-“A Special Halloween Presentation: Idolator’s (Sorta) Guide To Horrorcore” by Jess Harvell from Idolator.com
Thoughts on the Knux’s Album…
Well…it’s not good at all. Embarrassing to listen to really. So many of the riffs and melodies seem lifted from older songs and not in a sampled or interpolated way, in just this bullshit way that seems like it’s riding the still-for-some-reason kinda popular mash-up craze. Some of their flows and stuff too, sound exactly like the flows of rap songs of the past and it’s odd. Lil Wayne sometimes does this too, where he’s using the inflections and cadences from some old Three Six song or something but over a new beat with new lyrics…like that way no one will notice. And when they rap, it sounds too much like Outkast for comfort. Funny thing was, I was psyched about this in a way and was like “Cappucino Remix” is really good” only to find out original “Cappucino” is a totally different beat! If Girl Talk made a whole CD based around ATLiens accapellas, you’d get Remind Me in 3 Days.
The Next Polow Da Don?
For serious. The only joke here is that kinda You Tube sensation Rodney Jenkees makes way better beats. Put this dude on the cover of XXL. Imagine the club-ready stomp of Polow with the futuristic–or really, what was considered futuristic-sounding in 1982–of well, pretty much everybody these days and throw in a healthy dose of like trebly 8-bit sounds from like, Jurassic Park for NES and you get the sounds of Rodney Jenkees.
New ‘Wax Poetics’!
I mean, every issue of this magazine’s worth highlight, but this month’s is one where it really does feel like they made it for me or something: Shuggie Otis interview, Grant Green’s son, Slick Rick, and lots more. Especially that Otis interview. There’s not a whole lot of information about him and at the same time, he’s not like this super-mythic dude, just a guy that doesn’t seem to really give a shit. And the interviewer, Ronnie Reese, gets that and respects it.
-Hilarious FILA Wikipedia Entry I Read The Other Day
“Fila apparel was also very popular in the 1980s rap scene (today often called Old school hip hop). Examples are the song “Do the Fila” by Steady B, “Put your Fila’s on” by Schoolly D or even a whole group labeled Fila Fresh Crew. Also the cover of Just-Ice’s first album makes use of Fila signs.”
“On the other hand, in their 1989 song “The Sounds of Science”, the Beastie Boys exhorted listeners to “Rock my Adidas; never rock Fila.”
“However, in a dramastic reversal five years later, Mike D tried to mount a Fila revival, only to encounter considerable resistance: “Step into the party with the Fila fresh gear, people looking at me like I was David Koresh here” (“The Scoop”, Ill Communication, 1994).”
-“No Tricks This Halloween” by Noz off Cocaine Blunts:
Noz says what I was trying to say nicely with my Halloween post in a way more honest and er, blunt way..
-“Disney Makes a Porno, While Kevin Smith Lays an Egg” by Armond White from the New York Press
“High School Musical at least started as a good idea: The original film was a genuinely amusing fable about American plurality and teen division. Cute, multiracial kids at an Arizona high school released their energy in sports and theater—an ingenious way to combine the adolescent impulse to move with the post-Michael Jackson dance template that has ruled mainstream pop for the past quarter-century. HSM rescued the movie-musical from Chicago, Moulin Rouge, Rent and Dreamgirls’ desecration by reviving its connection to popular music (the rousing, propulsive songs made the CD a bestseller). It revived the concept that song and dance could release otherwise inexpressible emotions. The genius part? Each song advanced ideas of gender, race and economic diversity as natural and fun. Troy (Zac Efron), Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens), Sharpay (Ashley Tisdale), Chad (Corbin Bleu) and Ryan (Lucas Grabeel) became new-era tween stars who embodied multicultural aspiration and harmony better than the original 1950s Mouseketeers did. Sure, it was politically correct utopianism, but is there any better example to teach children?”
Awesome Book: Bat-Manga!: The Secret History of Batman in Japan
Album of the Week: Creep Wit Me by Il Al Skratch
Are You A Serious Comic Book Reader?