February 26, 2009 – 10:30 am
I know that having Blogarhythms cut back to only two posts a week is pretty sucky. But the honest truth is that if the state of my financial affairs doesn’t improve really soon things could get a whole lot suckier.
Obviously I’m not the only one facing fiduciary difficulties, as the entire country, and much of the world has hit on increasingly hard times over the last few months. Sadly, it doesn’t appear is if things are liable to get better anytime soon either. This week economists forecasted that the recession currently plaguing the American landscape would only get worse before it possibly gets better a year or more from now. And a similar sentiment was echoed by President Barack Obama in his televised address Tuesday night.
Earlier on Tuesday Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke offered his own—decidedly more optimistic—prediction of our economic future, positing that the recession might be reversed by year’s end if President Obama’s stimulus package is a success. I wish I could share Bernanke’s outlook, but the cold fact of the matter is that if my struggling employer—who hasn’t been able to pay me in full or on time with any regularity since last Spring—doesn’t find the resources to pay me what they owe me, and continue paying me on time, my connection to the internet and even my electricity are going to be terminated sooner rather than later.
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February 24, 2009 – 10:30 am
It probably doesn’t come off here on the blog—where my demeanor is for the most part pleasant and my tone generally positive—but I have a temper. Amongst my friends I’ve long held a reputation for being somewhat like The Incredible Hulk, prone to furiously voluminous outbursts at inopportune moments. So much so in fact that some of them took to shouting “KETER SMASH” at any sign of agitation on my part in an effort to defuse any imminent explosions with humour.
I learned at a young age to do whatever I could to re-direct my gamma-reinforced wrath away from other people so it’s a rare occasion when my rants about kicking chests and punching throats go beyond the hyperbolic. But every now and again the desire to issue forth a beatdown stirs—like yesterday for example, when a paycheck I’ve waited for since November arrived in my mailbox short by three fourths of the total amount I’m owed—and can’t be quelled.
Today faithful readers I’ve decided you will be my victims!
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February 19, 2009 – 10:30 am
In spite of the fact that I’ve had to cut the blog back to just two days a week I will be doing my best to keep it diverse and cover as wide a variety and a as large a number of records as I can every week. That probably means that I’ll be throwing up a lot of two-in-one features and multi-artist digest-style posts—a-la my regular Shuffle Songs entries—for a while. That’s what I did Tuesday, and it’s what I’m doing today as well. At first—not to mention second, third, fourth or… —glance today’s two featurees couldn’t possibly be more different. But despite their obvious differences Long Beach-based Hip-Hop trio Ugly Duckling and Los Angeles-based Indie-Rock duo Eagle and Talon share a couple things in common, not the least of which the they all call home.
Longtime fans of Golden-Era-obsessed emcees Andy Cooper and Dizzy Dustin and gold-chain-rocking vinyl nerd DJ Young Einstein of Ugly Duckling shouldn’t fret that such a pairing means the crew abandoned their old-school-flavored flows and loop, break & scratch-fueled beats in favor of a guitar/bass/drums Rock-trio setup though. Nope, their newest full-length Audacity—the group’s fourth—is every bit as upbeat, fun-loving, sampledelic and rooted in the conventions of late-’80s and early-’90s Rap as the rest of their catalog. A couple of tracks—like “Falling Again” and the vaguely 3rd Bass-reminiscent “The Takedown”—begin with the resonant boom and synthetic clap of a Roland TR-808, which might fool some into thinking UD’s latched onto the neo-Rick Rubin ’80s throwback sound, but the most ubiquitous of drum-machines is used only sparingly, and only to augment the group’s drumbreaks and melodic samples. They’re at their best on the aforementioned “The Takedown,” the optimistic and soulfully psychedelic “I Won’t Let it Die,” the Samba-flavored guitar-and-carnival-organ-looping paean to brokeness “It’s Gone”—which sounds like a bizarro-world take on Lamborghini-pose-era Grand Puba—the Soul-horn-drenched, Pete Rock & CL Smooth-influenced “It Never Mattered” and the self-deprecating thrift-store sound collage “Oh Yeah.” It comes recommended for fans of Time Machine, Tres Records posse-members People Under the Stairs, Giant Panda, New Jack Hustle and Johnson&Jonson…And it makes me wonder what J&J member Blu might sound like over Einstein beats. Hmmm…
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By El Keter
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Posted in Music
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Tagged 3rd Bass, Bikini Kill, Bloc Party, Blu, Dressy Bessy, Dri, Eagle and Talon, Giant Panda, Grand Puba, Johnson&Jonson, Le Tigre, Metric, New Jack Hustle, Nirvana, People Under The Stairs, Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth, Portishead, Quitzow, Rick Rubin, Santigold, Sonic Youth, Stars, Telepathe, The Breeders, The Pixies, Time Machine, TV On the Radio, Ugly Duckling
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February 17, 2009 – 10:30 am
As some of you probably noticed, there was no Blogarhythms post yesterday. No, this was not the result of some unusual affection for former US presidents George Washington and Abraham Lincoln that prevents me from blogging on their designated day of honor. But it was the start of what will be a new—hopefully temporary—schedule for Blogarhythms that reduces the frequency of new posts from daily down to two a week. Ironically you can probably place part of the blame for this reduction on another former president, George W. Bush, who assfucked the country’s economy so badly that both time and money have become equally scarce these days.
Speaking of carnal relations…Valentine’s Day just passed this weekend. Hopefully all you regular Blogarhythms readers had an appropriately sensuous day and night. I know I did. If you didn’t, I’m sorry to hear it, but I’m sure you’ll have more luck next year. At least one emcee—Los Angeles-based Blu—hasn’t been so lucky in love himself. Or at least that’s the way his newest release—a 14-track, mostly self-produced mixtape titled HerFavoriteColo(u)r—makes it seem. It’s anachronistically melancholy and vulnerable but still cockily cavalier and infused with the witty wordplay and humor you’d expect of Blu, further establishing him as one of the most talented and versatile artists working in the Hip-Hop genre right now. Speaking of versatility, his production on HerFavoriteColo(u)r is a revelation. Built around samples of dusty Jazz and Soul records and laced with copious sampled vocal hooks and extensive clips of dialogue from an array of films—including some of my favorites, like A Life Aquatic and Closer, which I just mentioned here on the blog last week—his Donuts-esque beats are some of the best he’s flowed over to-date. They’re also some of the dirtiest, most lo-fi-sounding in his catalog and the rough-hewn, gauzy sound not only suits the subject matter specifically but Blu’s style and personality in general.
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February 13, 2009 – 10:30 am
So, tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s Day, a feast-day intended to honor early Christian martyrs who bore the name Valentinus. Thanks to a misinterpretation of a Chaucer poem, the efforts of 14th century French courtesans and the industriousness of a Massachusetts woman named Esther Howland who essentially founded the modern greeting-card industry, February 14th has also become inextricably associated with love, romance, sex and sensuality. Somehow candy and jewelry also got thrust into the mix, but for our purposes the lovey-dovey stuff is most important.
Romantic love is of course one of the most common subjects addressed in song by musicians and singers. This may be traced back to the troubadours of the Middle Ages whose performance poetry was most frequently concerned with romantic chivalry and who set the mold for journeyman singer/songwriters to come for centuries. Or it could just be a calculated attempt by shallow musicians to get the women in their audience horny in hopes that it’ll help get them laid? Either way, the love song is ubiquitous to the point of being a tiresome cliché to some of the more jaded members of the listening public.
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