully out of touch with its market. It is apparent that the RIAA is unable to creatively reimagine a coexistent marketplace in the age of the internet. Its constant, misguided retaliation only appears desperate and spiteful, and alienates those music lovers and buyers that would potentially keep them alive.
It has been argued that mixtape DJs like Drama and Don Cannon in fact float the traditional record industry by exposing listeners to new music, somewhat like radio stations. Drama and Cannon are musicians, they are curators, and they are artists, but they are not thieves.
In honor of the most banginest Ciara f. Polow da Don collaboration yet, I present to you the lovers of origin, the fellows Polow references thru the track: SILK (prod. KEITH SWEAT)
I am really happy about Polow's invigorating take on grown-ass, apres-New Jack, art-of-seduction sex music. Perhaps fellows nationwide will now be inspired to increase their game.
Well, maybe the dubstep klonapin dance is just how the Britons get down (or, more likely, the BBC). Watch French people get crunk at about 4:00 in, in footage shot at a live Vex'd DJ jump in Paris (I would skip the annoying DJ-hand-mixer footage at the beginning, but definitely listen to the mix -- it's extra dubby.)
BBC Documentary about Dubstep. It's pretty basic and not edited well (more party footage, people!) but it's interesting to hear the perspectives of top producers like Skream and Kode 9, all teeny tiny and pasty-paste, and how, grime having passed, they wanted to create their own shit.
Also, the dubstep party dance looks like a klonapin coma. I would really like to see the sound of dubstep merge with B'more club-level enthusiasm on the dancefloor. Imagine the superslow grind of a dubstep ground-scrub? So screwed; so chopped!
This choreography is painful, on the other hand, but I like the song,"Dr. Cat," and it's consistent with my New Year's Resolution to only listen to songs about animals (particularly cats).
This choreography is painful, on the other hand, but I like the song,"Dr. Cat," and it's consistent with my New Year's Resolution to only listen to songs about animals (particularly cats).
I love this performance: the production is subtle and the costumes are over the top (tho latex brastraps were de rigueur in '99) Too much booty in the pants, not enough CDs as accessories. Ay papi, the choreography!!
Just got this in the inbox from color of change:
"Last week, the Democrats launched their "100 hours" agenda--a plan to begin a "new direction for our country." Sadly, it says nothing about Congress's continued abandonment of those left behind after Katrina.
A plan to bring survivors home exists. The Gulf Coast Civic Works Project would hire 100,000 displaced residents who want to return, providing them with training and jobs to rebuild their homes and communities. It's a solution that would rebuild the Gulf by investing in its residents, but Congress won't act without massive public support.
More than ever, those of us who seek justice for Katrina survivors must make our voices heard. Please join us and demand that Congress put Katrina back on the agenda and enact a plan to help displaced residents return and rebuild."
Feeling like a eulogy.
Above video: Soulja Slim's funeral procession, December 2003: The Lady Buck Jumpers Second Line.
Listening to PR on the train en route to work and realized the rap&R&B-spoofing SNL staffer should probably get with our dudes from the MIA stat.
"Grind with Me":
Step one: You kissing on me
Step two: Girl you killin me softly
Step three: Now you see why you chose me
Step four: And ooh you vibing with me"
"Dick in a Box":
"1: Cut a hole in a box
2: Put your junk in that box
3: Make her open the box "
In related news, I called Mo this morning to tell her the rumor that Justin Timberlake might be dating Scarlett Johannson and her response was:
"NO. NO. THAT is SO FUCKED UP. No. JESUS CHRIST," with the same vehemence as if GW Bush had anointed Pope Ratzinger as co-chair of America or something. For the record, I, too, think the Johannson is cut of great wackitude and that Cameron Diaz, 34-year-old surfer/stoner, is far more interesting and real. Also, Connie and I saw that movie The Holiday last night and liked it a lot. Thought the dialogue regarding people's actual love-insecurities and walls was at times terribly (painfully?) realistic. I cried. What.
In Slate's Year-End Cultural Round-up, David Simon, with his unequalled sense of the epic, writes a eulogy for the crumbling American newspaper:
"David Simon, executive producer, The Wire; former metro desk reporter, The Baltimore Sun:
In the year past, we've been given the clearest indications yet as to the future of the daily newspaper in America. And that future is brutal, reductive, and ever-less relevant.
The Los Angeles Times, which thought itself to be in the highest tier of daily journalism and therefore immune to the economic logic, is told to eviscerate itself, and when chief editors refuse, they are summarily dismissed. The Baltimore Sun is hollowed out by a string of buyouts that began more than a decade ago. The Philadelphia Inquirer is confronted with new ownership that demands a news organization with no pretensions beyond covering its circulation area. In their desperation to float their stock prices, the big newspaper chains are slowly strangling the only thing that still makes their daily editions matter: content.
For years, the Kool-Aid drinkers from the home office have journeyed to newsrooms far and wide to explain to the ink-stained rabble that these were new times, that by attritting the numbers in the newsroom, by offering buyouts to veteran reporters, by reducing the news hole, the American newspaper could not only remain viable economically, but could—given effective management—do more with less.
Here's a secret: You cannot do more with less. You do less with less. To gather more news, to investigate more wrongs, to analyze more of the complexity of modern life, you need more experienced reporters.
What now passes for journalism outside the vale of New York or Washington, D.C., is largely an embarrassment. Good people still remain in every American newsroom, and some of them are doing their damnedest to make their product essential. But every month, there are less of them, and every month, some soul-sucking whore from atop the pyramid types yet another memo explaining why this newspaper or that no longer needs a Washington correspondent, or a labor reporter, or foreign coverage. Until the industry begins to believe that content—and only content—matters, then there isn't a power under heaven that can prevent newspapers from meaning less to our world."
Chris Ryan points out the best AllHipHop Rumor of all time:
"Actor Ryan Phillippe wants Reese Witherspoon back! That's how Delaware does it. Get your woman, son, because she is rich and it's the right thing to do!"
[grammar correction mine]
The untold morbidity of Color Me Badd: "We can do it 'til we won't wake up." Do they wanna sex u up or put ur lights out?
From my R&B blog on urge.com, which is wholly unknowable to you unless you are pushing a PC (I see you, dad): A conversation I had with Brandon T. Jackson, star of Roll Bounce and host of the N's Brandon T. Jackson show. We discussed Prince, exclusively.
JSHEP: What were your impressions of Prince?
Brandon T. Jackson: What's funny about Prince, when Dave Chapelle did that sketch, that was so real! He plays basketball. In the middle of the night, he locks himself into a room and just makes music for like 10 hours a day. And when he stops, he plays basketball and he cooks. It's crazy. And when Dave Chapelle is like, "You want some pancakes?" that was me and the Revolution. [laughs] I love that. But he was really cool. After everything I said, he said, "So how would Jesus feel about that?" because he's Jehovah's Witness. He'd be like, "So Brandon, do you believe in Jesus?" I was like, "Uh, yeah," and it was just funny. He was like, "So what do you think Jesus knows about your career?" He was very eccentric.
SHEP: Under what circumstances did you meet him?
BTJ: Well, I met him because I was hanging out with Sinbad, doing a show in Minneapolis, Minnesota. And he just called and [suddenly] I'm in this big house-like-studio thing, and I forget what it's called, it's like this plaza-type-studio thing -- there's a name for it. People know what I'm talking about it starts with a 'P'.
SHEP: Paisley Park. Did he cook for you?
BTJ: He did, he and his chef.
SHEP: What did he make?
BTJ: It was some type of noodles and an Italian sauce.
Last week, I drove from IL to OH in one day with this wildman and it's exactly as he says: "i listened to the last barr record in a car in ohio this week it is great it is catharsis"
You know when people are like, "My shit is so uncategorizable," and you kinda have to roll your eyes, cause their shit is often completely categorizable, but they're tryna smoke-and-mirrors you into thinking they're elevating your mind and/or Taking It To The Next Level? Well like, whatever. Barr's new album, Summary, is actually "uncategorizable," insofar that he has his hands and feet in many forms, like a game of Twister (what's cool about that is that I could actually see him playing Twister), but he doesn't come across like some slapped-together goulash or "mash-up" or po-mo pastiche because his ideas are whole, uncensored, and appear to come out in a flash of synergy, like lightning. If you have never seen Barr, his deal is something like stream-of-consciousness talking over live drums (not like rapping per se but not like spoken word either). It's also like you're listening in on his intimate convos with his therapist (hence "catharsis"). I was reading the lyric sheet and, when he wasn't taking me into self-analytical mind-spiral, I was thinking how they, the lyrics, are the vocalization of his distilled brain down to every last tic, including the parts that everyone has where you second-guess your thoughts. It is self-reflexive, but it is not self-indulgent; it is, in fact, generous in its honesty and wide-eyed desire to... bond? I guess? This album is more "Barr's Brain Haus" than the last, because it is more personal, less political (explicitly), and exposes his own heretofore-unexplored-on-record true sadness. (Barr is also, p.s., unfazably positive.) The effect of both the words, and the actual motion of the words, is totally mesmerizing, and reaches this deep place -- I think his whole MO is making connections like Alaister Cooke (but between ppl not like, medeival spits and clocks) -- and he, by being completely honest and real, reaches this visceral transcendance that is (ahem) uncategorizable but has elements of rhythm, music, performance art and, like, therapy. Anyway he is my favorite and I wish I could objectively talk about his shit but it's too close to home. (Because you know, I, too, am the missing link between rhythm and therapy.)
Anyway, listening to Barr in a car with Wildman was excellent, and a distraction from the Ohio highway's endless monotony and/or intimidating road signs. Also, listening to Barr was way better than listening to evangelical Christians on the radio. No dis to non-scary Ohioans, word to Cleveland and the dudes from This Moment in Black History for dancing with us to James Brown and trying very hard to keep us up until 4 am. even though we had to get on a plane in like, two hours. Word to the song "We Fly High."
Double word to the lady bartending at the seedy Cleveland roadhouse who had a haircut like both Prince circa 1986 AND Vanilla Ice ca. 1991.
Triple word to the DC-based environmental protection lawyer in the airport bar.
Infinity word to the veteran in the airport bar who bought everyone drinks because he had just been laid up for five months after being shot in Iraq.
Last night B and I held a tenuous conversation regarding the Theory of Relativity and Black Holes. I was attempting to assert that if you were inside a black hole, you would age slower than someone NOT in a black hole. I have no idea if that is true (if you do, please leave a note here) but in the course of things, I happened to discover that one can, in fact, escape a black hole after being swallowed by it, contrary to what I (and Einstein) had previously assumed. This is terrific news. Granted, you might not be put together in the same way, but 'tis better to emerge as a bright speck of light (or a "glimmering," as quantum mechanics would have it) than never to emerge at all.
Light is a miracle.
Something I haven't mentioned: the Brits have been killing the past year: dubstep expanded and stayed blowing my fing mind with evil sub-bass and cold melodies. Lots of people were jacked on that Burial record, which was good enough and yet at the same time, totally overrated. Producers like Pinch, Caspa ("Cockney Violin" is my shit), Kode9, Black Jack made beats that were to me, more complex, scarier, and more likely to inspire me to interpretive dance and/or pop klonapins under blacklight.
Also P.S. I am way into this lady Sadie Ama – I dig how she takes lite breaths like Aaliyah and yet can drop a line like "boy, that chick is loose" – I like my R&B pulling zero punches (and reminiscent of Blaque's "808"). Let that language roll like a boulder. Smash. "Take You Away" is produced by DaVinChe, who's made beats for Kano, Shystie, etc. Brit R&B singers aren't shy about putting the neo / nu in the soul, I've found, but when they coagulate with their grimy counterparts (Sadie broke out in '04 singing hooks for grime rapper Kano), watch it: as the Ghost Town DJs can tell you, an R&B melody w/a heaping helping of low-end is a lethal dancefloor combo. I wonder if I can parcel my part out and live sometimes in Atlanta, sometimes in London, sometimes in Miami Dade County Florida. In a wormhole maybe. Where the dancing spirits live.
B.O.B.: Best myspace page by a 17-year-old Decatur native with a variable rap moniker and excellent bittersweet down-south niche weed anthems of 2006. (What no Bombs Over Baghdad from a fan of 'Kast?... I mean... DO YOU)
