The Times

In a time of so much flux, insecurity, and economic depression; I wonder how popular music and entertainment will shift to meet the times. I would like to use urban music to illustrate my ideas. In the late 60's and early 70's, during a time of tremendous political upheaval including the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights movement urban music, was and still is defined primarily by the black male superstars of the day. I make the black male stars distinction not to diminish or exclude the tremendous contribution of our female stars of then and now but to try and make the point that when outsiders analyze urban/ghetto culture it is usually defined by the actions of the male population of that community. I will continue this discussion within that framework. In the late 60's and 70's in America at any given time you could have had 8 to 10 black males, all from primarily impoverished urban communities. These communities suffered many of the same problems of crime, drug and alchohol abuse, single parenthood, and joblessness of poor urban communities of today but the difference of cultural expression of the urban males of then is strikingly different from the expressions of today. In the late 60's and early 70's on any giving week you may have had, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Sly Stone, Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, Curtis Mayfield, and Al Green all topping the charts at the same time. If you go back and listen to the message of the music of these products of the urban environment you heard a clear message of redemption and over coming obstacles to become a better loving human being. Granted those times were the times of revolution and free love, it was the time of LSD and Marijuana. If you look at the beginnings of a latest musical genre invention from the urban community, hip hop; it started in the late 70's as an extension of the sentiments of the black men who where influential in the lives of the Black and Puerto Rican men who were fathers of the genre. When did it shift?

In my opinion the greatest shift in urban music after the 70's was the advent of crack cocaine's arrival in the urban community in the early 80's. Crack cocaine took historical urban issues and put them into hyper drive; at the same time crack created a hyper urban economy. So you had hyper violence, hyper materialism, hyper childhood neglect, hyper moral decline, and a hyper rich criminal youth. Not even heroin would take a mother from her child, but crack did. Crack caused urban blight unlike anything else in urban history, in my opinion. It was said that crack was first introduced in Oakland California around 1982; I don't remember crack hitting the east coast hard until around 85, 86. On the east coast, crack culture didn't start entering into the musical lexicon until around 87. The west coast had experienced it's affect for much longer and combined with gang culture it had seeped into the urban music dialogue faster than it did any wear else. I'm showing my age, but I remember when I was a senior in High School in 1988 and I first heard NWA "Fuck the Police," my friends and I couldn't believe it. The use of hyper violent imagery and the free use of the word nigger was completely startling and new to us. 1988 in NY was the year of Public Enemy's largest success and the introduction of the Jungle Brothers and later De La Soul and the Native Tongue movement, it was Big Daddy Kane and LL Cool J. It was Rob Bass. Later that year in the fall I started my freshman year of college at Morehouse in Atlanta and NWA and Too Short was blasting through the dorms from our West Coast peers. I also remember that first week a kid from Oakland jokingly called me a nigger; and I remember being almost provoked to violence. In New York at the time if someone called you a nigger that was a huge insult. 20 years later, things are a whole lot different. I find myself using that word all the time now, like a filthy habit that I love but need to break.

10 years ago we were experiencing the height of the benefits of post crack epidemic culture in full bloom with the most hyper violent, materialistic, and misogynistic musical content in urban music history. Now that the crack epidemic is long past and we could possibly be moving towards the end of a hyper gangster black male cultural aesthetic (noticing the skater and rock star aesthetic taking off in the urban community prompted by Lupe Fiasco, Pherrell Williams, and Kanye West and the arrival of Barack Obama as a cultural icon largely promoted in urban fashion), I wonder what the next movement to be created out of the urban community will be. We must acknowledge that we are running into some very interesting financial and political times. I wonder what the urban response will be. Here is an interesting documentary trailer that I found recently that I think brings up some interesting points.

2 Trees

This is a fantastic animation series that my friend Pierre Bennu does. Enjoy!

The Visitor

Thank God for Netflix; what a brilliant business model. The way they are able to make data mining associations with your film renting history in order to make suggestions of films that you may like is what makes it such a brilliant sucessful company. Netflix recently suggested the film The Visitor and I took them up on their offer. I finally watched the film this morning and though it was largely predictable it was amazingly charming and visceral. I’m not embarrassed to say that I found myself welling up with tears several times and began to delve into the relationships between the characters and suspending my disbelief very easily.

The Visitor is about Walter Vale, a divorced economics professor from Connecticut who struggles with feelings of lonliness and frustration due to an inactive non-inspired life. A lecture that he is forced to make at NYU brings him back to New York City where he lived with his deceased wife and the apartment that he owns but virtually abandoned in Greenwich Village. When he arrives at his apartment, to his suprise a couple is living there illegally. The couple reacts in absolute fear that they of this instrusion and we learn that they are illegal aliens so they fear that this man will call the police, so they quickly leave the apartment. The couple is Tarek from Syria and Zainab from Senegal; Tarek is a purcussionist and Zainab makes hand made jewlery and vends on the streets on NY. Walter ends up inviting to stay for a few days until they get themselves together. A few days becomes weeks and Walter finds himself staying in NY for a while and involving himself in the lives of these 2 young illegal immagrants. An unfortunate mistake gets Tarek arrested and sent to immagration and Walter is wrapped up in this immagration drama and a new found friendship that changes his life forever. I recommend this simple charming film, its subtle and beautiful.

Nigerian Wood

I have only listened to Keziah Jones’ new album Nigerian Wood one full time; but I must say that I am fully enjoying it. I must admit though that the album starts off a little bit slowly for me. Normally artists pack there best songs at the top of the playlist, the first 2 songs of the album are not my favorites. Normally if the first 2 songs of an album aren’t cool I never get to the third song; but I really wanted to dig this project. First of all, Keziah and I in the last 4 years have become friends and second of all for me Keziah’s last album Black Orpheus is a classic LP. I first heard Black Office after taking a meeting at Atlantic Records with an A&R about an artist that I manage. The A&R gave me the record and asked me to get back to him and tell me what I thought. My business partner Jeff and I but it in the car stereo on the way back home and we remember remarking about how great the mix of the album sounded. I learned later that it was mixed and Engineered by Russell Elevado; who also mixed D’Angelo’s Voodoo album.

I first met Keziah Jones in LA in late 2004, a friend of mine tipped me to a solo show that he was having at the Temple Bar. I thought that Black Orpheus was a beautiful sounding and very interesting album before that, but after being blown away by his live show; I mean Keziah is a “bananas” rhythm guitar player and performer. I paid more attention to his music after that show, and after a conversation with he and his manager after that show we kept in touch and we would hang whenever he came through New York.

I would Nigerian Wood a 6.5 out of 10 overall and would suggest that if you haven’t listened to Keziah’s Music before that you start with Black Orpheus. If you are an audiophile and absolutely love music, you will dig the audio tapestries of Nigerian Wood, but don’t expect “typical” or melodic progressions, this is a music lovers album. Stand out songs for me are My Kinda Girl, Pimpin’, Lagos vs New York, and Uninteded Consequenses.

Bathroom Sign

This was in the bathroom of my local Bedford Stuyvesant Laundromat.

Sunday!

This past Sunday was a wild day; it started by photographer friend of mine from Montreal calling me and saying that he was going to drive to the city because he wanted to meet with me. Now that's a 6 hour drive. I told him that I was considering using him as a part of the event series that I am curating in Amsterdam. I wanted to let me know that he was serious about working with me so he drove all the way to NY, met with me for a couple of hours and then drove back the following morning. Big props to Neil Mota; www.neilmota.com that's the kind of person that inspires me to work with them.

While I was meeting with Neil, I get a call from my boy Dan; asking me what I was doing. I told him that I was in the West Village in a meeting. Dan says "I'm on my way to the studio to meet up with DJ Quick and Rakim, do you want to come?" "Hell yeah, where and when, I replied." So after my meeting with Neil, he and I walk up to 17th and 10th to meet with Dan. Neil and I part ways and Dan and I head to the studio; a long walk to 50th street and 10th Avenue, on the way there we see this sign in a store window made out of flouresant lights that said CHANGE, I thought that was cool. We get to the studio and we hear this bananas beat that Quick was working on, I was in heaven. Unfortunately, I waited for hours to meet Rakim, but I was exhausted and left before he showed. Anyway, it was cool to kick it with DJ Quick and his folks from La La...and so the day went. On the way out Dan asked me to manage him; he wrote an amazing script about his amazing life and has been shopping it in LA, I've never worked with a writer, so I need to think about that. Oh, we also stopped by Billy's bakery on 21st and 9th Avenue on the way up; craziest cakes in town, trust me!!

Chop Shop

I watched this movie last night and am watching it again as I am typing. My apologies; I called it a movie and I meant to call it a film, there is a difference. I always felt that if I were going to make a film; that it would feel like this one.

Chop Shop is a simple story about Alejandro, an orphaned 10 year old in Queens, NY who lives above an
Auto Mobile Chop Shop where he works. Alejandro’s story is typical of New York City’s street kid culture, a culture of selling candy on the train, hustling bootleg movies,and snatching pocket books. Alejandro is by all accounts a grown ass man. He negotiated a place to stay above his bosses Chop Shop for he and his homeless 16 year old sister Isamar who joins the story about 25 minutes in. Ale (Alejandro) finds out a dirty secret about his sister that he decides to accept but it strengthens his goal to buy a food vending truck for he and his sister so that they can start there own business.

Chop Shop is brilliant in it’s realism; the camera never gets in the way of the story and the acting is amazing. I highly recommend this film.

De La Soul

I can’t believe that the VH1 Hip Hop Honors are just getting around to honoring De La Soul this year, its almost criminal. How do you honor Snoop Dog, Outkast, or even A Tribe Called Quest before De La? Is there any understanding or respect for history? What criteria do they based their decisions for honoring bands on. It cant be based on the impact that a band has had on the genre or the aesthetic of the Hip Hop community because there are very few Hip Hop bands that did more to impact the genre than De La Soul. I know because I was there, in fact me and the youngest member of the group Maceo are the same age; I actually went to his high school graduation party in Amityville, Long Island; because we had mutual friends. I’m not from Amityville but I am from Suburban NY; the same suburb that Brand Nubian and CL Smooth are from, and as suburban kids we had a different sensibility towards Hip Hop because we grew up in a quieter, safer, more friendly place than our urban peers.

De La Soul gave birth to bands like A Tribe Called Quest, Leaders of the New School, Brand Nubian, the Pharcyde, Hieroglyphics, Freestyle Fellowship, Blackalicious, UMC’s, Main Source, and a host of others. They ushered in a whole movement and a different sound; a sound that had less to do with urban blight and more about the expression of youthful life discovery of sex, culture, and growing up. And the expression was wrapped in a competitive lyrical style that was based on who could be the most original. It was a time when it was embarrassing to be wack; what ever happened to that? If you listen to Three Feet High and Rising you never heard the word nigger, maybe once; and that was in the context of a parody of the word. There wasn’t one song bragging about inner city violence or drug trafficing. There were songs about diasies though, and potholes in lawns and about getting laid. The subject matters were universal and human, every kid; black, white, asian, indian from Long Island to Boisee could relate. De La Soul gave Hip Hop freedom, freedom from James Brown and Funkadelic samples; freedom to sample Steely Dan. It was fun to be young and black again and it for a minute Hip Hop was inspirational. Who the f*ck makes these decisions about who should be honored. If it was me De La Soul would have been on the first show with PE and Grand Master Flash and the Furious 5; they were that important.

King of Soul

Got a call from Cody ChesnuTT last night; it was brief, he wanted to tell me that he just saw an ad for Robin Thicke's new album which highlighted a quote from the LA Times calling him the new King of Soul music. The New King of Soul Music? Have I died and gone to hell? I've listened to the Robin Thicke album and unfortunately its not bad; it sounds like a Marvin Gaye tribute album, but its actually listenable. Is he the new King of Soul? Well, I think that's a ridiculous notion since there are people like Al Green still alive and making music but I understand marketing spin. The fact that his marketing folks could say that without being boycotted is a testament to where black music and artistry is today. Where is D'Angelo when you need him? D'Angelo please come back and shut this dude down; this is embarrassing.

My friend Josh sent me a link to this an old Omar video from 1994; I remember when I first found Omar. It was at a record store in Atlanta, I was in my first year of graduate school in South Carolina but I used to make several trips to Atlanta to see friends that were still at Morehouse and Spelman. Anyway, I think I was at Best Buy and I saw the For Pleasure album; being featured as a new release. I don't know why I bought it, I can't remember if it was in a listening station or not. What I do remember is that after one listen, he was my favorite artist at the time and I told all of my friends about him. Now Omar had already released 2 albums since 1990 in the UK, but it was his US debut that turned me on to him. It was For Pleasure in my opinion, even though it was not a smash hit sales wise, that spawned the Neo Soul movement in America. D'Angelo is often given the credit with his 1995 release Brown Sugar, because it eventually hit the mainstream in 1996 with the hit song Lady. But in London, Omar and his crew were dubbed the creators of what was called neo-classic soul before D'Angelo had a career. Well as fate would have it; Omar and all of his genius, never translated here in the US and D'Angelo is a legend. So here we are today and this discussion about two modern day soul geniuses doesn't matter because Robin Thicke is on tour with Mary J Blige and is the reigning "King of Soul," go figure.