Creating new out of old...

EPMD Sample Map

Black Thought In Action

(Click here for Part I)

• Life is hard in general / and we can't complain if things are hard - Talib Kweli
• He caused earthquakes / just from / ex-per-i-ments / some thoughts got lost / not knowing where it went - GZA
• The half-truth is a whole lie - Fly Union
• Stay fluid even in staccato - Mos Def
• I saw The Wizard when the curtain fell - Talib Kweli

And my new mantra for the Bar...

• I'm exhausted but I'll never ever forfeit - Black Thought

[Image via http://black-thought.com/]

Saul Williams

(Click here for Part II)

It was a cold night. Not cold like the Winter/ just cold like an energy / was in the air I generally / don't like. / The Driver had to dip / so he left me in the whip / turned round said "You know you're on your own, right?" - Black Thought

In order of progress from Start to Finish during this two-month marathon of study...

1. I'm workin' while the Boss relaxin' - Black Thought
2. I'm the shaky hand that touched George Foreman in Zaire - Nas
3. Bone gristle poppin' from continuous grindin' - Mos Def
4. Everybody knows me like the Contra code for extra men - Wale
5. Cuttin' up bodies and talkin' to the pieces - Notorious B.I.G.
6. I know where I'm goin' even when it's dark - The Roots
7. I'm half dead / never felt more alive - Peedi Peedi
8. Who's gonna stop us? Not a god damn one o' ya - The Clipse

Three from Lil Wayne:

• I like brain so I f*ck with a whole lotta nerds
• If it's bullsh*t you want, it's bullsh*t I share
• I do what I do and I do it right

And my favorite, by Saul Williams:

These words are not tools of communication
They are shards of metal
Dropped from eight story windows
They are waterfalls and gas leaks
Aged thoughts rolled in tobacco leaf
The tools of a trade
Barbers barred, barred of barters
Catch phrases and misunderstandings
But they are not what I feel when I am alone
Surrounded by Everything and Nothing
And there isn't a word or phrase to be caught
A verse to be recited
A man to de-fill my being in those moments
I am blankness, the contained center of an "O"
The pyramidic containment of an "A"
I stand in the middle of all that I have learned
All that I have memorized
All that I've known by heart
Unable to reach any of it
There is no sadness
There is no bliss
It is a forgotten memory
A memorable escape route that only is found by not looking
There, in the spine of the dictionary the words are worthless
They are a mere weight pressing against my thoughtlessness
But then...
Who else can speak of thoughtlessness with such confidence?

[Like this post? Check out my Muxtape.]

Wale

I love when quality rap and NPR collide. First was the most tremendous Fresh Air interview ever, a full hour with Terry Gross and The Rza. And now Wale's Nike Boots is featured as the Song of the Day.

Wale is one of the best around. I still can't thank sansserif enough for introducing me to the kid. Wale's 100 Miles and Runnin' is one of the best hip hop cds of the last couple of years, and I'd never have heard it if not for her suggestion. Via Elitaste:

After releasing a popular mix tape (100 Miles & Running) last year, D.C. rapper Wale signed a deal with Interscope; his major-label debut is due early next year. Known for rapping over beats from unlikely sources — including French electronic duo Justice and English singer Lily Allen — Wale is a blogger favorite, and the song responsible for much of the buzz is "Nike Boots."

Featuring a dramatic, Southern-tinged beat from producer Osinachi, the song pays tribute to the downtrodden people of the DMV — as in the District, Maryland, and Virginia.

Wale's latest mixtape, a tribute to Seinfeld, is called The Mixtape About Nothing. The Washington Post loves it (free download here).

David Sedaris Reading On Letterman

Nothing like listening to David Sedaris read his own stuff...

Being such a big fan, I was disappointed when I couldn't make it to his mid-August shows in SF. And then I heard that he didn't show. Instead, an impostor donned the mask, lip-synced over two tracks, and took off. Worse, a friend in LA said he'd done it there the week before. Then reports started to stream in from more Doom-less dates.

Disappointed, I started searching the Intertron for news. The best report was from the Village Voice, which summarized everything I'd been able to learn via The Oracle.

"The first thing out of my mouth to my buddy was, 'Wow, that doesn't even look like him,' " says concertgoer Dan Schwab, a buyer for Adidas who flew down from Portland, Oregon, with his girlfriend to see the show. "He looked way skinnier—at least 30 or 40 pounds lighter than the guy I've seen before. The guy who was up onstage was just walking back and forth, doing a little bit of the 'rapper hands' action and giving high-fives."

Though unverified accounts of "fake" Doom shows have been swirling for a couple years, the critically beloved rapper usually does justice to his brilliant studio catalog in concert. Schwab, for one, says Doom's performance on the same stage two years earlier was one of the best he'd seen.

But this guy was a joke.

"I went up to the sound guy about two songs deep and said, 'No one can hear Doom's mic.' He looked at me and said straight-up, 'I know. His mic's not on, and that's not MF Doom.'"

No fun at all, and seemingly a slap in the face to fans and concert goers. But should fans have seen this coming? I mean, this is the same guy who "once said he planned to release an album called Impostor". Is Doom providing commentary on the state of the music industry, or on fandom, or on rapper as act as opposed to rapper as person?

In 2005, he even employed a double for a pair of photo shoots.

"He'd been calling our editor saying he wasn't feeling good and wasn't going to make it, but for the shoot he sent his hype man [Big Benn Kling-on] in the Doom mask," reports Scratch art director R. Scott Wells, referring to his magazine's story on The Mouse and the Mask, a full-length collaboration between Doom and the producer Danger Mouse. "The photographer didn't know any better, so he just went ahead and shot him. When we got the film back, we knew it wasn't Doom. Benn's a much bigger guy."

"I spoke to Doom, and he tried to tell me something to the effect of: It was a new persona he was experimenting with," says Jerry L. Barrow, who was Scratch's editor at the time. "He had some sort of justification for it, but to me it was really unprofessional." (The pictures were scrapped, and the magazine made light of the situation by running Photoshopped pictures of figures like Jessica Simpson and Saddam Hussein wearing the infamous mask.)

. . .

Doom appears to have performed the same stunt at Elemental Magazine, which he confirmed in a letter to the publication in late 2005. . . . [Doom] noted that several different actors, from Adam West to George Clooney, have played Batman. His note concludes, "In the world of hip-hop music on-the-other hand things might be considered even stranger although not at all unusual. When you have artists 'playing' themselves, pun intended while having someone else more qualified to write the story (beats and or rhymes). To each is owns, after all its just entertainment right?"

Even a 2003 NPR piece seems to foreshadow Doom's Wizard of Oz act:

Remember, even MF Doom, metal mask and all, is a created character. . . . According to the story that Doom tells, Viktor Vaughn is a scientist and a rapper who's traveling the cosmos looking for the best places to practice his art.

I'm left hoping that The Villain is pulling an Andy Kaufman. Based on the depth and genius of his body of work, I'd bet he's laughing at us, with us, and giving someone the metal finger right now. Hopefully he'll start performing again in the near future... in person this time. For now, I'll stick with Madvillainy and MM...Food?, and stay far away from his shows.

[Update 8/12/08] Doom sent out an imposter to Rock the Bells. Video here. One person left a great comment re that video: "I wouldn’t be surprised if it was an impostor… remember Fantastic 4 -
everytime they beat Dr. Doom, he was a robot at the end of the battle."

I rarely see live shows, but was excited when I went with a few friends to see The Mighty Mos Def at Mezzanine last night. Sold out show in a solid, medium sized venue. Solid crowd in attendance. Doors opened at 9pm, and all bars in SF must close by 2am. A work night, we figured he wouldn't get there till 10:30 or so, but when midnight rolled around and he still hadn't shown, the crowd began to get a bit restless. A guy standing in front of me had taken CalTrain into the city for the show. His plan had been to catch an hour or so of the show, then head back on the last train. Instead, the poor, devoted guy got to hear one song.

The show itself, once it finally got started, was fantastic. Mos didn't play as many of his older songs as I'd have liked, but he made up for that by playing some of his works in progress. Even better, he focused on and rapped over long stretches of the original jazz and soul tracks sampled for his music. Tremendous.

I guess rappers don't invest in watches. Hopefully, Mos will spend his watch money to give the DJ a raise. With no opening act and no updates before Mos' arrival, kid earned it.

Definition Video (one of my favorites)