"...I've heard some interesting new music from Jamaica... a sort of hybrid between electronic music and reggae. It's a fascinating study in the new musical forms generated when a largely pre-technological culture is given access to modern recording techniques without the technological preconceptions that we've allowed to accumulate, limiting our vision. It's called dub music. You'd like it, I'm sure."
Unnu dun kno seh a Empire mi seh. So yu can si why mi buck di volume pon da 1 ya an beat down di place, when I unexpectedly heard this midway thru Santogold & Diplo's brilliant 2008 Top Ranking mixtape:
Other highlights on the 'dubtape': 1. Santogold's brilliant rocksteady/dub reprise of the punk classic by The Clash, Guns Of Brixton (updated as a Brooklyn anthem), which I'd included in my last post 2. Get It Up with M.I.A., featuring a great Native war dance sample 3. A sick remix of Shawty Lo's Dey Know 4. Vicious verses by some of London's wikidis toasters over the now-legendary Creator beat 5. all interspersed with a great sampling of classic ska, rocksteady, reggae and early dancehall chunez sprinkled throughout.
There's something so... delicious about how Jamaican producers made music in the '70s, with the echoing vocals and amped-up live instruments and the minimalism of the riddims... for a long time I've resisted the tendency of foreign musicologists to recognise dub as a precursor genre between rocksteady and dancehall, but this mixtape, which showcases dub's influence on international music perfectly, has changed my mind. It took a DJ from Philly to school me on the music of my own country.
Can't believe I've been sleeping on this chick for so long....
I'd been going thru serious urban alternative withdrawal for months after Kala and Seeing Sounds until I finally opened my ears and started paying attention again today. I'd been hearing Jay's joint Brooklyn Go Hard from the soundtrack of Biggie's biopic for a couple weeks, but it only dawned on me today that the chick on the hook rocking the extra verse was the same girl on My Drive Thru with Pharrell and Julian Casablancas:
I made the first connection after hearing the reggaelicious Shove It and realising that it was the same artist reprising her own opening lines from that song for the Jay-Z track, but it took longer for the other connections to sink in. I came across Santagold serendipitously (as the best music discoveries always are) after trying to find her single Unstoppable; on first cursory listen I could've sworn she was Nelly Furtado, given the quasi-dancehall chanting on the track, but after being swiftly corrected on that assumption on iTunes, I was instantly smitten with this treasure I'd unearthed and started hunting down more from her. I wasn't disappointed. I was, however, nonplussed that it took me so long to start listening, given that she shares so many musical influences with some of my favourite artists, moves in such wide circles (she's toured with everyone from Hov to Bjork and written for Lily Allen), and has even been compared to the Pixies, whom I've posted about before. It's not as if chick is underground or anything. Makes me wonder just what the hell else I'm missing out there if I passed over this chick for almost a year.
BTW, I know that M.I.A. is obviously the first comparison that springs to mind, but I think that's a bit unfair to Santogold. Given that both females share mutual admiration for each other and affinity for each other's inspirations, work with much of the same people and are in turn admired by so many of the same people in music, it's no surprise that their common lineage is evident. They're practically musical siblings, but that doesn't follow that one is consciously trying to emulate the other. Great minds think alike, leave it at that. I also think it's unfair for Santogold to be categorised as rap or R&B by American publications, whereas her 'sister' M.I.A. is given freer reign... since their styles are so congruent, I can't help but think that Santogold's race is the only possible factor in assigning her to the 'black music' pile. In M.I.A.'s case, since she's a Sri Lankan British-based urban alternative artist and experimental in her choices, if a descriptive genre label has to be applied, jungle works just as well as any other; however, since Santogold is a Philadelphia-raised Brooklyn-residing black woman, it seems that it's easier to just call her a rapper. Or another R&B act. Even though she hates R&B.
Some of my favourites:
School me on some more wikid genre-bending urban alternative piff like Santogold, N.E.R.D, M.I.A. etc... I'm gonna give Kid Sister and Yo Majesty a listen later, suggest anyone else you can think of along the same lines.
I know a lot of people say this, but when I say I only watch the Super Bowl for the ads, I really mean it. I won't get into why this throw-the-oval-thing-stop-throw-the-oval-thing-stop-take-an-ad-break-every-two-minutes shit doesn't deserve to be called football. The only football I recognise is the sport that EVERYBODY ELSE IN THE WORLD except Americans refer to as football, you know, the one that actually involves a real ball and actual feet. However, that being said, the last quarter of this year's Super Bowl was undeniably legendary, the kinda stuff that only happens in sports movies. Hate to admit it, but I actually became an NFL fan for fifteen minutes. The seemingly-invincible Patriots after leading throughout most of the low-scoring game, picked up 4 quick points to extend their lead over the giants 14-10 and seemed poised for victory with only minutes to go, but then learned at the worst possible moment that it's only a perfect season if you win the last game, and the Manning Bros. now have a matching set of finger jewellery. You couldn't script this stuff.
Before the final six minutes, the highlight of the game for me had been the lovely Jordin Sparks, daughter of former NY Giant Phillipi Sparks and the youngest winner of American Idol to date, KILLING her performance of the Star-Spangled Banner; by the time she was done I think even she knew she 'killt dat ish'.
Sweet 'n' thick like Betty Condensed Milk. For my money, her version was right up there with Whitney Houston's spine-tingling rendition at the '91 Super Bowl during Operation Desert Storm, in vocal delivery if not emotional connect. Great job... and just in time too, because the song she has out right now, Tattoo, although age-appropriate for her in terms of saccharine sappiness, is not what she needed to build buzz. To avoid slipping below the horizon, she needs to remind people that she really can sing, and this performance did just that. With a more sophisticated songwriter and the right songs to showcase her range, there's no reason she can't meet or exceed the high standards set by former Idol Kelly Clarkson, given time. From all accounts Alicia Keys definitely did her thing as well earlier in the pre-game show, but I didn't get to see her performance... I'll have to check it out online later before it inevitably gets pulled from YouTube for copyright infringement.
Now for the main event, as far as I'm concerned: the commercials. This year's crop was better (and weirder) than what we've seen in recent years, with a definite emphasis on surrealistic comedy. Madison Avenue must be currently inundated by a cloud of ganja smoke to turn out some of the definitely "weeded" ads that premiered during this year's game. Check them out for yourself at MySpace's Super Bowl Ads page. Below I've listed my ten favourite spots this year, in ascending order:
10. Coca-Cola - To tell the truth, I just liked seeing Stewie get his come-uppance at the hands of Charlie Brown... finally something goes right for Schulz' lovable peanut-headed loser.
9. Vitamin Water - Shaq as an enormous jockey, I defy you to tell me what's not funny about that.
8. Budweiser - Clydesdale rejected from the wagon team does '80s-style training montage to get ready for next year, with Dalmatian playing Mickey to his Rocky, at the end give each other a high-five (high-hoof? high-paw?)
7. Etrade.com - Funny talking baby = comedy gold.
6. Cars.com - "You should definitely step outside the circle.... yeah... just to avoid any confusion...." Hilarious.
5. Tide To Go - incredibly stupid ad, should really be annoying but is funny as hell
4. Bud Light - Apparently drinking Bud Light gives you superpowers, like breathing fire and flying.
3. Toss-up between Bridgestone and FedEx - screaming squirrels vs. giant carrier pigeons, you make the call.
2. Sobe Lifewater - This ad should really be number 1, just based on the sheer WTF factor alone. Lizards doing the zombie dance routine from Thriller while Naomi Campbell does her best Beyonce moves. I get the feeling that this will come out as the fan-pick of the night, but my vote goes to:
1. Diet Pepsi Max - Not gonna spoil it for you if you haven't seen it, but it's funny funny stuff.
There were also a couple great trailers for Wanted, which looks like a slick spy movie starring Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman; Prince Caspian, the second chapter in The Chronicles of Narnia; and Will Ferrell's latest fratboy farce, Semi-Pro. Iron Man looks pretty good too, but I'm more of a DC fan.
The losers of the night: Carlos Mencia doing his usual racist spiel. Mencia is not funny. Other observations: Justin Timberlake is a tool.
So Thursday morning, as usual, my bedside clock radio woke me to Alan Magnus on RJR doing the same routine he's been doing every morning since I was in prep school: news at 6:00, short sports report, weather update at 6:12, then a few contemporary chart hits up until the horoscope at 6:30. Like I said, routine, but very comforting to know that some things never change. I hit the Snooze button and dove back under the covers to squeeze out another 9 minutes of sleep before I had to get up to face the day. Eighteen minutes later (yes, I did hit the Snooze button a second time) I finally found the energy to wake up when the opening electric guitar riff of Rihanna's Shut Up And Drive came on and blasted me out of bed:
There's definitely something to be said about putting dance club music on before the sun is even up. Almost as good as a hot cup of Blue Mountain caffeine to get the blood pumping.
So anyways, while loading my iPod for the day, for some reason I suddenly got this overpowering urge to listen to an obscure alternative track that kept playing at the edge of my consciousness all morning. No problem, lemme just do a quick scroll thru my music library and find it... except I had no idea what the song was, who did it, the words to the song, where I'd first heard it, nothing except a chord progression that kept repeating in my head, a faint memory of chanted lyrics, and one single question being asked over and over. The question was the key; if I could only remember what it was, everything else would come to me.... but the question kept dancing maddeningly on the tip of my tongue and slipping away right when I almost had it. It eventually did come to me later that morning, after some hard mental concentration and using every mnemonic device I knew, and when it finally came to the surface it was appropriate in so many ways. "Where is my mind?" Four short words with worlds of meaning. After that, the rest began to fall in place... I quickly jumped on Google and did a search for that phrase, and came up with the name of the band and where I'd heard that song before... Pixies, from the Fight Club soundtrack, yes, that was it, the final scene, right after Edward Norton's character (who was never named, interestingly) has just killed Tyler Durden by blowing his own medulla oblongata out, and he and Marla stand in an empty office building watching the international headquarters of several major credit card companies implode in one single glorious act of econo-terrorism. Project Mayhem: reset the credit rating of every single person on Earth back to zero by wiping the international financial slate clean. No more rich and poor. No more haves and have-nots, upper- and lower-class, white collar blue collar. No more First and Third World. Reset button at the trigger of a detonator. Then Where Is My Mind? starts playing and the end credits roll. Fight Club is one of the greatest movies ever made.
So now that I finally had the name of the elusive track, I opened up Shareaza to download the song right away... but from the opening "wooo-hoooo" I realised that the original Pixies version, although brilliant, wasn't the one that had been itching my brain all morning. So what was the song that had now become an earworm in my mind? This was starting to drive me crazy. A quick check with Wikipedia revealed that Where Is My Mind (which, incidentally, Pixies lead singer Frank Black was inspired to write as a college student while on a scuba dive in the Caribbean) is one of those excellent songs that have been covered, remade, refixed, mashed-up etc. by about a zillion bands and artists since it was first recorded. It's cited as one of the pivotal tracks in the evolution of modern alternative rock, and listening to it I can certainly agree... one can sense right away the influence Pixies would have on later grunge and alternative bands of the 90s like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Stone Temple Pilots, Radiohead, and of course Nirvana... one can literally picture a teenage Kurt Cobain somewhere in a Seattle garage bobbing his head to this one right before an after-school impromptu jam session. No wonder there have been no less than seven Pixies tribute albums. I came across about a dozen different versions of Where Is My Mind, my favourite three of which I've listed below:
But this was getting me no closer to the specific version of the song that had tunneled into my skull by this time.... and what did Rihanna have to do with any of it? All I could think of were six infectious chords that sounded like a synth version of Orgy's cover of New Order's Blue Monday...
...and there, at last, was the answer. Shut Up And Drive, the tune that had jolted me out of bed, samples Blue Monday right from the electric opening riff. The chords I was thinking of were the actual chords from the same song. So I was basically looking for a remake of Pixies' Where Is My Mind? over a slowed-down, synthed up version of New Order's Blue Monday, with hip-hop/dancehall/techno lyrics.... but where the hell had I ever heard such a song? On a hunch, I went to my trusty old Google toolbar, input "where is my mind" and "blue monday" (in quotes so I would get an exact match)... and good old Google gave me the answer right away. It was M.I.A. - 20 Dollar, off her Kala album, one of the five best releases of 2007 in ANY genre. I had listened to the album straight through at least nineteen times before but the connection hadn't clicked until that very moment.
Brilliant on so many levels: a song about brutal poverty-driven violence and genocide in Africa facilitated by First World apathy, penned by the Sri-Lankan teenage daughter of one of the founders of the Tamil Tigers (considered a terrorist organisation by US and UK intelligence), who has Education for Darfur as her number 1 friend on MySpace, is rumoured to be on a C.I.A. watch list, and was recently denied entry to perform in the US. In other words, militant hardcore rebel music..... disguised as Rihanna-esque danceable pop. God, this girl is genius. Needless to say, I had Kala (and her 2005 album Arular) on repeat all day Thursday.
OK, now it's Six Degrees of Separation time. They both sampled Blue Monday for dance-pop releases in roughly the same period last year. Apart from being on my list of Top 12 women in the world I'd most want to wake up next to, what else do Rihanna and M.I.A. have in common? Answer: They've also both done collabos with Vybz Kartel. And as I finish up this entry, I've just watched Fight Club on cable for the twentieth time, and the original Pixies version of Where Is My Mind? is playing right at this very moment. I am Jack's complete circle.
So, a few days ago I met this cool Jamaican chick... cute, short and sexy, just the way I like 'em. I was in the dining hall earlier than usual, trying to get this whole 'eating so I can stay alive' thing out of the way so I could get back to tackling that History paper on Gilgamesh or whateva-him-waan-name. (Whoever invented food should be shot... it takes time away from the more fun things in life, like History papers and writing blogs.) So anywayz, as I made my way to a table, with a tray filled with enough food to last an Ethiopian till next semester, I noticed at the last instant that I was about to sit at the same table with a girl I'd recently downgraded from Friends to Other Contacts (long story, I'll tell you about it later). So, using a deft crossover move that would've made Allen Iverson proud, I switched my tray to the other hand and slid it onto the adjacent table, nodding casually in her direction as I glided effortlessly into another seat. Smooth, huh?
At first I didn't notice the girl sitting across from me talking to her friends. She's pretty and petite, but in a way that 37.4% of the girls on campus are pretty and petite. However, as I started slicing the chicken, which was unusually dry that day, I heard the beautiful sound of something I haven't heard in months: an actual Kingston-girl accent. Of course, I fell in love with her right away (love at first listen) and a quick glance across the table got me even more interested. I don't remember exactly what she was wearing, cuz her eyes have this sorta gravitational pull that must make neutron stars envious. As nonchalantly as I could, I caught her eye nonchalantly and nonchalantly asked "Which school yu used to guh?" All very nonchalant. She smiled and said "Wolmers." I was hooked.
So to cut a long story short (too late)... great eye contact, attractive smile, I'm making her laugh and vice-versa... she'd lost her Black Chiney8.1CD and I'd promised to burn her a copy, plus a Cash Money mixtape and some Vybz Kartel chunes (I'm working on a pantyripper mix of some of Kartel's slackest stuff... look out for it on Soulseek). On Saturday night around 9, I called her and told her I'd be coming by with the CDs. I also brought along Shottas on DVD, the best Jamaican movie of all time even though it was never officially released... although it's somewhat of a cult classic here in America most people in Jamaica have never watched it. On my way out, I ran into one a mi bredren, a Yankee yute we'll call Bryan. He asked what I was up to and asked if he could tag along, so I said sure. The more the merrier, right? Before we left we went back to his dorm and mixed up some rum & Coke, except he was outta Coke so I improvised by getting a bottle of Vanilla Pepsi from the vending machine. Hell, that stuff tastes better than Coke anyway... hehe. Even though he mixed it about half-and-half, that stuff was still wimpy... too bad he only had Captain Morgan and not the real stuff. I didn't even get buzzed from half-a-cup.
We went across campus to the girl's... let's call her Natasha.... Natasha's dorm building and I called her from downstairs. It took her an eternity to come down, but the old adage that "the longer a female keeps you waiting, the more she's worth it" was proven true when she finally graced us with her presence. I could see that my friend was visibly awed. She also brought her roommate down with her; while she'd been keeping us waiting I'd called her back and she'd decided she'd rather come over to our dorm... she said her room was too 'dry', dry meaning boring as I learnt later. Back in my dorm, I put on some reggae and we chilled for a while, talking, flirting lightly, dancing etc. Visitation ends at midnight here, so we walked the girls back over to their building after spending about 2 hours with them... this is when things got interesting.
As we were halfway between their building and ours, Natasha's roommate saw a large group of guys, about a baker's dozen, walking up behind us kinda fast, so she got nervous and suggested we walk faster. At first I figured that they were students so it wasn't anything to worry about, but as they got nearer I could see they were certainly not students, at least I sincerely hope they weren't as it would cast aspersions on the level of tertiary education in America if they were. One approached me, a charming young gentleman with bad teeth, bad dreadlocks and bad breath, spitting, "Whatchu got in your pockets?" Of course, I saw this as a rather personal question, perhaps more befitting of a second date with an attractive young lady than a first encounter with a snaggletoothed hoodlum in a dirty white 6XL T-shirt, so I answered accordingly: "Wha di fuck yu a ask mi dat fa battybwoy?" He seemed to take this the wrong way, as he responded with a right hook to the face. One or two of his colleagues also seemed to take offense, as they contributed positively to the debate with a few well-placed blows of their own. In fact, they were so vigorous in their rebuttals that one accidentally broke my front tooth, but they borrowed some money and left rather hastily before I could ask them to help me look for the fragments. At this point Bryan, who along with the two young ladies had ran away quietly at the opening lines to my discussion with my new friends, returned with some other friends of ours, perhaps hoping to arrange formal introductions between the two groups. Unfortunately my new friends had already absconded with the rather large sum of $5, so we may have to postpone the conference to a time more convenient to both parties.
Sitting in the back of a squad car at 12:10 AM with the left side of my face bearing an uncanny resemblance to Kanye West circa late 2002, a fractured tooth, and what felt like a concussion, one might have been surprised to see me smiling. Natasha had just leaned in and said, "Call me."
01 Elephant Man - Turn It Up 02 Sizzla - Eyes On Me 03 Vybz Kartel - Wha Yu Get 04 Elephant Man - Dancing Time 05 Vybz Kartel - Come Inna Di War Come Dead
The first time I heard this riddim was on a Cash Money mixtape, and it immediately caught my attention. This sounds like a Don Corleone production, and judging from the name of the riddim I'm probably right, which would make this the first eponymous riddim since the Cool Face Riddim (the real name of which was actually the Fusion Riddim). If this is indeed a Corleone creation, then it proves that Don is, well, a Don, but unnu done know who THE Don really is. ;)
Intricately layered yet deceptively minimalist, the Don Riddim kicks off with the warming-up of two instruments that I'm sure don't actually exist, then what sounds suspiciously like a submarine sonar bip, before delving into an infectious drumbeat which Elephant Man vocally emulates perfectly on both of his songs on this riddim. It's impossible to flop on this beat... every single I've heard on this riddim is flawless. But then again the only artists who've voiced on the riddim thus far have been three of the most indisputable talents in dancehall right now: two high-energy offerings from the Energy God himself, another two from Adi Banton at the top of his game, and one from the High Priest Sizzla Kalonji. These three (actually four) different styles complement each other perfectly; the riddim is milked to its full potential by each and every track. All that's needed now are a few more artists to round it out. I'm of the opinion that Sean Paul would perform well on this beat (don't hate, di yute can flow even if a uptown him come from). It's hard to pick a favourite from the five singles I've heard on the Don Riddim, but I find myself pulling up Vybz Kartel's Come Inna Di War Come Dead over and over.
A few lines up I remarked that although there were three deejays on the riddim there are actually four styles on display here. Allow me to elaborate on this point. Elephant Man, as he usually does on high-calibre riddims such as Mad Guitar, Dancehall Rock and Steps, does a 'dance chune' and a 'badman chune' on the same riddim. This is probably to appease both types of dancehall fans, the hardcore male fan such as myself who considers Bounty Killer the real King of Dancehall, and the mainstream listeners and females who like the beats, culture, fashion, and of course dance moves of Jamaican dancehall and are more apt to crown Beenie Man the reigning monarch. Of course, there's nothing wrong with either... both are essential for dancehall's success: the hardcore fans to 'keep it real' and the mainstream fans to keep the music popular. My point about Elephant Man is this: although his subject matter is usually markedly different when he has two songs on the same riddim, his high-energy delivery and usually even the hook remains the same in both.
Vybz Kartel on the other hand, is decidedly schizophrenic here. He focusses all his attention on the girls in the naughty Wha Yu Get, on which he suggests seductively that females ought to expect payment for the sexual services they provide: "Balance pon yu nosebridge, yu mus get a fridge, yu pum-pum likkle so yu bankbook big. Yu bedroom waan some richer furniture? Den pose pon mi cocky like yu a tek pikcha". Hmmm... counterbalance to his infamous Tek Buddy? However, on Come Inna Di War Come Dead, his beguiling bedroom manner is completely dropped, making way for ominous, thinly veiled threats against his new rival Spragga Benz, or as he names him on the track 'Fagga' Benz. Kartel's flow is excellently sinister here: "Wha really tek Fagga, an him likkle brodda, Teflon mek di pussy piss ina him bladda, climb up a tall house top wid a ladda, get a diving suit chuck back inna yu madda". Mi rate Spragga long time, but it look like him a guh need all him skills if him a guh clash Kartel an win. We'll see what happens at Sting, if it comes to that.
