A few months back I was invited to host a Taz Arnold showcase at Tammany Hall. I was surprised that I got the invite but I can thank the homey Meyhem Lauren who was cool with the show promoters and respects my Polo steez. Taz Arnold set the Polo Ralph Lauren collecting world on fire when he repurposed his archive of holy grail I.T.’s into the project he called ‘The Americans‘.
The Americans was at first perverse to me because I thought it mocked some of the items which people tried to acquire and would subsequently defend with their everlasting manhood. It wasn’t until I met Taz in person, and saw some of the pieces firsthand where it all made sense to me. The Americans isn’t a mockery, but a celebration. Taz Arnold is a fucking iconoclast. He is Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Ralph Lauren and Karl Lagerfeld with the Blackness of Jean-Michel Basquiat and Willi Smith.
I chilled in Taz’ hotel room at the Hudson Hotel for a few hours and kicked it with him about his motivations for fashion, music and style. It’s crazy that you watch this dude from the prism of social media and think that maybe he is wrong for his shit. Maybe he’s forcing his shit?. Nope. This dude is more centered and focused than 99.9% of the people who you might look to for artistic inspiration. Taz Arnold doesn’t play that safe lane because he’s been doing his thing for at least twenty years.
That blew my mind. Taz Arnold was more like me than I would have cared to admit before we had this meeting. I privately gave him props for pulling MCM from the vintage dustbin and making that shit hot again, but I secretly thought he might have lucked up with that move. Nah, Internets. Taz Arnold is locked in on that future funk flow flavor. You might will not be able to understand what his doing right now with this latest musical project.
Taz calls it ‘rAd AmericA‘ and this shit is nuts. File this under future vintage cocaine blow flow bounce.
‘cAliforniA $uite’
‘who fuckin’ with u$’
dont get it is he a hiphop artist or the deadmau5 type act /lmf0. shits over my head, i remeber way back in 95 when madonna or somebody tried bring this euro trash sound round here, hate to admit it bout 3 years ago when mtv put the jersey kids on tv with that techno club shit all of a sudden it got huge. listen to the radio today theres no boom bap its all computer noise like the shit dallas just played, your slipping. joke, wheres dopplegang new shit.
Nah pmac,
I’m Hip-Hop to my core. You just got put on. Matter of fact you ain’t even on. You listen to rap for the escapism. You would love to know my blues but you would end up choking without the privilege to be safe. Go somewhere that gives you the shit you want. I won’t miss you here.
I can respect everything you said in the write up, but the two joints posted, ain’t for me. This progressive shit can proceed straight to the recycle bin..
LEX,
I feel you my G and don’t think that you need to attach to all movements spawned by the Hip-Hop godhead.
The fly shit to me is that Hip-Hop birthed rap and all kinds of remixes to jazz, rock, blues and disco sounds. Get in where you fit in. I know I’ll be there too.
What.. Just what is this?
hmmm this stuff is going over my head like it’s was mixed wrong or something. are these final versions of the songs? i understand being different or trying something different but i find this music to just be irksome.
Hmmm? I was born in 1980 in Haiti raised in Brooklyn and consider myself as hip hop as the next. I am also a house & techno Dj but nothing like the cacophonous sounds heard on Jersey Shore. With that said, I don’t get it. Like the homie BigNat before, is this the final mixdown?! With regards to The Americans, I can only describe it as sacrilege & blasphemy. In the early aughts when everyone was on that over-sized Mitchell & Ness wave, I wore ‘Lo. When Kanye was talking Ralph Lauren was boring before he wore him, I wore ‘LO. I knew of 88 Keys back in the 90s not as a producer but as a Lo Head because I also lived on LI. You say dude has been around for 20 years? Where? Now that RL is “cool” again, it’s a little harder to separate the soldiers from the bandwagon patrons. I wish Taz Arnold the best with his endeavours, I just wont be supporting.
Mr.BL,
I know exactly what you say when you feel like The Americans project was blasphemous. That is the way ALL ‘Lo heads felt at first, and frankly, most still do. It wasn’t until I held these joints and studied the craftsmanship that I understood what a tribute to the original items it was.
tAz current musical inclinations may not resonate with you personally but since you are a DJ you have to understand how personal music is in the first place. I fux with the Sa-Ra collective and I understand what they are doing isn’t meant to be safe or familiar. It’s out there. Just like someone scratching a record or looping a breakbeat. You gotta live long enough to remember when that was the avant-garde.
RL isn’t cool again to the true heads. It hasn’t ever gone anywhere. RL is timeless and that’s the truth. For tAz to know which pieces are the heirloom I.T.’s is enough for me to respect his pedigree in this ‘Lo shit.
People fear what they don’t understand and then try to justify that fear with ignorance…it’s human nature. Everyone’s mind is not fit to wrap around everything it encounters, therefore most of the things we encounter will go right over our heads simply because your mind was not fit. Taz, at the end of the day is an artist and creativity shows no boundaries nor should it be boxed with fancy schmancy gift wrap paper and a pretty little bow….
Dallas, you know the time like a Swatch Watch homie and I’m glad you got the experience first-hand…
that clip is straight out of Jodorowski’s “El Topo”. Really, it aint hard to tell.