January 5th, 2009
If you asked your average rap music fan in between the ages of 28yo and 35yo what is the album they anticipate the most I bet the answer would be ‘Detox’ from Dr. Dre. I’m not even hypothesizing that answer. I know this for a fact. It has only been talked about for the last seven years. The question has been what is taking so long for this album to be released?
There have been some hiccups and roadblocks in front of the arrival of this album. None greater than the death of Dr. Dre’s eldest child from what has been ruled an accidental drug overdose. In this particular case, detox certainly did not arrive on time. The irony of the album’s projected title should be lost on no one. But I believe that from this tragedy we will receive a landmark musical lesson from Dr. Dre.
KanYe West found a way to condense the pain he felt inside and deliver what was prA’li the best hip-pop album of all time. Filled with passion, rhymes, new wave synth grooves, vocoder vocal pitch tricks, hissy bitch fits and just generally all around G.O.O.D. music. What do you think a producer of Dr. Dre’s caliber could do if he released the same amount of raw emotion that KanYe exuded? I think he could make an album that might cause a lot of heads to overdose the day it is leaked.
Think about how many of you switched your swagger up because of Dre’s influence? That is the power of music. It shapes how you view the world and you place inside of it. It tells you to wear a black hoody or to sk8board down the street. It teaches you how to speak to one another and how to treat one another. Music is that powerful in its ability to socialize us all. The best musicians are teachers and the best teachers and music lovers. You can not separate the two.
I hope that when Dr. Dre finally releases the ‘Detox’ album he chooses to include all the lessons he has learned from his time spent making music. The friends he has had to watch come into his leave and then abruptly leave without affording him the chance to say goodbye. None of these losses greater than that of Andre Young Jr. who wanted nothing more than to make music that influenced people just like his father. You will never get the pain from loss out of your blood system. You can only hope to make some music to give you a brief detox.
Posted in Crappers, Lust = Love, When I Reminisce..., 5 Elements | 5 Comments »
January 5th, 2009
If you thought that president-elect OBAAMA was going to waltz into the White House you were sadly mistaken. It seems that he is being chipped away from his support base even before his first day on the job. Now another state Governor finds himself embroiled in a money scandal. The Mexican governor of New Mexico (where else?!?) BILL RICHARDSON has withdrawn his name from consideration of the cabinet position in the new administration because of a Federal investigation into the contracts issued by his state to a campaign supporter.
The problem that I have seen with Governor BLAGOJEVICH and now Governor RICHARDSON is that neither of them are working on big money kickbacks. A million dollars is chump change compared to the hunderds of billions that are being sent to the banking institutions to keep them happy. The governors are selling themselves out for less than pennies on the dollar. Even the automakers are asking for upwards of fifty billions dollars to rescue their flailing enterprises and these toupee topped governors are looking like boxcar hobos. If our culture still wore hats these dudes would have them in their hands turned upside down.
All of these scandals make me nervous to wonder what skeletons OBAAMA has buried in his closet. We all know that he still puffs on the squares. And we have all heard the jailhouse stories about what some men will do when they have been denied a cigarette for a certain amount of time.
*shudders at the thought*
Posted in Social Upheaval, C.R.E.A.M., No Boutros Boutros... Ghali, Wig Owners, Harpers Weekly Review, HUFF YOU!, Politricks | 1 Comment »
January 5th, 2009
It’s bad enough that Black males are killing each other like “new sunglasses” a.k.a. the trend that NEVER goes out of style, there is still the lynchpin of supremacy that they have to worry about i.e. police brutality.
Here’s a clip of a young Black teenager (no Kamron) being cuffed and then shot in the back of the head like they do to animals in third world countries like New Orleans parish.
Video: KTVU.com
I don’t know what it is to be a parent, but I can imagine that this kid’s parents are all fucked the fuck up right now. My dad used to HATE for me to go out on the streets on New Year’s Eve. Partly because he knew I knew how to find trouble, and mostly because he knew that the world didn’t care about anyone. Do you think that police who shot this kid in the back cared about his family and how they would feel when they identified their child’s body at the county morgue?
Peep that video one more time and spot how the officer standing on the kid’s neck has to jump out of the way so that he doesn’t catch hot lead either. The shooter didn’t even give a fuck about his partner. That is the realest video I have seen since the beating of RODNEY KING. It reminds me of how zealous and reckless the police were when they threw fifty bullets at SEAN BELL.
I’m not even going to bother learning the name of the Black kid that was murdered. I don’t feel like investing my brain space on this dead kid. Since he was born a so-called Black he was born to die. That is how supremacy works. Happy new year to everyone that isn’t this dude’s parents. Wash, rinse and repeat.
Posted in Social Upheaval, Black Bullshit, When I Reminisce..., Harpers Weekly Review | 18 Comments »
January 2nd, 2009
Editor’s note: DP Dot Com celebrates 25 years of being the freshest nigga of all time.
When I had noticed that I was no longer the first person that the swoosh brand was checking for my feelings were a little hurt. I mean. hadn’t we done big things together? I still keep a copy of the love letter I sent to Beaverton, begging her to bring back the Dunk style. She was only interested in Jordan fans now and giving Air Force 1’s to undeserving rap artists. Where were these dudes when the Air Train was on the streets? I bet none of them knew you for your wild beauty during the Air Tech Challenge ‘90 years. But there I was kicked to the curb, while some newjack rookies received all of your attentions.
I was holding on even though it was obvious that you were going in another direction. I wasn’t ready to share my heart again after so many years. Who would want my love anyway. Everybody wants someone that is younger and more beautiful than the next. My young, beautiful days were well beyond me now. I thought that I would just go to PayLess and settle down. Forget about what used to be and just be happy with the memories of the good times.
During the summer I bumped into a pair of leather ROD LAVERs and they told me that the three stripes brand was looking for a committment from an older guy. I admit that I was intrigued. The three stripes had the classic Forum in a New York state colorway that was my 1986 Shea Stadium workshoe. It was comfortable as all get out and that helped me scale the steep upper mezzanine seats with my Harry M. Stevens propaganda. So I visited the three stripes and we started dating a bit. I liked the way the three stripes reflected on their history. I thought that it was a real appreciation of the past, but I soon found out it was just a facade. The past was used just for exploitation without any serious reverence for the journey. I had traveled all the way to Paris in seach of the navy/burgundy ILIE NASTASE. Instead I found only disappointment.
I was prepared to go on now alone because there is no way in hell I would ever touch the apartheid supporters again. As soon as I had been told that Reebok’s Union Jack insignia was becaue of their support from South Africa I never again purchased a pair of the sneakers.
I rode the Metro to Les Halles to satisfy my heart with a delicious freshly prepared raspberry Gran Marnier crepe. As I walked through the courtyard I saw so many happy kids wearing their Dub-Zeros and the latest Jordan retros that were flooding the streets. As I walked past the most non-descript boutique I could hear a Wu-Tang baseline pulsating from the open door. I curiously looked inside just to see what a Parisian boutique that features Wu-Tang would sell.
The store was filled with NIKE Dunks. It was visually exhilarating to see all of these sneakers at once. There were colors that I hadn’t seen in America since the mid-eighties. The Michigan Wolverine’s high tops, the Iowa Hawkeyes, Kentucky Wildcats, the Ohio State, Syracuse’s orange and white. It brought back memories of heaven. When I went to the Latin Quarter I used to wear one Wildcat dunk on one foot and one Syracuse Dunk on the other foot. A fringe benefit from working at Shea Stadium was that I had ‘found’ several authentic Mets jerseys and caps because I was enterprising like that. My orange and blue color coordination was a favorite of those in my crew and the haters prah’lee felt a kind of way too, but we had too much posse for my mix match Dunks and my Mets gear to be an issue.
So even though the swoosh brand had apparently moved on it was obvious that she still had affections for me and she remembered all the good times that we shared. I decided that I could live with being her ‘old school john’ because she still knew how to make me feel like a million bucks when we were together.
Just don’t step on my feets when you see me in the streets.
One Hundred.
Posted in Lust = Love, When I Reminisce..., The Addict, Sneaker Fiends United | 7 Comments »
