"like B2K, but not even as good"

FROM March 27, 2004

Though we rarely see one another in the flesh, my four-blocks-away-neighbor Jeremy Devine and I love to rant/debate music b.s. on the phone. Today's topic: the new issue of Alternative Press, in which Eyedea and Abilities are erroneously described as the "Shaq and Kobe" of hiphop (with the byzantine qualifier "except they're on good terms")--such a ridiculous assertion, we didn't even discuss it, except to postulate who may be the ACTUAL Shaq and Kobe of hiphop. My answer, the obvious one, was that it's Kanye and Jay-Z; Jeremy countered, "Or Eminem and Dre... no, Em and Dre are more like the Tanya Harding and Jeff Gillooly of hiphop."

We then agreed the new D12 single has incurred new standards of wack, and that Eminem wants to run this circus like Ring-a-ling, but has ended up somewhere between the bearded-lady tent and the elephant poo with his uninventive Slick Rick carnival fetish.

Meanwhile, I missed the Blazers-Sonics game tonight (we won in overtime!) in favor of work obsession, but Connie called with the following breathless message: "It was hiphop night at the Rose Garden! They weren't accurately representing hiphop AT ALL, but we stayed at the game late because Dale Davis' label, WAR Records, was having a show afterwards, and it was SO BAD!! It was just these four, like, Beaverton suburban-adolescent boys in Blazers gear, pretty much like B2K but not even as good, singing a song called 'Take Your Pants Off'! There were all these little kids there, grabbing their balls and singing, 'take--yo--pants--off!'" Let's hope lil Jimbrowki's wearing a hat.