Two Turntables and a Blog

My review of Missy Elliots "The Cookbook" on Prefixmag.com

Song of the Day- Missy Elliot "Can't Stop"

I was listening to some (clear channel) radio the other day and Montell Jordan’s 1995 joint “Somethin’ for the Honeyz” came on. I hadn’t heard this song in about 10 years (and from listening to the song, you’ll probably know why)! But at the time of it’s release, at the tender age of 15, I, unlike some of my friends who were feelin’ Too Short, Richie Rich, Mac Mall, 2pac and Biggie, chose instead to get down with “the 6’8 brotha in a big black truck.” Being 6’8, as Montell sings on his first two singles—the old school nite guarantee “This is how we do it” and the aforementioned “Something for the Honeyz”—should not be a gimmick to compensate for lack of charisma, flow, or style. But i will admit to liking some bad music.

I just happen to like bad music perhaps more than others realize. Why “Somethin’ for the Honeyz” and Montell Jordan made such impressions on me back then… I don’t know. But for some reason it just reminds me of summer and young teenage idleness or awkwardness—stuff that I thought at the time was straight up mackadocious. The 4 minute sonic timewarp got me wondering what other tracks also had the pathos of summer.

This is by no means a definitive list of summer anthems… if anything its far from it. In fact, it’s more me admitting that despite being a dj, I have had and still do have some pretty bizarre-if-not-borderline-wack music tastes. But this is really less about the music then it is about memories…

Anyway, so break out the sprite colored Supersoaker 50s cuz “school is out and it's a sort of a buzz, and back then I didn't really know what it was…” (fresh prince)

Here are my top four, in no particular order…

he had me twisted 

Keith Sweat – Twisted (remix) (Summer 1995)

Mr. Sweat’s legacy is manifest in his track “Twisted” (remix). His crooning is unmatched, probably cuz no one sounds as whiny as he does. I’m surprised that a song about being punked by a girl would sample Marvin Gaye’s “Lets Get it On,” a song about forthcoming sex, being that they have sort of divergent trajectories. But, hey, Sweat is still a sexy sangfroid despite his female situations. The song seems like it was built for teenage love and I’m pretty sure it’s was a staple on h.s. mixtapes—the sonic form of a love letter without directly saying.

So whut does this song have to do with Summer? Well, for some reason this song became the soundtrack for joyriding in my friends 1985 Toyota Corolla. During the summer before our sophomore year in h.s., several friends and I had just gotten our driving permits; it coincided with the release of “Twisted.” My friend’s 1985 Toyota Corolla was relatively light and for fun, my friend and I would quietly push it out of the garage and into the streets. My friend and I used to joy ride for a couple hours, with the windows down and Keith Sweat whiny voice even more evident through the treble friendly and bass empty speakers.

not a good look 

Men in Black – Will Smith (Summer 1997)

I admit, I NEVER liked this song. This song was all over the radio and MTV, but I guess if you have a blockbuster movie with a rapper-come-actor, then its only fitting that the song and soundtrack are gonna saturate the other avenues of mind control. Anyone notice that this soundtrack (perhaps excluding Smith’s track) was actually surprisingly hot? Anyhoo, MIB seemed to mark a transition: Fresh Prince became Will Smith; each single was thereafter was accompanied by a matching dance step (the “jiggy wit it dance” and the recent “switch” move). Unfortunately this trend has NEVER picked up, as evidenced by Cassidy’s “hustler” dance in his song “hustler.” I guess adding a bonus disc with videos and interviews is much more lucrative and won’t bust up your street cred.

This song definitely reminds me of summer because… well not just cuz it’s from a summer blockbuster. I remember a girl and I were sorta hanging out during that summer. We went to watch MIB at one of the few drive in theaters left in the bay area (it has long since been demolished and replaced with a 20+plex and its siblings Starbucks, Baskin Robbins, Borders, and Home Depot have also colonized the area too); it was an attempt to live out the backseat make out sessions that tv and film make endemic to outdoor theaters like that. Unfortunately, anytime my hand was placed on her thigh, she quickly brushed my hand off or away. We soon stopped hanging out after that…

But the latent backseat snuggle sessions wasn’t the problem. Basically we had nothing in common and had nothing to say to each other…at all. I realized that the sparks we had in 4th period U.S. history was really just me trying to use my charms to get the attention of the girl who sat in front of her. Plan B didn’t seem like such a bad consolation prize tho at the time.

Shortly after this girl and I watched MIB, my best friend at the time had just come home from a vacation with her family and I admitted to her that I had been hanging out with this other girl. My best friends exact words were “What? I leave for a month and you resort to this? Geez, were you that lonely?” Slightly embarrassedcuz i got called out by my best friend, I apologized for being "desperate" and figured it was best to end things as soon as possible...

Damage – Love II Love (Summer 1997)

I was flipping through my h.s. cd collection earlier today, I noticed that next to Lost Boyz “Legal Drug Money,” Bone Thugs “Creepin’ on the Come Up” and Dogg Pounds “Lets Play House” were cds with coolness in stark polarity to the ones just mentioned. Why did I buy Paperboy’s complete album; or even European boy band Take That’s “Back for Good”; and Hanson’s “mmm bop!” single (that was before I found out they were prepubescent white boys, but I guess that’s still not an excuse)? These are pretty horrendous, but nothing quite takes the cake as does Damage’s “Love II Love.”

The song reminds me of summer cuz it reminds me of my first summer of work and how much money I used to waste afterwards. I got my first taste of service labor as a busboy at my dad’s Chinese restaurant and absolutely loved it. I usually had about 15 dollars in cash tips per lunch, which would end up being spending it soon after my shift ended at a nearby Towerrecords. I happened to find this song in the singles section, but honestly, have no idea why I’d try it out.

Damage is basically a five person boy band and the single featured a very generic computerized drum loop with some synthy violins here and there and a horn blast every 8 bars. It’s the type of cheese that Euros would seem to get down to before these acts come state-side; if they were white, they’d been making millions soon after (see backstreet boys and n’sync). How I ended up spending 3.99 on this 2 track single—original and remix version—is besides me, but I do remember liking it so much that I bought a ANOTHER Damage single cuz it had another remix on it. This shit was not even on some posse cut-“Flava in ya Ear” Remix tip or even the b-team G-dep “Special Delivery” remix, but I basically spent 8 dollars on this one song, which I do remember listening to a lot during my breaks between lunch and dinner shifts, driving up and down El Camino Real, thinking I’d been the first to find this ‘gem.’

The song isn’t good, but it deserves some attention since it should be some sort of deterrent to my current record spending habits. Did I really need to buy two used copies of Total’s “What about Us” and when would I ever play any of them? And was buying Gerado’s “Rico Suave” for 10 dollars on ebay absolutely necessary?

You bet.

summer 2001 

“Where the Party at?” – Jagged Edge feat. Nelly (Summer 2001)

I’m not really about Thug n’B and nobody can really pull it off like the self-destructive Bobby Brown. But for some reason I really liked “Where the Party at” or maybe just cuz it came during a time when my friends and I were trying to take full advantage of new our age specific privileges.

Nelly—the hottest thing out there at the time—was on the track and seemed ideal in boosting the career of some of the ugliest r&b singers since Xscape. Nelly, like MIB few years before, was EVERYWHERE.

Besides the Radio and TV, the song was at Stan’s 21st birthday at Avaron—a Korean club catering to wealthy underage drinkers—where he tried to have as many shots as his new age. It was at a really racially tense house party in Davis, where white party goers glared at our 6 person brown and yellow posse. We, on the otherhand, sorta oogled at my friend’s roomate’s girlfriend’s friend who flashed her five thousand dollar “graduation presents” from her grandfather to everyone there, us included. It reminds me of a brief stint with a girl who after some intimate moments, would always start comparing me to her ex-boyfriends and told me I was just right (perfect really) as if I was the porridge in the story Goldilocks and the Three Bears. My first visit to Las Vegas seems to register when I think about the song too. Nothing particular exciting happened in Vegas tho…

But anyway here’s to Jagged Edge and Nelly for being the anthem to summer 2001!

Honorable mentions:

This DJ-Warren G (summer 1994)
Are you that Somebody –Aaliyah, RIP (Summer 1998)
Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop-Young Gunz (Summer 2003)

Song the day - definitely none of these...

(photo courtesy of Salon.com)

Shai, Ram (Shai's younger brother), and I saw "Saving Face" by engineer-come-writer/film director Alice Wu last nite. The reviews of the film I had read in both 'mainstream' dailies and independent Asian Am press were very positive; and they mention how the film doesn't get caught up in the intergenerational conflicts over Chinese Patriarchy and all the other cultural collisions. As Shai notes over at his blog, the film "doesn't need to force the issue of ethnicity." Plus it features the eternally beautiful Joan Chen. I hear she's living somewhere in the bay area. A lot of people have recommended this film and i will too..

here is a interview with writer/director Alice Wu from Hyphen Magazine online.

Oh...and i realized i have just spent close to 20 dollars on movies over the weekend. There is something not right about that.

Song of the Day-Bobby Brown "Roni"

In the past few years and recently, a lot of friends, family, and family friends have gotten married--or are planning to in the next year or so. A good friend of mine (and Stan’s) is getting married in a few weeks; and Stan and I thought it was fitting to watch “Wedding Crashers” to get tips on how to make his wedding the most worthwhile (just kidding folks). For those that are completely disengaged from popular culture or could care less about it and films like this one, the basic premise of the movie is two friends who crash (random) weddings and attempt to hook up with women at each one, usually by taking on false identities to charm their way into the family. The film was actually pretty funny—or at least funnier than I thought it was going to be—and it made me think of some of the best wedding moments I’ve had. The story isn't much. It basically consists of nothing more than a few interesting moments on the dancefloor that made me feel like John Travolta or rather the legendary Crazy Leggs but with Jay-Z swagger. So in an attempt to make myself seem a lot sexier than I really am… here is my #1 wedding moment so far!

Don’t worry, this story is completely PG-13.

A friend of mine got married in a typical beach town in California. It was a small, intimate ceremony on the beach—if it wasn’t for the beach balls rolling into the ceremony from on-lookers--in the late afternoon with the sun beginning it’s descent. My friends didn’t believe me when I said we were overdressed as everyone in the family and friends were dressed in matching “Aloha” shirts and white/khaki shorts--typical California beachheads who think they’ve recreated their favorite South Pacific fantasy on the ‘mainland.’ For a minute, I thought I was at the restaurant “Spoons” more so than being at a wedding. The theme continued at his house where the reception was held, with more “touristy” imaginations of the South Pacific: décor decked out “luau” style tiki torches and all.

A bunch of us younger folks—about 15 of us—had our own table and people were getting crazy faded at the table. That’s what weddings are for, right? I haven’t been to that many weddings, but from what I’ve been told and seen, weddings and receptions are really as much about entertaining guests as it is about celebrating a lifelong partnership (as my parent would says “between two families”), everlasting love, trust and monogamy. People have also told me that if you’re gonna bring (or as someone said "drag") all these people out, you gotta give them something to remember; and they mentioned this usually could entail lots of single people mingling (use your imagination!). Unfortunately, people’s anecdotes are usually a lot more scandalous than mine. I think the most I’ve scored at a wedding is someone’s auntie asking me to dance, but hey somethings more than nothing…

Everyone's getting pretty faded after the first hour and everyone's a lot more affectionate and touchy. A guy friend of mine hugs me and says "hey brian.... i just wanted to tell you... I hellla threw up my dinner in the bathroom just now!"

"..."

Anyway, after a couple hours, we decide to have a real "afterparty" to the wedding and we hit up a local club instead. By this time, people are more than inebriated, which is usually a good thing I guess. As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m no Carrie Ann Inaba but I’m definitely not the type to be “gardening” out on the dancefloor… but this night, my friend (mostly friend’s friends really) made me feel like I was Crazy Legs! I coulda busted out the running man or the butterfly and be mistaken for Usher. But it was probably the more the circus mirror alcohol distortions than anything else. It’s amazing how alcohol and intermittent club lightening can make me look like I’m dipped in sauce, yaddamean?

So we’re all on the dancefloor and a friend’s friend comes up to me and starts dancing with me and she says “you’re a really good dancer! You’re like P.Ditty!!!”

WHAT?

When was Ditty ever a good dancer? I didn’t know whether to be insulted or not considering this was the ‘pre-mogul’ Ditty and the post-Ma$e era of Bad Boy where he was twirling around in every video he ‘produced.’ Ditty was a backup dancer back in the day—I recently saw him in a Dougie Fresh video from the early nineties with a high top fade mad cheesin’—but his moves from his recent videos at the time “One”, “Bad Boy for Life” hardly qualified as fly. But considering this was a white girl saying this to me, I figure she was being real. I then proceeded to twirl harder than before.

The music was okay, the usual radio stuff and everyone seems to be having a pretty good time. A few minutes later, I’m dancing with my friend and then this girl (I didn’t know) that my guy friend brought to the wedding—who I hadn’t even talked to all nite—grabs me by the shoulder and turns me around. All of a sudden she did the typical booty dropping moves where she dropped fast than curled up slow. But on the recoil, she started whippin’ her long blond hair around—hitting me in the face in the process. She then dropped again and began doing some weird head bobbing around my crotch area. She then gets up walks away, but as she’s walking away, she turns around and looks at me, then goes back to talking to my friend on the side again as if nothing happened. The girl I was dancing with was laughing the whole time… I thought the moves were fresh, honestly. Definitely some new variations I hadn’t seen before.

So it’s almost 2 am at this point; we’re all pretty tired. I’m talking to my friend on the side talking about when we’re going to leave when this other girl comes up to me. This girl was the most faded of them all: She reeked of alcohol; was crazy slurring her words; stumbling, and was making mayo sandwiches with random people as the guy she was seeing was off on the side. Maybe she was trying to give her man a hint…

So I’m chillin’ on the side of the dancefloor and she gets up in my grill to tell me:

“I think you are soooo cool and sooooo hot.”

Damn, first I’m Ditty, then a maybe a stripper pole… now this? I said “thanks…” as I see her boyfriend a few feet behind her staring.

She then starts rubbing my chest followed by a very intentional butt grab (open handed I might add)—the whole time with her boyfriend watching a few feet behind! I’m starting to think that maybe my friend likes to watch his girlfriend with other dudes? Perhaps this is just some odd fetish of theirs...? I have a friend works for Google in the Advertisement/Customer service dept. and once told me that they had to check to make sure sites really had the stuff they were advertising through the Google search engine. One particular sight she said was a porn site for people with black sock fetishes; so maybe voyeurism was their thing? Maybe she was just wanted to compliment me and my fine ass-ets (she was very pleased I’m sure), no harm in that right? I was telling myself that I knew I shouldn’t have worn those linen khakis from Banana Republic…my butt in these pants were just too dangerous for the dancefloor. Anyway, at that moment, I told her that we should go dance, but two guys she was freaking with earlier beat me to it and grabbed her to resume their sandwich making…

Those were pretty much the hi-lites from that night; it is hardly ESPN Sportscenter material, but definitely some interesting masculine boosterism. So from what I learned from that nite and weddings is that 1) alcohol makes me look hella sexy. 2) me dancing in front of people who are drunk makes me look hella sexy or like a back up dancer in bad rap videos and 3) people expect to get faded and grind more than mortar and pestles at weddings. This probably happens to people on the regular when the hit up clubs so for a bunch of you readers, you’re probably thinking “dude, you don’t get out much do you?” or “its cuz you ain’t that young, fly, and flashy!” you could make a case for both, but my real point is to say that weddings can be pretty fun(ny) and make for great memories…as g-rated as they are.

Song of the day-Joy Enriquez “Tell me how you feel”

This is old news, but everyone loves re-runs right? Shaz sent out an email couple weeks ago and attached was Jeff Chang's commencement speech for the Asian American Studies dept. of University of California, Los Angeles this past academic school year. I've been talking about love, sex and loving sex--definitely the signs of bitter sexist sex-less man (like Kanye West says, "everyone's self-conscious, i'm just the first to admit it" and when i say "sexist" i don't mean that i'm misogynistic--i like to think that i'm not--but i honestly believe that men, regardless of how progressive you are, are still 'sexist' in some way or another due to the fact that you claim privileges and power un|consciously. so please, don't think im going around beating up women--cuz its usually the other way around). Jeff Chang's speech definitely makes me feel like I'm looking for love in all the wrong ways and places. Chang talks about love, compassion, and community building in a truly inspiring way.

***********************************************************************************

"To Dr. Min Zhou, Dr. Don Nakanishi, the Asian American Studies department faculty, the Asian American Center staff, Dr. Sue Ann Kim, Dr. Kay Song, Irene Soriano and the student graduation coordinating committee, and most of all, to the 2005 graduates of the UCLA Asian American Studies Department, please let me extend my heartfelt gratitude for being granted the honor to speak to you this afternoon. To you graduates, let me offer a hearty congratulations on your great achievement.

You are graduating into a dangerous world, a much more dangerous world than the one I graduated into 10 years ago...." read more

(picture courtesy of Yahoo Launch Music)

I admit, i am a Nick Cannon fan. I thought Drumline was incredible and made for a great blockbuster night and his (rare) hit Gigolo (featuring vocals and production by the Pied Piper) made me think he was the second coming of R.Kelly with that sexual corniness that we all love pre-tp2.com-and-feeling-on-your-booty. But his most recent single "Can I Live" is hard to read and it seems to take an inadvertent pro-life stance on the recent (but also on-going) controversies about abortion.

I never saw the full video until a few days ago; I am usually frustrated that I only catch the last few seconds and credits. After watching the video, starring my teengage fantasy--the stunning Tatyana Ali (whuts up with child stars doing music videos now?) as Nick Cannon's mom some 20 years ago heading to an abortion clinic with pro-life protestors and activists outside. Cannon's spirit then raps to his mom saying how he sent her messages not to abort him, with him positing the question "Three hundred dollars, that's the price of living? What?" (courtesy of OHHLA.com)

Nick Cannon isn't the only rapper to discuss abortion. In "Retrospect for Life," Common speaks to his unborn child and perhaps Cannon stole some of his lines:

I'ma use self control instead of birth control
Cause $315 ain't worth your soul
$315 ain't worth your soul
$315 ain't worth it

This isn't to say both rappers are necessarily pro-life, considering both rap about the specificities of their own lives and neither of them make any biblical references. Cannon notes at the end that he isn't passing judgment and that "he loves life." But considering Sandra Day O'Conner's resignation and Bush's non-stop push for restrictions on abortions, who knows how important Cannon's song might actually be. When i mean "importance" i don't mean grammy nominations or how being on MTV's TRL (tho that would be surprising), but you know how songs end up being anthems; i could imagine this track being blasted at some pro-life rally on repeat. Seeing how McDonalds and Hip-hop are interestingly married in their recent marketing ploys (can we see Ronald McDonald sporting "urbanwear" in the near future?), are we to expect George W. Bush reciting rap lyrics or perhaps a duet with Cannon at his next press conference concerning domestic issues?

and in response to my last post...

an anomymous commenter called me out saying that after reading my last post, i must be a "stiff motherfucker on the dancefloor" or I'm on some "Served shit." Yes, i look stiff cuz i'm poppin' and lockin' fool. just playing.

Okay, i probably didn't clarify whut i really meant. I don't give a shit how people dance. I hate to bring up the fact that I'm a dj, but i will here. As A DJ, I want people to wild out and have a good time, cuz that's what i like to do for people as a DJ and that's whut im usually getting paid to do. If the club is full of folks getting drunk pulling off their gardening moves, that's fine. if you and your friends are having a bomb ass time, that's fresh. drink up and wild out some more cuz sometimes i get paid based on how much is made at the bar. but it's strikes me as odd when the white people i have seen at gigs or clubs i go to end up freaking to just about EVERYTHING and freaking is the ONLY thing they do. Granted, this is a generalization. I repeat, a generalization. But it seems to happen more often than not and more often then other people in club.

As I mentioned in my response in the comments section, white folks at that irish pub were freaking to Abba's "Dancing Queen." It seems to get even crazier once "Black music" (notice the quotation folks) comes on, when white people just automatically start grinding the hell out of each other EVEN harder. my point is to say that it seems that for White people, rap music registers in this odd way that seems to signify to them that its time to act as sexual as possible, usually a combination of really unerotic looking moves at that--which gets to the point about how race and rhythm are historical signifiers for sexual deviance, "blackness" and other scapegoating of hip-hop and people of color as pathological. If "blackness" is seen as hypersexual (i.e. Birth of a Nation or perhaps the "welfare queen" stereotypes), then white folks enacting these moves (often times the only moves they do actually do) leads me to think that they are consuming the music more for it's supposed racialized meanings; the dancefloor becomes the spot where they think they are "transgressing" (check the quotes again folks) some sort of racial boundary--one that is socially constructed by historical, economic, political and cultural factors; they feel some what liberated by their crotch thrusts. If freakin' is the only dance move you know or if that's the only thing that you think about when you hear rap music or rnb, then i really don't think i'm the stiff motherfucker or the one with the problem.

in addition, and does one HAVE to be freaking and doing some sort of choreography or dancing solo to dance to rap music? when does mad grindin' become the only acceptable dance when someone flips on rap records? i'll just do the same ole two step, thank you.

And about the gardening moves, that's fine too! just don't swing your arms at my head or if your grindin', pleae don't kick me in the ass or back of my knees iight? that shit is irritating!

song of the day-KSolo "mom's in my business"

the pre-party
they start young


White people cannot dance. I’m not an essentialist, I swear. But after going to Rosie’s (an “Irish” Pub) at Santana Row—a recently constructed shopping and residential area catering to upper-middle class and/or yuppies clientele—and seeing the White people dancing, I can’t help but bring up the most irritating dance moves I’ve ever witnessed; I’ve only seen them performed by White people, too.

In the past season of “The Chappelle Show,” Dave Chapelle does a particular skit that (I think) brilliantly critiques the myths of the natural connection between race and rhythm. This skit featured Chappelle conducting an ethnographic study in hopes of answering “Can White people dance?” Chappelle and Mayer head to an office meeting (with all White people) and then to an upscale restaurant (with again, all White professionals) and at both spots Mayer plays a variety of rock guitar rifts. The White people react, dance—moshing or that wack hippie “spiritual” dancing that White people love to do—based on what Mayer’s playing. As a control group, Chappelle goes to an inner-city barbershop with Blacks and Latin@s barbers and customers and Questlove is present to play some breakbeats and some famous latino keyboardists is there to drop some keys on top of the drums; the conclusion is that Black folks like drums and Latinos love drums with keyboards. From this, Chappelle concludes that White folks can dance, but they only prefer dancing to certain instruments—as witnessed by his experiment (but what do Asians like to dance to?). Yet, his study fails to really answer the question “why do White folks dance so bad?”

When I say White people dance bad, it isn’t an attempt to reinforce those racial White-Black binaries. I’m not saying Black, Latin@s, and Asians are naturally more in tune with their corporeal rhythms. I read a piece by Simon Frith that discusses how stereotypes about Blackness and embodied by their “rhythm” and their “soul” versus white’s dancefloor awkwardness, whihc reinforcs the genetic racism that Whites are more in tune with their intellectual capacities since Blacks are more “physical”; these comparisons are ripe with historical and contemporary references to racially segregated labor force (i.e. slavery, sharecropping, low-wage labor…etc. etc.). There are bad dancers all across the board, heck, I’m no Carrie Ann Inaba (an ORIGINAL fly girl—In Living Color), but I am definitely not the goofy White dudes in the clubs pretending to do gardening.

What do I mean by this? A friend of mine went to Santa Barbara the other weekend and told me her friend’s friend (a white guy) and his friends (more white guys) were SERIOUS when they said they did moves like the “lawnmower” and the “sprinkler.” I’m sure you’ve seen many white guys doing this stuff at high school dances or house parties parodying their inability to dance. Hey it’s not just people of color claiming their bad dancers, they do it to themselves too! In the middle of the day, my friend said this crowd of white guys were all imitating their favorite yard tool in completely serious—making those scrunched up faces of intense concentration.

Although I didn’t see these ridiculous dance steps last nite, I saw the more R-rated variation of the white person “freak” or should I just say the “dry-hump.” All sort of people “freak” at clubs… heck kids in middle school freak. I’m not against it… and I’m not prude, I swear. But there’s just something about the way white people do it that just makes it look absolutely silly.

So last nite, a white woman was straddling her friend on the dancefloor; her male dance partner having lifted her off the ground with her legs wrapper around his waist. They were grindin each other and then he through her straight up into the air! She probably flew up a good foot or two maybe and as she descended, he caught her and they continued their humping action. It wasn’t just one couple doing it, but another couple was also doing a similar move!

Another example: A house party I djed at UCSD where a white couple were flipping into all these sexual positions in the corner: doggystyle, picking her up, (her) one leg up on the dj table—the whole time making orgasm faces. Last example: This girl pulled down her tight black shorts a little bit, enough to show off her thong, bending over and grinding her dance partner’s crotch, furiously. Was the pulling down of the pants necessary? Was it to compensate for poor dance moves?

It makes you think that White folks are taking the sexual innuendo, messages, imagery of rap music as gospel. Much academic research have noted that White (and also other non-black people of color) are so enamored with Black culture (i.e. hip-hop’s reckless cowboy imagery) because it allows them to “transgress” racial borders (binaries) of what is racially and socially acceptable, but in a very controlled way. White people have been historically condemned to supposed rhythmic inferiority but supposed moral superiority and Blacks and other people of color as "heathens" or genetically pathological as sexual predators that are contaminating white racial stock. So historically, White and Black culture are divergent historically in attempts to define racial difference (this is more complicated than it sounds and im definitely not doing it justice). As a result, the private listening spaces of the home, car, or club have been considered by scholars as the spaces that allow whites to act out all their desires often considered to be “naturally” Black “culture” and “lifestyle.”

So the question of White people dancing funny isn’t a racial thing in the way that people have considered as inherent, but possibly a social phenomenon rooted in historical forms of racism. So does that explain why White people dance sooo awkwardly? Maybe..

I don’t mean that there is a “right” way to dance but these dance moves just trip me out, especially when it means I’m going to get someone’s elbow in my head or back. Really, the shit just bothers me cuz it’s really an invasion of my personal space on the dancefloor I guess, but these moves are just so damn bad... and they take themselves so seriously too! I guess i'm just a hater.

If anyone has some funny stories involving bad white folks dancing, I’d love to hear about it…

song of the day-50Cent + Mobb Deep "outta control (remix)"

And Happy Birthday to my homie Stan. It's his 25th.

The summer doldrums have not set in. It's been a week since i've last posted anything, but much has happened that I'm not at liberty to discuss. Lets just say I went to a bachelor's party and that I'm not a fan of white meat.



In other news, my short review of Us3's recent lp "Questions" is up at Prefixmag.com

Song of the day: Teddy Riley and Tammy Lucas-"Is it Good to You"

...it's muuuuurrrddaaaaa!

In my last post, I asked you all for help on how to use semi-colons. The Semi-colon has been a very mysterious grammatical and stylistical tool, which i have been unable to comprehend for the longest time. Two sexy friends--Lizelle F. and Stanley Wong--assisted me in my quest to master the english language; they deserve some crazy recognition! (is that the correct usage?)

Here are their description to the semi-colon:

Lizelle: "use it when you are writing two distinctly different thoughts that could either be written the same sentence or as different sentences. hence the . & , sorta like a Double Decker® Taco."

I've known Lizelle for quite some time now. We first met in college through some mutual friends. Lizelle will always have a unique place in my dj career because she was the person who got me my first paying dj gig--djing some beginning of the year APA student org fair at the CCC (Cross Cultural Center). I remember in my 5th year in college, i was walking into the Film and Video library and from far away, I thought the girl working behind the counter was lookin hella fly. Then as i got closer, I realized it was Lizelle! She was wearing some stylish glasses at the time, which i thought made her probably the hippest person that i had ever seen working at the Film and Video Library. Thanks again for the grammar help (and helping me get those videos)!

Stanley Wong: "i think your grammar is already good! and you write much better than i ever could. so this is just a half attempt to get a shout out because
you probably already know all of this about semi colon. hehe. use it
to connect two sentences that are related to one another. usually the
second sentence elaborates the first in more detail. bob is an
architect; he enjoys building homes. i think that's correct...actually, not
sure. but what i do know is sometimes you can use colons in a list
like..'i have lived in following cities: sf, ca; fremont (ee! ee! ee!), ca;'
anyway, that's my two cents. my grammar is horrible so don't take my
word on the above."

Stan loves being featured on my blog (as do many of my other fans) so i thought i'd take some extra time to post about how Stan and I became friends. We met indirectly in 7th grade and for some reason, we had beef with each other without even talking to other person--ever!. In the 8th grade, I think we had a class together and we finally talked to each other and realized that we both thought the other person didn't like the other versus us having any problems or anything. We started hanging out more in high school and I began to realize what a mack he was/is. While I was still figuring out how to smoothly unbuckle a girls bra without them noticing (and eventaully stopping me), Stan was already rounding third base and sliding safely into home. He's great at BBQing and delivers perfect high-fives and chest bumps at Warriors games. This guy knows his bay area hip-hop, too. He reps the yay area hard!

To all 6,738 daily readers, if you see Lizelle F. or Stanley Wong on the street, give them a pound or a hug.

Song of the Day-Evelyn Champagne King "Love Come Down"