Coolest Moment of Today (4/25)

I'm riding by on my bike today, extra cool-like, right? I'm moving at a snail's pace b/c I haven't quite gotten my pre-flu strength back. So, I look over and see this old guy waving fiercely at the sky. I laugh..and look up, only to see Obama's helicopters, making their way across DC's spring sky.
I stopped and waved, too.

-kw

The StereoType Demos: Episode 1

The StereoType Demos is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Episode 1:
Features recycled tracks, aka my music library staples. Newer stuff to come!

Peter Bjorn and John, Feat. Victoria Bergsman-Young Folks- (Diplo Youngest Folks Remix) [2009]

Broken Social Scene- 7/4 (Shoreline) [Broken Social Scene, Single 2006]

The Faunts-Memories of Places We've Never Been [High Expectations/Low Results, 2005]

Aphex Twin-Xtal [Selected Ambient Works 85-92, 1993]

Cee-Lo Green- Evening News [Cee-Lo Green ... is the Soul Machine, 2003]

Her Space Holiday-The Young Machines [The Young Machines, 2003]

Calm (via Nik Weston)-Dubbing For The Nature #2 Waltz for the Virgin Forest [Sakura Aural Bliss, 2003]

Moby- Another Woman [18, 2002]

Kings of Convenience-Know How [Riot in an Empty Street, 2004]

Final Fantasy-Library [Has a Good Home, 2005]

Erykah Badu-Telephone [New Amerykah, Pt 1: 4th World War, 2008]


To Download:
http://www.divshare.com/download/7176088-314

The StereoType Demos

It's arrived. After hours of procrastination by re-doing the intro 1000x (really), I've finished The StereoType Demos. The name is borne out of some adolescent and young adult ish when I got these hurtful responses to my music taste--"why do you listen to white people's music?" or "you're not like other black people." In effect, I was labeled "less black" because of this curiousity. In effect, I felt trapped within the confines of stereotypes and was so embarrassed that I adored the Counting Crows or The Ghetto Boys. (Now of course, there are race/class politics shaping my taste of music, but I don't want to go into it here. We can talk about it in person.)

On my podcast, you'll hear snatches of music from a few different genres. However, they all converge to create sounds that speak to me in a particular way. The making of this podcast has been extremely liberating (but terrifying) and I'm working through "my stuff" in creating it.

I really dislike it when someone takes credit for "putting you on" to different artists--I like to think that music finds a way into a life in a more poetic way than that.
With that being said, big ups to all of my friends who slipped me mixed cd's along the way or dropped some on my hard drives. From time to time, you may hear song that are familiar to you. They are blessings, really. Some of these tracks have become as good of friends as you are to me.

Tat-Tat Tatt'd up

A wonderful friend of mine shared a poem with me this weekend. As I prepare/anticipate/freak out about the start of school in the fall, I need a bit of something to hold onto before the whirlwind starts. It was a great sedative for my anxiety about losing me in the midst of books, grades, and pace. Also, I read somewhere that Maya Angelou told her son once, when he was young, to find a poem, lock it within and it would get you through...This is going tobe mine.

The Blue Star

"Show me the place," he said.

I removed my shirt and pointed

to a tiny star above my heart.

He leaned and listened. I could feel

his breath falling lightly, flattening

the hairs on my chest. He turned

me around, and his hands gently

plied my shoulder blades and then rose

to knead the twin columns forming

my neck, "You are an athelete?"

"No," I said, "I'm a working man."

"And you make?" he said. "I make

the glare for light bulbs." "Yes,

where would we be without them?"

"In the dark." I hear the starched

dress of the nurse behind me,

and then together they helped me

lie face up on his table, where blind

and helpless I thought of all

the men and women who had surrendered

and how little good it had done them.

The nurse took my right wrist

in her strong hands, and I saw the doctor lean toward me,

a tiny chrome knife glinting in

one hand and tweezers in the other.

I could feel nothing, and then he said

proudly, "I have it!" and held up

the perfect little blue star, no longer me and now bloodless. "And do

you know what we have under it?""No," I said. "Another perfect star."

I closed my eyes, but the lights

still swam before me in a sea of golden fire. "What does it mean?"

"Mean?" he said, dabbing the place

with something cool and liquid,

and all the lights were blinking on

and off, or perhaps my eyes were

opening and closing. "Mean?" He said,

"It could mean this is who you are."

-Philip Levine

Following the poem, the author (not Levine) wrote of a friend who was about to start medical school and how she was goint to get the blue star mentioned in the Levine poem, b/c she too was an artist, poet to be exact, and feared just as I do, losing that self. How apt, right? The author argued with his friend, didn't understand why she'd do such a thing, as she'd be changed by this experience, and later might even be embarassed of the tatoo. She met his comments with her own, saying (something like) if she was in fact embarassed, years later when she saw the tattoo..then she should be b/c she never wanted to forget that she is an artist.

So this all inspired me to get a tattoo before school starts. It's too coincidental to not be the universe dropping hints. I think I know what it'll be, but where and when are undecided details. I'll keep you all posted--and will drop pics also.

The music's got my tongue:

via videosift.com

Today's been one of those days where I hide behind my noise cancelling head phones and dare my officemates to speak to me. So in between working, I've been surfing and came upon one of my loves, DJ Shadow's (Joshua Davis) Midnight In a Perfect World. There are so many types of DJ's out here, and he's the serious type. He's basically like a neonatal cardiac surgeon when it comes to suturing samples. This track is off his album Endtroducing, just a beautiful piece of music, each track flows into one another as if we're witnessing the path of water and the earth it takes with it. Whenever I hear his music, I get the feeling that this is pretty close to truth for him and those who love his music. Digest y'all.

A fix.

Tonight, I stepped out of Border's feeling quite powerful--you see, I just bought my own copy of The Souls of Black Folks, and with the weather just cold enough to keep my senses open, I finally heard Radiohead's, All I Need. (Not as it relates to their valiant yet poor attempt to depict white privelage in their video.) The song's intro, a build-up, the calculated advance of a lover. The song progresses this way, picking up speed until the last 40 sec. of the track. It's like
being f-cked, and not being able to think--just crave, thirst, and need in a desperate, but beautiful way. All at once you cross over into this grey area of something feral and something tame. One threatening to surrender, while the other is threatening to escape. And once you get "it" whatever your "it" may be, it is all you need. However, does this satisfaction mean that your senses won't go searching for it again? For me it doesn't. And Yorke manifests this same feelings in his vocals. In short peeps, it's a dope track. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. I'm a Radiohead junkie that's addicted to "enough. "

my mic sounds nice. (check one)

I'm resurfacing, never fear! I'm putting the finishing touches (vocals) on the podcast. At least the sound of my own voice isn't repulsive, anymore. I shall return. Most importantly, the podcast has a name "Spoke." More on that soon!

-kw