....on whatever crosses my mind

On Torture

I know a lot of stuff. 

But an area about which I know absolutely nothing is foreign policy, torture, and everything relating to the Middle East.

For this reason, I haven't blogged much on the torture stuff. For me it is very simple - the U.S. shouldn't torture. Ever. - but the national conversation includes a lot of stuff that makes me tend to wanna shut up about shit I don't know.

Luckily, my boy Ta-Nehisi Coates has written a beautiful post about why Obama should go on 'head and investigate the architects of the U.S. recent foray into torture:

I believe that while a good politician accomplishes what is possible, a great one expands the realm of possibility. He doesn't simply accept the lines of argument as their drawn and hew to the side with the most soldiers, he tries to redraw those lines to benefit his ideals. Obama's jobs isn't simply to spend his own political capital, it's to grow his capital, and by extension, the moral weight of his ideals. Perhaps pushing torture investigations would make passing health care harder. But this is the business he chose. This is the business of becoming great. And after what happened last year, we have the right to expect more of him. We have the right to demand more.

Indeed.

Barry - you listening?

Solange is a STAR!

This performance on Jimmy Kimmel reconfirmed for me that Solange is a major force:

Wow!

So few artists reimagine their songs for a live setting so you can feel like you are hearing the song anew.  This performance of T.O.N.Y. does just that.

Man - Solange is doin her damnedest to get a fickle public fed on a diet of Pro-Tools to pick up her album.  I ain't mad.

People should go on 'head and cop that album if you haven't already got it.

It's a crime that Sol-Angel and the Hadley St. Dreams has only sold about 140,000 copies. 

Hip-Hop Dopeness: Kool Moe Dee on Quincy Jones' Back on the Block

Kool Moe Dee's closing verse is amazing.  It succinctly deconstructs (and constructs) black identity.  We do NOT talk about Kool Moe Dee enough when we talk about the greats of Hip-Hop's Golden Age.

We should.

An everlasting omnipresence is my present
State of being, seeing the unpleasant
Sight of righteous souls live like peasants
The mind stunts growth in adolescents
My insight enables me to enlight
The weakest of minds, and I put em in flight
As I transcend, a-scend or de-scend
Re-create, re-incarnate and re-send
The powerful spirits of our ancestors
For those that don't know how God blessed us
Because man messed up, the media dressed up
Lies perpetrated as truth, and it left us
Confused, but I've seen it all before
From Babylon to the Third World War
I'm more than a man, I'm more like an entity
Back on the block, and this time my identity
Is the Dude

Best of the Rest: Truth Hurts' Catch-22

Truth Hurts - Catch 22 - Truth Hurts

I chose Catch 22 for a very simple and obvious reason: a singer who tends to be rather harsh shows surprising proficiency with subtlety and vulnerability.

Truth Hurts' first album was beautiful in its toughness.  Here was a vocalist who wrote songs about how tough she was and matched that with a phrasing that was like a brick.  That's not to say the songs weren't emotional and engaging because they truly were, especially songs like Bullshit, Next to Me, and Jimmy.   

However, on Catch 22 from her second album, her phrasing has a softness to it.  It's more fluid, though she doesn't totally abandon her style.  She just adds a few subtleties to her approach to show the cracks in the armor.  And it works perfectly for the song.

More:
Best of the Rest - Full List
Best of the Rest - Explained

AYO! Meth and Red Are Back!

Can we have a national conversation about how Lil Wayne owes Reggie truckloads of cake for jackin Reggie's eccentric persona?

Eh, probably not.  Still true though.

Anywho...

I'm feelin this something fierce.  This is actually a little out of left field for Cliff and Reggie, sorta summery.  I can picture myself riding through the hood in my droptop to this joint...you know, if i had one.

The "aww shit" line?

Meth: "Livin this life like it was written. Especially for me I'm what the recipe is missin"

Indeed.

WATCH ME!

Side note - Method Man is so telegenic it's ridiculous.  I can't think of another rapper who commands the camera as easily as he does (maybe Jay, but clearly he's no Clifford Smith, am I right?).  There are lots of pretty rappers (hi T.I. and Cam), but Meth is next-level fine because you know he kinda grimy and shit.  Sort of a throwback to Treach and nem.  Whewwww!

Bow Wow Does Sinatra...Nancy, that is.

No joke - I kinda like this. His bootleg Jay-Z flow is pretty darn good (I smell ghostwriter, folks).

This song falls into the Sweet Potato Pie/I Got A Man category - hip-hop songs so ridiculous that you like them because they are ridiculous.  It's different than say the willful denial of Lil Wayne's wackness (or T.I.) that fuels that love and adulation. 

Who is Young Shad fooling with this cartoonish masculinity, you ask?  No one.

So just sit back and watch the hot mess.

T-Boz Speaks True about Destiny's Child

T-Boz of TLC was recently interviewed on AOL Black Voices.  It's an interesting interview because she seems to feel free to say what she really thinks.  

The best part is when she drops the truth about Beyonce and Destiny's Child:

They get mad when I say this, but I don't give a damn. It was all about Beyonce anyway. She was my favorite, too, but come on. Her parents are over everything. Who do you think they were going for? It's always Beyonce. It was supposed to be exactly the way it is now, Bey is on top...That would have been a hard group for me to be in, because I would have been like your mommy and daddy are running things and they're gonna have you at heart the most. That's just how I feel. (my emphasis added)

Bout damn time someone in the industry spoke true about DC.

Fun on Youtube: Marcus Bellamy Does Britney Better than Britney

I've been a subscriber to Marcus' Youtube channel for over a year now.  He's a dancer in New York City who does some homemade videos to pop songs, his own songs, and also a few random talky videos. 

His music videos are always intriguing, well-edited, and fun to watch (he's nearly naked or undressing 75 percent of the time, ladies and gentleman, so PG-13 titillation abounds).

This video, for Britney Spears' inane If You Seek Amy (seriously - the dumbest song I've heard in ages), is probably his best, mostly because the interplay between him and the other dancers gives it dynamism that was not possible in his solo videos.  He also manages to poke fun at Britney's new vacant video persona without being too arty or on the nose.

Also - nudity!

Anywho...check it out and subscribe to his stuff.

En Vogue is Back

Seriously - why do other groups even try?

The irony about En Vogue is that they didn't change the game nearly as much as they probably should have.  It's almost like every other set of girls just said "we ain't even gonna try to compete, that 'actually being able to all sing and harmonize and share lead vocals' lane belongs to En Vogue and Xscape, we'll go over here and be broke ass Supremes."

Don't you think?

Anywho, the point here is:

• En Vogue is back

• Them voices ain't changed a bit.

• Cindy Herron Braggs does not age (and is she taller?)

• Dawn can sing the same song over and over for 20 years and find new wrinkles in it and make you think you're hearing it for the first time.

• I CANNOT WAIT FOR THEM TO BRING THE FIRE!!!!

Note: the fire is not a Timbaland, Pharrell, or Polow produced joint, ladies.  Call Mike City and Ray Ray NOW.

Smoke E. Digglera covers Babyface

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a huge Playa stan.

Well, Smoke E. Digglera, one-third of Playa, is on the verge of releasing his third album, Truth in the Booth, and has been putting up promo stuff on his Youtube page.  It's all great, folks should check him out.

This is his cover of Babyface's Whip Appeal.  He kills it!

Best of the Rest: INTRO's Love Me Better

Love Me Better might be the single greatest Stevie Wonder ballad that Stevie Wonder didn't write or sing. The late Kenny Greene cements with the first couplet - made you a crown to call your own, made out of grass just like your thrown - that he is every bit the lyric (as in poetry) songwriter that Stevie is, and nearly as good.  

The thing about INTRO was that even though Kenny Greene handled all the leads, the songs were arranged so that all three voices make the song work.  Here Kenny's tender lead singing is actually the part of the song that you get to last because the hook grabs you so totally.  The vocal arrangement of it is so intricate and specific in the emotion it conveys that you almost don't hear the words. This is important because the lyrics are lyrical (again, as in poetry) and intimate more than they explain.

More:
Best of the Rest - Full List
Best of the Rest - Explained

Iowa for Gay Marriage

So Iowa is down with the gays.

Money quote from the eminently rational, reasonable Iowa Supreme Court:

“Equal protection under the Iowa Constitution is essentially a direction that all persons similarly situated should be treated alike. Since territorial times, Iowa has given meaning to this constitutional provision, striking blows to slavery and segregation, and recognizing women’s rights. The court found the issue of same-sex marriage comes to it with the same importance as the landmark cases of the past.”

Word.

Day26 - Y'All Ain't Puttin It on NOBODY

How did Day26 go from the seemingly effortless cool of this:

Day26 - Got Me Going sélectionné dans Musique et Clips

 

...to this trendy cacophonous mess (with Yung Joc, no less):

 

 

??????????????????????????????

 

Seriously, there are so many things wrong with this:

 

1.  Willie is the only one who looks good, but he should never sing lead.  Ditto for Q.  Ironically, if you had told me that Day26 would shift from the next 112 to the next Pretty Ricky, I'da told you that vocally Willie and Q would be perfect for such thin melodies.  I was wrong.  They have zero vocal authority.  In Willie's case, it's particularly sad because....so.pretty.

 

2. Yung Joc.

 

3. Robert's hair.

 

4. Brian is singing way too hard.

 

5. Puffy's presence

 

6.  Y'all ain't puttin it on nobody.  Seriously - what swag they had on Got Me Going is completely absent here.  Is this even the same group?  Aren't you supposed to be better with the next album? Even reliable Brian, who has video charisma to spare, ain't bringin it.

 

7. This song is beneath their talents.  I don't necessarily think they needed to stick with what worked on the last album, but chasing a radio and club hit (I'm lookin at you, Willie) only works if its good.  This ain't it.  And who mixed the vocals?  Geez.  This is truly awful.

 

Boo.just.boo.

Best of the Rest: 702's Jealousy

702 should have been huge stars. Jealousy is a perfect showcase for why I think this true. The song is not single-worthy in the conventional sense, as it structurally has small ebbs and flows instead of crescendos and sweeping arrangements.  It is a wonderful mood piece that gives lead singer, Meelah, an opportunity to invest a very simple melody with stunning, subtle emotional beats, much the way great blues singers do.

On this song, she reminds me of Aaliyah on her greatest songs.  With Meelah on lead, Jealousy is really about sadness.  It's about disappointment.  Rather than perform the song as written (anger or even denial), Meelah fills the song with a sadness that gives the song emotional resonance it wouldn't have otherwise.  Particularly with the bridge and the final adlibs, Meelah slowly, artfully breaks down.  And when the song just ends, you know there is so much left there.

A perfect piece of singing.

More:
Best of the Rest - Full List
Best of the Rest - Explained

Fun on Youtube: Lauryn Hill Hip-Hop Gospel

Thrilling!

What a treasure Lauryn was.

White Paranoia Has a Face....Finally

 

Mascot for all the white guys out there mad that at non-white people's progress.  I almost want to say this post is half-joking, because that is sort of my intention.

But I suspect I'm right.