Music for a Monday: When They Reminisce Edition

I am surprisingly intrigued by her new album. I thought Tasty was pretty good.

The above picture has nothing to do with what follows. I just wanted to celebrate Kelis, the sexiest woman in hip-hop.

Let's take a Jay Dee-inspired step back in time today. Below are ten originals that were made into hip-hop songs that you likely know. A number of them are Slum Village joints. And several should be pretty easy.

The t-shirt printers just asked me for the size distribution for my order, so the Reincarcerate Yayo shirts should be here soon. First person who can match up the artists with the respective songs they made and then tell me which songs later sampled each track, you can have a free shirt. Try to not spend that much time on the internets...

Songs
1) "Hogin' Machine"

2) "Extra Dry"

3) "Fun"

4) "Wang Dang Doodle"

5) "Found a Child"

6) "Strangers in the Night"

7) "Clair"

8) "Funny How Time Flies"

9) "Make This Young Lady Mine"

10) "40 Days"

Artists
a) Janet Jackson

b) Brick

c) Les Baxter

d) Billy Brooks

e) The Mad Lads

f) Singers Unlimited

g) Ballin'jack

h) Young-Holt Unlimited (Trio)

i) Thomas Banglater

j) Koko Taylor

Colin Farrell Sucks: Straight Bangin' Cinema

See how close they are? That's duct tape.

As I've noted before, I go to the movies a lot. Always have. I particularly enjoy going to the movies in the summer because stepping into the theater usually makes me feel as though I've stepped out of time. I don't know if it's the contrast between the light outside and the dark inside; the heat of the streets (literally, not like some studio gangster recalling the reasons why he's so revered) and the air conditioning of the cinema; the real-world reality that junk food is bad for you and the movies-driven notion that popcorn and Reese Bites are a suitable replacement for lunch and dinner--whatever it is, I always feel like I'm getting away with something sinful when I am at the movies.

I had nothing else going on today, so I indulged this synthetic thrill and went to see Miami Vice.

Big mistake. Miami Vice is terrible. And for a cavalcade of reasons.

To start, Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx are the worst on-screen duo since Tim McCarver and Deion Sanders, and at least those two didn't have to pretend as though they liked each other. You really can't have a convincing--to say nothing of good--buddy movie when the two protagonists obviously hate each other. The Buckets had told me ahead of time that Jamie Foxx was rumored to hate Farrell because Farrell spent the whole time that they were filming acting like himself--an idiotic, drunken asshole. That comes through on screen, as the two have no chemistry. It was almost as if each shot his scenes alone against a green screen and director Michael Mann then superimposed the footage so that it was a cohesive product. They were just a disaster.

It also didn't help that Foxx spends the whole moving grunting and trying to redefine bland while Farrell plays some alleged American with a Barry Melrose-like mullet and an accent that makes him sound as though he grew up in Alabama, Indianapolis, New York, and San Diego simultaneously. Farrell's representation of an American is the functional equivalent of those idiotic movies in which characters allegedly from France or Italy or some other European country all speak with British accents. What is that?

As for the plot (SPOILER ALERT), here's how it goes:

- We open with some bullshit scene in a dance club that was likely just leftover footage from a Bad Boys movie (Mike Lowwwww-rey!) or some shitty Fat Joe video. That annoying Jay-Z/Linkin Park "mash-up" is playing, so if you weren't sure whether the movie would be culturally relevant, don't worry: it's not.

- Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx are wearing suits, but they're not pastel colors, so that immediately stinks, too. There aren't nearly enough pastels for the entire movie.

- White supremacists--again, extras from Bad Boys who were probably still under contract--have done some bad stuff to some people, the FBI has fucked up a drug bust, and the Vice squad must now go undercover to save the day. Despite being cops, Crockett and Tubbs tool around in a Ferrari and hang out in a house that a cop can only afford if he is on the take from some major drug dealer like Ricky Rowss.

- Crockett and Tubbs successfully execute a drug shipment for a Latin drug overlord who conveniently also traffics in those proverbial rogue Russian weapons supplies, and they feel as though they may be onto something, so they get so deep undercover that they no longer can tell "which way is up"...

-...At least, Colin Farrell can't. For 75% of the movie, Jamie Foxx scowls at people not named "Crockett" and futilely tries to lend the film some personality (although that is really a generous assessment of his performance) while his character goes nowhere. There really was no need for Vice to have gotten a big name to play this part, and worse, the movie would have been fine without the character entirely. That's not good for a movie explicitly about TWO people fighting crime TOGETHER. Farrell, meanwhile, spends what seems like an unengaging eternity seducing and twisting out some Asian woman whose English, like Farrell's, is pretty poor and who is married to the leader of the crime syndicate that Crockett and Tubbs are attempting to expose. Colin, the Asian woman, and Colin's hair go to Havana and have sex; the three of them go to a dance club and almost have sex; they get in a car and have sex; etc.

- To make Crockett seem somewhat sympathetic in the minds of an audience that probably (and should if it doesn't) hates Farrell and loathes his existence, Crocket also spends a lot of the intimate time half whispering a bunch of crappy sentimentality and awkwardly attempting to demonstrate his ambivalence about falling in love with this boring, inarticulate suckbox.

- The only interesting character in the whole movie is some other Latin dude who works for the crime boss and hates Crockett and Tubbs because they get to have girlfriends while he doesn't. This guy is named Jose Yero (like those Greek sandwiches that aren't pronounced like "Jai-ro"). Yero's facial hair looks a lot like that of Sayid on Lost, and Yero speaks English with an accent and voice inflections that make all of his tough talk sound a little truncated and a lot funny. You're always waiting for his voice to come down as he drops the other verbal shoe, but that usually doesn't happen and Yero is left seeming incompetent and unintentionally hilarious. Predictably, his general discontent leads him to make a jack move that drives the movie's theoretical climax.

- It all ends poorly as Jamie Foxx's girlfriend gets blown up (but survives), the arrests fall through since the Miami police kill all the criminals, and Farrell's ladyfriend "go fast"-boats off into the Cuban sunset, so to speak.

And then, most disappointing of all, the neon-blue "Miami Vice" sign lights up an otherwise black screen...and the theme song from the TV show never comes on. If they had done this properly--a black screen lit up by the neon WITH the theme song blaring over the credits--the movie would have been about 20% good and 80% disastrous, not the actual 5/95 split. I mean, come on: a black screen and silence that slowly builds toward the sudden neon flash and 80s guitars as the drums pick up? That would have been frickin' bad ass. And it would have sent the audience out on the highest note possible. But instead, we all trudged out pissed off after having spent 140 minutes of big guns and blaring boats and boring cars wondering why they didn't just make a music video and call it a day.

Oh wait, I know why Miami Vice wouldn't have been a good music video--the music was horrible. Not only was the theme song conspicuously absent, but everything else was an indiscernable melange of generic, boring rock music. At some point, whatever they were calling an original score sounded a little bit like the haunting music from the scene in Boyz N the Hood when Doughboy and Tre (kind of) ride out on the guys who killed Ricky while Laurence Fishburne sits at home playing with those Chinese meditation balls. But that resemblance is quickly lost and the music reverts to being worthless.

I also hate to keep harping on Scarface, but I can't see how anyone can assess a movie about gangsters, Latin Americans, drugs, and Miami without invoking a film that defines the subgenre. Pacino's Tony Montana and the glitzy, cheesy Miami of Brian De Palma's masterpiece (and while it has its flaws, I can't think of another movie that I literally can watch every day, so that counts for something) loom large since Miami Vice has so little character and does so little with its setting. I really liked Collateral, but I didn't want to see some weak derivative, and that, sadly, is what Miami Vice was. The strong acting and visceral camera work that made the last Michael Mann movie so dope were replaced by brooding, listless performances and cinematography that felt inauthentic and emotionless. I was able to buy into the gritty, dark world of L.A. at night, but attempting to graft that sense onto Miami failed horribly and wasted a location that has been such an exciting part of similar works.

Really, until anyone can summon a performance like Pacino's, there should be a moratorium on drug movies set in Miami. Scarface is inarguably the most influential movie in hip-hop history, and thanks to the preeminence of hip-hop these days, the film will remain fresh in the minds of people like me, forever condemning as inferior all other attempts to master the subgenre.

Did I mention how bad Colin Farrell was?

- Theme, "Miami Vice"

- Theme, "Boyz N the Hood"

NBA Offseason Withdrawal Has Begun

Still a Piston, right?

You know, things were puckering along pretty well for a while. After the NBA Finals, there was the draft; free agency; the S.S. Disaster that we call the Knicks; the whole to-do about LeBron leaving Cleveland one day. It was going along well. Throw in a couple of golf majors, the summer-long looming specter of college football, and exciting storylines like Barbero Danica Patrick Team USA potentially playing the Wade-James Backcourt to End All Non-Magic/Michael Backcourts, and the sports summer was going along well.

But then this weekend, I found myself up at 5 AM manically searching the internets for news about the Richard Hamilton trade about which I had so vividly dreamed that I woke up in a horrified panic. That's when I knew that I really, really am missing the NBA. It also confirmed that I'm sick in the head, but that was well known, I'd assume.

In the dream, the Pistons had traded Hamilton for a player combination that I want to remember as Moochie Norris and Peja Stojakovic, but that doesn't seem: a) likely; b) possible; c) sane; d) all of the above. It was a terrible nightmare, really. Suddenly the Pistons were missing 40% of their championship nucleus and were going to be compensating with a middling center who used to platoon with Jamaal Magloire; a journeyman backup point guard whose hair stopped being his only redeeming quality about five years ago; and some never-shorn Euro who's allergic to staying healthy and to the playoffs. Always the sports pessimist, I woke up convinced of this bleak reality and checked ESPN.com, SI.com, True Hoop and several other sites just to make sure that, as it turns out, I was wrong.

The world championships need to start ASAP. But in between time, longtime reader Alando sent along this excellent morsel of information at the end of this week: Juanny found!

That's right, Dajuan Wagner has been located--he's probably going to be playing ball in Israel for Maccabi Tel Aviv this year. Is there anything more appropriate for a player who, while in high school, was called "The Messiah"? The Haaretz story is actually kind of sad, despite certain matter-of-fact passages that can't help but be described as hilarious. It's not every day that you read the following:

But his bad luck continued, and a knee injury that Dajuan picked up toward the end of his first season, coupled with more medical problems, kept him out of action for six months.

"The Cavs wanted Juanny to spend the break at the University of Memphis and work with his father, but he decided to return to Camden," recalls journalist Brian Windhorst, who covers the team for The Akron Beacon Journal. "I have no idea what he did in Jersey, but when he returned to Cleveland, he was unable to play and the team was very angry."

That's right: in the course of a two years, a basketball player went from scoring 100 points in a high school game and becoming the 6th pick in the draft to spending a mysterious summer in New Jersey and never again being abe to play for real. Now, I haven't been to Camdem, and I know that it's a horrible place, but do you know how much shit Juanny had to have been involved with to work his way from lottery pick to NBA detritus in one offseason? Renaldo Balkman will be in the NBA longer than Juanny, and some people didn't think that Balkman should have even been drafted.

It's fun to joke, but the story also has troubling information like this:

But medical problems aren't the only thing one finds in Dajuan Wagner's Pandora's box. "You have to understand that he grew up in a dangerous and problematic environment," Windhorst explains. "He was always surrounded by dubious people, and I remember that one time he missed a flight to the opening of a training camp because he was unable to find his driver's license.

"He has always been surrounded by weird stories. Dajuan was never really very well educated. He has trouble reading; he doesn't speak much; and I remember him staring into space for the most part. It is as if he was born for the sole purpose of playing basketball.

I am positive that no one at Juanny's high school or at Memphis, where he went for a year, ever cared to make sure that he could do something like, oh, I don't know...read. What a wonderful system we've built around these prep phenoms.

Danica Patrick is Sleeping with the Men of ESPN

There is no other way to explain why ESPN wastes so much time on a total loser. And by that, of course, I mean that she hasn't won shit. Ever. Scoreboard...or whatever the fuck they use to keep track of things at a car race.

That's also the only reason that Danica gets hyped up as some stunning woman: no one wants to admit that they have bad taste.

Today's abbreviated diatribe was prompted by this screen shot of ESPN.com captured on Tuesday:


In related news, NO ONE CARES!

Are you kidding me? A "Breaking News" box AND the first headline? For that? That? A racing-team switch? Isn't that like an oil change or something? Who fucking cares--about the "sport" or about a driver who gives boring interviews, isn't that pretty, and isn't even good at her job. If ESPN is so desparate for stories about women just because they're women, why not begin featuring some mediocre housewives? Like Danica, they spend a lot of their time driving, they probably wouldn't provide scintillating interviews either, and some of them could probably wear their hair like a Munster, as Danica does.

But, in ESPN's defense, there wasn't any Terrell Owens news, so what else were they gonna cover?

This Country Is on Crazy Pills

Don't shoot the messenger, Bush fans. This is the first result when you run an image search for "stupid."

From Kevin Drum:

Half of Americans now say Iraq had weapons of mass destruction when the United States invaded the country in 2003 — up from 36 percent last year....In addition, 64 percent say Saddam had "strong links" with al Qaeda....Fifty-five percent said that "history will give the U.S. credit for bringing freedom and democracy to Iraq."....American confidence in the Iraqis has improved: 37 percent said Iraq would succeed in creating a stable democracy, up five points since November.

OK, let's all say it together:

What.
The.
Fuck.

I mean, really? REALLY?! Look, I don't have an absolute problem with the final two findings. As ill-equipped as the U.S. is for nation building in Iraq, and as unlikely as it is that the mess in Mesopotamia will be cleanly resolved any time in the near future, I'd agree that at some point, Saddam Hussein's ouster will be seen as a step toward freedom. It may already be seen as that by some people, even if it is accompanied by the warranted qualification that the country has descended into a chaos that currently precludes this supposed improvement from manifesting itself in a way that Americans envision. The dude was a sociopathic dictator, after all.

Similarly, I'd agree that eventually--in five years? Ten? Twenty?--Iraq is likely to have some kind of real, stable democracy. Throughout human history, democracy has usually triumphed. So I'm cool with these findings (even if I am approaching this concordance with a certain facetiousness that I'd argue is warranted. It's not like there will be stable, self-sustaining democracy any time soon.)

But turn the beat off for a minute--What new information has emerged in the last year that has convinced 14% of the population to change its opinion about WMDs? I have read that there are canisters of X or Y that predate the original Gulf War that have been found, and that there have been dormant or non-threatening munitions found, but these have not been revelatory pieces of information. And these findings certainly have not been represented as having comprised a formerly imminent threat that would have served as a compelling reason for war. They haven't even dominated coverage. So what has so strongly swayed so many people in the last year? What am I not reading and watching? Is all just FOX News and other bullshit, dishonest conservative media?

And where is the evidence of the "strong ties" that existed between Saddam and al-Qaeda? Again, where is this information being dispensed?

This poll, to me, is a horrible indictment of the media. Unless, of course, the media likes it like this. And say what you will about the larger "War on Terror"--I don't think anyone would argue that the U.S. shouldn't be confronting terrorism--but to lie to the public in the name of consensus building is absurd and an abortion of justice. It's so antithetical to the American creed that I am repulsed by the thought of such widespread intellectual malaise.

When did so many people just stop caring?

Links, Rhymes, and Life

How many blogs do you think have used the exact same title for posts? God, I am an unoriginal lame...

- There is a caption contest over at Schembechler Hall that is not to be missed. I mean, if you like shitting on Notre Dame, you MUST get over there.

- I'm crazy late on this, but Dallas Penn has the hip-hop post of the year. I told y'all, I'm a movie geek.

- The top-ten hip-hop diss records. I think this might warrant its own post at some point. Direct your discussion to the comments section below.

- The new Method Man album cover:



- I really hope that Phonte didn't actually say this. It's so lame and stupid. Please, no.

- Peep game: Balls and My Word

- The Realests with breaking Michigan football news...

- Make your own club record. Use the club-record of the year.

- The Game, "One Blood"
Is this the first single from the new album? Honestly, it sounds so much like a lot of other Game tracks--steady beat that doesn't steal your attention; lots of boasting and name dropping and geographic shout outs. That whispering during the intro blows. And what's sadder, that Game is actually sort of likable only because 50 sucks so much or that Game is a more interesting rapper than most of those annoying-ass dope boys?

- Big Tuck ft. Chamillionaire, "I Know U Want That"
I am NOT a Chamillionaire fan. His sing-song choruses are just as irksome as 50's and Ja Rule's. But if "Ridin'" was your thing, then you might be into this, too. It's not the catchiest song I've ever heard--Tuck doesn't really ride the beat so well and sounds too mechanical, among other things--but I also don't really mind it. It's the kind of track I'd inadvertently wind up listening to on the radio late at night as I hopelessly circled around my neighborhood looking for a parking spot that wouldn't violate street-cleaning rules and get me a ticket.

- Blak Jak, "Bobbin' My Head"
See above. Another unremarkable track--generic synthesizers, mid-tempo bass, club talk. To stick with the real-life hypotheticals, this is something I'd probably invent a shitty dance for if it came on while I was out at a club and drunk on a Saturday. Shouting out Shawnna and Yung Joc probably won't win dude too many internets plaudits, by the way.

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

Has this been around?



Update: A thoughtful reader passed this along...

This Post Would Be a Lot Better...

The inescapable specter of the only movie playing in hip-hop heaven.

...if I hadn't spent all of Monday night: trying to figure out why my apartment became overrun with flies while I was gone for the weekend; cleaning the shit out of my apartment since my OCD gives me the sort of adrenaline most people need to jump out of an airplane. I mean, when I get worked up about a perceived lack of cleanliness or an imagined biological agent threatening my well being, I give off more energy than Dick Vitale in the Cameron Indoor locker room.

Anyway, this is all meant to be some kind of explanation for why there isn't more context for what follows, because the internets store is selling both albums from which these are culled:

- Masta Killa ft. U-God, RZA, and Method Man, "Iron God Chamber"
If you like those Wu-Tang songs--and I do--that feature the Clan saying a lot of things that only half make sense; come off as pure, seductive bravado; and probably relate to some kind of pseudo history and/or bizarre, kung-fu-infused Islam, than this is a track for you! For instance, what are we to make of these sorts of raps:

"Time to knock 'em out
Cut 'em with the glass hand
Time to shut 'em down
I'm comin' out the bad land
Oscar the Grouch, kid
Jumpin' out the trash can"

"I used to be afraid of the devil as a boy
But now as a grown man
I realize he is just a toy
A grafted image
Of the magnificent
Splendid
Dominant
Prominent
Islamic
I was here before the dinosaurs
Shinin', definin' law
Measurin' every inch of the Earth
Combinin' more
Elements and chemicals
Phosphates and minerals
Kept devils on the run like Monk Monk the General"

"Look at this bitch-ass
Snitch-ass
About to get a kicked-ass
Get mad
Get smashed
And get another zip bag
Of 'dro"

I also just want to say that U-God might not have much to say, and he might be fairly forgettable within the history of hip-hop, but there is something about him--his voice?--that I've always liked. I could just be projecting, here, but I also have always imagined that he raps because he can't really do much else and runs with a crew that has made it OK for him to spit nonsense under the guise of some sort of next-level homespun mysticism that you're simply not cool or high enough to understand. I really respect that.

And this begs a question for Robbie and the Weed Carrier cohorts (including me, I guess) to tackle: What do weed carriers who don't put out records do all day? Memphis Bleek, Lloyd Banks, Consequence--these dudes are at least recording shit. But U-God, Dice Raw, Spliff Star--what are these people doing all day, every day? I mean, they can't be carrying 24/7, right?

- Rick Ross, "Push It"
Oh, I get it: You're from Miami and you front like you're some neck-bearded Antonio Montana so naturally you sample 80's synth-rock used in Scarface. What a clever way to get Paul Engemann some royalty paper. Subtle, Rick, subtle. Your wit knows no bounds.

I like this track in that "I don't really like it but find its mere existence to be funny" kind of way. Why? Well, you know how I sometimes like to make a big deal about these studio gangsters, who pretend that they still gets moneeeeeeeey by selling drugs when they're not lounging in suburban New Jersey or wherever they're filming their episodes of Cribs, picking mismatched beats for their lyrical content? Well, this is just the latest addition to an expansive catalogue of dope-boy gangster music that relies on completely non-gully 80's pop. And that's hilarious. Just ask Jadakiss or DMX or Cam'ron. I mean, what's harder than hallucinatory tales of violence and drug dealing set to a Casio drum pattern and a simple sprinkling of electronic keys?

More Dog Bites Man

Please watch this episode. It's the best half-hour of non-Deadwood TV this year:

Every Day I'm Hustlin'

That Jay Dee review I wrote is now up at About.com. Hopefully it isn't too shitty

Music for a Monday: Ignorance Won't Be Stopped

GO HERE NOW.

What are you going to? Robbie has posted a track from Lakey the Kid called "No Homo." Here is a sampling of the lyrical mastery:

"You disrespected us
I can't hug no homo thug
Have him layin' in my crib
Or playin' round with my son
But I still let you plead your case
But you (muffled) so weak
I said get outta my face...
Cuz here is something I can't understand
How this cat would sex another man

There's penalties for this that way we live
There's penalties for this game that we in
There's penalties for being loyal to the G Code
A G won't be a ho for nothin'
No homo"

Watch out, Rakim.

And so we're all clear, Lakey doesn't hate a dude that's gay. He just hates gay guys who front like they're straight. I don't know if that's because Lakey is gay and doesn't like seeing others hide their true selves or if he's a Republican and thinks that homosexuals fronting like they're heterosexuals is going to diminish his own life. Whatever his reasons, let's all agree that Lakey is a moron. Honestly, this is just pathetic. Bol should bring back one of his "Let's Hunt and Kill" posts for this guy. Or maybe Lakey should just get a boyfriend already: If this isn't a manifestation of self-loathing then it has to be the unbridled intollerance that could only be born of something like Lakey's hometown being burned down by every single homosexual in the world. I mean, this guy spent hours of his life thinking this up?

Best of all, you'll never believe not at all be surprised to read that this song was broken by the Ignorance King, DJ Kay Slay.

Sometimes, I really hate rap music.

The Summer of Endless Socializing: Wrigleyille Whitey

Eats pieces of shit for breakfast; thinks it's so funny and ironic when his friends use the n-word.

If you'll recall, I have a backyard, and when the weather is nice, I enjoy inviting friends over to eat grilled meat () and drink cold beer. This summer, I have not been doing this enough, mostly because it seems as though every weekend, I am socializing. Sometimes, I'm hosting friends, other times, I'm traveling--to London, to Detroit, to Boston, to wherever. In the coming weeks, I'll be on Cape Cod twice and may try to make my way up to Amherst. I am not complaining; being young and spending time with friends is an excellent way to use a summertime. But it also means fewer barbecues.

This past weekend, the Summer of Endless Socializing brought me to Chicago for the dual purposes of helping my parents get my sister's apartment in Evanston set up and seeing friends, old and new. The former was easily accomplished thanks to my next-level proficiency when it comes to assembling Ikea furniture while the latter was the usual drunken mess of fun. I mean, you know you've done a good job:

- when you embark upon a four-mile walk at 2 AM merely because you think "it's nice outside" and wind up feeling as though you've just finished the Tour de France;
- when you attempt to gain a better vantage point from which to observe a potential frat-boy street fight in its nascent stages by climbing a street-sign pole and inadvertently inviting the cops to ask if you'd like to go to prison;
- when you ask a girl if you can place a drink order for her and then quickly remind her that you are simply offering mechanical assistance and will not, of course, pay for the drink;
- when you force the karaoke proprietors to turn on the disco ball during your rousing rendition of Peter Cetera's "Glory of Love";
- when said rendition emboldens a stranger in the crowd to augment the performance with the poignant, albeit chronologically inaccurate, exhortation "Put him in a body bag, Johnny!"

Sadly, the weekend was partially marred by one embarrassing and ugly incident. Chicago, for all its strengths (see below), can be alarmingly segregated. Wrigleyville, a neighborhood that offers a copious amount of nightlife, is one section of town that unfortunately suffers from this condition. I mean, you get there, and for the most part, you feel as though all you're missing is Strom Thurmond. Even worse, you feel inadequate if you aren't calling people "bruh," fondly remembering the best fraternity parties, and wearing hair gel and a striped shirt. The segregation is bad enough, but the homogeneity just makes you feel like you should go home and take a shower. You almost feel like you're doing something wrong by being there. But of course, Wrigleyville is where you go if you are seeking out karaoke because it is home to one of the city's most popular karaoke bars boasting an excitingly deep catalogue.

My friends and I like love to karaoke, not least of all because, collectively, we know a ton of cheesy music that deserves some attention and respect. Thus, we wound up in Wrigleyville. For the most part the evening was fun, despite the obvious absent integration and a steady cavalcade of crappy selections. (Note to the dudes in the front of the bar by the stage who are likely best described as "karaoke groupies": Stealing the microphone from other people and performing your own inside-joke songs really isn't that much fun for anyone. Thanks -- Management.) But then it got close to closing time and some douche named "Shooter" got up on stage.

First of all, Shooter must be a regular at this place, because half of the frat boys were chanting his name as though he were their boyfriend and it was funny when he'd make shooting motions with his hands. I mean, what the fuck is that? Second, shooter was straight from central casting. But neither of those conditions really warrants indictment. What does, though, is that he got up on stage and decided that he was gonna perform Young MC's "Bust a Move." You know, because that song is never performed at a karaoke bar and because it's not already one of those rap tracks that white people love and obnoxiously cite far too often when trying to find lyrics they know. I mean, I don't even think that hipsters find it ironic to lose their shit over Young MC anymore.

But Shooter and his buddies did. And they did--people were acting as though Shooter was unveiling some new or rare talent mostly unknown to mankind, like a telekinetic way to give someone the shocker. That would be so sweet, dude! I, of course, went to the bathroom during this portion of the evening, but when I returned, I was overcome by horror. A Shooter competitor had commandeered the microphone and had asked that the KJ (you know, karaoke jockey) turn off the monitor so that he could do "something that we've never seen before." He then proceeded to drop verses from "Bust a Move," "Nuthin' But a G Thang," and "Humpty Dance." Though fairly hackneyed, it was also all fairly innocuous. Oh, except for the fact that this white dude on stage was dropping the n-word with gusto while the white crowd cheered wildly.

It really was horrible to stand in that bar and witness this. There was something so smug and ignorant and ugly about this white guy freely using that word and a large group of white people adoringly dancing along. The situation is, of course, part of a larger discussion, and I realize that if rappers are going to use the n-word, their audience--which counts tons of white people and other non-African-Americans among it--is going to use it, too. Just ask Fat Joe and Jennifer Lopez and a white dude I know who will, unembarrassed, drop a line like "I ain't got shit, n***a" when folding during a poker game. But all of this just reinforces my belief that no one should be using that word. I struggle with legitimate arguments made about reclaiming the term, or differentiating between "nigger" and "nigga," but I think that if we, as a collective society, ultimately become comfortable with that word in some form, it will unfairly marginalize the persistent racial inequity that was built into American culture thanks to the original European racial intolerance. And to lose touch with the severity of that legacy is a bad thing for everyone.

I won't bore you with any more inconsequential details about my trip, but I would like to impart a few critical recommendations:

1) If you're a white person in the Chicago neighborhood of Wrigleyville, please re-assess your priorities.

2) If you're gonna get your karaoke on, please pick a song people actually want to hear or might find amusing. Self-indulgently performing something like Meatloaf's "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" is just annoying.

3) If you're gonna get your karaoke on and want to sing something by Bon Jovi, go with "Blaze of Glory" instead of the obvious drunk-at-3-AM bullshit ("Living on a Prayer") or the trite "emotional" track, "Dead or Alive."

4) If you're a movie geek like me, you need to see Clerks II just for the scene during which various characters discuss the relative merits of Lord of the Rings and Star Wars. Wow, am I a loser. (The movie itself is pretty funny, too.)

5) If you're in or around Chicago, you must eat at Merle's. Much to my dismay, I have not spent time extensively touring the American Southeast and heartland (I'm looking at St. Louis and Kansas City here) sampling the legendary barbecue, but I've had a lot of it in the places I've been, and Merle's is among the best. As a lover of all things pulled pork, brisket, and whatever else you can throw barbecue sauce on, I usually will go out of my way for some barbecue (Redbones, for instance, is one of the few reasons to ever visit Boston); Merle's is worth the hour it might take on the CTA to get up to Evanston. Trust me.

6) If you haven't been to Chicago in the summer, you need to go. Not only is there the battery of attendant cultural offerings that one might expect to find in a major American city, but also there are the wonderful lakeside recreation opportunities; the excellent public parks; the engaging assortment of neighborhoods with differing characters; the big-time-city-with-small-time-scale feel of most residential areas; the college-town-like drink specials ($2 beers!); and the shitload of good eating. Chicago in the summer is the balls (except for Shooter and his bruhs).

"Back in the Winner's Circle at the Majors"

Admit it: you were a little choked up when you heard him sobbing.

Am I the only one who immediately thought of Michael, clutching that Larry O'Brien trophy, sprawled out and sobbing on a locker room floor? Great stuff from Mr. Woods today. As the Giants announcer on TV screams at Jerry Seinfeld after he's ditched George and Peterman at dinner, "You've gotta love sports!"

Sergio Garcia, speak with your high-school career counselor.

Harlem, Stand Up

And you were still trying to shake...

(HT: James, as always)

Where You Been At?

Do any of you have jobs? And do any of you live in stifling heat without air conditioning? If so, you, more than anyone else, will pardon this poor showing so far this week. Between work and my heat-driven lethargy (and my suddenly obsessive interest in only watching Dog Bites Man), blogging just hasn't happened. Well, not here, at least. Peep my Schembechler Hall game and my Jay Dee review over at About.com. Shouts to my mans 'an 'em for hooking up the latter.

I absolutely promise to post some audio and review some a lot of records tonight. I also have some free shit to give away.

In the meantime, Dog Bites Man in three parts. Get inside the mind of a gay:

Murray's Revenge?

Just a horrible, horrible picture.

This is good. Not great. Not a savior. Not "the missing piece." But it will be scoring off the bench. Now, the Pistons just need a real backup point guard and maybe someone who can just fucking bomb. Read more about this move here.

Best Week of the Year. Easily

You know, I was all set to just ease into the weekend with some low-key writing, maybe some nice links, and some wrap-up stuff.

And then all hell broke loose in the last few days: Roots, Jurassic 5, Boot Camp Clik, Pharrell, Nicolay, Raekwon. It's too much, hip-hop, it's too much!

Take a listen and maybe we can get some impromptu open-source track reviews going?

Enjoy the weekend...
- The Roots, "Game Theory" (Buy)

- Jurassic 5, "Back 4 You" (Buy)

- Nicolay ft. Black Spade, "I Am the Man" (Buy)

Straight Bangin' Caption Contest: Winner

Come Mr. Danny man, tally me banana.
Me say gay, me say gay, me say gay-o.

The caption contest is over. Rafi of Oh Word has won himself a free "Reincarcerate Yayo" t-shirt. Thanks to all who entered.

Housekeeping

The Strangers with Candy crew on Colbert.

I've been putting in work all over the internets, not least of all here. Check out the left-hand side of the page. Scroll down a bit. Notice anything new?

Your boy boy updated his blogroll, the first major overhaul since the Bangin' was launched in February 2005. I went through the dark hallways of my memory and months of peep-game recommendations to find sites that I thought deserved some shine on SB. I hope that I haven't forgotten anything. I also took out some trash, removing dud sites, and broke out the blogs a little, loosely placing them in categories that might better organize and identify them.

The "Internets Fam" links are mostly duplicated in the categories lower on the page, and that category is just a repository for friends, heads that have supported me, and places I've been on the regular as of late. Hopefully no one feels slighted. And also, don't miss the links to my BlogPoll brethren. College football season will be on and poppin' sooner than anyone wants to admit, and those sites will provide an endless array of discussion topics.

Traffic on the Bangin' is up to almost 700 visitors a day, and I appreciate every single reader who takes the time to stop by. THANK YOU. Seriously. And along the same lines, thanks to everyone who leaves me comments. As I always write here and say to people, I blog because the internets afford me a chance to find catharsis as I connect with new "friends" and share my interests with people who are similarly passionate. It means a lot to me that you all take a few minutes each day to visit with the cyber me.

Here's what's going on elsewhere:
- I take great satisfaction in announcing that for the roughly 15th straight year, I couldn't have cared less about the MLB all-star game.

- My guest blog entry for Oh Word is here. I wrote about recent coverage of hip-hop and Hot 97 in The New Yorker. Tara Henley, the Dorktown capos, and Three Minute Record are also blogging about the piece. Any thoughts from this peanut gallery?

- Don't miss out on the Straight Bangin' caption contest. A winner will be officially selected tomorrow.

- The Reincarcerate Yayo shirts are in the works. That is a ball that will not be dropped.

- Latest from me at Schembechler here and here.

Will be back tomorrow with a pantload of music reviews...

The 193-Day Check In: Music of the Half Year

2006 is already stronger than 2005, and we still have 172 days left

(Don't forget the Straight Bangin' caption contest)

Now that we're 52.8% of the way through calendar year 2006, I thought it was only right that I hit you with my token music-retrospective post commemorating our arrival at (and now, to be honest, passage of) the half-year mark. Below are some loose thoughts about the year's best and worst, so far.

Before we proceed, here's where we left things at the end of last year:
- Songs of the year
- Albums of the year

And here are the caveats for the current lists:
- Things may change between now and December 31st.
- My taste, like yours, is not static.
- Songs can get dap for all kinds of reasons
- All break-outs of songs are listed alphabetically by artist

Away we go...

44 Best Songs of the First 193:
- AZ, "The Format" - Sounds like something from 1997, but Premier and AZ were good back then, so no complaints here.
- BHI, "Do It, Do It (Poole Palace)" - My favorite explicitly club record of the year.
- Bronze Nazareth, "Good Morning (A Nice Hell)" - Love how he just takes the beat for a walk.
- Busta Rhymes ft. KRS-One and Swizz Beatz, "New York Shit (Marley Marl Remix)" - Are you kidding me? Beat is sick--a top-five production.
- Cam'ron ft. Juelz Santana, "We Make Change" - Best track off a weak record.
- Cam'ron, "Y'all Can't Live His Life" - One of the funniest songs ever. Do you know what an ecstasy ring is?
- Camp Lo, "Bed Rock" - Classic Camp Lo Dadaism.
- Clipse, "We Gangsta" - Silverhawks sample and foreboding beat get the job done.
- Common, "The Movement" - A former concert staple, produced by Dilla, that finally got on a record of some kind.
- The Coup, "Ass-Breath Killers" - Message-rap humor.
- Da Backwudz ft. Killer Mike, "Getting 2 It" - Menacing, crunching beat just asking to get flipped as a posse-cut remix.
- DangerDoom, "Korn Dogs" - Why wasn't this on the DangerDoom album?
- De La Soul, "Voodoo Circus" - More of that solid, reliable, relatable De La sound.
- DJ Green Lantern ft. Saigon, dead prez, and Immortal Technique, "Impeach the President" - Melange of the familiar.
- Dudley Perkins, "Dear God" - Experimental spoken-word/soul fusion that somehow works.
- Ghostface Killah, "Big Girl" - Turn on the blue light!
- Ghostface Killah, "Shakey Dog" - Most exciting record of the year.
- Jay Dee, "Time - The Donut of the Heart" - Wonderful encapsulation of Dilla's talent.
- Jay Dee ft. Madlib and Guilty Simpson, "Baby" - Ditto.
- Jeannie Ortega ft. Papoose, "Crowded" - Guilty pleasure club track.
- Kelis, "Bossy" - Sexiest woman in hip-hop.
- Little Brother ft. Legacy and Chaundon, "Boondock Saints" - Still waiting for Phonte to waste a verse.
- Little Brother ft. Skyzoo and Chaundon, "Speed Racin'" - Epitome of the best Justus League sound--solid rhymes, soulful chops.
- Loosie All Stars, "Brooklyn Kids" - Throwback New York essence.
- Ludacris, "War with God" - Best Luda track in some time. It's trite, but dude sounds focused.
- Lupe Fiasco, "Failure" - Lupe rides the beat so nicely.
- Lupe Fiasco, "Intro" - Establishes Lupe as lyricist worthy of rewind.
- Masta Killa ft. Raekwon and Ghostface Killah, "It's What It Is" - The gathering momentum and blaring horns loop are sublime.
- MC Travel, "This Is a Breakup Song" - Haunting, emotive hip-hop.
- Method Man ft. Fat Joe and Styles P, "Yah'Mean" - If only Fat Joe weren't on this dope, simple, militant beat.
- Murs, "Yesterday" - One of the five best songs of the year.
- Mobb Deep, "Put 'Em in Their Place" - Beat is infectious, Prodigy almost drops some couplets that rhyme.
- Nas, "Where Y'all At" - Dude still flows like few others.
- Nelly Furtado ft. Timbaland, "Promiscuous" - Unavoidable.
- Papoose, "In the Bushes" - Pap was a lot more likable about 6 months ago.
- Pearl Jam, "Gone" - Great, somber Pearl Jam track.
- Raekwon, "Heavyweights" - Portend of Cuban Linx 2?
- Rhymefest, "Dynomite" - Just Blaze kills this, and 'Fest has more charisma than most.
- Roots, "Long Time Coming" - Incredible bass line. More cohesive, and better, than recent melodic Roots efforts.
- Shakira ft. Wyclef, "Hips Don't Lie" - Don't front like this song isn't fun.
- Soul Position, "The Cool Thing to Do" - Simple but amusing lyrics.
- Strange Fruit Project, "You (The Only Ones)" - The best of SFP, a poor man's OutKast/Little Brother fusion.
- T.I., "Ride Wit' Me" - Easy listening for the car.

20 Worst Songs of the First 193:
- Beyonce ft. Slim Thug, "Check Up on It" - Just didn't click for me.
- Beyonce ft. Jay-Z, "Deja Vu" - "Crazy in Love" rip off that was annoying after one listen.
- Busta Rhymes ft. Missy Elliott, "How We Do It Over Here" - Just a totally cluttered mess.
- Clipse ft. Pharrell, "Me Too" - Boring, grating. Tired of Pharrell, who suddenly sounds crazy stale.
- Cam'ron ft. Hell Rell, "He Tried to Play Me" - See here.
- Dem Franchize Boyz, "Lean Wit' It, Rock Wit' It" - Worst of the snap sound.
- Field Mob, "Baby Bend Over" - Just so grating.
- Gnarls Barkley, "Transformer" - Shrill and gimmicky, a horrible combination.
- Gucci Mane, "745" - *Sigh*...
- Ice Cube, "Stop Snitchin'" - What a loud waste of time.
- Jim Jones, "We Fly High" - When Jimmy steps in the booth, it's always Groundhog Day. See him by the bar and then in his car.
- Justin Timberlake, "Sexy Back" - This sounds like something a ten-year-old would cook up on a Casio.
- Lupe Fiasco, "Spaze Out" - So does this. A retarded ten-year-old.
- Method Man, "Take the Heat" - Most boring Dr. Dre song since...
- Mobb Deep ft. Lloyd Banks, "Give It to Me" - Typical soulless, bland, tired G-Unit sound.
- Paris Hilton ft. Jadakiss, "Fightin' Over Me" - Self-explanatory.
- Paris Hilton, "Stars Are Blind" - Self-explanatory.
- R. Kelly ft. Fabo, "Gorilla" - One of those records that disingenuously tries to copy a popular formula and fails miserably.
- T.I. ft. Young Buck and Young Dro, "Undertaker" - Fine example of that boring, synth-driven southern bullshit.
Yung Joc, "It's Going Down" - Most. Annoying. Song. Ever.

Single Best Skit of the First 193 (and the Foreseeable Future):
- DangerDoom ft. Master Shake, "Skit 1" - Is there anyone funnier than Shake? On the wheels of steel, I am the DJ Imperial Grand Master Shake! Hello Ladies, I am so available...

11 Beats That Deserved Better Rhymes of the First 193:
- Baby ft. Lil' Wayne, "Stuntin' Like My Daddy" - I don't know which Hot Boys album this was supposed to be on, but it's a shame that they wasted it. 1999 still sounds pretty good.
- Busta Rhymes ft. T.I., "Cannon" - Just a hot beat that deserved better treatment than some phoned-in rhymes.
- Cam'ron ft. Juelz Santana, "Byrd Gang Gold" - That Prince/Cam mash-up was mostly unlistenable, but this beat, thanks to Prince's "Gold," was great. Juelz? Not so much.
- Consequence ft. Mike Jones, "Been Robbed" - They should pay Mike Jones half his share since all he does is repeat himself over and over again.
- Dre ft. Rick Ross, "Chevy Ridin' High" - Rick Ross is on this track, right? Yeah, I just threw up.
- Dem Franchize Boyz, "I Think They Like Me" - Not a bad song, but seems like real rapper could make it better.
- The Game, "Wake the Dead" - Did you know that the Game owns NWA and Biggie CDs?
- GLC, "Honor Me" - Dude must have pictures of Kanye in a thong.
- Kanye West ft. Consequence and John Legend, "Grammy Family" - Boring.
- Papoose ft. Busta Rhymes, "Get Right" - Some of Papoose's worst verses.
- Rick Ross, "Hustlin'" - The Paris Hilton of rappers. And the worst one in about a decade.

Single Worst Rapper Who Thankfully Only Ruined One Song of the First 193:
- Joe Scudda (on Murs's "Sillygirl") - See here.

5 Most Disappointing Records of the First 193:
5) Busta Rhymes, The Big Bang - Wasn't expecting much, but Busta was everywhere before this dropped and it only had about three good songs.
4) Ice Cube, Laugh Now, Cry Later - Ice Cube just doesn't have it anymore.
3) T.I., King - So much hype for such an inconsistent and repetitive record. Did you know he hustles?
2) Cam'ron, Killa Season - Are you kidding me? You're gonna run your mouth and drop this garbage? I thought that the Dips got good beats. What the fuck happened here?
1) Mobb Deep, Blood Money - Really should change their name so that they don't continue to besmirch their legacy.

3 Most Overrated Records of the First 193:
3) The Procussions, 5 Sparrows for 2 Cents - I usually trust the Okayplayers, but these dudes just sound like amateurs.
2) Lil' Wayne, Dedication 2 - Lil' Wayne is not any better than mediocre. Stop with the bullshit.
1) Gnarls Barkley, St. Elsewhere - An annoying gimmick record. Period.

15 Best Records of the First 193:
15) Da Backwudz, Wood Work - By no means a great record, but Da Backwudz have a more soulful, creative sound than their Georgia peers.
14) Soul Position, Things Go Better with RJ and Al - Some of the concepts fail, and Blueprint can sound really flat at times, but nonetheless an engaging listen. And RJD2 constructs some beats that are a little more interesting than they first appear.
13) Jay Dee, The Shining - Not Dilla's best work, but hard to go wrong with him.
12) Strange Fruit Project, The Healing - Best album so far from a so-called "conscious" Houston group that admirably seeks to make soulful music. Dudes really flow well at times.
11) Lupe Fiasco, Food and Liquor - Lupe's lyrical gifts would be served better by more consistent production. An obvious debut that calls out for some direction from someone like Kanye.
10) The Coup, Pick a Bigger Weapon - Pretty much a standard Coup record.
9) Pearl Jam, Pearl Jam - Most consistent album since No Code. Primary criticism is that few songs jump out from the rock milieu, much like Riot Act.
8) Rhymefest, Blue Collar - Most of the production is solid (even if it has been around for a year!) and Rhymefest, though at times too corny, acquits himself as a colorful, skillful MC.
7) Jay Dee, Donuts - A collection of lush soundscapes that impressively stand alone without anyone rapping over them. A wonderful legacy for one of the most important producers of all time.
6) Dudley Perkins, Expressions (2012 A.U.) - Most genre-stretching "black-music" record since Cody ChesnuTT's Headphone Masterpiece (which I love). Fusion of hip-hop, soul, funk, rock, and spoken-word is an absorbing experiment.
5) De La Soul, Impossible Mission - Typical De La: poignant rhymes, smooth beats, witty execution.
4) Little Brother, Separate But Equal - If you were to take the best of this album, with its wider array of soul-driven sample beats, and combine it with the best of The Minstrel Show, you'd have a supreme effort that would son the industry. Phonte is one of the five best MCs out. The best Gangsta Grillz tape I've heard so far.
3) Bronze Nazareth, The Great Migration - This is, without question, just timeless Wu-Tang beatsmithing. Period.
2) Murs, Murray's Revenge - 9th Wonder's strongest work in a while combined with Murs' stories makes for a great listen.
1) Ghostface Killah, Fishscale - Ghostface is one of the most interesting, gifted MCs of all time. All of his talents and interests are fully on display on this satisfying album.

Waiting for...
8) Guffman
7) Method Man
6) Ludacris
5) Common
4) Masta Killa
3) Nas
2) The Roots
1) Raekwon

Straight Bangin' Caption Contest

(Insert insanely easy joke here...)

This one might be too easy, but whatever: Use the comments section and come up with the best caption. Winner will get a free Reincarcerate Yayo t-shirt when they arrive.

For the record, that's Danny Glover and Harry Belafante at this year's BET Awards. (HT: Semaj)

Quick Links

I'm sorry, but this is damn funny (HT: Gothamist)

- Are people reading Bleek's site? If not, you should be. Peep game.

- Really strong work from all the guest bloggers at TrueHoop this week. My latest joints are here and here.

- Straight Bangin' caption contest

- Texas is costing Paul Wall money.

- I'm also (gonna be? Might not be posted yet) getting my grind on over at Oh Word as part of the Week of 1,000 Guest Bloggers. Peep game.

- So Chappelle's Show was a letdown and the season premier of Reno 911 didn't do much for me, either. At least Entourage has gotten its shit together the last two weeks while Deadwood remains sublime in all of its Old West gulliness.

Dictators, Dash, and Dons: Hip-Hop's Ruling Class

Telling it like it is

While the essence of hip-hop music might remain one with an element of rebellion to some degree, no one in America can credibly tell you that it hasn't been adopted co-opted and exploited by billion-dollar corporations as it has gone mainstream. That's just how it goes, for good and bad. Similarly, while the record industry is still ultimately ruled by whites, some black men have, in fact, ascended to various positions of prominence and power, greatly benefiting from the system. For a long time, Russell Simmons was the most obvious example of a black music impresario, but in recent years, thanks to out-the-trunk marketing success and the rampant proliferation of boutique labels and imprints, more and more hip-hoppers have been minted as millionaire music executives.

I thought I might just take a quick minute to check in with a three of these prominent businessmen and commit some thoughts to the internets, as a confluence of events over the past two weeks have given this topic some loose cohesion in my mind.

Jay-Z: Fit to Be a Latin-American Dictator

Ever wonder why rap-record release dates get pushed back? One more reason: CEOs who tour. Um...

If you'll recall, a few weeks ago, Jay-Z put on a spectacle concert at Radio City Music Hall to commemorate the ten-year anniversary his debut release, Reasonable Doubt. In preparation, he did another show in New York and has since announced a world tour on which he will be embarking. At the time, I wrote: "Do you think any Def Jam artists get tired of being shown up by their CEO? Just a question." In addition to these concerts, Jay has also stayed busy recording guest verses on songs for Memphis Bleek, Rick Ross, and Beyonce, among others.

And now it looks like people--most importantly, Def Jam artists--are starting to take notice. First, of course, it was the Dip Set. While Cam'ron's jabs at Jay have ultimately seemed to be part of a largely immature and inconsequential attention grab (chancleta lines aside, insulting Jay's bone structure, whining about where one might find Sauce Money, and complaining that Jay isn't signing New York artists are all fairly tame "assaults"), new complaints from Method Man and Ludacris are more authentic and significant.

Meth said (while sitting on his ass and just getting his Lauryn Hill collabo on the radio even though it's been around for months):

"Whatever happened to artist development? They'll take a Ne-Yo, they'll take a Rihanna and develop them. They don't do that with us rappers. You know why? They look at us as fast food.

I don't have anything against the Roots or Nas. But, there's a lot of hungry muthaf****s out there that deserve those slots. The Roots had a deal, Nas had a deal and still has a deal. Jay, stop sitting in that office, b. Go out there and find those talents. N***as is mad at you, b. Stop signing all these established acts..."

And Ludacris has taken it a measured step further (audio available). On a new track surveying and ripping the industry, "Tell It Like It Is," Luda rhymes:

"I'm down for my artists
Try my best to stay true to them
'Cause outside my label
Competition is irrelevant
Unless I'm still in competition with my president (What up, Jay?)
And believe that I'm supportin' the Hova
'Cause the industry's shady
It needs to be taken over
But the first rule to accumulation of wealth
Is don't trust nobody but your God damn self"

Certainly not an ethering, but also a notable observation that while Jay may not be a typical record executive, he's also the only one that rappers have to worry about competing with. And, of course, a track like Luda's becomes the musical equivalent of asymmetrical warfare when the dude you're rapping about can shut down your project and fuck with your budget and promotion.

Now, I am not an industry insider, so I don't know how these things work. And since Jeezy and Rick Ross and Rihanna and Ne-Yo and all that shit makes money for Def Jam, I'd imagine that Jay-Z is well received by whomever it is he has to please. But let it be said here that CEO Carter is sewing the seeds of his own undoing right now if Def Jam artists are going to be calling him out for prioritizing his own celebrity and career while holding incredible power over theirs. Maybe this will emerge as a nascent coup d'etat...Or maybe it won't amount to much if some of the guys who aren't getting shine sell well.

And by the by, it's not like the Jay's latest verses are anything that inspire repeat listening.

Damon Dash: Ersatz Gully

The grim, petulant face of insecurity. In a fur-lined hood.

Jay's ascendancy and the demise of the late-'90s Roc-a-fella was vividly and amusingly captured in a new documentary, I Am, from Choke No Joke, a longtime rap-industry operative who spent some time as the videographer for the Roc and later as the producer of BET's Rap City. Choke's video is effectively edited to demonstrate Jay's growing business savvy, his clandestine maneuvering that netted him his current position, and the poisonous atmosphere of paranoia that developed around Damon Dash. But while the Roc is the primary focus of the documentary's latter half (it's only about an hour long, and the movie, despite the unrefined production, remains engaging given its rare content), Jay is a secondary player in the drama that should be entitled, "Damon Dash Is a Raving Lunatic Asshole."

I mean, WOW. Around the time that Jay's retirement record, The Black Album, dropped, forces at Def Jam (which Jay likely endorsed, either explicitly or tacitly through his absent protestations) had started to squeeze Dame Dash out of power. And as is common in corporations, these maneuvers usually take everyday forms in conspicuously absent emails and meeting invitations, as was the case with Dame. Choke has video of Dash angrily storming into one such meeting--a marketing meeting at which Def Jam but not Roc-a-fella staff was present--and losing his shit. Dash behaves in the manner that one might expect from a man who is simultaneously delusional with regard to his significance; paranoid about an emerging plot to strip him of power; desperate to retain control over his livelihood; and unavoidably profane.

This is not an exaggeration: he walks into the room (in basketball shorts, a long white tee, high socks, and flip-flops) and curses out every single Def Jam staffer he can see, berating people for what must have been twenty minutes. The largely white Def Jam staff is told that it doesn't know anything about Dame's culture; that it is incompetent; and that it has caused him to act like Bobby Knight with road rage. It's vile and angry and aggressive and, most of all, pathetic.

As Dash menacingly makes his way around the room spewing an endless torrent of obscenity and serially belittling everyone in sight, the viewer is never scared or impressed by his ferocity. Rather, Dame does what Dame do, showing himself to be the obnoxious, arrogant, out-of-touch wannabe thug that other candid moments captured on television, in film, and on radio in the past have all already helped to demonstrate. By the end of the episode, when the meeting room has been cleared and Def Jam executive Kevin Liles has attempted to placate Dash while wearing a smug, knowing smile the whole time, Dash is functionally up to his neck in embarrassment and sudden irrelevance, left to boil.

Dash's meltdown is a shocking climax, not because the raw emotion is overwhelming but because Dash so excessively exceeds his own reputation for crass boorishness that one can't believe he has actually just witnessed such a monumental unraveling. And it goes without saying that Dash's empty machismo and cringe-inducing theatrics are the antithesis of gully. It's one of the great hollow mean-muggin' moments of all time, purposeless and unconvincing ice grillin' writ large.

Choke No Joke follows up this bizarre and riveting moment with an epilogue that contains the simple text laid over a photo of Dash: Damn Dash Music Group has not released an album since the break up of the Roc and Jay's ascendancy. All that Armadale and Ultimate Hustler and posturing from Dash? The deceptive boasts of a seemingly small man.

Russell Simmons: Done?

The most hysterical man on TV. And not in a good way.

Increasingly, and with no small amount of regret, I have begun to see Russell Simmons as similarly small, despite his obvious, undeniable professional success.

Am I the only one completely disappointed by Russell Simmons, the person? Every time this dude is on camera, he sounds like a moron. I don't mean that he isn't using the King's English. I mean that he is constantly using bogus logic, spewing faulty wisdom, or failing to do the right thing. I've seen him interviewed about serious topics--violence, snitching, whatever--and he usually just mumbles his way through an evasive answer or simply changes the subject because he knows that he isn't going to say anything positive. Remember when I saw that documentary about images of manhood in hip-hop? Well Russell was in that acting all ignorant and misogynistic, declining to call out rappers for their stupidity with regard to women and homosexuals. He does this shit all the time, it seems like. Maybe it's just selective memory on my part--I mean, dude did start the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network--but really, in the past few years, he has consistently failed to sound like anything other than an opportunistic charlatan who probably does good only because someone tells him that he should.

And it seems like every week on Run's House, Joey goes to visit big brother Russell so that Russell can yell at him about something, make a big production for the cameras, sit like an idiot with his legs crossed on his couch--it's all crazy. Have you ever seen someone who senselessly yells so much? Simmons lives in a constant state of hysterics, and it makes you wonder how in the world he's accomplished enough to the point that his bum ex-wife can take baths in Cristal or whatever the fuck gross shit she's into.

*Throws down microphone and walks off stage*

Will LeBron Still Leave Cleveland?

More or less what goes on in my head most of the time.

My guest blogging over at TrueHoop continues. Peep game, as I attempt to have some fun, ruffle some feathers, and just float an idea. Peep the responses, too, as people seem to not like what I have to say.

Chappelle's Show Sucked Last Night

I had recently become a reluctant Chappelle's Show fan. When the first two seasons aired for real, I always found the sketches to be amusing but not all that laugh-out-loud funny. It seemed like the ideas were either executed poorly or taken in a weird direction or whatever. Most of the skits had me engaged but I wasn't bursting out with laughter in the same way that I was when watching something like Ali G. Over time, though, I caught Chappelle's Show repeats and got into it more and more since there were so many quotable bits, from Charlie Murphy's True Hollywood Stories to Wayne Brady's guest appearance to "I Know Black People."

The show has always had a pitch-perfect hip-hop sense, though, getting great musical guests and parodying the conventions of the industry with a certain comical resonance. Last night's newest Tupac song (see below) and Method Man (also see below) skits were the two latest examples. And both were the only things worthwhile from last night's typically underwhelming episode.

Pac


Meth (horrible video quality)

Puttin' in Work

Yankees suck; bussing sucks; and being a Red Sox fan is some kind of noble, poetic suffering. We got it. You're all obnoxious. Especially Peter King.

My endless summer of travel took me to Boston for the weekend, and much to my surprise, there were no racial incidents despite the town's deserved reputation for maintaining a bigoted environment. Perhaps as or even more surprising, I inadvertently went to a club that was playing raggaeton music almost exclusively, and I enjoyed myself. I have no idea how this happened, but it was likely due to the excellent company of my mans 'an 'em, who is going to be the most important doctor in America at some point in the next few decades. As his anecdotes about medicine seem to illustrate, there is no substitute for a winning personality in a field driven partially by merit and alarmingly by connections, charm, aesthetics, and playing trite social-caricature roles. Luckily for him, the dude works hard, knows everything, and tells stories like few others, so that should leave him in good standing. And In defense of Bostonians who'd likely not want to be seen as getting all soft on intolerance and profound whiteness, I'd like to mention that I was, technically, in Cambridge, home to all of that book learning and liberalism and shit.

As a result of my traveling, I wasn't left with much time for the Bangin'. Sorry about that. Enjoy the random thoughts and links below, and get ready for something good tomorrow.

- Your boy boy is doing some guest blogging over at TrueHoop for the week while Henry is out on paternity leave. Peep game...

- Get to know your author over at Schembechler Hall...

- Are you hip-hop's biggest Stan? Robbie wants to know, and he's giving away money to prove it. I once ate dinner in Detroit's fantastic Sweetwater Tavern (have the pulled pork and peach cobbler) alongside Jurassic 5, eavesdropping the whole time, dying to flex my knowledge. It was sad...

- Why white hip-hop fans hate white rappers...

- Deciding the World Cup--theoretically one of the most important world events--with penalty kicks is like deciding the NBA Finals with a free-throw shooting contest. Dat not good. What a joke...

- Now is the time to invest in Iran's waterfront property. It will appreciate in value significantly by 2050, I'd imagine.

Traveling Into the Great Sundry

The most inappropriately compensated player in the Association?

Lanks
- The weekend trip to Ann Arbor and Metro Detroit got my college football juices flowing. Peep the ill Schembech.

- Things that aren't a good idea under any circumstances: rape; racism; enrolling at the Ohio State Joke of a University; eating anchovies, tomatoes, and/or arugula; most open-toed shoes; dogs; animals; signing Peja Stojakovic to a five-year, $64 million deal. Are you kidding? Almost max money for a guy who hates the playoffs, can't stay healthy, and peaked about three years ago? This is just a horrible signing.

- Henry's rap albums of the so-far year. Look for a similar topic to appear on the Bangin' in the near future.

- Do you think that The New York Times committed treason last month? Do you oftentimes wonder why this country can't just get with the program and allow 60-foot statues of Jesus Christ to be erected on public property? Are you convinced that the ACLU is the devil? Is legal abortion an affront to your life? Will allowing the gays to get married ruin your own marriage? If so, then you need to be listening to Bob Dutko, one of the most frightening and depressing people in the United States.

- You know what's hilarious? Rick Ross beefing with Akon. Is there anything that you have ever cared less about? The only thing that interests me at all about this is whether or not Rick will have to call in one of his 100 favors with Pablo Noriega. Here's the tale of the tape:

	Rick Ross	Akon
Favorite illicit activity	Moving bricks of yayo	Jackin’ for cars
Claim to fame	Shittiest rapper in ten years	Most annoying singer in ten years
Defining look	The annoying neck beard	The malnourished routine
Percent likelihood that you’ll care about him in a month	1%	That “Locked Up” track dropped two years ago
If he weren’t put on he’d be…	…stealing Freeway’s identity	…doing whatever Capelton does all day
Wrongly subjected us to Young Jeezy	Yes	Yes

Music
- The Roots ft. Peedi Crakk Peedi, "Long Time Coming"
I'll be honest: this song is hot. Seems like it has the moving bass and cheery melody that the mainstream might actually get behind. Really, the first thing I thought of when hearing this was that while Kanye goes out of his way to make his too-pop hybrid hip-hop, this is a much more natural, authentic iteration of hip-hop with a new-jack twist. If Game Theory sounds like this and "Don't Feel Right," it will challenge Fishscale for album of the year. I am not loving Peedi's verse, and the lyrical concepts are mostly unoriginal, but let's not neglect how catchy this joint is. Well done, ?uestlove.

- Heart, "Never"
More of that 80s chick rock that I can't seem to escape this week. Just had to get this out there.

- Loosie All Stars, "Brooklyn Kids"
More from Spec Boogie's Crew, the Loosie All Stars. All of these dude's flow pretty well, although I can't get into Von Pea's voice. Didn't like it on Foreign Exchange and don't really like it now. He just doesn't sound right over the beats.

...And All I Got Was This Crappy Nazr Mohammed

"...and I think Victor should go check himself out with his physician to make sure everything is fine before things start falling off on the man."

The question that inevitably follows is "Why?" but I'd like to mention that I went to Detroit for the weekend. That's just what you wind up doing when you have friends that live in Southeast Michigan.

Though far less audacious than The London Trip (that's right, all caps), this journey was some kind of a descendant, partially inheriting that traveling spirit. I mean, there was talk of strawpedos; we honored the Motown legacy by discussing seemingly everything in the R&B terms of "grown and sexy"; for reasons unknown even to me, I spent much of the weekend with the flies of my various pairs of button-fly shorts unbuttoned; we (read: me) were generally loud and disruptive while playing mini-golf and watching soccer (I never realized how much fun "football" could be until I watched it in a sports bar and got to indiscriminately yell for about a half hour down the stretch of the Brazil-France match); there's was karaoke; and, of course, we drank plenty of beer.

Aside from one full day of nostalgia happily spent with another college friend in Ann Arbor, Detroit was the locus of activity for the weekend. Among other activities (many drinking- or eating- or both-related) I checked out Hamtramck, home to lots of Polish people who don't take kindly to rampant profanity on a Sunday after church; I checked out the Detroit Institute of Arts, home to a renovation-necessitated abbreviated collection that luckily included some incredible works from painters like Reginald Marsh; I checked out Belle Isle, the greatest Frederick Law Olmstead-designed bizarro world and feral recreation space that I've ever seen (make sure to check out the garbage-filled lagoon on the Canada side of the old casino building); I checked out the Heidelberg Project, which sort of defies written description; and I checked out Tastefest, an annual music-and-food festival.

My friends from college have nearly wholly divergent musical taste, so when I am hanging with them, I wind up learning about a lot of rock and roll that I had never intended to hear. This weekend, the respective constellations of SSM, the New Pornographers, and Kings of Leon all entered my universe. I liked SSM, especially the synthesizer work, something a little more interesting than the hard guitar riffs; I thought that the New Pornographers were easy to listen to, although their whole shiny-happy-people-holding-hands, family-band routine got a little too gimmicky after a while; and Kings of Leon was pleasant, if not fairly generic, unsubtle rock and roll. My biggest problem when I listen to new rock music is that I inevitably pick out strains of other songs that clearly influenced that which I am hearing (for instance, Kings of Leon's "The Bucket" is vaguely reminiscent of Led Zeppelin's "Going to California"), and I immediately want to instead hear the non-derivatives. That's not a knock on the bands, though; that's just mostly my own neurosis. All in all, I enjoyed Tastefest, although no one could stack up to the Go! Team, my rock-and-roll crack du jour. (And I am so late on that, as is.)

Spending time in the D over the weekend also, sadly, afforded me an opportunity to again experience the stark, alarming results of America's obsession with cars and myopic planning policies. There are no pedestrians in Detroit; there is little mixed-use zoning; and the public transportation is functionally nonexistent. As a result, the sidewalks are uninviting; there is no street life; and there is so little going on that anything open past 10 stands out as a welcomed anomaly. You need a car to get anywhere unless your destination is a reasonable walk away. There are a depressingly high number of vacant lots and abandoned storefronts. Few things look new or well-maintained. And there is no money for anything since cars, the highways on which they travel, and the white people for whom they were built leeched the tax base and political capital from the city. What's left is a concrete desert. It would be funny were it not depressing.

And speaking of depressing, the Pistons are no more. At least, not as we knew them. On Monday night, when I heard the news that Ben Wallace had agreed to sign with the Bulls, I was upset. It had been reported that he was going to take $1 million more per year and leave a team and a city that had made him a star and had come to rely on him for a sense of identity. I was almost in shock that a relatively small sum of money would be of greater currency than the emotional attachment to his teammates and to his city. But then it turned out that the deal was for $12 million more. In the NBA, where all contracts are fully guaranteed, this is not an insignificant consideration.

So that said, I guess I am mostly just sad to see something end. I don't wish Wallace ill, although I will now be forced to root against the Bulls; I am not mad at Joe Dumars, who I admire for not foolishly committing too much money to a player who can't play offense and is already seeing his energy-game style diminish; and I am not fretting that the Pistons will now be battling it out with the Knicks for a chance to suck the most. Rather, I enrolled at the University of Michigan when the Pistons were just figuring out how to be a winning organization. They'd moved past the Grant Hill era and were emerging as the team on which a plucky big man also-ran and an attitude-adjusted Jerry Stackhouse were forging a new identity of defensive intensity and offensive collaboration. Stack was soon gone too, and that had made me nervous, but this was also the time when I learned to trust in Joe Dumars. My NBA fanaticism and disgust with the Knicks compelled me to find another team to care about, and the Pistons fit the mold. I guess I really invested a lot of emotional energy as I vicariously participated in the evolution of a championship team, and it's now sad to accept that the process has seemingly ended. But it was a great time while it lasted, and I am thankful for that.

So, too, am I thankful for a college-reunion weekend in Detroit. It was the balls.

Better Than Yours: Break Ups to Make Ups to... Edition

The smiling faces of a soundtrack letdown?

I am fully aware of the contract that everyone in the world seemingly signed at some point while I was in college, the one that forbid any future criticism of OutKast. Ever since Stankonia (if not Aquemini) dropped, friends, bloggers, babies, grandmothers, and all others have never failed to gush about Atlanta's best rappers. Much of the praise is deserved, as Big Boi and Andre truly have made timeless contributions to hip-hop and popular culture. I am not here to dispute that in any way. I am not even here to serve up my regular helpings of fire and venom, as I am happy to be counted among the OutKast fans.

But people, come on! These are still just two men making music and taking risks; still just two dope boys in a Cadillac. Sometimes they fall short of deserving such breathless critical fellating. They do not, and should not, enjoy some musical version of papal infalibililty. If you want to argue that OutKast is the greatest rap group--or even greatest American music group, period--of all time, feel free to do so; I am open to the possibility even though I don't currently agree. But even that exercise is one which invariably warrants examination of the duo's shortcomings.

Look no further than the latest batch of music released from OutKast's upcoming movie and soundtrack, Idlewild. These are catchy pop tracks that will surely find their way into some sort of steady rotation later this year (Andre's being the more radio friendly of the two--surprise, surprise). But you can't tell me that these are songs that comprise some kind of unequivocal crowning achievement. I find that despite their rich soundscapes and toe-tapping rhythms, they are both missing a certain something that, in absence, prevents me from feeling wholly good about either. Maybe there's too much going on? Maybe I am not having my expectations met? Am I the only one sort of disappointed by these songs?

And since we all love beef and conflict and competition, here's the real question: Which do you like better? Is this gonna be another case of Big Boi's Speakerboxxx being better but less recognized than Andre's Love Below?

- Andre 3000, "Idlewild Blues"

- Big Boi, "Morris Brown"

80s Chick Rock

Surrender all your dreams to Pat tonight

Somehow, these songs were stuck in my head all weekend. And yes, this does mean that I probably need to either: a) seek out therapy; b) start wearing leg warmers and home-fashioned headbands.

- Pat Benatar, "Shadows of the Night"

- Scandal, "The Warrior"

Also, peep game: Hip-Hop Lounge