The Knicks Have Handled Stephon Like Bush Handled Iraq

I wouldn't be surprised if these two went out celebrating tonight. And won the lottery in the process.

So after all of that, the Knicks reach a buyout with Stephon on February 24th?

Are you kidding me? You're joking, right?

All that acrimony and drama, all those meetings and sessions and jabs, all of it for...what?

WHAT WAS THE POINT OF EVERYTHING? WHAT WAS THE POINT? THERE NEEDS TO BE A POINT!

*breathes deeply*

Let me get this straight: In April, Donnie Walsh fired Isiah Thomas ("fired" meaning "sent to an office somewhere"). In May, Donnie Walsh hired Mike D'Antoni. In July, Donnie Walsh signed Chris Duhon to serve as the starting point guard. This confirmed what everyone knew: the team was going in a new direction, and Stephon was on the way out. Only, there was never a way out. Instead, there was a circus.

All fall, the media speculated about when and how the Knicks and Stephon would part ways. Then the season started, and Stephon wasn't in the lineup or rotation; he wasn't a starter and he wasn't a contributor. Next, he was intermittently hurt, suspended, refusing to play, not used, and/or banished. He basically only played enough to fight with Eddie House and offer the timeless admonishment to "get caught up in life!" (Good advice.) And all along, the media speculated about when and how the Knicks and Stephon would break up.

Only they didn't. They traded jabs in the newspapers. They'd meet, they'd flirt with ending things, and then they wouldn't. It was just on to the next episode in the seemingly endless pussyfooting exercise. D'Antoni would assassinate Stephon's character; Stephon would say outlandish, provocative things; Donnie Walsh would be evasive and coy.

It became clear that Stephon wanted to start, and failing that, he wanted to get paid in accordance with his contract. Putting aside that Stephon is selfish and mischievous, and that he was corrosive as a Knick, his position was fair. If the Knicks didn't want to pay him, they shouldn't have traded for him. (Remembering Isiah Thomas's decisions is like having acid reflux disease of the mind. Gross.) And since they couldn't undo that, they should have traded him. Since they couldn't even do that, they had two choices: 1) cut him, pay him what was owed, and let him become another team's problem; 2) hold onto him, suspend him for insubordination, pay him.

This was an imperfect option set--a true dilemma--but it was appropriate for a franchise that has done everything wrong for the last decade. And in true Knicks fashion, they couldn't even get this right.

If you choose Option 1, you do that early on, so that you don't come off as petty and inept (which they have). You don't invite controversy and distraction by prolonging so much unpleasantness. If Option 1 was the plan, Stephon should not have been on the Knicks beyond 2008. They could have cut him in training camp, or, to be generous, once it became clear that he had no trade value. Option 1 is a financial hit, but nothing else, as the money is a sunk cost. It also severs all ties with the past and places the emphasis on LeBron the future.

If you choose Option 2, you keep Stephon in team-imposed purgatory. You make a decisive announcement, and then you suspend him. If he files some kind of grievance, you activate him and then you let him rack up DNP-CD's all year. Or, you let him play with the scrubs. Anything short of starting isn't going to work for him, so it's not as though the method through which he is deployed (or not) makes a difference. Most important, though, you do not give him what he wants. You do not pay him and then let him go play for someone else, especially not a contender. Just as you are bound by the contract, so is he. He wants out? Well, he can either honor his signature or waive his rights. Again, the money is a sunk cost, so with Option 2, you take a financial hit and likely endure Stephon's antics, but you don't get sucked into a back-and-forth, you don't cave to his foolishness, and you don't help another team.

Two options. Simple. But simple and decisive is not how the Knicks do things. No. The Knicks go for complicated and messy. It's an institutional problem that runs with the Dolan family, I'd imagine. Not even someone like Walsh, who had no ties to the team or its ignominious recent history, could escape the regressive pull of Knick culture. So instead, the Knicks have chosen Option 3, the anti-Panglossian Worst of All Possible Worlds.

Under Option 3, the Knicks pay Stephon 90% of what he's owed; the affair gets stretched out as long as it can go, bringing with it as much embarrassing media coverage as possible; the Knicks buy out Stephon pretty much as late as they can while still leaving him eligible to join another team for the playoffs; Stephon joins a division foe that is among the two or three teams most likely to win a championship this year. Read all that again. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

EPIC FAIL.

The Knicks, in effect, have chosen the worst possible solution. I mean, short of installing Stephon as NBA commissioner and making him eligible for the bailout funds we reserve for mismanaged banks, how could this have gone worse? The Knicks are paying Stephon almost $20 million for 65% of a season during which he actively hurt the team; the media coverage has been constant and embarrassing, casting the Knicks as--hello--inept; Stephon can and will join the Atlantic Division's Boston Celtics; and Stephon is now among the 24 players in the NBA most likely to win a title. What, the Knicks couldn't also get him to agree to administer anthrax to David Lee on the way out? They couldn't bargain away their cap space for the next 50 years? Why did they stop when they were doing so well at the bargaining table?

In effect, the Knicks decided that all of the tomfoolery and insanity, all of the wasted time and resources, the chance for Stephon to redeem himself with a title after behaving like a child--it was all worth $2m now and $2m in luxury tax savings. $4m to the Knicks is like 50 cents to Tiger Woods.

It's pathetic and disgusting. Maybe that's an overreaction, or a reaction encouraged by an irrational, visceral disdain for Steph. But as a Knicks fan who would like his favorite team to do one thing right for once, this feels like the latest betrayal. They couldn't even do this one thing. Unreal. And for what? FOR WHAT?

Only one situation properly captures the ridiculousness of this entire ordeal: the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Like the disposition of Stephon, that has been protracted, mismanaged, embarrassing, expensive, and ultimately fruitless. Maybe this means that Barack Obama will replace James Dolan. I'd go for that.

I Think There's Been Some Huge Mistake

Sing it!

My sister, The Buckets, is many things: smart, funny, goofy, compassionate. She has accomplished many things worthy of our admiration: she's among the few twenty-somethings who can comfortably command respect as an authority on all-things tween; she is universally recognized for her curation of television; in the span of six months, she's become deeply embedded in the elite literary milieu of San Francisco. And she can do many things in splendid fashion: update her GChat status; use her BlackBerry; buy things on eBay.

What she isn't is a "writer," and what she can't do is deliver speeches for which other people pay money. As such, you likely can imagine my surprise and bemusement when I saw that she is, in fact, going to be making an appearance as a writer on Thursday, and speaking to those stupid fortunate enough to pay 10 bones. Look at this:



Um...WHAT?!

REALLY?

Has she even, you know, written anything?

I wonder what tales of Judaic living my sister will summon. Perhaps she can regale the crowd with that time she was excited to learn that Keri Russell is Jewish. Or maybe she can talk about some of the synagogues my parents have taken her to see on various vacations. Better yet, how about some stories from summer camp, where Jewish folks from up and down the East Coast gather to go swimming, learn about hooking up, and compare bat mitzvahs. Ooh, wait--here's one: the time that my grandmother started calling her neice-in-law-once-removed "Shoshanna" instead of her given, not-quite-Jewish-enough name, Shannon.

Yeah, that's worth some money.
  

Letters to Cam

Now that Killa is on his social media deluge, the homies Eric and Jeff got a hold of him to answer some fan mail. This is highly profane:

  

Somewhere, Rich Rodriguez Is Smiling

You know what will help Michigan football recruit even better than it already does? More Rich Rodriguez spread-offense disciples showing out nicely for NFL scouts. And, of course, getting drafted in according fashion. Says SI.com of Rich Rodriguez's most prominent creation, Pat White:

Score one for collegiate experience and a little old-fashioned perseverance, because of all the quarterbacks who threw on Sunday in Lucas Oil Stadium, none looked better than West Virginia's Pat White, the record-breaking senior passer who many have been trying to project as anything but a quarterback.

White threw the ball accurately and with authority in his quarterback group, looking poised and comfortable in an unfamiliar setting that has thrown many a highly-ranked quarterback off his game. White was especially strong in throwing deep outs, which always catch the eye of NFL scouts.

"I'll tell you who looked good today and that was Pat White," one longtime NFL offensive assistant coach told me. "He really helped himself with that workout. He made people recognize him as a quarterback."

In a draft class heavy with junior quarterbacks at the top, it was White who generated the most buzz Sunday. Not USC's Mark Sanchez, who was decent but far from spectacular, or Georgia's Matthew Stafford, the top-rated passer who ran a solid 40-yard dash (low 4.8s) but declined to throw here with the rest of the draft's quarterbacks.

White might still be thought of by some NFL talent evaluators as best-suited to be a team's Wildcat formation quarterback and part-time receiver, but all Sunday's throwing session has to do is convince one team to draft him as a full-time quarterback.

"He was sharp and he made all the throws you want to see," another NFL talent evaluator told me. "Our quarterbacks coach said he looked better than most people anticipated."

If Rich is smart, he will send these kinds of press clippings to the Devin Gardners and Robert Boldens and other future Michael Vicks and Pat Whites of the world, reminding them that at Michigan, they'll play in a progressive system without sacrificing an NFL future.

  

Peep Game

Two of my friends maintain general-interest/cooking blogs. I recommend them both, though I'd imagine that if you don't know them, the real value comes from the cooking and not so much the details of their lives. Whatever. Both are quality sites, though one just started.

- In Good Taste

- olivejuiced

Also, internets legend Combat Jack has his own blog on and poppin'. Most hip-hop blog readers already know, and I can't recall if I've already paid homage to the daily mathematics. But just in case:

- Combat Jack with Today's Mathematics

 

And finally, note the basketball blog maintained by Peter Robert Casey, business development director for the Entertainer's Basketball Classic and a member of the basketball cognescenti:

- Peter Robert Casey

All four of these joints are on the blogroll.

 

Kings of the South

As I've intermittently noted, life in St. Louis is hard for a hip-hop head: There are few concerts of interest; we don't get to see Common on a Thursday night just because, for example. The two rap radio stations that we have cannot play enough Lil' Wayne and Gorilla Zoe and Akon. Every song that isn't immediately identifiable sounds the same, and it all sounds like disposable southern something. The next time a radio station plays a dancehall song will be the first. And, this is a city of driving, so street life--not, you know, "street life," but the energy that comes with pedestrians walking around--that recalls hip-hop's roots, hip-hop's inclusiveness, and hip-hop's ethos is largely absent. You don't really bop down the block taking in city life with the earphones bumpin'. I guess what I'm saying is that St. Louis is not New York.

There are hip-hop moments, though. Like the time I went to the Apple store and overheard two of the salespeople geniuses talking about Jay Dee. Or the time that I went to the sports bar that Nelly owns. (OK, so it's a stretch.) In general, though, St. Louis enjoys enough atmospheric hip-hop elements--a regional rap sound (my derrty!), a sizable black community--to attract some bigger name rappers when they tour. As such, and starved for an authentic hip-hop experience, I saw Ludacris and T.I. at Saint Louis University on Thursday night. Nothing says Jesuit school like the chorus from "Game Got Switched."

As you might recall, the last time I took in a St. Louis rap concert, the results were underwhelming. But as well chronicled, that largely owed to the audience and the dissonance of David Banner appearing at Washington University. My evening with Atlanta's best-known hip-hop emissaries since Outkast became fashion models was a chance for St. Louis rap redemption. It would be a night of hip-hop reminiscent of the hours I used to spend at Madison Square Garden or at Jones Beach losing my voice. Were I still living in New York, I don't think I would have paid money to see T.I., a rapper whose best albums are still inconsistent and toward the upper end of mediocre, but desperate times call for desperate measures. So I went to the show.

Upon spending enough time in St. Louis, someone transplanted from a real place, like New York or Chicago, comes to realize that this is a city of limited means and unrealistic aspirations. Most places close around 10; few movies go on after 9:30; too many stores aren't open on Saturday or Sunday or both. Nightclubs and sushi restaurants and trendy spots would very much like to be on par with their analogs in those real cities, only they're not. They're worse. Of course, that doesn't stop them from charging covers, attracting douche bags who dress like Sisqo's entourage, and pricing the mediocre drinks and food too high. That the covers are $5, the douche bags second-rate, and the price of a night out still relatively low makes this yearning sort of cute, but nonetheless tacky. And this is how pretty much everything feels if you're young, single, and used to a true metropolitan experience. Rap concerts, sure enough, are no different.

The people at this concert were effing weird. And when I write "weird," let me give you some context: I go to a fair number of concerts. It's one of my favorite activities. I go all over and encounter all kinds of folks. I've spent an evening with the Roots in a casino amidst Atlantic City's finest unpleasantness. I've rushed from the airport to St. Andrew's in Detroit so that I could stand in the back holding my luggage just to avoid missing any of Common or Slum Village. I've waited until dawn in the middle of a field in Tennessee among drug users hoping to see Kanye West. I've stood alongside vomiting ecstasy addicts at Lollapalooza. I once saw a woman hit her infant child at a Raekwon show. I've seen pimps, hoes, players, johns, tricks, marks, mark-ass tricks, trick-ass marks, skeezers, skanks, skig-scags, and scallywhops. I've seen a lot. But I had never been to a concert in St. Louis.

First, the women. Look, ladies, we get it: you have a crush on T.I. You think he's cute. And you are excited to be going to the concert. It's a special event, a special night. A night to be commemorated. Plus, all your friends are getting gussied up, and you, too, want to look right for the fellas. It's not so hard to understand. But here's the thing--the concert is not the club. And the club is not the strip club. So when you show up looking like they forced you to check your pole at the door, it's kind of bizarre. And depressing. Further, I'm sorry to be mean, but most of you really can't and shouldn't be wearing dresses that tight and that short. The audience looked a lot like this:



Not only that, but many of the women so clad were drunk and falling all over the place. In fairness, drinking for, say, four hours is a long time. And making your way up and down steep staircases, or weaving in and out of open aisles, all while wearing heels and boozing it, is a real challenge for one's dexterity. Inevitably, a heel gets caught and someone falls over a few seats. Or rows. But this all suggests that maybe you should have just settled on your nicest jeans, a cute top, and been content with understated and put together. It's a whole lot better than trashy, drunken, slutty mess.

Now, the men. Uh, we get this too, I think: nothing says "I'm hard" () like, well, actually, that was the thing--no one was really mean mugging or projecting the kind of unassailable gulliness that would make you think a fight could break out. Instead, it was a lot of dudes falling into one of three camps.

Camp One was composed of men who practice their bird walks and turning on their swag in front of the mirror. There were just all these guys who seemed to think that the concert was doubling as a casting call for the next generic rap video featuring repetitive chanting and coordinated dancing. And it was pretty stereotypical: lots of fake chains and loud t-shirts, plenty of A-rab money scarves and low-slung jeans. One dude had on a neon-yellow scarf that matched his neon-yellow-and-black vest and his neon-yellow underwear (). It was like hip-hop Tron or something.

Camp Two contained more traditional rap fans. You had the coordinated baseball hats and racing team jackets (Cheerios!). You had some jerseys and matching accessories. You had the conspicuous branding of LRG and Rocawear and all that. I'm also going to lump in the dudes who dressed like D'Angelo Barksdale, rocking leather jackets and affecting a certain Men's Warehouse style:



There isn't much to say about this group, although there were three from this set sitting in front of me, and one of them spent the whole time texting his paramour in the most egregious text-speak possible. I am not entirely sure that he wasn't sending her suggestions for lolcatz. Never has spelling suffered such a loss. As an educated person, I felt personally injured.

Camp Three was for people like my man's 'an 'em () and me. Just kind of there in t-shirts and jeans. However, this group sadly captured an overwhelming number of drunk-ass idiots. I don't understand men--really, any person--who come to concerts and pretend it's an open bar. First, in St. Louis, an arena is unquestionably the single most expensive place to get drunk. I can't think of anything more profligate than building a night around arena beer brewed down the block. Second, don't you miss out on the reason you've come--the performances--if, after the second hour, you can no longer walk down a row of seats without tripping multiple times? If you're that drunk, you probably forget what's happening, right? I am no teetotaler, and I think drinking can enhance many experiences, but all things in moderation. For whatever reason Because this show brought out St. Louis's "finest," there was an inordinate number of men who couldn't wait to make a $20 beer run. And it was annoying. They're lucky we didn't have an incident: if one more jackass had called me "Bro," grabbed my arm, and asked me to move out of the way so that he could go retrieve beers seven and eight, or thirteen and fourteen, I swear to god.... *serenity now*

OK. Anyway...

Those were the people in my neighborhood. Like I said, scallywhops. It painted a sad picture of life in St. Louis. At least, among those inclined to care about T.I. and Ludacris.

As for the concert, well let's start with this: to death, taxes, and the enduring racial hostility of Boston, we can add to our list of absolutes the corrolary that hip-hop shows don't start on time. I have written of this sad phenomenon before. Since it's an absolute, it's no less true in St. Louis than it is in New York, and so I rolled into the Chaifetz Arena a solid two and a half hours after the doors had opened. Two and a half hours? Didn't you miss something good? Nope. I missed some opener of zero consequence who I assume will one day ascend to become a weed carrier in someone's entourage. Best of luck to him. His stage name involved the word "Kid." That's the best I can do.

Having missed him, my evening started with Murphy Lee. Let me tell you about Murphy Lee. So far, during my time in St. Louis, I have not heard a single Nelly song on the radio. I hear about Nelly from teachers who don't know much about hip-hop but understand that Nelly is a local celebrity and mention him to me when they find out that I am a rap enthusiast. And my friends and colleagues at school, most of whom are from elsewhere, make references to Nelly when discussing local culture. But Nelly isn't really a part of my everyday St. Louis life. And I don't think he is a part of everyday life for most people here. At least, not right now.

But Murphy Lee? Well, on the radio, they play that Big Tuck song that he coopted a lot. And they play that shitty-ass "My Shoes" a lot. And he is in a number of random ads. It's like the bizzaro world. Everywhere else, he is a footnote in hip-hop, if that, even. But here, he continues to command a special place in the cultural universe. I find it mildly pathetic, to be honest, because no one really cares about the St. Lunatics anymore; that moment in time has passed. And so, his persistent celebrity only serves as a referendum on St. Louis's cultural relevancy. Murphy Lee is actually just like the Rams--can't get over his recent, but faded, glory.

Murph Derrty (sp?) hit the stage with his entourage--which included Slo'Down, the Lunatic who wears the mask--and did his few solo songs. Like "What the Hook Gon' Be." And then he did some verses from St. Lunatic songs, including "Air Force 1's" and "Shake Ya Tailfeather" (which remains a pretty awesome guilty-pleasure track). And then he did his opening verse from "Not a Stain on Me" THREE TIMES IN A ROW. In. A. Row. They just kept throwing the beat on and letting him rap the same lyrics over and over. Hello? What? It perfectly captured the tenor of the evening.

So yeah, that happened. And then another staple of hip-hop shows popped up: the extended, between-set, house-DJ downtime. Only this wasn't your father's rap-concert downtime. First, as noted, we were in St. Louis, a rap market where all things begin and end in St. Louis, Atlanta, Miami, and New Orleans. There were none of the house-DJ staples that otherwise pervade markets from New York to Chicago to Los Angeles. And in this rapidly changing, ultra-regional, short-attention-span hip-hop market, history is functionally irrelevant. It feels very youth-oriented in that regard, whether or not that's fair. Want to get the crowd hyped up? Why waste your time with Scarface or Nelly? Who dwells on Lil' Jon? Just throw on the ten latest, interchangeable Soulja Boy records. Pretty much literally.

You know when you go to a wedding, or an NBA All-Star Game, or a Filipino prison yard, and everyone starts dancing together? Well, Chaifetz Arena resembled all of those when the DJ threw on "Kiss Me thru the Phone." It was fairly awesome. Everywhere, people got up and started dancing, pretty much in unison. And it just kept going and going. Record after record, people were up on their seats, in the aisles, along the concourses--all just getting down with the latest club songs. For the next 30 minutes, the arena was filled with all kinds of just-dropped dance rap and thousands of adoring fans. That was really fun, particularly because several small groups had come to the concert in coordinated outfits seemingly intent on exploiting such an opportunity. There may have even been a few dance battles. The house-DJ downtime wound up being one of the three most-appreciated parts of the evening among the audience, in general.

Free swim, so to speak, was interrupted by an unquestionably odd circumstance: Jim Jones came on stage.

As people were still dancing, the scoreboards in the arena began flashing ads for an official concert after party hosted by Jimmy. Jones was not advertised as part of the concert lineup, but he obviously was meant to be there, so that was sad for him--from not even top ten to not mentioned at all. No one else really seemed to notice the ads, though, because everyone was dancing, and getting beer, and milling around, and probably hoping that "Not a Stain on Me" would come back on. But ever perspicacious, I noted the signs and immediately turned to my friend while shouting something along the lines of, "Capo Status is here! Capo! Dip Set, baby, Dip Set! Joooooooones!" Then, the house DJ said "I think my man Jim Jones is in the building." And he repeated that a few times, getting ever more loud. However, no one--NO ONE--gave a shit. Except me. Things then got awkward. The crowd wanted to keep dancing but the DJ had to make people excited about Jimmy. So he kept asking, "Y'all ready for Jim Jones?" And the reaction was reliably disinterested every time. Finally, the DJ stopped trying, and they just cut the lights. Then, Jim and his cohorts walked up on stage and, in very disjointed fashion, launched into "Certified Gangstas."

Capo's problem is like Murphy Lee's. He's best known as being part of a collective and contributing verses to posse cuts. Also, Jim:Cam'ron :: Murphy:Nelly. Only, on this night, it was worse for Jimmy because he wasn't in his home market, and because no one in St. Louis cares about Jim Jones. It would be as if Murphy came to New York, where no one would care about him, and everyone would act largely indifferent as he floundered about on stage. Hip-hop remains a confederation of regions, and the truly national stars are limited. Jones, like Lee, is not one of them. Honestly, I think I was the only person in the building excited that he was there, and even I couldn't rap along to most of Jimmy's solo songs. Plus, I spent most of his stage time yelling out "Dip Set," "it's the Set, baby," or the names of various Diplomats. (The dudes in front of me somehow knew what I was talking about and appreciated that 40 Cal and J.R. Writer got name checked.) I was even more hopeful that we'd have a Ron Browz sighting.

Following "Gangstas," which totally bricked with the crowd, Jimmy said "I got off the plane, and it's cold in St. Louis. We need to warm things up." And that, of course, meant "Summer with Miami," another song that the audience seemed to only vaguely recognize. This kept happening for a while. "We Fly High"? I was one of 20 people to shoot a jumper. It got so bad, and so out of whack, that Jones started putting on Juelz records and saying things like "If Juelz were here, we'd perform this one." That is a direct quote, actually. So we, the audience, got to rap along with the chorus of "Oh Yes" and "There It Go" as Jimmy tried to stitch together a narrative about meeting a willing girl, whistling to show approval, and then sealing the deal. To complete this tepidly amorous trifecta, and while conspicuously ommiting a certain name, Jim threw on "Suck It or Not." A law student, I almost sued him on Cam's behalf. Mercifully, the set ended with the only song anyone cared about at all: "Pop Champagne." Of course, actual bottles of bub were popped as Jimmy kind of muddled his way through his verse. Then, he was gone, a puddle of champagne remained on stage, and we all pretended that a shared hallucination was over.

Ludacris arrived on stage next, and I have nothing bad to say about the man because he just wrecked it. Dun was out there for an hour, and it felt like 20 minutes because his set was just superb and it went by too quickly.

Luda's a funny dude, and assessing him is tricky. I don't think he's consistently made great albums. In fact, I think his first and his most recent are both very good, and everything else is somewhere between mildly underwhelming and good-but-leaves-you-wanting-more. Further, his acting, his quasi-political run-ins, and his obvious wordly awareness have led critics to project onto him an exaggerated sense of gravitas. This post from She Real Cool should forever temper the more inflated assessments of Ludacris the Acceptable Rapper. However, all that said, he is a smart guy when he wants to be. He is legitimately funny. He can flow for days. He can write a good song. And he has been prolific for about a decade. Who has more, better guest and remix spots? Maybe Jadakiss or Busta, but I don't think so. Ludacris is among the more reliable voices in rap music.

It all adds up. On this night, I don't think he did more than half of his singles. He didn't do some of the better album tracks. He completely ommited his work with Usher, with Missy, with Nas, with Kanye, with flavors of the month like The Dream. He didn't do any of that, and he still killed it. I suppose that it helps when you can start with "Everybody Hates Chris," perform songs like "Ho" and "Southern Hospitality," segue into your verses from remixes of "Damn" and "Dey Know" and have the crowd in a frenzy. It helps when you can bring out Playaz Circle for "Duffle Bag Boy," can bring out I-20 for "Move," can bring out Shawnna for "What's Your Fantasy." "Stand Up," "We Got," "Grew up a Screw Up,"Runaway Love," "Mouths to Feed," "MVP"? No, no, no, no, no, no. Didn't need them. He really could have done two more hours and not run out of notable, enjoyable material. And he's a showman. He understands how to create energy, build more onto it, and get the crowd rocking. He can structure a set, and this is a largely underrated talent among rappers. I will forever, from here on out, happily pay money to see a Ludacris show.

A prominent sidenote was that Shawnna was probably the second-most popular person in the arena, behind only Ludacris. She did "Fantasy," she did "Gettin' Some Head" (which caused the drunken 40-year-old woman behind me to exclaim, "Aw shit, this is my fucking joint!"), and she then did some rapid-spit joint off of a forthcoming album that made people lose their minds. Her ovation after this last song was as loud as an arena only 60% full (recession hits hard!) can be. In St. Louis, Shawnna is the Jay-Z to Jim Jones's Vanilla Ice.

When Luda was done, so was, roughly, 15-20% of the crowd. A lot of people filed out and never returned. I sort of wished I had been one of them, because I bought my ticket excited about Ludacris but only intrigued by T.I. Clifford Harris just doesn't do it for me (). Sorry to all the readers who think he's a genius, or who "love his swag," or whatever. He's just mediocre at best. King was far from the soaring accomplishment that critics wanted it to be, T.I. vs. T.I.P. was laughably forgettable, and Paper Trail is good, but not as good as Theater of the Mind. The stuff before King is a little too regional and generic for me, though songs like "24's" do stand out. I guess that there are only so many times that I care to hear about how good of a hustler Mr. Harris claims to be.

T.I.'s stage show is similar to his catalogue: it has its moments, but it's also weak when compared to those of better rappers. Ludacris had the crowd's energy as high as it could be. T.I. never came close to that. He started out alright, and T.I. has been making music long enough to have the many songs required for an hour or even 90 minutes of feel-goodery. "Top Back," "I'm Illy," "24's," "Rubber Band Man," "What You Know," "Swing Ya Rag," "ASAP," "You Don't Know Me," "Bring 'Em Out." Dude has songs people know and like; no one questions that. But he is terribly angry--either for real or as part of a persona--and just horrible at maintaining momentum.

His set was one of fits and starts, one of awkward, slow soliloquies interspersed among poorly sequenced songs. He'd get the crowd's energy flowing and then he'd stop to talk for five minutes about all of the "motherfucking motherfuckers, and all of the motherfucking haters" who had hoped they'd never see him again. He'd juxtapose an exciting, high-energy song with a slow, boring one, and then he'd start talking and talking and talking about "ho-ass rappers" again. He made a number of veiled threats and semi-coherent rants about jail. T.I. spent almost as much time projecting and angrily admonishing the crowd as he did rapping. I understand that he has had legal problems, that he's lost friends, and that he has one of the worst cases of Napoleon complex ever. But that doesn't really explain why he was so angry the whole night. It was funny before it became amusing before it became awkward before it became uncomfortable. We all paid money to see him; what the fuck was he yelling at us for? Had he just rapped and built to a crescendo, rather than telling us how much he hated L.A. Reid for doubting him, it would have been much better.

By the time he arrived at "What You Know" and "Live Your Life" and his other biggest radio hits, the crowd was excited but kind of weary. And a little confused since he wouldn't shut up. At least, I certainly felt that way, and I wasn't the only one. It was a disspiriting ending to the show when contrasted with Ludacris, but it also was oddly appropriate given the attendant circumstances of the evening.

And so, to recap: Murphy Lee is lame; Jim Jones is even lamer; we all love to dance; Ludacris is the man; Shawnna should run for mayor of St. Louis; T.I. could likely use some time in the hole to consider revising his live show; and St. Louis is a confusing, weird place. On a 10-point scale, here's how the excitement levels of the night turned out:

10 - Ludacris
9 - Shawnna
8 - Tie: Dancing to house music, T.I.
4 - Murphy Lee
-7 - Jim Jones

Now You're All in Big, Big Trouble

Wednesday can't get here soon enough. ()

Sad Proof That Eric Holder Was Right

It is too perfect, and too sad, that on the same day that Eric Holder had to slap some kufis off regarding the persistent racial divisions in this country, the New York Post ran this cartoon and tried to pretend that: a) it wasn't racist, and b) any notions of racial bias were invented by inveterate opportunist and demagogue Al Sharpton:



Here is some kufi-slap talk for the Post:

Sharpton's obvious failings and absent credibility notwithstanding, the United States is a country where black men are locked up and shot up by the police at alarming rates. Thus, the imagery of white cops shooting a black monkey is sadly poignant, and to insist that it shouldn't immediately trigger debate about racial tension is either frowardly deceptive or recklessly ignorant. Further, the stimulus bill has been a signature cause for Barack Obama, a man who is not even a month removed from his historic inauguration as the country's first black President.

Conflating the incendiary imagery of white-on-black police violence with the first black president's championing of the stimulus package is absolutely racist, certainly hostile, and potentially criminal (you are not allowed to threaten the President's life, I believe). Perhaps it was done subconsciously, but that doesn't make it any less racist. It just means, as Eric Holder valiantly explained today, that we, as a nation, fail ourselves if we don't encourage more honest assessment of race relations and the inequities that fall along racial lines.

There shouldn't be people at the New York Post who can argue that this isn't a racist cartoon. Unless they are knowing bigots. In that case, they should just wear hoods to work and the public can choose if that's a news service to which it wants to direct business.

Real talk.

P.S. Here is an almost laughable example of what festers in America. Click on those "Freedom" links.

On to Year Five...

Today is Straight Bangin's fourth birthday. Whoop whoop! Thanks to everyone who reads; to all the great bloggers who force me to step my game up; and to Al Gore, for inventing the internets. It's fun having one.

Here are some other four year olds:

Allen Iverson and I Have a Lot in Common

Thanks, Nate.

We both rocked the Jordan XI's; we both love the track "40 Bars" by Jewelz; and neither of us wears our hair in braids. Shoals and I discuss...

SI.com Has the Scoop on Favre and King

From Peter King:

1) We're getting married, and we signed a prenup saying that Brett would stay retired to spend time with me.

2) I'm pregnant, and it's Brett's. I haven't yet figured out how I am going to tell Peyton. I hope he and I can still be friends, at least.

The New Transformers Movie Had Better Not Suck

If you believe everything you read on the internets--and I do--then you can see here that the new Transformers movie is trying hard to not already suck: the Constructicons will be in it.

I don't understand why it was so hard for the idiots responsible for this film, Steven Spielberg and Michael Bay, to get one effing thing right about this project originally. The first movie was horrendous--the Transformers had teeth (they're robots!); Starscream didn't sound like Starscream; the original theme song was nowhere to be found; the transformation sounds were weak; there was no energon; the "plot" had some bushleague, fake Matrix of Leadership; the action was filmed and edited so poorly that it was pretty hard to appreciate what was going on. It was just a complete miscarriage of justice, and so thorough a disappointment that Brett Ratner should likely get a retroactive executive producer credit. (Nothing will ever be as horribly upsetting as X3, though.)

They now have a chance to get things right with this one, and they'd better not blow it. Though I am sure they will; that's how the universe works. All will be right with the world if they do a good job with the Constructicons, and Devastator. It has potential to be the coolest thing for dorks like me since Lord of the Rings (and until The Hobbit). I mean, how awesome would this be (minus the lame-ass captions)?

Please don't screw this up. Please. Seriously: please.

P.S. This looks like a disappointment waiting to happen:

Give me some Destro now. And they had better have that theme song. That's what the target audience wants. Really, these live-action films should be much more like the cartoons.

 

R.I.P. James Yancey, 1974-2006

Reppin' the real and the raw.

Today marks three years since the passing of J. Dilla. We are diminished by his absence.

Don't forget to check out Brandon's ongoing tribute to an all-time great.

I Think This Makes Me Captain Obvious

Isn't that guy in the suit nominated for an Academy Award or something?

Long-time readers know that while this blog proudly bumps a hip-hop soundtrack, there are times when we digress. Witness my Pearl Jam obsession, for example. Today, we're making a similar detour.

The Beatles are, and always have been, terribly overrated. So much of that early sound--"Love Me Do," "Hold Your Hand," "She Loves You," "Hard Days Night," etc.--is repetitive and boring. I am far from a Beatles scholar, and far from a rock scholar, so I readily concede that there is ample room for disagreement. Further, I acknowledge that I am somewhat out of my depth. But I did grow up in a household with a Beatles maniac, and I'll stand by this opinion based on my own experience. The early Beatles is not good.

By the end of the 60s and into the 70s, their music became much more interesting. "I Am the Walrus" is probably my favorite song they made, and that came out in '67. I like "Glass Onion," "I've Got a Feeling." Abbey Road has some solid material, and similar to most people, I recognize the quality of Sgt. Pepper's and The White Album.

A song that confounded me for a long time was "Hey Jude." As a kid, and all the way through my college years, I hated it. I thought that the opening movement sounded a little whiny, and the rousing chants at the end always lent themselves to easy mockery. I would bristle when it was listed as one of the great rock songs ever made because that kind of validation seemed to neglect its shortcomings, and I was disappointed in music criticism, overall. How could such a seemingly gimmicky song could command so much respect? (This was before I became hip to the fact that far too many music critics are either self-conscious idiots, like Tom Breihan, or rambling liberal-arts majors who think they're smart, like me.) What about the fact that a baby can sing it (see below)? It made me crazy.

I was way off base, though; "Hey Jude" is actually an incredible song. I accidentally stumbled upon this realization while listening, oddly enough, to a few Dusty Fingers beat tapes. Those joints carry some jazz covers of "Hey Jude" that are great, as is the Wilson Pickett version that was in common internets circulation not long ago, when he passed. Hearing these sent me off on a little bit of a scavenger hunt, as I dug up all manner of covers. Surveying just how many ways there are to play "Hey Jude" encourages a fuller appreciation of the song, and the writing behind it, because few records allow for so much improvisation and creativity while maintaining the original contours that make the song recognizable.

In effect, a song like "Hey Jude" is a songwriter's song, or musician's music. It is the Aristocrats joke, but for instrumentation: "Hey Jude" invites immitation and expansion. To start, the opening segment has this simple, lilting melody and am ambling pace which gives someone like Pickett the latitude he needs to do what he wants without irreperably changing the original or wandering too far astray. From vocal flourishes to instrumental filler, plenty of color can be applied inside the elemental lines which give "Hey Jude" its shape. And then, of course, the second act is organized chaos. So long as you build up along the asymptotes which the Beatles first explored, you can do almost anything. Scream, jam out, insert a horn riff, summon an orchestra, scat, cue the strings section, pop off on the Moog--anything goes. I think you could even graft the chorus from Beck's "Loser" onto it and have a nifty-sounding remix. Really, it's a playground.

There are other songs like "Hey Jude." "Light My Fire," with that sprawling keyboard solo, practically begs for subsequent performers to produce signature versions. To stick with the Doors, the simple bass of "Break on Through" is almost license to take that joint for a walk. In rap music, a beat like "A Milli" is the functional equivalent: it has an innate value that is simultaneously reinforced and expanded through remakes. That original Wayne beat looms larger today for having been used so widely. The progression wrote the legacy of the original, transforming a club single into a track that now captures a certain time and spirit. "Hey Jude" is the same, only its incredible versatility and enduring invitation for exploration helps it stand out.

That so many versions of "Hey Jude" have been made speaks to the utterly derivative nature of this post. I am not the first, or even among the first million, to recognize the distinct quality of the song. To the contrary, I am a reluctant convert. But nonetheless, if you love music, then it is a simple pleasure to take some time and consider "Hey Jude" in its many forms. I'd share many with you, but as Jeff chronicled in the LA Weekly, it's impossible to know what is and isn't allowed. I could post an mp3 of myself singing the chorus from Raekwon's "Rainy Dayz" remix and I'd likely get my post zapped for copyright infringement. So...to YouTube we go:

The Overton Berry Trio


Wilson Pickett


Assagai


Elvis Presley


Paul Mauriat


Everyone's Favorite Asian Baby

Murs for President

Just saw the above video on White Men Can Blog. I don't check that site regularly, though I guess I should, because it has a bunch of good footage featuring Murs. I think I like Murs better as a person () than a rapper, but regardless, dude deserves more shine.

It Was Written

Called up the homies and I'm aksin' y'all/Which park are y'all playin' basketball?

Fair or not, there is no offseason in the NFL. The Super Bowl gives way to the Pro Bowl, which gives way to the Combine, which gives way to the Draft, which gives way to the holdouts, which give way to "optional" summer workouts, which give way to training camps and reality shows, which give way to the regular season, which gives way to the playoffs, which give way to the Super Bowl, which gives way....

Peyton Manning is on television for all of it, and the PTI guys can get weeks and weeks out of trivialities like Tony Romo's vacation schedule.

Fair or not, there is no offseason in baseball, either. The World Series gives way to recriminations and avowals from the Steinbrenner family, which give way to the beloved Hot Stove league, which gives way to the owners' meeting, which gives way to more Hot Stove, which gives way to six or seven teams spending money, which gives way to pitchers and catchers reporting in February, which gives way to spring training, which gives way to the national holiday of Opening Day, which gives way to the long and boring season, which gives way to the playoffs, which give way to the World Series, which gives way....

We all hear far too much about Alex Rodriguez's latest psychodrama, and the PTI guys can get months and months out of trivialities like which side in the endless Red Sox-Yankees blood feud serves better hot dogs.

(Decidedly fair, there is no regular season in hockey. It's one interminable offseason, from what I can tell. Rumors of a season give way to rumors of the playoffs, which give way to three minutes on SportsCenter about which team allegedly won the Stanley Cup, which give way to the usual confusion about whether or not there will be another NHL season, which gives way....)

Fair or not, there is an offseason in the NBA. Of course, an outsider could easily lampoon the Lig's cycle--overly long regular season, playoffs, draft, new overly long season--but that would obfuscate the real differences among the NFL, MLB, and NBA. While there is no shortage of NBA news from July through October for those of us who seek it out, the Association operates without a media industrial complex analogous to those which have grown up around football and baseball. ESPN's basketball "experts" are largely absent from the airwaves during the offseason. They are put into storage after the second round of the draft, and they really aren't heard from again until October, for a meaningless season preview, unless someone important gets traded. And in those instances, they usually just regurgitate the conventional wisdom that any fan might stumble upon by himself when asked to speculate about the trade's impact.

Life in the NBA is different. There are no video packages ready to roll immediately after the Finals end, highlighting every team's offseason needs. There is no Mel Kiper, Jr. woven into a year's worth of coverage, perpetuating an endless season. There are not daily updates about who will sign some mercurial specialist (*cough* Manny *cough*), or weekly articles about the money pool drying up for mid-level free agents. Sports Illustrated isn't devoting cover stories to the NBA's offseason as an annual ritual. And the irony of it all is that in no sport does the future get written during the offseason as it does in the NBA.

The National Basketball Association's power structure is fairly static. There are always surprise teams and surprise players during a given season, just as there are always teams on the rise and teams on the decline. And there are annomalies, with the Spurs' ten-year run of dominance and the Lakers' second act validating the all-time greatness of stars Tim Duncan and Kobe Bryant. However, when considered in three- and five-year blocks of time, the picture of the NBA's ruling class is largely fixed. I leave it to others to decide if this is good or bad, but in the NBA, we generally don't find teams like the Ravens, which ping pong from 5-11 to the AFC championship game; we don't have teams like Tampa Bay, which jump from last place to the World Series. Similarly, it's rare to find the NBA equivalent of the Jaguars or the Mets, teams widely expected to contend for a championship that don't even make the playoffs.

Instead, we have a league where "unexpected" is a relative term, where we can see things coming, and where the summer is the time when the future is manifest. Que? A personality-driven league, the NBA's narratives cleave to those of its players, and their personal stories don't stop when the games do. So the offseason is really just a time when players continue down the paths that run through the season. And because we have a fairly defined set of expectations concerning which teams and players will matter, the down time has special import. Summer 2008 was an exaggeration of this reality, because the Olympics served as a de facto season preview, but nonetheless, Team USA captured and amplified the process perfectly:

- In the global arena (wordplay!), LeBron entered a new phase, with his maturation manifest and his Best Player in the World campaign launched as he played seemingly every position, showcased an array of capabilities that extended beyond the already outsized boundaries most fans had accepted, and asserted his leadership without ever seeming petulant or demanding. This season, as the Cavaliers have risen to a new level of competitiveness, they have been carried by this same James, the one who has improved his defense, has grown ever more comfortable as a galvanizing agent, and has become a nightly inevitability.

- Recognizing the need for better coordination and an unwavering commitment to team, Kobe Bryant subsumed his game, picking his scoring spots, diverting energy toward less-heralded necessities, and settling for a muted, though nonetheless acknowledged, leadership role. Witness, now, the 2008-2009 Lakers, a championship favorite with a "supporting cast" that Bryant has supported through greater deference, quieter intensity, and an eschewing of his latent megalomania while still picking his spots and garnering ever more reverence.

- Forgotten amidst injury, personal tragedy, and the disintegration of the Heat, Dwyane Wade used Beijing to put the world on notice. He was at times Team USA's best scorer, at other times its best defender. He was unquestionably its most physically intense and disruptive player. His passion made Wade the comeback story of basketball--forget just "Comeback Player of the Year"--and the only lingering questions about Wade centered upon degrees: just how devastating would he be? Well, now we know: he's leading the league in scoring, he blocks shots at a pace unheard of for a guard, and he is carrying a team bereft of a real point guard and much talent into the playoffs. Dwyane Wade has thus far assembled an MVP-like resume, much like he did over the summer.

- Though his notoriety and popularity grew in response to his dunk-contest victory, Dwight Howard wasn't the premier big man in the Lig until he improved his defense, something that was a primary focus for him during the Olympics. His time anchoring the back line energized his further transformation, and a player who blocks shots, rebounds, and lifts his team to the elite level spends more time than seemingly anyone acknowledging the carry-over effect stemming from the Olympic experience.

- Chris Paul's 2008 playoffs did not culminate in a championship, however casting the Hornets' run as a team failure neglects that Paul's season ended in a coda. The Lig and its fans were abuzz (wordplay!) with talk of Paul's arrival as not just a superstar, but as the best point guard since Magic Johnson, and the unquestioned leader of a new era. Despite starting in Beijing, Jason Kidd occupied a ceremonial place atop Team USA's depth chart, because Paul was a first among the equals, his easy mastery and understated swag (a word that now needs to be retired) propelling his star turn. A New Orleans season so far best characterized as up-and-down only cements Paul's status; his "offseason" drove such outsized expectations. (As did the Hornets acquiring modern-day Robert Horry, James Posey.)

And all that is, in effect, a perfect encapsulation of the terrific first half of the 2008-2009 NBA season. We can dwell upon San Antonio's resiliency and sustained relevance. We can wring our hands about the 2010 free-agency situation. We can celebrate the coming dominance of Kevin Durant, and the exciting opportunity to refer to Russell Westbrook as "Russy." But save for the Celtics and their encore, the five men discussed above have been the principal authors behind the story of this NBA season. And counterintuitively, it's been exciting to see a summer's worth of predictive elements become manifest.

I think some of what compels NFL fans is that each fall, a Dolphins can rise up and defy expectations. That seems like it would be awesome. But yet, somehow, in the NBA, seeing what we think will happen trumps seeing what could serendipitously happen. Again, I think it's because the Association is a league of individuals, and we like understanding the stories of our heroes. It's the same reason that so many movies can cleave to so few general formulas.

Am I insane?

Dilla Dog

As some may be aware, tomorrow marks the three-year anniversary of James Yancey's passing. In observance, a dude named RP3 slid me this nice mixtape he made that stitches together some of the jazzier, mellower Dilla productions. The project, Dilla Midnight Snack, can be downloaded here. I recommend it.

And don't forget Brandon's ill, month-long tribute to Donuts.

Memo to ESPN: Shut Up about Notre Dame

Bang up job, Mike Brey.

If you only watched ESPN for your college-basketball news--and, honestly, it's hard not to do so--you'd think that Notre Dame was some historical power, a perennial contender, and one of the defining programs of the hoops landscape. You know, like North Carolina, or Connecticut, or UCLA, or Kansas.

But here's the thing: it's not. Not now, not then, not ever. It's Notre Dame--a small, white football school in the middle of nowhere that was awarded two national titles almost 100 years ago, once beat Lew Alcindor, once (!) made the Final Four, and once was lucky to have Austin Carr. That's it.

And yet, ESPN drones on and on, night after night, about this soon-to-be-only-2-games-above-.500 Irish team. This soon-to-have-lost-seven-straight Irish team. This NIT-bound Irish team. This historically irrelevant Irish program. What's wrong with the Irish? Will the Irish bounce back? Why hasn't Notre Dame called us back yet? We went out three days ago! Can it please stop? Can today please end the madness? Notre Dame is not good; Notre Dame is not worthy of anyone's attention this year.

Here's some real talk, ESPN: we get it--Notre Dame was expected to contend this year, and you loved that because you love Notre Dame. You love propogating the myth that Notre Dame football wakes up and gets an HJ from God each morning. You love neglecting the fact that Notre Dame should join a football conference and shouldn't receive special treament. You love filling your airwaves with the mindless, incoherent, inarticulate blather of Lou Holtz and Digger Phelps. You love Dick Vitale screaming his Cath-o-lic head off about Nawtre Dame because, well, he's a Catholic and he sent his kid (kids?) there. You love that Mike Brey wears turtlenecks. You just love Notre Dame. Anyone who's been in love understands. Love is blinding, and it feels so good even when it's so wrong.

But that's the thing: this is wrong. You have to let it go. Notre Dame is about to lose to another top-25 team, and is doing it in spectacular fashion. Notre Dame is not good at basketball this year.

Get some hobbies, hang out with your other friends, talk about other teams (teams that, uh, matter), and just let it go. It's what's best for everyone.
 

New York Smells Like MF Doom and 9 Milli. Bros.

You know how New York smells like maple syrup sometimes? And no one knows why? And at first you thought it was some kind of breakfast-food-based terrorist attack? Well, wonder no longer: it's fenugreek. Word to Special Herbs, Vol. 1. Be nice to the crackheads!

UPDATE: As Rafi rightly notes in the comments, we should also give praise to the Monsta Island Czars, who originally ripped the Fenugreek:

  

Best Email in a Long Time

Jyeah!

Cam!

Not sure I even like this, but it's new Cam'ron, which means that he's still alive.

*wipes his brow*

 

We Celebrate Greatness

Forever the man.

There are many hip-hop blogs on the interwebs. One of the best--witty, poignant, entertaining, thoughtful--is No Trivia. But I probably don't need to tell anyone that.

My man Brandon () had the great idea of spending the month of February acknowledging the life and work of J. Dilla by dedicating each day to one of the captivating songs from his beautifully elegiac (HT: HR) coda, Donuts. The retrospective started yesterday, and I am honored that my participation was solicited. As you'll read, it's not something I took lightly, both because of my admiration for Brandon and because of my deep appreciation of Dilla.

You should be checking No Trivia on the regular, and if you haven't, why not start this month? We are all diminished by Jay Dee's absence.

"The name is Dilla Dog, and I can only rep the real and the raw."