Archive for February, 2009

Beef, It’s What’s For Dinner…

Wednesday, February 11th, 2009

beef

BILLY X. SUNDAY stays giving the people what they want.

Survey says that the people who frequent XXL mag dot com are mostly into shit other than music. The Chris Brown beatdown of his former beatbox Rihanna is now the most discussed story while the ongoing internets shenanigans of the raptors Fisty Scent and Rick Raws is more popular than the music they are releasing as the soundtrack. Rap music now has to play the background to weblogs about… Rap music.

Don’t act like you didn’t see this coming. This is what you asked for. You were gullible enough to imagine that someone had amassed wealth from illicit narcotics trafficking prior to recording songs in which he claimed to be a wealthy narcotics trafficker. Enough of you bought into that fantasy to let the survey takers know that you would also consume ringtones over orchestral productions. This simultaneously followed the idea that simple call and response lyrics were more palatable than rhymes containing too many polysyllabic words.

As the music component of Hip-Hop was dumbed down for packaging the audience followed suit. Why do you think the WWE has such a tremendous following in the south, midwest and Philidelphia? This is where the dumbest populations in America reside and where they crave the entertainment of actors dressed up in underwear grabbing each other’s crotches. Wrestling was always the pastime for teh ghey mongoloids. Professional wrestling is definitely entertaining but the viewers with any sense have left reality at the door. We know the actors all have lunch together from the same craft services buffet table.

Rick Ross had his actor facade removed last year with the disclosure that he was formerly a correction officer prior to his career change to a recording artist. Fifty Cent was on a downward trajectory since releasing his monumental album Get Rich or Die Trying back in 2003. These two artists needed this Vince McMahon type excitement to justify the amounts of money that their respective labels have invested in them. What the labels should be doing is arranging for a cage match between the two since the survey says that is what the fans want to consume. Are music labels ready to convert themselves into fight, er, concert promoters?

All that is left now is the spectacle since we are no longer interested in the lyrics or the music. At the end of the day the so-called fans gathered around for the negativity and the controversy. And you know whose legacy those marketing strategies belong to…

Tupac.

SWAGGER LIKE US…

Tuesday, February 10th, 2009

lifestyle

It may appear to you that I am falling behind you in the race, but the truth is that I am on my third lap already while you just got into the game.

lifestyle

lifestyle

lifestyle

lifestyle

lifestyle

And you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!

The Most Hip-Hop Magazine Is…

Tuesday, February 10th, 2009

antenna

BILLY X. SUNDAY says its not who you think…

I’m poring over the magazine rack at the supermarket when I come across this chunky magazine that looks like one of those hip fashion rags. Its obviously for cool motherfuckers like myself because the cover photo has a snowboarder jacket featured along with a pair of my favorite sneakers, the Nike Dunks. I pick the magazine up and the shit is brawlic. Like you know those mags that should be hardbound because they are so heavy? These dudes are using some good ass paper too.

I love magazines that are printed in such a hardbody fashion that they will last a few years of me flipping through the pages. On some coffee table shit where the magazine can be used as the table. These are the joints that are built like reference books so you can consult them for the the next several months instead of finding out what the flavor of the week. Flavor of the week is just the flavor of the weak. Do you homos dig my homonyms? Anyhoo…

So the mag was called Antenna and the shit was filled with streetwear ads that looked like eye candy for those of us fuxing with shit like Stussy, or G-Shock or Motorola. The features were about the next season’s shoes, t-shirts and gadgets and the twenty-somethings, thirty-somethings that design all of this slick shit. I was impressed with the content as much as I was attracted to the ads. To tell you the truth they all seemed to meld into one linear path and I didn’t even mind. You know how the ads can sometimes appear forced into a magazine? Not in this shit. Everything was all together like gumbo.

So now I had to go a little deeper to find out who was putting this dope shit out. When a nigga like me goes through a publication that is so visually exciting the next thing I am thinking is that I want to work for whoever is publishing this joint because they obviously know what the fuck is really good. Holy shit! Haha. Antenna mag is published by the people at Harris. The same folks putting out a shitload of gun fanatic magazines and even XXL. Where the hell do they keep all the cool motherfuckers doing this Antenna mag shit? No one in the XXL offices is this fucking cool. Well there is Daytwon, and there is Carl, and there is… Nah, that’s it.

These clowns doing the Antenna mag are more Hip-Hop than the people doing XXL, which in all fairness focuses primarily of the music facet of Hip-Hop which is rap while eschewing the other elements of Hip-Hop. Damn, I want to work for the Antenna people. They aren’t looking at what’s now. They are fucking with what’s next. Streetwear culture has surpassed Hip-Hop culture in content and marketability. It’s what Hip-Hop used to be before the music industry commodified rap music. Streetwear culture is active and inclusive, while Hip-Hop culture now looks like Jay-Z standing on stage. Stiff and immobile.

I fux with streetwear culture because I can listen to my rock music and my rap and whatever the else I fucking like to hear. My friends can be of all different races and most of them are half white and half ______________ (insert ethnicity/race of choice). This is the future of America party people. Antenna will be our magazine too. I’m just mad this shit only drops quarterly.

Eastbound & Down For The Count…

Tuesday, February 10th, 2009

eb & d

How do you have a show called Eastbound & Down and you DON’T play the anthem for trucker trash culture? That’s a fail off the bat.

The second strike is all this hype about a baseball sitcom and then NO baseball. What is the deal with that?

The third strike was the writing which might have been on strike at the time. You are fucking out Eastbound & Down.

The good thing for you guys is that there are nine innings.

The truth about television show premieres is that they are often less hit and more miss. Home Box Office however has a ridiculous track record for their original programming so you can expect at minimum a certain level of entertainment. Where their series ‘Flight of the Conchords’ is smart, and unassuming in its wit, ‘Eastbound & Down’ is predictable with its punchlines. I’m not saying thats a bad thing at all, but HBO has spoiled us rotten with quirky, hilarious shit like LARRY DAVID’s ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’. Its a little weird for me to find myself giving a shit about Kenny Powers who is the lead character in ‘Eastbound & Down’. CYE’s Larry made his selfishness and stupidity amusing. EB & D’s Kenny Powers is just grating.

The same people who brought us shit like ‘Talladega Nights’ and ‘Step Brothers’ along with the same actor who featured in ‘Tropic Thunder’ and ‘Pineapple Express’ have teamed up to give us nothing like the hot shit I just mentioned. Where ‘Eastbound & Down’ fails is that the writing seems to have been set up for a laugh track. Characters aren’t just one dimensional. Some are non-dimensional. And I can’t force myself to laugh at a holograph. The writers need to sit down and decide what they want to do with this character who is supposedly a former major league player of the highest caliber all the while being a cretin of the lowest possible moral fiber.

I’m not saying that it can’t work, but someone needs to come in and refine the show. DANNY McBRIDE is funny as the lead even though he is working with some cliche’d bits. The show should have dealt with his downward spiral from the majors. Kenny Powers should have been that guy that snorted cocaine off a stripper’s ass cheek. That is the outrageous the show needed as opposed to showing us a nude shot of McBride in the shower at the middle school his character is supposed to be teaching at. Nude shots and profanity are all golden when they are done right, but when they are done wrong, they are just gold-plated like the slum jewelry on Jamaica Avenue.

I’m going to give ‘Eastbound & Down’ at least one more shot because the creative team behind Funny Or Die has to still have some funny left inside of them. Also because my folks from Cornerstone Marketing make sure that I stay invited to shit that I love with no reservation. If ‘Eastbound & Down’ doesn’t make it to sweeps week (does cable even give a fuck about that shit?) don’t blame DP dot com. Blame the fact that JERRY REED’s theme song from ‘Smokey & The Bandit’ was nowhere to be heard.

De La Soul – Excursions

Tuesday, February 10th, 2009

de la

De La Soul – ‘Excursions’ (Extended Tribute ReMix)

J.Period is back at it…

The Best of Abstract

Album download free via The Gud Word