Thursday, August 31, 2006

New York Sh*t

I just gotta say, that old school Diamond D beat is ill.

Have you heard the Talib Kweli/Jean Grae version? Check it out on Kwe's MySpace page.

At Least Black Men are Safe...

Sen. Conrad Burns of Montana believes "the United States is up against a faceless enemy of terrorists who 'drive taxicabs in the daytime and kill at night."

Wow, you better think twice before catching that cab next time, you could be riding with Osama bin Laden! Don't you just love it when our elected representatives make incredibly assenine racist statements?

Well at least Black men don't have too much to worry about, since I can stand on a corner in a suit and tie and still get passed by...

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Is this Love?

As I was walking home tonight I felt compelled to go to Tower Records. Honestly I had been thinking about it since yesterday when I was contemplating buying J Dilla's (God bless) posthumous release The Shining from iTunes. I decided I wanted the physical product so I could explore the liner notes. I was quite dissapointed to find it missing from the shelf, and once again I started thinking about the iTunes store. But before I walked away I checked out some other CDs, looking for anything good on sale for the right price. As my eyes covered more and more titles, I felt like I had to buy them- I had to- but I realized that once I bought one I might not be able to stop myself until I dropped way too much loot that needs to go to my bills. Besides I had done this twice in the past month or so, which is very unsual for me. I've deprived myself of a lot of good music throughout the years simply because I thought CDs were far overpriced. So after stopping myself from loading a stack of CDs on my debit card, I thought about just grabbing a bunch and taking them on a five-finger discount - which is when I realized something was very wrong.

I had a few impulse buys lately...or so that's what I thought. But these impulses are getting stronger and stronger. I've been listening to Yahoo! Launchcast for hours during the day...my iPod is glued to my head...

I think I'm experiencing now what a lot people may have started experiencing in their early teens or even earlier when buying, listening, and sharing music seemed darn near essential as food and water. After downloading Laffy Taffy Rots Your Teeth (see post below), I burned a CD and gave it to one of my co-workers. He hooked me up with a chill Kanye mix pre-Late Registration, so I figured I'd reciprocate (don't worry Naomi, I got you for that Unspoken Heard). Even though I wanted the CDs and liner notes and all that, I'm glad I thought twice...

...but I still bought a Miles Davis CD on the way out the door.

Laffy Taffy Rots Your Teeth




























Sunday, August 13, 2006

Jay-Z is My New Favorite Rapper

I mean that in a tongue-in-cheek way, cuz Jay-Z was far from the list of rappers, emcees, etc. (...it's a long story for another post).

Jay-Z hooking with up with Kofi Annan & the United Nations to do a tour highlighting water crises around the world is crazy. He's taken hip-hop to yet another level. I mean, someone could ask why specifically water when there are so many causes that effect Black folk domestically. But Mr. Carter needs to get his feet on something (pardon the expression).

Hopefully Jay won't get caught up like Barack Obama or Michael Jordan and have the expection & weight of being the next "Black Superman." But even if that does happen, I feel confident that Shawn Carter can handle it.

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Expanding Peace Through Hip Hop

I have a solution for the Middle East Crisis: Battle

Three of the four elements of hip hop will used to wage the contest: emceeing, b-boying, and DJing

It'll be like The Last Emperor's Secret Wars

For something like this you'd need a crazy large area, perhaps stretching from Jerusalem to East Medina...

I heard there are some ill cats out there in the Middle East who can really flow

Live satellite feed to broadcast all over the globe

Now that would be ill...

Damn! Damn!! DAMN!!!

The American Muslim Taskforce today urged Muslim nations to end diplomatic relations with Israel.

Yes, we're all concerned about the loss of life in Lebanon and Gaza, but what will that solve? How can you resolve differences when there is no communication?

everybody wants to be right/but nobody's left/to see you/raise the flag of victory/upon your last breath