1 for the people, 2 for the globe, 3 for the people. Keep it Eco.

Ambessa Contave, one half of Oakland hip hop duo Fiyawata, organizer and green movement mobilizer  giving a shout in favor of climate change regulations.  This Saturday is the International Day of Climate Change Action and eco activists around the world are hosting over 1500 actions in over 125 countries, calling for climate justice at the Copenhagen climate talks from Dec. 7-18.

Filed under: Activism, Art, Media, Music, San Francisco

Remember when Freestyle DID NOT equal written raps?

This makes me smile. A lot.

more about “Freestyle 101 with Doseone and Jel | …“, posted with vodpod

I’ve been getting my grumpy old man on for a minute when it comes to the current crop of “freestyle” MC’s and their shifting idea of what that means: spitting prewrittens, doing internet research and bringing out all types of props and skits and ish.

Filed under: Music, Oakland , Art, Bay Area, Doseone, freestyle, Hip Hop, MC, Oakland

Why don’t you follow me?

After a recent suggestion that this become the new Twitter theme song (love it!) I had to dig up this vid.  So Classic.

Filed under: Dance, Music

Music for Lazers

It’s just dope, no questions.

Filed under: Music

B-more club, MIA, Kuduru: It ain’t where you from it’s how you Bang

Start your week with a Bang:

This vid is a perfect example of some of the greatness that’s been coming out of the DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia) area in the last couple of years.  Rye Rye’s been making her name on the Bmore club scene for a hot minute and has recently been touring with everyone’s favorite ruddie-MIA-bringing the B-mo’ club to a worldwide audience.

I’ll write more about this later, but the last few years have seen some interesting international club music collabs.  Bmore Club, Portugal’s Kuduro and MIA’s brash outernationalisms all share a street energy, this primal funk that apparantly transcends geographies.  This is hood music, no matter the country, continent or context.

Filed under: Music , B more club, Buruka Som Sistema, Kuduro, MIA, Music, Rye Rye

There’s deep house, then there’s Thunderbolts

This, good people, is house music.

I’ve been hearing this joint for a hot second.  I never knew the producer but the cut is fire.  Some serious dancefloor deepness.  Turns out it’s called “Thunderbolts” and it’s by a young cat by the name of Ezel, an NY by way of Puerto Rico house head recently signed to Carlos Mena’s Oakland based Ocha Records.  

Filed under: Music , Carlos Mena, Ezel, House Music, Nina Simone, Oakland, Ocha Records, See line woman

First MJ, now Vibe. But Vibe kinda sucked.

Although I’ve gotta say that while I’m sincerely sad about the first, the second is a pure nostaligiac respect based on three things:

1. Vibe was the 1st mag I ever bought a subscription to with my own hard  earned yout’ money (The only thing I had to show after a high school at Taco Hell, save a longstanding and unhealthy obsession with 7 layer burritos).
2. Quincy Jones  has always been, and will continue to be The Fucking Man.  Anybody who can roll with Miles and Sinatra’s gotta command a little respect.
3. Eff what ya heard, Daniel Smith was the best editor of any Hip Hop mag ever. EH-vah.  When I heard she was going to be back at the helm I actually considered subscribing again, for like 3 whole seconds.  Ah well, maybe this means she’ll have time to get back to blogging (her kaleidoscopic  didact rants on entertainment, politics and sports are still an inspiration. )

Filed under: Hip Hop, Media, Music

What the Fuck? Michael Jackson is dead.

Alright, this is depressing as fuck.

I first heard the news as a rumor between two cats outside the corner store about 4 hours ago on my way downtown.

“Yo, you heard Michael Jackson died?”

“Naw, man I heard that was just a rumor.”

A small lump in my stomach started to throb. The kind you get when you realize something’s gone irreversibly wrong and there’s nothing you can do about it.

As I kept walking the sounds of “Thriller,” “Billie Jean” and “Beat It,” blasting from nearly every car that passed confirmed it and by this time the lump had blossomed into a full blown sadness. What the Fuck? Michael Jackson is dead?

For a minute I felt like pulling an old-black-moms-at-her-son’s-funeral and break down right at the corner of 17th and Telegraph. What the Fuck? Michael Jackson is dead?!

Filed under: Art, Music , Billie Jean, jimmie Hendricks George Clinton, Michael Jackson, prince, RIP, Thriller

Red Clay and Bukowski are better artists than you

If you don’t have to make art, don’t.  This shit is difficult and the hourly pay sucks.

I remember when I was in college one of my poetry profs would regularly deliver the one two reality punch of encouraging students  to write as much as possible, right before stressing that you should only make it a career if you had no choice.   The ones that had no choice knew who they were.  We were the ones with that far off look in our eyes and wandering gaze, the ones who walked into class on clouds and talked sestinas and sentence structure till 3 in the morning clutching a jug of wine and chain smoking hand rolled cigarrettes.  We’re all broke now.

But of course, it’s what we do.  No regrets over here.  Especially when you run across a work that changes the way you look at life, offers a new vantage point, or gives you hope regarldless of the stupid shit that happens on the day to day.  There’s that old saying that “hearts speak to each other” and while I’m not ready to get on The Secret Metaphysical, I do believe that you can spot a true artist a mile away, someone who does it because they have to, cuz there is no other option.  Who, even if they were down to their last dime, dumpster diving they’d find a top to bang on, a pencil to write with or a song to sing.

Filed under: Art, Hip Hop, Music, Poetry , Art, Charles Bukowski, Hip Hop, Music, Poetry, Red Clay

Ursula Rucker as alternative to bad poetry

So earlier this week, in a bit of creative hissy fit over all the marketing and journalism work I’ve been doing lately and the great but oh-so-business-focused Tweets I’ve been recieving, I decided to send out a poem a day, 5 days a week, to add a little verse into these heavy tech and business conversations.

So far there’s been this great piece from Martin Espada, a poem from Kevin Young’s brilliant “To Repel Ghosts” a collection insired by the paintings of Jean Michel Basquiat, and this spoken word/house anthem below, from 4Hero and Ursula Rucker.  This came out a while back and was one of the 1st pieces that I thought “got it right” when it came to blending beats and spoken word w/o sounding corny as hell.  

Filed under: Music, Poetry