Hypestyle's Homebase!

2012-01-18T19:30:00.000-08:00

c. currie radio consolidation presentation

2011-12-24T20:18:00.001-08:00

2011-11-09T19:12:00.000-08:00

IN MEMORIAM:

Dwight “Heavy D” Myers, 1967 – 2011.

Hip-Hop performer and actor Heavy D died on Tuesday, November 8, 2011, in Los Angeles, California. Another Hip-Hop icon passes away that I never got to see perform live in person. I’m not sure when I first heard his music. Circa 1986 – 87, when his first singles and debut album, Living Large, came out, I was in the eighth grade. I remember a classmate making a passing mention of somebody with a record out called “Mr. Big Stuff”. I didn’t have cable at home, so BET (and, whenever it premiered, Yo! MTV Raps) was out. When it comes to the Chicago radio stations that were my frame of reference for new music, I’m not sure if they were playing the records.

I’m thinking that I finally caught on to 'Hev' with the second LP, Big Tyme. A classmate sold me his cassette of it, and it was one of the first rap albums I managed to pick up in my school years (mainly, I settled for taping songs of the radio with blank cassettes.) By the summer of ’89, staying with family in Detroit, cable was available, so I got to see some of his music videos on Video Jukebox (later The Box) and some stage performances.

Heavy had danceable, funky rhythm tracks, and he was a capable rhymer. His street appeal was credible but he wasn’t all the way hardcore. Unafraid to dance, Heavy had engaging stage shows with his DJ Eddie F and dancers G-Wiz and Trouble T-Roy (the latter of whom died in a tragic stage accident in 1990.) He managed to avoid low-down commentary on women, portraying himself as a plus-sized ladies’ man, aka “The Overweight Lover.”

If it was a gimmick, it was one that worked, as his records made inroads at urban radio and eventually garnered crossover sales. By his zenith in the early 90s, he was already a platinum-selling artist several times over. Even as gangster-rap gained a bigger presence on the radio, Heavy stuck to his non-guns and kept promoting his brand of Hip-Hop with a nod toward adult-contemporary sensibilities.

By the time of his death, Heavy had a journeyman’s career of sorts in acting. In 1989 he had a memorable guest-appearance/performance as himself on the sitcom A Different World. From there, he had a recurring presence on television shows like Roc and Boston Public, and had a featured role in the short-lived Tracy Morgan Show. In film, Heavy enjoyed supporting roles in films like Life, The Cider House Rules, and, ironically, a role in the just-released Tower Heist. By the late 90s he even did a stint on the off-Broadway play Riff Raff with Laurence Fishburne.
Heavy is survived by a daughter.

2011-10-18T21:38:00.000-07:00

OCCUPY DETROIT 2011

On Friday, October 14, 2011, protesters from various parts of Metropolitan Detroit and beyond gathered in Downtown Detroit, Michigan for the "Occupy Detroit" event. Speakers began the march at the Spirit of Detroit statue in front of the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center in Detroit. The event was a parallel of the recent "Occupy Wall Street" events in New York City and similar public demonstrations in cities across America and now even foreign countries like Italy (where demonstrations turned violent.)

The march went up Woodward Avenue to stop at the nearby Grand Circus Park. Some of those camped out in the area (with permits) plan to live there for up to 60 days. With the Detroit Tigers' Comerica Park and the Detroit Lions' Ford Field in the background, activists held up signs expressing their displeasure with the events of recent years. Speakers spoke out against bank bailouts, home foreclosures, foreign war, lack of jobs for the public, and more.

Protestors called for the recall of George W. Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthy and a reform of financial systems to curb corporate profiteerism.

2011-10-15T11:31:00.000-07:00

RICK'S HEALTH SCARE SHOULD GIVE PAUSE

Miami-based rapper Rick Ross was recently hospitalized twice in the past 24 hours, relating to unreleased health issues. In both cases, Ross suffered from a seizure, which left him temporarily unconscious.

http://www.freep.com/article/20111015/ENT07/111015008/Rapper-Rick-Ross-reportedly-hospitalized-2nd-time?odyssey=navhead

...as much as I have a problem with his overall image and themes, I wish him the best during this crisis.

I also hope it prompts him to take whatever his health situation is more seriously, and take steps to address it. It's definitely missing the point to just write this off as nothing, or just an isolated episode of "exhaustion" or whatever.

Who knows whether he has a health insurance plan. He definitely should have the money to afford one. If he can blow "a million" on strip bars, high-end cars, clothes and jewelry, I really hope he's got some comprehensive coverage..

Medicaid information-
http://www.cms.gov/home/medicaid.asp

Many low and modest-income folks, particularly in minority communities, avoid going to see health care professionals on a regular basis, and end up going to Emergency Rooms whenever a crisis hits, or just whenever "they feel bad".. There is a particular challenge for black men to see about regular health checkups, and the various health issues that disproportionately affect african-americans, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, cholesterol, cancer, HIV/Aids, and more.

As various citiy, county and state governments are facing revenue shortfalls (hello, Bush tax cuts), one of the programs that typically face cutbacks are public health facilities, including free/low-cost clinics and health departments, which may not provide primary care but do provide other resources including immunizations, disease screening, substance abuse treatment, lead-poisoning prevention/control, and more.

Too bad that more rappers have not been public advocates for health care reform or improved health/wellness resources in urban communities; and I doubt that this incident will compel anyone in the business to do that. But they should.

2011-09-24T22:41:00.000-07:00

THE WAY HOME
“I’m on my way home… I left three days ago, but no one seems to know I’m gone/ home is where the hatred is/ home is filled with pain/ and it might not be such a bad idea if I never… never went home again”
Gil Scott-Heron, “Home is Where the Hatred Is”

I drove down to Northwest Indiana from Detroit early Friday afternoon. My high school graduating class was having a 20th anniversary get-together this weekend, and I was planning on attending, meeting and greeting.

The alumni gathering was split into two events—a football game later Friday evening (ostensibly where folks could bring their families), and an ‘adults-only’ pub gathering Saturday evening, in Chicago: Gary and vicinity is roughly 35 miles from the Chicago city limits; the Chi was and apparently still is often the ‘hip’ nightlife destination for residents of Northwest Indiana (frequently referred to by outstate Hoosier folk as simply “the Region.”)

I make it back to Gary and vicinity on average maybe once a year. Sometimes it has been just to visit and catch up. Other times there has been a distinctly upbeat event at hand—a wedding, a graduation, a baby shower. Still yet others have had decidedly downbeat contexts, i.e., funerals—uncles, aunts, and most hauntingly, my father and a brother.

Gary, compared to my adopted home base of Detroit, is much smaller in terms of land mass and population (current Census figures put Gary at about 85,000 residents, way down from a 1950s-era peak of about 250,000), but there were similarities in their histories of development. At the beginning of the 20th century, the city was carved out of the swamps and sand dunes that largely defined the immediate natural environs at the south end of Lake Michigan. Elbert Gary was a steel magnate who decided to open a factory here, U.S. Steel Works. Other steel industrialists followed, as did the largely unskilled masses needed to fill the ranks of labor for the mills. Executives of the company made pitches in European countries to bring people to work there. Eastern Europeans, Greeks and Scots-Irish folk largely made the overseas journey to settle in Gary, Hammond and East Chicago (the latter town named after its ‘cousin’ in Illinois.)

The burgeoning manufacturing also was attractive to American southerners. In particular this demographic included a high number of African-Americans (including my maternal and paternal grandfathers) who during the Great Migration fled the egregiously brutal Jim Crow south to the industrial north and Midwest, where they could find a modicum of social freedom and expanded employment opportunity. To be sure, both de jure and de facto discrimination was rife in the area, but pockets of non-racism could be found.

With the exception of the Jackson family home, there are no major tourist-attraction museums or similar arts/science venues. No movie theaters in the city limits. Sports culture here is joined at the hip with Chicago teams—Da Bulls (including Saint Jordan), Da Bears (the "Superbowl Shuffle" and Sweetness), the White Sox, the Cubs, and provided you give a damn about hockey, the Blackhawks. A side note on baseball- folks from here are flexible to openly root for both teams, while apparently many Chicagoans have a Northside/Southside split on who they’re down for.

Local television and radio, especially at the time, was near-exclusively Chicago-centric. Nowadays I know there are various examples of this throughout the nation, but it was an odd feeling, at the time, growing up watching TV news or listening to the radio, with scarcely a mention of your home community. There was a sense of invisibility that went along with that.

Touchdown
….I brought a camcorder that I bought maybe a year ago during a January clearance, but never used until now. Of course, the standard-size blank DVD discs I have a spindle of are too big for this, so time to divert to Best Buy for likely more expensive smaller-scale discs. Huzzah, it works!

While at the game I took as much footage as the charged battery would allow: The crowd, students, players on the sidelines, the game itself. Booths were selling food and school merchandise. I tried to notice anything new that wasn’t there back in the days. I saw an expanded soccer practice area. At the stadium, there’s a nominal digital-graphics screen, with messages from sponsors. Pop-music excerpts played during the game included Eminem and Poison, from what I recognized. The visiting team was the same team that, in my senior year, prevented us from taking the Regional title, short-circuiting a state title run that local papers said we were good for. I recalled memories of videotaping assorted events for the school, working with a partner, using a 1980s-era RCA VHS camcorder, either slung over my shoulder or sitting on a tripod. We would talk about the game at hand, or the school play, and girls, not necessarily in that order.

The night air became increasingly cold. I looked to the cheerleaders, at the sidelines during the game, take the field during halftime. None of them seemed to be wearing hosiery. I wondered how they managed. There were maybe 12 girls total, in what I presume was the varsity squad. Among them, there was one clearly brown girl who looked Latina. No black girls. I wondered, as I did back when I was going to school here, did any sisters not "make the cut", or did none even bother to try out because the routines were fixed in a 1965-safe-for-parents-and-the-Catholic Bishop-if-he's-visiting zone that was straight corny to anyone from urban culture. Oh, well.

Looking at the crowd, I noticed one set of parents rooting for an African-American boy on the team. Out of a couple hundred students, maybe less than a dozen were African-American, and other minorities were similarly scattershot. With this suburban town being reportedly about 45% African-American now (a major leap from my childhood), I was expecting more of a presence. But I suppose if I was expecting a Friday night high football game to be reflective of this, I was wrong.

Racial Hysteria, Economic Inertia
Gary, like Detroit and several Rust Belt metropolitan areas, had some form of heavy-industry/manufacturing as a keystone industry that led to its prosperity in the early 20th century. Unlike say, a Pittsburgh or a Chicago, Gary has yet to reinvent itself from the collapse of said industries (in particular, steel manufacturing) that was a major catalyst in their economic decline. The local steel mills currently operate at maybe 30 – 40% of their original capacity. My dad worked as a crane operator for 30 years; I’m not sure that a career arc like that is even remotely standard now, regardless of industry, and especially for the unskilled folk looking for an entry-level leg up. That era is basically over. From the 1960s forward, there has been both drastic and gradual disinvestment, by both larger corporations and smaller businesses, which has economically crippled the city of Gary and made the metropolitan area much less prosperous than in the past.

Gary elected one of the first black mayors in Richard Hatcher in 1968, and the civil-rights social tumult of the times permeated the region. Mama Hype was among a group of black students that integrated one of Gary’s high schools in the 1950s just after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education decision, and mini-riots were a regular occurrence. Demonstrations led by the NAACP, the Communist Party, and others helped make the region a lightning rod for both activism and reactionaryism. In 1972, Jesse Jackson and other national African-American activists came into town for a convention on a national black agenda: http://www.indianahistory.org/our-collections/collection-guides/national-black-political-convention-collection.pdf

The town of Merrillville incorporated in 1971 from once-unincorporated rural and semi-rural areas to the immediate south of Gary. By default it was almost exclusively white, as Gary was by now overwhelmingly African-American. The narrative of urban disinvestment, white flight, and industrial collapse now came to define Gary’s story from that point forward. The organized-labor allegiances and its nominal relationship with Chicago led Gary and a few nearby communities to be one of the few, if only Democratic strongholds in Indiana. At the state leadership level, three GOP governors in a row led Indiana between 1969 and 1989. Democratic stints held the office from 1989 – 2005, and GOP standard-bearer Mitch Daniels is now the governor there. Going way back to the 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan had very real political power over much of the state as avowed members were throughout the state legislature and the governor’s office. Even well into this post-civil rights era, when I was coming up urban heads were wary of getting caught "way out" after evening.

Seeing is Disbelieving
In driving through communities south of Gary such as Merrillville, Crown Point, and Schererville, I see newish strip malls, big-box retail stores, apartment/condo complexes and single-family houses where there were once outright cornfields (indeed, some cornfields still stand, providing a seemingly incongruent visual landscape of rustic farm plots interrupted by Buffalo Wild Wings and Great Clips salons.)

When I drive through Gary, a feeling of deep melancholy overtakes me. I see in most areas worn-out/burnt-out storefronts where there used to be bustling department stores and small-business activity. Family Dollar and the like have replaced Montgomery Ward’s and JC Penney’s for popular shopping in Gary boundaries. My elementary schools are out of business. The hospital I was born in is abandoned, with the exception of one wing, sealed off from the rest, which apparently has become a police station.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXkh430I6bI

In a lot of cases I have seen structures that were abandoned when I was a kid still in the same (worse) shape, with nothing to take its place—in others there are just plain empty lots with weeds, with no “coming soon” sign. In the neighborhoods where I lived, I see a lot of homes now where the entire facades have either been stripped or allowed to crumble, haphazardly reclaimed by nature. Some family is still here, making a go of it, though none have encouraged me to come back. I was the youngest out of my siblings and all my first cousins (and due to my 'unexpected' status, really a generation removed from the rest), and I saw nearly all of them leave for good.

I still remember the young man who was two years behind me in school. His family lived across the street. I caught a bus to school, his parents drove him. They were nice enough folks, in their late 30's at the time, I'm thinking. They gave me a ride once, when I was late to school. They made barbecue dinners in the summer, which they would sell (and give us for free). They also dealt drugs out of their home. An assortment of "strange" visitors coming to their place at all times of the day/evening was a regular occurrence. Some of them would glower if you happened to be in the front yard at the time. My mother warned me not to visit in their place, and I didn't. After I graduated I don't think I was gone a year before there was a violent shootout targeting the house; a molotov cocktail was thrown through a window. The couple's son was killed.

Here’s What they Think About You…

The demographics of my high school were largely kids of upper-middle-class types, mostly Caucasian, and those who attended school lived throughout the county and beyond (during my tenure there were even a couple of students who commuted every day from Chicago.) It was an early introduction to “the real world”, both the good and the bad, I suppose. I participated in a bunch of extracurricular activities by the time my tenure there was over—student council, math club, science club, art club, videotaping school events, quiz-bowls, football, and probably some things I’ve since forgotten.

I remember it was roughly a few months into sophomore year. I had been given a note of some kind to go and see “Father Quint”, who was the financial officer for the school. At first I really had no idea of why I was being sent down there. I only remember sketches of the conversation, but one of the first things that he said to me was “Mr. Hype, do you like going to school here?”

I was puzzled by the question. Was this just rhetorical? Did he really want to hear what complaints I had, if any?

To be on the safe side, I responded with a nervous yes/sure (something along those lines). As the conversation progressed, and his tone became blunter, it became clear to me that this was about tuition. Apparently my parents were on an installment plan for payment, and the balance due was behind to whatever extent.

I walked away with a “notice”, feeling uneasy and embarrassed. Money was, well, tight. I remember when the school held food-drives every fall. All the homerooms had boxes where students could bring in nonperishable food. I’d bring in some cans of food myself. Of course, you’d overhear chatter from some students about folks on welfare, food stamps, boxed milk, trading it for crack, etc. And a week or so after the drive was over, one of the nuns would privately contact me and provide a box of collected food to take home.

Months later, I figured I’d take a swing at being class treasurer for junior year. I was no financial guru at the age of 15, but I knew math, and I figured this was something interesting to be able to interact more with other students on student council.

I prepared a speech, passed out flyers, put up some posters where allowed, and gave a speech my dad helped me out with. I was then elected. It felt good. I started junior year thinking that I’d actually have some work to do. I approached Fr. Quint’s office, and made myself available in whatever capacity to help look after our class’s finances.

In the conversation that took place, I felt that I was being given a very polite brush-off. Whether this was the intent or not, I took it very personally. Statistically, I was the only African-American class officer.

In the weeks and months that followed, I participated in student council meetings, and occasionally did some perfunctory research on ticket prices for different entertainment events that our class would have wanted to organize. But I never got to look at a financial book nor a receipt during my ‘tenure’ in that position. I came to a rather sobering conclusion that this had amounted to some token nonsense.

Concurrent with all the “atmosphere of Christian instruction” at the school, there was a “reality beneath the reality” for a lot of the minority students. Ignorant remarks and behaviors were not unheard of-- some whispered and subtle, others shouted and blatant; some of the generic jackass kind, others of straight cracker intent; the school administrators and certain teachers who came across as unusually smarmy on a recurring basis. School lunch hours, open assemblies and sports games were frequently self-segregated.

We're Goin' Hoppin'...
The school dances—sock hops, as we tended to call them—were solidly reflective of top-40 tastes in the music played, and of course nothing too naughty. Not that anything was inherently wrong with most of it, but as one could imagine, hip-hop or R&B spins at the dances were minimal, pretty much limited to whoever was the breakout crossover artist of that year—Fresh Prince, Tone-Loc, and the like. I lived for Saturday evenings. Not that I had dates or girlfriends, that never happened. But around freshman year the Chicago radio stations had recently begun their hip-hop centric weekend mix shows. In particular I remember 107.5 WGCI’s Ramone-Ski Love and the ‘Rapdown’, and some years before his syndicated show took off, Tom Joyner had a daily show where he showed hip-hop some love (apparently commuting between there and Dallas regularly.) Listening to these shows introduced me to a lot of the golden-age hip-hop I would come to latch onto for entertainment and guidance. It was an emotional escape, an audial oasis of acceptance where I seemed to find little elsewhere.

When it came to student-to-student conflicts, I managed to make it through without any outright brawls (and thus a likely suspension), though, a few months into senior year, I seriously considered doing grievous harm to some people up there. Around that time, another black student, “Eddie”, had a meltdown of sorts.

Eddie and I both played football. I didn’t have any classes with him that morning. He apparently came to school that day with a pistol. I don’t know if it was loaded or not. He muttered to someone that he had a ‘hit list.’ By lunchtime, he had been arrested by Merrillville police—and summarily expelled. For years I wondered what happened to him, though I suppose it wasn’t hard to guess. He made it to the 10-year reunion. We didn’t talk about the incident, but he seemed to be in a good place (we were, coincidentally, the only black men in our class who bothered to come.)

More Long Island Iced Tea, Vicar?
The evening went faster than I expected. I wore an all-black suit and a black, knitted kufi. Despite my full beard, folks seemed to recognize me right away-- then again, many of us have been on Facebook for several years now. For icebreaking purposes, it helped to have a camera to take some impromptu photos, as well as remembering the eccentric cast of teachers: the bearded, rotund priest who served as the Dean of Boys who some guys made regular visits to; the history teacher that had sweat-rings under his arms even in wintertime; the science teacher with a voice like Ben Stein; the art teacher who had a circa-1975 hi-fi stereo in the classroom, exclusively tuned into a classic-rock station, in the background as students created projects. To this day, I still startle some urban-music-only peeps who wonder how the hell I know all these David Bowie and Rod Stewart records.

Aside from renting out part of the bar, arrangements were made for an open bar for the night. As much as I’m sure it was an incentivizing move to arrange for free drinks (sans shots) for the length of the evening, it also may have led to some folks getting flash-inebriated. I don’t think I had a single conversation last longer than two minutes before people abruptly switched partners or groups. My measured, conservative approach seemed ill-suited to the freewheeling interactions going on around me. Whether by deliberate choice or circumstance, I’ve pretty much always been a minimalist when it came to alcohol. Likely due to my anxieties about inviting disaster following a bender, and lack of exposure to keg-parties as a kid have probably honed my quasi-abstinence. I knew I’d be driving later, so I had a light-beer and cut myself off.

"Hype, you fawkin' rawk, man! You've always been my buddy! This is gonna be an awesome night, I'm tellin' ya..."

By 12:30 a.m. or so, a lot of folks had started catching cabs going back to their hotels (or homes, for those who lived in Chicago now.) My classmate ‘Rick’ was already far-gone somewhere around 10 p.m., going on about the after-party he figured was sure to happen, and the female classmate who he apparently went all the way back to sixth grade with that he was sure was hot for him (oddly enough, more than a few girls that I had crushes on back in the days showed up tonight. Not that I had any intention of telling them after all this time.)

Rick came to the event from Dyer, a suburb to the distant southwest of Gary. I never got the details out of him but apparently he caught the South Shore commuter train into Chicago from Indiana, but the service doesn’t operate past 10 p.m., and he hadn’t rented a hotel (I'd been told that downtown Chicago was solidly booked relating to a Northwestern/Wisconsin college football game.) As folks were heading on their respective way, he was stumbling and wandering. I went to grab him, and offered to take him back home. In a few minutes, we were on our way.

Rick had at this point turned into a bobble-head, but I got to seat-belt him in, and headed back to the Dan Ryan expressway and the I-90 toll road back to Indiana. I’m glad I had an empty storage box handy, because he ended up hurling about 20 minutes into our drive. Getting Rick home was a challenge for a while; making a general arc toward Dyer, it was like pulling teeth trying to get a coherent sentence out of him and he was unresponsive to asking for his driver’s license so I could look up his address before finally mumbling it out. Maybe 15 minutes later, he finally had a fleeting moment of clarity when we made a brief stop at a gas station to ask for directions (and ditch the hurl box). Finally we got to his place: a tony, quiet subdivision, where several houses had their garages wide open, including Rick’s. He thanked me for the solid, and made his way—still uneasy—into his garage. In conversations before tonight, he told me he had been laid off from his accounting job for over a year and had gone into house-painting and temp general-labor work, which he had done as a kid.

If there was a universal undercurrent to the conversations I had, whatever careers folks may have embraced- physician, attorney, schoolteacher, engineer, sales.. Everybody’s feeling the pinch of the ongoing recession. I don’t know. Maybe I missed the point by not getting “white-boy wasted” (Gucci!)

Escape
While at the get-together, someone pointed out to me my behavior at graduation. I was senior class vice-president, and thus was on the main stage of the auditorium during commencement. Dressed in our caps and gowns, we had been given notice a few weeks before: on stage, we would not be getting our real diplomas, but instead generic rolls of paper sealed with a ribbon. See, everything but our tassels were rentals. We were not to be given our real diplomas until we went into the girls’ gymnasium (much smaller compared to the main gym) where our homeroom teachers were standing by. Two boxes and a table were sitting in front of them—the boxes were for our cap and gown, respectively, and the table had stacks of our diplomas. When the final announcement was made commencing our class (we were not allowed to toss our caps), I apparently made a beeline for the girls’ gym. I was the first student up in there. Family wondered where I had ducked off to, and were slightly disappointed that they didn’t have the chance to take some after-graduation photographs with me wearing the gown.

I was really trying to get the _____ out: Out of this school, out of Gary, out of Indiana period. My homeroom teacher, who was also my English Lit teacher, reminded me my grades had slipped in the last quarter- I had started giving less and less of a damn about being there, and it showed. I had started halfway looking at school graduation as a form of parole. I was on an Amtrak train for Detroit barely two days later (I had to board from Hammond because by then there was no Amtrak stop in Gary—and there still isn’t.) I had already been coming to Detroit almost every summer to visit relatives; it was as good a place as any to start anew.

I only scarcely realized it at the time, but I had become very embittered by then. My depression managed to contribute to an aborted stint at the University of Michigan before personal issues came to a head and I dropped out. It took me some years to work myself out of it (after a fashion), and so when it comes to events like this, I can go and socialize, reminisce, all that with my peers. But when it comes to the stuff we get in the mail about fundraising, become an alumni donor, all that, I can’t go for it. I’ll skim through it, but then I just chuck it.

Aftermath: Enter Hypestyle
In the years that followed since graduation, I gradually developed a philosophical muse that has alternately unnerved and energized me, and brought me to my contemporary news-media career interests: a long way from my freshman-year dreams of being a comic-book artist-writer.

When our Generation X-crew graduated it was near the tail end of George H. W. Bush’s one-term presidency, officially or unofficially a continuation of the eight-year Reagan revolution that has reverberated into the present day. Our first, 10-year reunion was in July of 2001. None of us had yet hit 30, most were unmarried (unto itself a shift from decades past), and it was barely two months before the events of 9/11: the abrupt, violent deaths of thousands, the sharp veer into Wars on Terror, an escalating War on Drugs, economic recession, threadbare job-security, unprecedented home foreclosure, and lost innocence for generations of young people.

This, our second reunion, was late into the first (and preferably not the last) term of Barack Obama (back then, I don't think I could have seen a black president by now), and the heavily mixed-results of attempting to manage/reconfigure the U.S. policy culture of George W. Bush and his ideological kin. Tonight, for all the careers that folks I talked to have segued into since then—physician, attorney, schoolteacher, salesperson, small-business owner, accountant, and more—married, divorced, with kids or without-- one universal thread came up: everybody was feeling the pinch of the lingering economic downturn. Some folks have changed careers, others are trying to, and degreed folks are doing things plainly unrelated to their ‘official’ skill-set. Everyone’s American dream has manifested differently, and for most if not all, the dreaming continues.

Folks are promising to plan smaller get-togethers every other year now, I suppose before crutches and grandkids come into play. We’ll see. Maybe I’ll wear my fire-truck red suit with the gator shoes; I rarely bring it out.

2011-09-11T19:59:00.000-07:00

REMEMBER FOR ALWAYS

On this, the 10th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, many people have been pondering the meaning of the attacks and the legacy that they have left the country.

This author has many conflicted feelings about the events of that fateful (and fatal) day. Waking up like any other day, this author saw the spectacle unfold on national television (mostly Good Morning America) before heading to work. Work was at an office building (converted from a defunct small hospital) near downtown Detroit. Everyone in the office was abuzz about what the events meant: the unpredictability, the "prophecy", and whether there would be a local analog to the chaos that was expanding in New York City, Washington, D.C., and rural Pennsylvania.

This author's college classes were canceled for that day.

This author felt deep anger at those responsible, a coiling frustration at trying to comprehend the depth of depravity that could compel someone to concieve of, let alone execute, the mass-murder of thousands. What yawning abyss lay where there should be a soul?

That the primary progenitor of the attacks has recently joined the ranks of the deceased may bring a sense of closure for many, but the emotional impact of the events on that day will resonate long after all those who were alive to observe it have passed on. The ambitions of madmen frequently leave a poisoned legacy.

In the span of mere hours, thousands of families violently lost members; those same families also gained new members, regardless of blood relation.

This author felt heart-rending shame in observing the seemingly unceasing carnage being wrought and the rescue efforts, knowing that he could do little to pragmatically assist from nearly 1,000 miles away.

This author fretfully pondered the local reactions, considering that this part of the country-- Metro Detroit-- hosts the largest concentration of people of Arabic descent outside of the Middle East. Were there 'sleeper' factions of Al-Qaeda here? If so, when and where would they strike? What will happen to the people who live in Chaldeantown on the near-northeast side of Detroit, or Dearborn to the west?

This author saw American flags conspicuously flown and shown in and around dozens of area homes and businesses-- especially shopkeepers of Middle Eastern descent.

This author saw, read or heard friends, strangers, and family members openly endorse what would ostensibly be considered a suspension of civil rights for the sake of national security. This author also saw, read or heard friends, strangers and family openly endorse unfettered surveillance, open-ended detainment, and mass deportation of people of Arabic descent.

In the years since the events of September 11, 2011, this author has seen both an immediate and gradual rise in reactionary thought and action from both ends of the political spectrum; base jingoism masquerading as patriotism; selfish resource-hoarding, fear-mongering replacing reasoned debate, and political expedience bypassing policy that uplifts the vulnerable among us.

This author has also seen an undercurrent of person-to-person outreach, thoughtful inquiry, volunteerism, community-minded empathy, reasoned analysis, and bravery in the face of daunting opposition and danger. Despite the efforts of the ill-intentioned and the misguided, hope endures.

These trends continue, and this author will continue to document, initiate and respond to them.

Whatever the faith tradition or socio-political worldview (or the lack thereof) of anyone reading this, a revisitation of the Golden Rule seems appropriate, especially in this politically contentious time: Honored readers, please take the time out to read it, ponder it, and apply.

http://www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler/goldrule.htm

2011-09-11T19:55:00.000-07:00

MARCH OF THE FUNKATEERS

On Monday, September 5, 2011, funk music grandmaster George Clinton brought the latest incarnation of Parliament-Funkadelic to the stage of the 14th Annual Arts, Beats and Eats festival. The festival showcases local and national artisans of various kinds, in conjunction with hip restaurant booths and both local and nationally prominent musicians. Clinton and his original collaborators are rightfully considered godfathers of hip-hop, as many of their records have directly or indirectly influenced the legions of hip-hop MCs and producers in the years following the funk ensemble's heyday. Several of the band's seminal albums were recorded forDetroit-based indie label Westbound Records, and so Detroit usually shows up en masse to see Uncle Jam and company when they perform locally.

The crowd gathered in the Detroit suburb of Royal Oak was shoulder-to-shoulder as far as the eye could see by the time the concert got going. The eclectically-dressed multi-piece band, featuring alternating male and female leads, shook things up with P-Funk standards like "Tear the Roof off the Sucker", "Flashlight", "Mothership Connection", "One Nation Under a Groove", "Not Just Knee Deep", "Atomic Dog" and more. Clinton, wearing a blue grand marshal's outfit (and sporting what seemed to be a recent hair-and-beard makeover), held court with his raspy baritone, surrounded by the Funkateers, who were occasionally heckled by the dancer/contortionist who does the Sir Nose routine now (there was also someone dressed with a giant skeleton's head meandering the periphery of the stage, and late into the show a hula-hoop dancer crashed the set.)

The climax of the show was a searing rendition of "Maggot Brain" led by the guitarist, a fitting tribute to storied, late band member Eddie Hazel (who says a funk band can't play rock?) The encore of "We Want the Funk" closed the show and the festival, with the audience still energized for more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7KDp7Yv_a8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UehGyWnD9AE&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4Q6CLPzLAk&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDTd4E80Z38

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4Q6CLPzLAk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrJQfxOHTsM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJXV5yFMtmE&feature=related

2011-08-28T07:26:00.000-07:00

VALLEY GIRL THUGS

Gucci Gucci, Louis louis, Fendi Fendi, Prada
The basic bi*ches wear that sh*t, So I dont even bother
I put that on my partner, I put that on my family
Oakland city representer, address me as your majesty

http://www.youtube.com/user/kreayshawn

Kreayshawn, "Gucci Gucci"

Over the 30+ years of its wax-based recorded history, hip-hop has birthed a number of artists with unusual motifs. Afrika Bambaataa, Digital Underground, and Cee-Lo Green/Gnarls Barkley, come to mind. One of the genre's current stars is Nicki Minaj, whose performance-art/cartoon-inspired outfits and antics easily make her a hip-hop analog to Lady Gaga.

Where it concerns racial and gender diversity, the white female rapper has, surprisingly, been starkly rare stateside. Over the years, several mainstream pop and rock artists have dipped their toes into hip-hop based rhythm tracks for singles (Debbie Harry, Madonna, Paula Cole, Christina Aguilera) and others like Fergie and Ke$ha have integrated occasional rap-lyrics into their overall presentation. but the history of straight-up lady MC's has been minimal. Mostly, they've involved young women who didn't last past their first LP. Icy Blu, Tairrie B, Sarai, we hardly knew ye.

So, enter the White Girl Mob. Claiming Oakland, California as their home base, the central artists in this clique include Kreayshawn, V-Nasty and DJ Lil' Debbie. This group, Kreayshawn in particular, has cultivated a significant underground following with mixtapes and performances, enough to secure a deal with Columbia Records. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kreayshawn .

Watching YouTube footage of these women, their cadence is quite salty and ghetto-tastic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Agmzea0pjNM . They even defend use of the N-word as a neutral term of endearment for friends. I have to wonder: is this schtick? Do they talk like this all the time, like a typical Jerry Springer guest? Offhand, I'm not sure what to make of it, though I'm not remotely prone to defend it like rapper Mistah F.A.B., who apparently is one of their producers/mentors. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JySIVObOGis V-Nasty reportedly was released from prison earlier this summer relating to a robbery. One hopes that this was not just a ploy for street credibility.

In the underrated film Black & White (1999), writer/director James Toback showcases a complicated interconnectedness of various whites and African-Americans in New York City. One of the film's several mini-plots involves Bijou Phillips as an affluent Manhattan-reared teen who makes out with black rappers in between hanging with her fellow white trust-funders and freaking out her parents with her 'hood-chick persona. She has an exchange with a teacher, and openly admits to some of her fetishes and wilding-out, but adds the disclaimer of "I'll grow out of it" someday.

It's interesting. I remember the white girls of my high school were definitely not in the hip-hop chick clique (though i'm sure that some had certain tapes on the low); indeed, rap was only just starting to become an occasional crossover presence on the mainstream charts, far from the fully integrated pop genre of today.

My high school-- suburban and parochial-- had a significant, though statistically modest, minority population. When NWA, Ice-T, Public Enemy, 2 Live Crew and the like first broke, inner-city resident Hype never really considered what it was like in racially homogenous suburbia/small town America-- and their households-- with nearly-or-exclusively white kids interacting with each other and conversing about this music. What lyrical references were foreign to them? What slang was brand-new to them? Did the girls think the guys were sexy? How did they feel about hearing n-words.. How did their parents react to this, versus say, hard-rock, metal or punk?

Back then, I scarcely could have imagined that there would be rappers/groups that would have sustainable movements outside of having a relationship with an urban minority audience.. Which is clearly what Kreayshawn and her colleagues represent. Based on their age (what, early 20s at the most?), I guess they grew up in a post Tupac/Biggie-death era, where posthumous rap releases were the norm, political rap was mostly dormant, George W. Bush was the U.S. President in her teen years and ballers/hustlers were the dominant themes from most rappers to come up.

With the various indie/DIY performers out there, and the democratization of music production via the Internet/ProTools, etc., I'm well aware that not everybody is going to have a 'huge' audience in the way that we normally think of such things. Niche is the cool thing, now. I'd like to think, though that most of these performers have an awareness of the world outside of themselves, though. Insane Clown Posse, as reviled as they are in 'progressive' hip-hop circles, has at least enough sense to avoid co-opting the n-word as just another slang substitute for 'buddy' or whatever. Eminem was forced to come to terms with his casual outburst on that old demo of his that was leaked.

I have to admit, I'm still slightly thrown (though also amused) when walking in a park, shopping mall or wherever and overhearing conversations heavy in hip-hop slang delivered by valley girls and such. So far, though, no n-bombs.

I still think that America is in the early years of of an era of young, white children growing up being assimilated, to varying degrees, by the most contemporary trends in African-American culture via hip-hop. What will be the socio-political outlook of these young people when they grow up, get 'real-world' jobs, and are considered the middle-class stewards of their generation: physicians, attorneys, laborers, teachers, small-business owners, corporate-climbers, and, yes, public officials.

Hopefully they will grow out of latching onto the most egregious cliches of urban culture and will have matured into people with genuine empathy for the underclasses, urban and minority communities, and not holding the broader community of such folks in contempt despite their avowed love for the music, language and fashion. That would be a rebellion worth sustaining.

2011-08-17T20:50:00.000-07:00

FOOD FIGHT

http://tinyurl.com/3lzenmo
http://tinyurl.com/3apv6wz

Currently, Detroit Public Schools are under the control of a governor-appointed Emergency Financial Manager, former General Motors executive Roy Roberts. Plans are underway to merge the lowest performing 5% of statewide schools into a single district, targeting reform until academic standards/graduation rates are raised. Roberts has only been in office since approximately May of 2011, but his tenure has been controversial. Among the complaints against him are a recent announcement of an across-the-board 10% wage cut for teachers in the system, as well as a recent voiding of all contractual based services pending a re-evaluation. Labor interests such as the Detroit Federation of Teachers are promising to fight Roberts' reform efforts in court. This week, controversy struck again, but from a different corridor.

Just the other day, a new federally funded pilot program has been announced for this fall. All children in the Detroit Public Schools (DPS) system will be given free lunch. Up until now, reportedly 78% of children in DPS were eligible for free breakfast & lunch, but one challenge in that was the ongoing stigma among children associated with being ‘on the free lunch’, and many opt not to get it to 'save face'; also some parents are neglectful and do not fill out the paperwork for clearance.

"There in school, see? I'm made a fool; with one-and-a-half pair of pants, you ain't cool. But there's no dollars for nothing else; I got beans, rice, and bread on my shelf..."
Boogie Down Productions, "Love's Gonna Get'cha", 1990

Michigan is one of three states participating in this program (also Illinois and Kentucky): If at least 40% of the children in a school district are under the federal poverty line, that district can apply for the district-wide free meals program.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the announcement has come under attack. All over local message boards, people are complaining about “their taxes” being misused by legions of bridge-card (food stamp) users, while the remaining, ultra-law-abiding and completely subsidy-free-since-birth folks are assumedly left to pick up the entire tab. I'm pissed.

Since this is a federal program with an implicit connection to the Obama administration, I can only (vainly) hope that is not one of the reasons behind all the so-called pushback. And for those in the region who don’t live in Detroit, why are they so hung up? Why do they feel so personally aggrieved by this development? Nominally at least, many have been on-board with the top-down school reform efforts as manifested in the appointing of an emergency manager to guide DPS. Do they really think that they’re not going to be able to buy that mink coat or a Corvette or new summer home because a few thousand urban Detroit kids get to eat a hot breakfast & lunch 5 days a week? Do they really think that? Is that really where our region is at? God bless America...

I have yet to hear the outrage from people complaining about the repairs to Michigan public roads that they ‘never’ drive, even though ‘our’ taxes pay for it (‘highway socialism’?) It's almost hilarious.

The intellectual hypocrisy implicit in the arguments of reactionaries is nakedly bare. Bush-era Tax breaks, Unemployment insurance, SSI/Disability, Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, going to college on the G.I. Bill, and more.People swearing that they live their lives completely free from any and all forms of "government supplement" are fooling themselves. If you want to live completely tax free, go found your own country.

2011-08-11T06:58:00.000-07:00

NO SMILES FOR SMILEY & DOC WEST

On August 8, 2011, radio hosts and political commentators Tavis Smiley and Dr. Cornel West's "Poverty Tour" of the United States came to Detroit, Michigan. The event was hosted at the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center (Detroit City Hall), in an upper-level auditorium.

In recent years West and Smiley have come under fire for their harsh criticisms of President Barack Obama. Within the past year alone, both men have had on-air arguments with National Action Network president and radio host Rev. Al Sharpton.

There was a contingent of local protesters who came to voice their dissent with West and Smiley as they spoke at the event.

A blog site has uplifted the counter-protest as sensible Detroiters standing up for themselves:

http://tinyurl.com/3qnlnhs

(Incidentally, I really hope their use of 'refudiate' was with ironic intent, since, well, it's not a word)

I'm of the opinion that not all criticisms are created equal. It takes being able to mentally compartmentalize and discern. The flailing canards of John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Michelle Bachmann and Newt Gingrich are in one category. The same goes for right-wing media commentators like Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.

African-American culture is so used to defending its beloved figures from political attacks from hard-right conservatives, that now when certain criticisms come from black figures, critiques that may have been considered spot-on for a George W. Bush are considered racially treasonous as applied to President Obama.

The summation, for some of those who can't stand Smiley and West, is that they are cynical quasi-intellectuals with little to offer in terms of pragmatic policy changes to help African-American communities. Others are a lot more blunt with it: "They're just haters who want [Obama] to fail."

Statistically, Detroit barely voted 51% in the 2008 Presidential election. Maybe just under 50% in the 2010 election. Many polling spots, voting lines were heaviest by early morning, modest, but not jam-packed, by mid-day and were a trickle by late afternoon. I saw it first hand.

Plenty of people still don't have health care coverage a year after the bill passed. It's still not going to be "cheap", so for adults who don't qualify for Medicare (seniors) or Medicaid (lower-income adults and children), they're out of luck, even now it's illegal for Health care insurance groups to deny based on a pre-existing condition.

Whatever the complaints about Smiley & West, they're not to blame for the horrendous voter turnout that consistently happens in Detroit. Also, it speaks ill for the intellectual discourse of black voters if "all" they do is uncritically accept "anything" that Pres. Obama does based on the notion of "well, it could always be worse". Clearly, it could be. But direct engagement with urban, inner-city, and poor communities in general is needed more than ever by the federal government, and it's not happening. Attacking literally any-and-all criticisms of current White House policy smacks of sycophantism. Why weren't there protests in the Van Jones firing or the Shirley Sherrod case?

African-American journalist George Curry hits the nail on the head about the hyper-sensitivity to critiques of the President. http://tinyurl.com/3ln5chs

People can protest Smiley & West all they want. Bravo. But hopefully they're also putting that same energy into making phone calls, emails and letters to their elected officials, including the President, and directly expressing their opinions on what their community needs.

2011-07-29T07:44:00.000-07:00

THE HOLLOW PRIZE:
Tulane professor Melissa Harris-Perry guest-hosted the Rachel Maddow Show, and featured a segment highlighting the cities of New Orleans and Detroit. She compared the current plight of President Barack Obama to that of African-American mayors in America, particularly focusing on current Detroit mayor Dave Bing. "The Hollow Prize" refers to black mayors being elected to oversee cities that have already slid into economic decline-- which in the case of Detroit, has been ongoing since its first black mayor-- the late Coleman Young-- was elected in 1973. This week Mayor Bing has announced the beginning stages of his administration's "Detroit Works" initiative, where certain specific neighborhoods will be identified for particular attention from city services to maintain their quality of life, while other neighborhoods will get a minimum of police, fire and garbage patrols, but mostly public service attention will amount to blighted structures being demolished. Footage of Harris-Perry's editorial follows.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

2011-07-21T20:42:00.000-07:00

CAPTAIN AMERICA HAS STAR-SPANGLED ACTION

Captain America: The First Avenger is the first major motion picture based on the venerable Marvel Comics superhero character that first debuted in print over 70 years ago. Since then, there have been largely forgettable cross-media interpretations, including a 1940s movie serial and an aborted attempt at a television series in the late 70s that left two telefilms in its wake. With the power of Marvel Studios (now wholly owned by Disney and partnering with Paramount Films for distribution), Marvel attempts to return the luster to its onetime flagship hero that matches his mighty shield.

Here, Chris Evans (Fantastic Four, Cellular) plays heroic shrimp Steve Rogers, who in 1942 wants to enlist in the military but is determined to be a 4-F. Still, the little guy has heart, as displayed when he keeps confronting local bully. His gumption impresses military scientist Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci) and gruff Colonel Chester Phillips (Tommy Lee Jones). They put him through the paces of boot camp, and finally reveal that he’s the perfect test subject for their ‘super soldier serum’—if it works (this shouldn’t be a spoiler) then Steve’s musculature and reflexes will be boosted to virtual perfection.

Alas, the experiment’s aftermath has a tragic end, which poises newly buff Steve to be the sole super-soldier for the Allied Forces—thus, ‘Captain America’ is born. Soon, he is pitted against the nefarious Johann Schmidt (Hugo Weaving), aka the Red Skull—an ambitious Nazi scientist who heads up ‘Hydra’, a super-science-weapons division of the Nazi army. Schmidt searches for an ancient artifact of power, called the ‘tesseract’, allegedly giving its wielder the power of the Nordic gods themselves. Heady stuff, this.

The film’s remaining supporting cast is capable, including Sebastian Stan as Cap’s best friend Bucky Barnes and Hayley Atwell as British agent (and nominal love interest) Peggy Carter.
The script, credited to Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, features an anti-ironic sensibility here, being fairly straightforward in its depiction of patriotism and earnest heroism as exemplified by Cap. This could have easily diverted into self-satire or camp, but the filmmakers, including director Joe Johnston (Jurassic Park 3, the Rocketeer), wisely avoid this.

Presumably to keep its comic-book-reality bonafides intact, the movie plays fast and loose with the fictional history it represents (the Red Skull’s Hydra troops feature no swastika iconography, and Cap’s Howling Commandos team is racially integrated without a blink.) Still, the period designs are convincing enough, including a nod to Frankenstein with the Super Soldier laboratory.

Captain America is poised to be the first in a franchise of solo adventures as well as the introduction to the character’s featured role in next year’s The Avengers. Time will tell whether Cap regains his former fan-favorite glory: his stalwart shtick may seem quaint compared to brooding avengers like Batman and Wolverine. Still, the film gets enough right to stand out from the crowd and in a time of political contention provides plenty of flag-friendly good will.

2011-06-07T06:45:00.000-07:00

TWITTERGATE SCANDAL ROCKS THE HOUSE

(Photograph) I don't want your /(Photograph) I don't need your /(Photograph) All I've got is a photograph (Photograph) /But it's not enough...
Santana w. Chris Daughtry, “Photograph”, 2010

Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-New York City) has for 13 years built up a reputation as a liberal lion of the House of Representatives, frequently offering a staunch counter-point to Republicans on political television during the George W. Bush years. Even as the tenure of Bush ended and the Barack Obama presidency began, Weiner maintained his status as a voice of progressive interest: As policy was developed such as the stimulus packages, health care reform and financial law reform, Weiner warned against premature compromise with Republicans and stumped for such statutes as a public option for health care and stiffer penalties for stock-market manipulators. Hated by the opposition party, and in some circles resented by the centrists of his own, Weiner was unabashed in advocating what he felt were eroding principles that the Democratic Party stood for.

During the past week and a half, Weiner has almost single-handedly derailed his own career. Not to put too fine a point on it, but he didn’t just shoot himself in the foot, he pretty much used a LAW rocket. Perhaps the great karma gods above were not satisfied this time with letting stand revealed the sexual peccadilloes of former California GOP governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (while talking tough on illegal immigration, he was likely visiting detention centers to interview for part-time nannies—but I digress).

Apparently, suggestive photographs were sent by Weiner to one if not several women through the social networking Internet site Twitter. For well over a week after the scandal broke, Weiner ducked directly answering questions on whether the photos were of him, were sent by him, or if he were the victim of a cyber-prank. One wonders if he was also able to duck the items that may have flown from the hand of former Hilary Clinton Aide Huma Abelin, his wife of barely a year. In what amounts to a Herculean display of chutzpah, Weiner says that he will not be resigning, instead leaving his fate in the hands of his district voters, who will choose next year whether to give him another two years in office. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi has publicly called for an ethics investigation, which Weiner has, to his, uh, credit, openly welcomed.

In a word (or three), Congressman Weiner: You blew it. Not just for yourself. Not just for your family. But for progressives nationwide. It’s bad enough that the Tea Party express upended the Democratic advantage in the House last year. Your bungling may well have emboldened conservative activists and office-holders alike (i.e., John Boenher, Eric Cantor), who will be relentless in hammering you and every other Democrat that’s even tangentially affiliated with you from now until November of 2012, by which time—theoretically—you will either be re-elected or replaced as the congressional representative of your district.

The progressive wing of the Democrats barely gets enough respect to begin with. Up until this point, you were at least considered much more photogenic than Ohio’s Dennis Kucinich. Of course, being photogenic is exactly what got you in trouble, alas. As for your ambition to be mayor of New York City— much like your photos, that may be another goal of yours that has been shunt into the recycle bin of your political desktop.

I could dream of ways to see you /I could close my eyes to dream /I could fantasize about you...
Taio Cruz, "Dirty Picture", 2010

In closing, let me be frank, Mr. Weiner: For whatever its worth, I’m probably more forgiving than most when it comes to scenarios like this. I can emotionally compartmentalize to a degree: Let’s say you’re doing a bang-up job representing me in Congress, and bringing home plenty of resources to help our community, I probably don’t care that you, say, watch “naughty vids” on your home computer, with or without your wife. But when you start being patently reckless, using your official (i.e., taxpayer subsidized) Internet accounts to facilitate flirtation, frolicking and/or fooling around, well, that’s just meshuggah, friend.

2011-05-17T07:12:00.000-07:00

DETROIT REHAB PROGRAM GIVES SECOND CHANCE

A group of men and women graduated from Detroit/Wayne County’s 3rd Circuit Court Adult Drug Court program on Monday. The program is a creation of the aforementioned court, and administered by the Salvation Army of Detroit, whose downtown Detroit main headquarters (a converted warehouse) also hosted the commencement ceremony. Eight of the 25 graduates were present for the noontime commencement (others had work commitments), dressed in caps and gowns.
The origins of the program were to offer non-violent substance-addicted offenders an alternative to imprisonment. Entrance into the program is at the discretion of the presiding judges in the defendant’s case. Once accepted into the program, participants are put through an intensive 12-step drug/alcohol rehabilitation, and also including educational instruction/GED, life-skills training, job-readiness training and placement.
R&B singer Kem, a Detroit native, was present at the event as a keynote speaker. He told of his own background with substance abuse and revealed to participants that he also completed the Salvation Army’s program at the same facility: “Because of my own background with substance abuse…anytime I have an opportunity to give back on this level, it’s a good thing,” Kem says he still attends group therapy sessions and claims to have been sober now for 20 years.
Another celebrity of sorts was also in attendance-- Judge Kevin Robbins was among the justices who participated in the graduation ceremony. He says he oversees over 30 individuals a year whose cases he diverts to the Drug Court program. He told the story of a new graduate in attendance whose case he supervised. Curtis Rowe was a basketball player for UCLA in the late 60s and early 70s, where the team won championships in ’69, ’70 and ’71. He was drafted and joined the Pistons team. He played for the Pistons for five years (among his teammates were current mayor Dave Bing) and three years for Boston. Apparently Rowe relocated to Detroit at some point, and somewhere along the way, things went badly enough to get arrested. Robbins went on to say that Rowe was a sports idol of his as a child, and he got to meet him twice in the distant past, and was struck by the irony when Rowe appeared before him as a criminal defendant. Robbins presented Rowe with a photograph of Robbins as a child playing basketball, asking him to keep this image in mind if things get stressful in maintaining his sobriety.
…Rowe says he likes Miami for the NBA finals.

Rowe's Stats: http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/r/rowecu01.html

2011-05-15T19:48:00.000-07:00

HYPE'S RETRO REVIEWS:
N.W.A. ALUM BUSTS SHOTS ON SOLO EP

Artist: MC Ren

Release: Kizz My Black Azz

Label: Ruthless/Priority/EMI

Year: 1992

“Kizz My Black Azz” is the first solo EP from former N.W.A. member MC Ren. Quiet as it's kept, Compton, California native Lorenzo "MC Ren" Patterson allegedly signed on to Eazy-E’s Ruthless Records as a teenager with the intent of being a solo artist. So the story goes, a fateful opportunity presented itself when N.W.A. founding member Ice Cube took a leave of absence from the group to attend an architectural-drafting vocational college in Arizona. Eazy allegedly asked Ren to contribute to ghostwriting raps for Eazy and making guest-appearances on recordings like “Ruthless Villain”. By the time tech-school grad Ice Cube came back into the fold, Ren was a full-fledged member of the group.

While N.W.A. as a group managed to change hip-hop and pop-culture forever with their groundbreaking and controversial music, unfortunately, Ren’s solo debut was clouded in the aftermath of the group’s disintegration in the early 1990s. By the time of this release, Ice Cube had quit the group and had released two solo albums, and Dr. Dre (along with associate D.O.C.) had recently defected from Ruthless to form what would eventually become Death Row Records. Within N.W.A., Ren had done solo-style cuts before (“If it ain’t Ruff”) but this is effort is clearly driven by Ren’s direction.

“Kizz My Black Azz” finds Ren treading familiar territory, telling tales of wayward young women (“Behind the Scenez”), reckless gangbangers (“The Valley”), post-fame hangers-on (“Hound Dogz”) and bitter rivals (on the title cut).

The production on this release is exclusively handled by DJ Bobcat (see also- Ice Cube, LL Cool J, Tupac), who proves himself to be just as capable as his contemporary Dr. Dre in crafting head-nodding, sample-heavy breakbeats which alternate between uptempo and pre-Chronic G-funk.
The best song on the six-cut effort is the battle-anthem “Final Frontier”—no Star Trek references, but Boogie Down Productions’ “The Bridge is Over” is given a West Coast-revamp.

In retrospect, there are some criticisms to bear here- Ren continues the unabashed sexism of N.W.A. here, and, viewed at face value, “Behind the Scenez” crosses into gratuitous territory (the narrative climaxes with incest and group sex). Also the title cut finds Ren bashing rap acts that involve live musicians in their performance lineup; it proved to be kind of nearsighted in light of the rise of acts like the Roots, Black Eyed Peas, Lauryn Hill and others. Ren gets props for being honest in his opinions, but some of them were clearly off-base.

Ren’s future solo albums would prove to be somewhat uneven production-wise, so this is arguably his most sonically consistent release. For fans of Golden-Age West Coast rap, this is a worthy buy, but for the uninitiated, N.W.A. and Ice Cube’s first LPs should come first.

*Note: The 2003 re-release features the music video to "Final Frontier".

@ Amazon- http://tinyurl.com/6y938ud

2011-05-01T08:41:00.001-07:00

NBC'S MEET THE PRESSNBC's David Gregory and this week's roundtable on national politics; New York City's mayor Michael Bloomberg makes an intriguing suggestion about immigration policy and the city of Detroit:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Mariah Carey's Twins: Gives Birth To Boy, Girl

2011-04-30T15:15:00.001-07:00

congratulations to Mariah and Nick, many blessings to the both of them..
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

2011-04-15T16:45:00.000-07:00

THEATER REVIEW- FORGIVING JOHN LENNON When:Sundays : 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. (ends May 22) Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays : 8:30 p.m. (ends May 22) Saturdays : 3 p.m. (ends May 22) Except April 24 www.detroitreptheatre.com Writer: William Missouri Downs The play explores intercultural relations, through a lens of interactions between an American married couple and a Somali national who is of the Muslim faith. The couple, who are both college professors, are both interracial and intercultural themselves-- Joseph (Benjamin Williams) is African-American and Katie (Leah Smith) is Caucasian and England born and raised. Asma (Yolanda Jack), the guest, is a poet who has lived in several countries, and has been brought to America for a performance sponsored by two colleges, including the one that the couple works for- A misunderstanding places her in their care for the evening, and thus begins the narrative. The title is a flip reference to the Vatican's official newsletter, L'Osservatore Romano, effectively pardoning John Lennon for making his meant-to-be-taken-ironically- "we're bigger than Jesus" comments in the late 60s that brought down condemnation from an assortment of parties, including the religious leaders of the time. The play takes place entirely in the living room of the couple's home, and the narrative is completely dialogue-driven. Most of the comedy-- and conflict-- comes from Asma's sharp observations about American culture, and dispelling many of the preconceptions that Joseph and Katie have-- despite being self-described liberal academics, there ends up being a lot they don't know about misunderstood minorities-- and even themselves. Some themes: the play lampoons how political correctness can intellectually and emotionally hobble even the most well-meaning of people, how professors that are supposed to be teaching people to be free thinkers are boxed-in by chasing down the holy grail of tenure status, how it doesn't take much for someone convinced of their open-mindedness and generosity can really be quite conservative and self-serving.

2011-04-08T18:59:00.000-07:00

THOR MOVIE PREVIEW

2011-04-03T22:39:00.000-07:00

DETROIT MEDIA PARTNERSHIP'S IDEAQUEST 2011 The two major Detroit newspapers (Detroit News and Detroit Free Press) are having a free contest on how the newspapers can better serve the Metro Detroit and Michigan communities. They started an online contest where people were given an open-ended solicitation to come up with ideas that both the News and the Free Press can potentially take on as real initiatives or policies. From content delivery to editorial content and coverage to supporting charity initiatives, "the sky's the limit" in the words of the promotion staff. This author came up with a pitch that would involve both newspapers bankrolling a charter school for urban Detroit school-age children, providing a quality education with a lean towards media-skills instruction that would prepare them for an eventual career in that industry. The "Media Academies" pitch can be found here- http://ideas.michigan.com/forum/index.php?topic=87.msg96;topicseen#msg96 The link to Voting (preferably for the "Media Academies" pitch) can be found here- http://ideas.michigan.com/forum/index.php?topic=507.0

The top Ten pitches voted on will enable the authors to make a live pitch to the contest's judges, including representatives from the Detroit News, Free Press, and the current Domino's Pizza CEO. The final top winners (one from the public and one employee of the Newspapers) will each receive a $5,000 cash grant and the idea will be formally adopted by the newspapers. Voting can be done once a day for the next two weeks or so.

2011-03-23T08:55:00.001-07:00

STRAIGHT TALK WITH THE GOVERNOR AND MAYOR
Detroit Mayor Dave Bing and Michigan Governor Rick Snyder sat together for a joint interview at WXYZ-TV 7 studios in Southfield (Detroit), Michigan. The live broadcast included questions lifted from emails, a chat-room, and video questions submitted through the Web. This author appears at the 3:15 mark--

2011-03-11T16:49:00.000-08:00

Question to Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, for a planned live interview with constituent questions, collected by Detroit's WXYZ TV-7.

2011-02-17T12:54:00.000-08:00

A TEACHER WILL BEGIN TO SPEAK

“Playlist: KRS-One” is a compilation album featuring the pioneering hip-hop artist KRS-One of Boogie Down Productions. The 14-track set includes songs from his long tenure on Jive Records during the 1980s and 1990s. KRS and the B.D.P. crew were initially lauded as part of the late 80s new-wave of hip-hop performers, bringing updated musical and lyrical styles-- among other things, KRS is credited with weaving a reggae sensibility into many of his works. In particular with B.D.P., KRS-One alternated between stage personas: One was ‘The Blast-master’, given to relentlessly fierce battle rhymes that sought to energize fans and intimidate his rivals (“I’m Still #1”, “Step Into a World”, “Rappaz R.N. Dainja”); the other was “The Teacher”, incorporating everything from Malcolm X quotes to the Bhagavad Gita in social commentary cuts like “Love’s Gonna Get’cha”, “My Philosophy” and “Black Cop”.

Nearly every Jive album that KRS recorded is represented here, but the selections are not in chronological order. KRS’s heyday was considered the golden-age for remixes, and so the producers of this set wisely included the “Live from Caucus Mountain” 12-inch mix for “You Must Learn”; puzzlingly, they chose the album version of “We In There” over the well-received remix by A Tribe Called Quest’s Ali Shaheed (side note: retroactive sampling issues have damaged updated CD re-releases of various period hip-hop gems.)

Minor issues aside, what’s most disappointing about the compilation is that nothing from KRS-One’s first album Criminal Minded is included. That seminal release was recorded for the now-defunct indie B-Boy Records (and since re-released) and so it falls outside the purview of the Jive/Sony archives; still, it couldn’t have hurt to pay a license fee to include at least one song from that album for context (or include one of the live-in-concert renditions as recorded on the Live Hardcore Worldwide LP, also ignored here.)

Still, for those who have a yearning for ‘the boom-bap’ over the ‘bling-bling’, this best-of set is a can’t miss for the discerning hip-hop fan.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002ZDOXLM/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img

2011-02-07T15:46:00.000-08:00

FREEWAY CONGESTION

Hip-Hop Culture website HipHopDX.Com interviews "Freeway" Rick Ross, the Los Angeleno who spent years in federal prison on drug-charges, and who became legendary in the 1980s for the cocaine/crack epidemic that hit throughout inner-city America. The interview touches on Ross's experiences, including an ongoing lawsuit against popular rap artist 'Rick Ross' (whose real name is William Roberts). The elder Ross is suing his namesake for undisclosed damages. He is also pursuing the creation of a biographical motion picture based on his life-- claiming to have the acclaimed actor Nick Cassavetes onboard as a screenwriter/producer.

http://www.hiphopdx.com/index/interviews/id.1651/title.freeway-rick-ross-reality-check
www.freewayenterprise.com

I grew up in the inner-city, but I didn't grow up idolizing the "street dudes" a.k.a. the dope-pushers of the neighborhood, the gang-bang guys, etc. I just had other things on my mind, like school, football, my favorite music, comic books, etc. Back when the gold-ropes and early Air Jordan shoes were popular, I wouldn't have minded having that, but I knew my folks couldn't afford it, and I wasn't interested in going the "hustling" route.

I My hope is that the 'real' Rick Ross is now dedicating his life to helping the inner-city underclass, considering his role in exploiting the underclass years ago. Regardless of whatever the government involvement/connection was, he is not an innocent in the legacy of crack.
I hope he puts whatever money he raises toward scholarships, job-training programs, drug-treatment programs, etc., and that "Freeway Enterprises" isn't just a front for him to be a big baller all over again..

2011-01-29T10:57:00.000-08:00

OPEN LETTER TO LOCAL AND STATE LEADERS

Regarding the recent U.S. – China leadership summit in Washington, D.C., there are lessons that local leadership can learn from this concerning developing a redevelopment plan for the future. Michigan governor Rick Snyder’s recent comments about attracting immigrants with college degrees to Michigan can play a part in this as well.

An initiative that needs to happen is to seek out and incentivize entrepreneurs and companies from global regions (Africa, China, India, Middle East, South America) to set up shop in Wayne County/Detroit, renovate abandoned buildings and hire locals to work at these new businesses. Our region should be taking the initiative to benefit from globalization and not be left behind by it.

Next, when it comes to getting a rail system going here, Chinese consultation on this could prove invaluable since China already has a vast network of mass-transit trains. Building off that thread, when it comes to the proposed Detroit Riverfront International Crossing (DRIC), I support that project being green-lit.

The DRIC project can go further than currently planned. Designers of the bridge and crossing area should incorporate a light-rail train to go over the bridge, either through the center or along the periphery. Incorporating a light-rail train into the bridge will allow for pedestrians to go from Detroit to Windsor, Ontario and back, whether for work, for business, for school, or recreation and tourism. Having a rail component built into the bridge will lessen the burden on the car and truck traffic that will already be intense once the bridge is completed and available for public use. U.S. Homeland Security and the Canadian equivalent would have full authority for incorporating comprehensive security measures. Having a rail line as a part of the bridge can only increase Michigan’s economic prosperity. Funding can be sought from corporate and individual donations; aggressive outreach should be done for collaborative foreign investment partners, as this bridge would indeed be a beacon of multinational trade.

Southeast Michigan/Detroit needs to be thought of more as an international destination. Immigrants with college degrees could be recruited and incentivized to collaborate in job-training programs in growth industries (partners can include Wayne County Community College District) for local residents, to increase the skill-sets of urban residents to make them more employable and in a better position to start their own small businesses.

2011-01-20T16:52:00.000-08:00

STATE OF SNYDER

Michigan governor Rick Snyder has just delivered his first 'State of the State' address, given at the state Capitol building in Lansing: A transcript of the speech follows-
http://www.freep.com/article/20110120/NEWS15/110120009/1318/Transcript-State-of-the-State

The speech mostly dealt in generalities, which surprised some political observers who felt that some specifics would be announced on how to handle the state's current $1.5 billion budget deficit.

Some of the parts of the speech I found intriguing were:

An office of urban affairs that will deal with the issues confronting several major urban centers in Michigan, including Detroit, Grand Rapids, Flint, and Saginaw.

Openly supporting the Detroit Riverfront International Crossing, a project that would create a joint- U.S. and Canada-owned bridge going spanning from Detroit to Windsor, Ontario. Currently, a high volume of international trade between the U.S. and Canada goes through the Ambassador Bridge-- despite the lofty name, it is actually a privately owned bridge, owned by local real-estate tycoon Manuel "Matty" Moroun, the CEO of CenTra, Inc. During the Jennifer Granholm administration planning for this second bridge was stalled due to several state politicians (mostly from the GOP) balking, not to mention Moroun's organization steamrolling ahead with trying to build their own second bridge-crossing right next to the Ambassador, despite protests from an assortment of Michigan authorities. Detroit journalist Darrell Dawsey comments on Mr. Moroun's unique status in Southeast Michigan: http://detroit.blogs.time.com/2010/02/19/the-billionaires-bridge-and-his-big-blighted-building/

Snyder also called for Michigan to embrace immigration-- specifically, immigrants with advanced college degrees (and presumably in the science/physics realm), citing immigrant-run startup companies in Silicon Valley. On this particular issue, Snyder received polite applause, but most certainly did not get a standing ovation like virtually every other point he drove during the speech. Likely, the Legislature's Republicans, many of them new to state office (term limits left dozens of politicos as lame ducks last year), and several of them neo-con idealogues, want to keep up the backlash against immigrants in general, especially after reactionary types locally were energized after Arizona initially enacted their law about being caught without proof of citizenship.
Snyder also revealed a 'Report Card' style means of measuring the state's major policy/quality of life issues, and he promises to give a graded update to each of his goals with every 'State of the State' speech.

2011-01-09T13:10:00.000-08:00

ARIZONA TRAGEDY

On January 8, 2011, Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D- 8th District) was one of nineteen victims of the shooting at a Safeway grocery store near Tucson, Arizona where she was meeting publicly with constituents. She was taken into emergency surgery, in critical condition from a gunshot wound to the head. At the time of this writing, after the surgery a physician treating the congresswoman said that he was optimistic about her chances for recovery. The gunman, a Jared Loughner, has been taken into custody.

The nation should rightfully be mourning this tragic incident and be supportive of law-enforcement efforts to bring this investigation to closure. However, there are some issues that can be examined from a policy level that can hopefully curb outbursts of violence such as this.

Mental Health- The 2010 Health Care Act must be defended against repeal efforts by those in opposition to it. In particular any statutes concerning mental health coverage should be scrutinized and bolstered with amendments. Publicly funded mental health facilities in the United States facing drastic budget cutbacks and outright closings has been a quiet, disturbing trend in the past 15 years. Mental-health coverage in self-purchased or employer-paid health insurance through private firms is often modest, at best, with high-co-pays and deductibles. Lack of mental health access has, in part, reputedly led to a spike in homeless populations, particularly in Southeast Michigan.

Gun Control- This ongoing issue in American politics is always contentious and brings out very emotional responses. But if there is going to be any genuine progress in addressing gun proliferation in our country, elected officials must be bold enough to take a stand on enacting new regulations. More stringent background checks are needed to make sure that a person is not of unsound mental health. The trend of self-described collectors owning high-powered weaponry is extremely disturbing. The purchase and ownership of military and paramilitary weaponry by civilians must be analyzed and curbed. The mantra of gun-rights absolutists and lobbyists that any and all firearms are okay for anyone to own should not be allowed to define our culture.

If there is anything to be learned from the recent tragedy, it is that disagreement with others, even drastic disagreement, should not be a justification for violent aggression against our neighbors.

2011-01-07T12:17:00.000-08:00

STATE OF DETROIT 2011, part 2:
Hypestyle's Manifesto

Local Detroit television station WXYZ TV-7 has an intriguing new initiative called 'Detroit 2020' (www.detroit2020.com) The station says that this will be an ongoing news saga to highlight the state of Detroit (and vicinity) for the next ten years. In particular the station wants to hear from the greater community about good things going on as well as the challenges that are still in place.

This author has spoken on these individual issues to varying degrees (and I have written to any number of elected officials and media outlets), but based in part on the challenge issued, I have prefaced my statements with questions that have come up in various community meetings, such as those initiated by mayor Dave Bing's Detroit Works Project (www.detroitworksproject.com).

What parts of your local economy are working or thriving? What businesses and sectors are expanding and hiring?

Some of the moderate growth industries in the local region include medical office assistants, billing processors, retail sales, and truck driving. There are also currently tax credits in the state of Michigan that involve trying to make Michigan into a major filmmaking region in the country.

What parts of your local economy are not working or thriving? What businesses and sectors have been hit the hardest? What are people struggling with the most?

The parts of Detroit’s economy which are not working mostly involve manufacturing. This cannot be over-stressed. Historically, Detroit has placed an inordinate amount of resources into assuming that the heavy-industrial manufacturing industry would be here forever. There was a time in which various factory and heavy-industry-related jobs were plentiful for local residents, whether they were simply a high school graduate, or even a dropout. At the risk of understatement, that era is over. From the 1960s forward, there has been both drastic and gradual disinvestment, by both larger corporations and smaller businesses, which has economically crippled the city of Detroit and made the metropolitan area much less prosperous than in the past.
Manufacturing as an industry farmed jobs out to foreign countries while downsizing dramatically within our borders. Today, even entry-level jobs at various companies require some form of formal skills training, a degree or certificate. This prevents a high percentage of Detroit residents from even being considered for various jobs. Thus, even so-called blue-collar jobs are not a sure thing for anyone unskilled seeking employment.

All types of businesses have been hit hard, but non-profit organizations have a special challenge- many of their budgets are created with contracts with city, county, and state entities—and also private and corporate donations. All of these resources have dwindled, and so various non-profit organizations that were otherwise providing various community needs (such as parenting classes, counseling, financial literacy training and more) to local populations have similarly scaled back services drastically.

What are the opportunities of growth in your community? What businesses and sectors seem poised to rebound? What do you see as the jobs of the future?

Construction & Building Trades- With all of the blight and urban decay that exists throughout the city of Detroit, the various construction and building trades would be a prime industry to recruit urban Detroit residents for new jobs and start-up businesses. General contracting, electrical, plumbing, heating & cooling, welding, and various related fields are all growth industries. With respect to organized labor, the insular nature of many labor unions must be addressed. There is a statistical lack of racial minority representation in many of these unions that can be dramatically improved. Detroit’s skilled-trade unions should be partnering with Detroit city schools and training students in their respective disciplines, grooming them for future employment after graduation.

Green Industry- There are a number of green-industry jobs that can be initiated in the city of Detroit. Detroit can be a much ‘greener’ city than it is now. Creating new uses for land in the city is an absolute must. A recent Detroit News article identified agriculture as experiencing slight growth in the state of Michigan, despite the ongoing challenges of recession and unemployment. There are those who feel that an urban environment and farming can’t coexist. I disagree vehemently. I feel that there should be a City Department of Agriculture Development that encourages both large-scale commercial farming as well as smaller neighborhood-based farming communes. Schools in the city can also participate- especially with partnerships with state colleges and universities, they can have dedicated plots of land, where students can work on them for credit, especially during the spring and summer. Detroit schools can emphasize earth-science curriculums, leading to career fields as forestry, agriculture, urban planning, botany, new energy, and more. Age-appropriate green-industry jobs training for high school students, college students and non-student adults can be a long-term boost to the local economy.

Film Industry- Detroit is effectively over one-third vacant, taking into account abandoned and otherwise unoccupied housing, decrepit commercial properties, and other landspace that has been allowed to be recklessly reclaimed by nature. Much of this ostensibly available land could be used to house movie production studios and backlots. The city of Detroit should have a Department of Film & Television to work directly with film/TV entrepreneurs and at least one major film studio if it is going to be competitive in the contemporary entertainment industry. One prime spot for a potential film studio location within city boundaries is the abandoned old Packard auto Plant, which covers several acres in the city. Some Detroit city schools should have TV and film-production curriculums to prepare students to enter this industry.

What are the obstacles to job creation in your community? What could make local businesses more likely to start hiring?

One of the major obstacles for job growth in the city of Detroit is education. Detroit’s public schools have a dropout rate of approximately 70%. This is unconscionable and this is an emergency. Detroit’s adult illiteracy rate is approximately 48%. This is also beyond shameful and it is a prohibitive roadblock to hiring local people for newly available jobs. Detroit adults need GED training and basic literacy re-training programs, to help the adult population achieve the baseline competency that competitive jobs require for candidates. State colleges and universities should be ‘adopting’ Detroit city schools and managing them with specialized curriculums such as medical science, physics/engineering, information technology, accounting/finance, and more (with the understanding that upon graduation they would already have some transferable college credits.)

Detroit also faces a major problem for formerly incarcerated persons returning to the community. A high number of Michigan inmates return to Detroit neighborhoods. Typically, these individuals leave prison with no applicable job skills, no immediate prospects for employment and/or training, and with negative attitudes toward rehabilitation. There needs to be more special attention paid to the formerly incarcerated. These persons need access to the mainstream labor pool. This can reduce the rates of recidivism drastically.

Some conditions for which local area businesses could start hiring include, but are not limited to:

Blight Removal- The city of Detroit has an enormous problem with blighted structures throughout the city. Detroit has reportedly as many as 88,000 currently abandoned homes in the city, most of which are structurally unsound. Not only are there abandoned houses, but there are abandoned storefronts, apartment complexes, warehouses, defunct factory grounds and other commercial structures throughout the city. You cannot drive through a neighborhood in the city without encountering a string of structures which are empty, broken-down, and dangerous. These abandoned structures are not only eyesores, but they frequently serve as available locations for criminal and drug-related activities, and also are prime spots for predators to take kidnapped people. It is difficult to get a handle on exactly what type of new developments are possible when there is so much blight that could be removed and this could give city planners a better idea on what type of commercial or residential developments could be beneficial to a given area. The city should have more aggressive statutes in place to fine owners of unkempt properties as well as the means to seize them provided continued inaction on the properties and/or amassing of large, unpaid fines.

Mass Transit: The Southeast Michigan area suffers badly from a lack of a comprehensive mass transit system. As many as one-third of adult Detroit city residents do not own their own vehicle. Minors and the elderly are particularly challenged in this regard. Local insurance rates for urban Detroiters are exorbitantly high, which prompts many individuals to simply not purchase insurance (which is required by the state). Many currently available jobs in the general region are at least several miles (and beyond) from the Detroit city core. For people either trying to find work or getting to work, reliable transportation is a genuine must. Detroit must be able to compete with not only American cities like Seattle, Chicago, New York and Boston, but also London, Tokyo, Berlin, and Beijing. Mass Public Transit not only reduces the greenhouse-gases that individually-owned vehicles make, but also enhances quality of life for residents of a community. People can meet their family and career obligations more easily, and recreational opportunities expand.

There should be multiple light-rail lines throughout the city, especially on its major thoroughfares. The city should be partnering with regional government and business entities to have next-generation buses and street-cars to serve throughout the neighborhoods. 24-hour availability for transit is also a must. Detroit should have special consideration for the proposed initiatives for funding for high-speed rail development and stimulus funds for transit development. Not only would a new mass transit system provide a sizable number of jobs specific to transit operation, but economic redevelopment, including small business development and other jobs, follows any newly implemented transit lines.

Because of the taxpayer bailout of two automobile companies, I feel that the engineering and mass-production/assembly resources at General Motors and Chrysler can and should be used to help design and implement comprehensive mass-transit systems (including but not limited to light rail/high speed rail, and alternative-fuel buses) for use both regionally and nationwide. Other automakers should be recruited for the transit-development process including Honda, Daimler, Toyota, Kia, and more. The American auto industry’s backyard of Detroit and greater Michigan would be great to start pilot projects connecting cities with 21st century transit systems. Previously closed factories can be reopened for the specific purpose of producing rail infrastructure and vehicles.

What other issues and ideas should be considered?

The city of Detroit needs special attention. The city of Detroit must move far beyond being over-dependent on the automobile industry to employ the greater majority of the population, as was the case back in the mid-20th century. The city of Detroit needs nothing less than radical intervention at all possible levels, along the lines of Reconstruction efforts in the aftermath of the U.S. Civil War. The City of Detroit needs a special economic and educational stimulus plan.

The Coleman A. Young City Airport needs to be expanded vastly. It can serve both consumer use for air travel as well as an air-transportation hub for assorted businesses. City leaders should be looking at the land near the airport for expansion purposes. Ideally, the Detroit City Airport should have at least 3-4 commercial airliners. This can provide jobs for hundreds of city residents. Detroit city schools can have academies that train students for jobs as pilots, airplane maintenance/mechanics, air traffic control, and security.

As you are already aware, Detroit at its peak population could count roughly 2 million citizens within its boundaries, but that was well over 50 years ago. Currently, there are no dramatic repopulation trends anywhere in the city. I would like to see a commission of experts take a survey of Detroit’s boundaries, its neighborhoods, identify pockets of low and high population, and offer incentives for low-density-area residents to move. Land can be reconsolidated for future redevelopment, whether commercial, residential, or civic. The city should have more quality public parks, and it can also have a nature preserve/reforesting initiative.

The city of Detroit should be looked at as an international city. Detroit is situated right next to Windsor, Ontario, Canada. It lies right next to a major waterway, the Detroit River, connected to two Great Lakes. Detroit has cultural diversity from various ethnic groups. I would like to see more direct foreign trade taking place within the confines of the city of Detroit. Business owners from different countries can help provide job training and entrepreneurship training for city residents. Aggressive business outreach should be done with international-based companies (Africa, China, Middle East, South America) to invest in the city, bring their people to reside here and engage in commerce here. Tax incentives may help in this. Detroit desperately needs to attract alternative industries to the core city to provide 21st century jobs.

Lastly, so-called ‘big-box’ retailers and grocers (like Wal-Mart, Target, Kroger, Best Buy, etc.) tend to be extremely fearful of locating outlets in urban Detroit. Thus do many Detroit residents have to go many miles away from home to do their basic shopping, as there are virtually no comparable shopping options in their general neighborhoods. If there are federal and local tax-incentives for entrepreneurs and big-businesses to open in urban Detroit, that would be a boon for job development.

2011-01-07T11:37:00.000-08:00

STATE OF DETROIT 2011, part 1:

Coming of the Nerd

If this author hasn't indicated so already, happy new year! Of course, despite the popular saying this time of year of "out with the old, in with the new", the City of Detroit and southeast Michigan are still facing plenty of old issues in the new year. A new governor is now in office in the person of Rick Snyder, the GOP candidate and self-described "tough nerd" who was a dark-horse candidate that surprised even those in his own party, capturing the governorship in a landslide victory over Democratic opponent Virg Bernero. Having had a wide advantage in voting polls vs. Bernero, Snyder opted to only have one official debate, and in comparison to Bernero, Snyder spent scant time campaigning in Detroit.

Governor Snyder has promised to have a two-year budget prepared for vote in the Michigan state legislature by July of this year. Among his stated policy priorities are revising Michigan's tax structure, eliminating a state budget deficit of over $1.5 billion, and engendering a better climate for job creation. He also has pledged to have an open ear to hear Detroit's issues, publicly acknowledging that without a prosperous Detroit that the state of Michigan can never live up to its full potential. In a display of what one could alternately describe as shrewd or cloying, Detroit mayor Dave Bing was the master of ceremonies at Snyder's inauguration in the state capitol of Lansing.

Whether Snyder's public statements about being more open to assisting Detroit will bear fruit remains to be seen. The state legislature continues to be GOP dominated, Republicans having a 'supermajority' in the state Senate and a statistical majority in the state House. The only pockets of Democratic representation are in the City of Detroit and its immediate vicinity, as well as a few others in or near Michigan's other major urban centers like Grand Rapids and Flint. Local news columnists in Detroit have opined that Snyder, a self-described moderate, will have to learn to reign in the stauncher conservative idealogues in his own party while still having open dialogue with Democratic officials in order to avoid the partisan gridlock that defined most of former governor Jennifer Granholm's tenure.

Already Snyder is breaking with some traditions- for one thing he will be commuting to Lansing from his family's Ann Arbor home every day for work, bypassing the state-owned governor's residence in Lansing. Also, as many photos will indicate, Snyder tends not to wear ties. The latter is certainly a non-issue for the sensible. As for the former, this author's hope is that the commute allows the governor time to consider some important topics: Not the least of which is addressing Michigan's infrastructure- roads, bridges, and public transit, especially rail. Michigan is among states that spend the least on transportation policy, and this has got to change. Young professionals are moving to cities with comprehensive alternative-transit options already in place like Chicago, New York and the California Bay. There is certainly existing landspace for new factories to get involved in creating next-generation buses and rail cars, if only such a proposition could get some mainstream traction. Funding for improved transportation options must be confronted head on, and it is on this issue that anti-tax zealotry will be put to the test.

By this time next year, Michigan residents will have a better idea on what kind of leader Rick Snyder is. In particular, this author wants him to be a governor that seeks to uplift the state's urban centers and reject any legislation that would effectively marginalize Detroit.

2011-01-04T13:44:00.000-08:00

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

More to come....

2010-12-19T15:24:00.000-08:00

REAP THE WHIRLWIND

Ex-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and four others stand newly indicted by a federal grand jury. The others charged include Kilpatrick’s father Bernard Kilpatrick (currently a local political consultant), ex-official of the Detroit Water Department Victor Mercado, Kilpatrick mayoral aide Derrick Miller and local construction businessman Bobby Ferguson. A six-year investigation preceded the 38 total indictments—some of the charges include extortion, bribery and racketeering. The junior Kilpatrick is already in prison regarding a parole violation earlier this year.

According to articles in the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press, Kwame Kilpatrick's entry into ethically questionable practices stretched as far back as his stint in the State of Michigan legislature where he represented Detroit from 1996 to 2001, the year that he was elected as the youngest mayor in the city of Detroit (allegedly there were secret payoffs to allow Kilpatrick to become the Democratic Floor Leader and House Democratic Leader.)

Once elected, the feds allege that Kilpatrick and his camp of advisors, chief among whom would be his father Bernard, regularly tapped local businesspeople for payoffs to get favors in various aspects of city contracts, especially where it concerns construction-and-utility-related projects. A list of alleged payoffs is as follows, totaling in the millions of dollars: http://www.freep.com/article/20101216/NEWS07/12160527/The-Kilpatrick-Enterprise-How-the-feds-say-he-profited

Detroit City Councilman Kwame Kenyatta has raised the issue of the Justice Department apparently granting immunity to some parties who may have been the donors in the various alleged kickback schemes:
http://www.freep.com/article/20101219/NEWS01/12190584/1318/Some-who-paid-to-play-in-Detroit-corruption-probe-wont-be-charged

The rise and fall of this once favored son of Detroit has recently been documented by this author: http://hypestyleshomebase.blogspot.com/2010/05/requiem-for-hip-hop-mayor-former.html Kilpatrick's ongoing string of legal misadventures have made national, even international headlines, during the past few years.

Kilpatrick was fond of a form of populism that initially engendered overflowing goodwill from Detroit's predominately African-American constituency. He was fond of mentioning his religious leanings, often mentioning God in speeches and interviews. At the memorial service for civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks (who was a longtime resident of Detroit by the time she died) Nation of Islam minister Louis Farrakhan was one of the invited speakers, at the request of Kilpatrick (and possibly to the silent chagrin of some in attendance, including Governor Jennifer Granholm, who looked quite nervous.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsaVIXN-N-Y

If one accepts the (somewhat broad) premise that if the city of Detroit is 85% African-American, then the tax money that Kilpatrick and his cronies were fooling around with was roughly 85% African-American as well. Juxtapose that notion with the smug defiance and dismissiveness that Kilpatrick showed in the initial months after his secret text-messages were revealed, and you have on display a man that seemingly holds in contempt the people that he is supposed to represent (as well as presumably having an elevated cultural empathy for.)

On the surface Kilpatrick offered a form of genteel Afrocentric solidarity that made him a folk-hero for locals, a more legitimate successor to longtime former mayor Coleman Young (who served 5 terms, 1974 - 1993). Young's personal style was marked by brusque blunt-spokenness, especially concerning racism-- Young took office in the early 70s when racial strife was still seething in the city (divestment by white residents and businesses ratcheted up after the city riots of 1967: Detroit flipped from being roughly 30% black by the mid-60's to being about 80% by the late 70s.) Young had a cooperative relationship with Democratic President Jimmy Carter; much less so with Ronald Reagan and the conservative revolution of the 1980s. Young's immediate successor and Kilpatrick's predecessor Dennis Archer managed to serve two terms (1994 - 2001) but is held in low opinion by many urban locals who felt he was an accommodationist to then-Republican Governor John Engler.

Sidebar: Archer's administration, like a lot of contemporary urban mayors, concentrated on getting downtown redevelopments going, after a decades-long disinvestment that left Downtown Detroit resembling a modern ghost town. Still, this left a lot to be desired for broader neighborhood issues-- Archer's most glaring embarrassment hit in winter of '97 when a tremendous blizzard hit the city, blanketing the city in several feet of snow. Archer was on vacation at the time--
and the initial word from city hall regarding snow cleanup was that no
residential streets would be plowed. The public backlash was palpable, and
within less than a week Archer was back in town his position was changed.

Despite all of this, throughout the initial text-message scandal and the court appearances that followed, Kilpatrick still could count on a loyal, vocal sect of (mostly) African-American supporters. Most typically, the sentiment being raised was that he was a semi-messianic figure who was laid low by a quasi-anonymous conspiracy of political power-players ranging from the near suburbs to state government in Lansing; and whatever his 'crimes' (often, Kilpatrick's extra-marital affair with advisor Christine Beatty is pointed out to be the only 'offense'), they weren't any worse than what various white politicians have presumably gotten away with in other communities.

In fairness, the charges, serious as they are, are just that for now-- charges. In a move that annoys those who are annoyed with the Kilpatricks, both father and son have retained public defenders, claiming personal poverty. RICO statutes were used to put together the case against the accused. It remains to be seen who among these men indicted will be forced to stand trial, and if so, who-- if anyone-- will be convicted. Regardless of the outcome, the present circumstances are another gut-punch to the morale of city residents and the entire metro area. In particular for the city, under the leadership of current mayor Dave Bing, it is trying for the first time to revision a long-term outlook for the city. Pending 2010 Census results will likely put Detroit's population at well under 1 million, a far cry from its mid-20th century peak of about twice that. The Detroit Works Project seeks input from the general public on how to best make the use of the available land in the city--- Detroit has 139 square miles of land, roughly 30% of which is effectively abandoned or otherwise vacant.

Revisioning the city will take being able to somehow get beyond the violations of the past-- both real and perceived. In the case of the "Kilpatrick Enterprise" (as the Feds have dubbed the alleged graft operations) the ongoing woes of the former mayor and his confidantes threatens to derail any progressive outcomes of this ongoing initiative. On one end of the reactionary spectrum are those metro-area suburbanites greater-Michigan residents who tend to feel that all urban (and black/Democratic-aligned) politicians are corrupt by default, Detroit is forever the urban-wasteland of John Carpenter's "Escape From New York" in their eyes and anyone who says otherwise is an idiot (or worse, a liberal). On the other end of the reactionary spectrum are certain African-American residents of the city and vicinity, embittered by contemporary conflicts, who feel that pointing out black corruption is only fair if there is a white counterpart to share an indictment, or that publicly aligning one's self to a Higher Power means that any and all mistakes-- including blatantly criminal choices-- should be forgiven without repercussions.

This week's events should not-- they can not-- define Detroit from now on. The city-- and the country-- deserve much better.

2010-12-19T15:04:00.000-08:00

COMMUNITY CRIME SUMMIT IN DETROIT

In Detroit Michigan at Second Ebenezer Church there was a community town hall meeting held. The subject was crime prevention in the city of Detroit. Hosting pastor Bishop Edgar Vann was in attendance, as was Detroit city council president Charles Pugh, who served as official moderator of the event. There were about 20 or so individuals on the panel, mostly representing different aspects of law enforcment. Among them were members of: Detroit Police Dept., Detroit Public School Police, Michigan DEA, Michigan ATF, Homeland Security, Michigan Dept. of Corrections, Wayne County Sheriffs, and Michigan State Police. Kym Worthy of the Wayne County Prosecutor's Office was present, as was the US Justice Dept.'s Barbara McQuade. John Broad, the Presidnet of anonymous tip-line CrimeStoppers Michigan was there, as was an executive of the Skillman Foundation and representaives from local non-profit social-work agencies/Community Development Coalitions. The event was sparsely attended, though obviously the inclement weather contributed to the low turnout, as Metro Detroit had just experienced a bad winter storm.
Detroit City Councilwoman Brenda Jones was in the audience but not on the panel. Each panelist had roughly two minutes explaining their agency's function and what program(s)/practices are in effect in Detroit that are ongoing.
Questions (written on index cards and read by Pugh) were asked of the panel.. The one that got the most debate was concerning prisoner re-entry. The Dept. of Corrections rep mentioned the programs they had, and made passing mention of Kym Worthy's disagreement with some of their policies. Worthy offered a sharp rebuttal about her concerns of violent offenders being released prematurely and not just non-violent offenders. counter-points were made by both of them for a few minutes before finally moving on.
Other questions raised-- what can schools do about bullying... how can the gang issue be addressed, in light of school consolidations and neighborhood rivals being corralled together.. what is the benefit of testifying regarding crime... is crime-stoppers truly anonymous.. why are there no more police mini-stations in the city.. is it wise to "confront" the known malefactors in the neighborhood..

2010-12-13T15:06:00.000-08:00

PUBLIC ENEMY'S BOXED SET HITS HARD

http://totalboxmusic.com/store.html

Artist: Public Enemy
Release: Greatest Sites and Sounds: Bring the Noise, the Hits, Vids and Doc Box
Label: Slam Jamz/Total Box Music

Greatest Sites and Sounds (Bring the Noise, the Hits, Vids and Doc Box) is the first boxed set release from the storied hip-hop band Public Enemy. Subtitled Chapter 2: 1999 – 2009, the collection focuses almost exclusively on the group’s post-Def Jam era of recordings, released through Chuck D’s Slam Jamz label. The set’s content is split up into no less than six parts: three music CDs and three DVDs.

The CDs are loaded with 20 tracks each, featuring ten years worth of singles, album cuts, live performance excerpts and remixes from the six studio albums, remix compilations and solo recordings that the band has collectively logged since the tail end of the Clinton presidency. The core lineup of Chuck D, Flavor Flav, Professor Griff and DJ Lord (who replaced Terminator X as the band’s turntable man) stand out on songs like “Do You Wanna Go Our Way???”, “Black is Back”, and “41: 19”. “Fight the Power” and “Can’t Truss It” will be familiar to casual fans but the remainder of material will be functionally new, since radio play has seemed to evade the group since the late 90s. The Bomb Squad continues on in spirit with production by longtime collaborators Gary G-Wiz, Johnny Juice, Griff and C-Doc the Warhammer, among others.

The DVDs include music videos from many of the songs represented here as well as live-in-concert footage and behind-the-scenes documentaries recorded by assorted crew members. The camaraderie of the group’s expanded lineup (including guitarist Khari Wynn, drummer Mike Faulkner, bassist Brian “Hardgroove” Hargrove) is showcased and sheds light on how this band has continued to be an in-demand concert draw years (decades?) after many of their peers and successors have slid into inactivity.

Firings, rehab, early retirement and reality shows of various members have not dulled the band’s musical edge or messages. Public Enemy has embraced international and Internet audiences, surviving the trends and for the progressive hip-hop fan stand far above the self-styled drug barons, emo-kids, and bling-kings of today’s rap scene. Greatest Sites and Sounds is a testament to their relevance and longevity.

2010-11-03T16:58:00.001-07:00

GOP SWEEP...

IS DETROIT IN THE DUSTPAN?

Never discount the political schizophrenia of the American electorate. In Michigan, largely self-financed and self-described ‘tough nerd’ GOP candidate Rick Snyder has beaten back Lansing mayor Virg Bernero in the gubernatorial race. Bill Schuette, a former 4th District Michigan Court of Appeals judge, beat Gennessee-County area prosecutor David Leyton in the race for attorney general, and current Oakland County Clerk Ruth Johnson beat Wayne State law professor Jocelyn Benson in the race for Secretary of State. Snyder is considered by his supporters to be a moderate Republican, and he was the surprise winner in the Republican primary earlier this year, beating out traditional GOP idealogues such as western Michigan congressman Pete Hoekstra, Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard and current Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox. Snyder managed to snag votes from the Republican base of right leaners as well as the conservative Independents, and also some centrist Democrats- some of whom considered themselves repulsed by the aggressive populism of Bernero, who beat out the comparably moderate Michigan legislature Speaker of the House Andy Dillon (D-Redford).

By now we all know how things turned out nationwide… I spent the Election Day afternoon at the local NAACP helping with their Voter-Info\Assistance hotline.. The Michigan 13th District’s Hansen Clarke (Clarke claims African-American and Bangladeshi heritage, a statistical first for Congress) is going to be my new U.S. Congressional rep, but since he’ll be a 'freshman' and with the new GOP House majority, he may possibly get stuck on some toothless committee.. it will be a depressing holiday season for me.

Snyder, current venture capitalist and a former founder and executive of Gateway Computers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gateway,_Inc.), is a native of the breakfast-cereal capitol of Battle Creek, Mich., and has resided for many years now in the college town of Ann Arbor, home to the University of Michigan.

In his victory speech, Snyder pledged that Michigan's urban centers will get their due attention from his administration. Curiously, as of today, Snyder announced that three of his top cabinet members will be veterans of the John Engler Administration http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Engler —John Engler was the last Republican governor in Michigan, who served from 1991 – 2001. Engler was considered a right-wing idealogue by progressives, and among the more notorious policies he enacted was to drastically cut state funding for public mental health services. The former governor now resides in the state capitol of Lansing, and is touted as a possible advisor. Engler has downplayed speculation that he is eyeing the senate seat of Democrat Debbie Stabenow (D-Lansing), who is up for re-election in 2012.

Certainly from the 1980 elections forward, Michigan has been chock full of ‘Reagan Democrats’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reagan_Democrat) alongside GOP loyalists. The presence of organized labor has dwindled nationwide over the past 40+ years, and has been less potent of a political power-player, with the possible exception of local political races. To be union-affiliated carries more weight in urban and working-class near-urban areas, but union-culture ambivalence and/or hostility increases in Michigan’s myriad small-town, rural and exurban areas (coincidentally, the racial diversity also drops sharply in these areas as well), especially as one explores further in the state’s northern regions. ‘Detroit run amok’ has long been a scare tactic of various state politicos since the social upheaval of the 1960s.

Disappointingly, but predictably, urban Detroit's voter turnout was relatively low- http://tinyurl.com/2efzyy2. As far as urban-voter apathy goes, I don’t know what it means long-term except that there is a large demographic of folks who do not see any elected officials/politicians as being relevant to their day-to-day existence/survival, and the challenge is to help them see what are the pragmatic benefits to being engaged and involved that don’t involve running off a bunch of statistics that the layperson doesn’t consider informative. In Detroit, the comfort in which people vent at barber shops, beauty salons and bars tends not to translate into voter action.

Mass incarceration will likely continue as a trend—current governor Jennifer Granholm instituted a program in her second term that started minimum-sentence “early” release for non-violent offenders and others who are not considered a high risk (e.g., elderly, ill/infirmed). This program will possibly get scuttled by the next administration to fit the law-and-order hardliners’ agendas. The current tax-credits program for the film/TV/Video-game industry currently promises a 42% return for productions that are spending $50K or more on a project in Michigan. The program will now face relentless scrutiny, and the tax-credit rate will likely get cut down drastically.

Improved mass-transit is a toss-up. Certainly Snyder will not cop to anything resembling trying to force General Motors and Chrysler to get behind new transit/rail developments in the state. During his campaign he has agreed that better transit is important. However, the fiscal-conservatives and anti-tax hardliners among Republicans/Indies will likely balk at any new developments initiated with public funding. A new rail-line planned for Detroit's Woodward avenue may well end at Eight Mile Road.

An amendment also passed that bans former elected officials who were convicted of felonies involving ‘misrepresenting the public trust’ from running for office for 20 years after their conviction. While this presumably applies to all, it became unofficially known as the Kwame Kilpatrick amendment. Whenever Kilpatrick (and former Detroit city councilwoman Monica Conyers) get out of prison, it may be more feasable for them to get a gigs as talk-radio hosts than to try and get back in public service.

As the new year-- and new state government/Congressional lineup comes in, we'll see what happens. The auto companies got the bailout they wanted, but will the city of Detroit?

2010-10-22T08:00:00.000-07:00

FAT BOYS ARE BACK

This week pioneering hip-hop act the Fat Boys have been profiled on TV-One's documentary series, "Unsung". Think of it as a version of VH-1 Behind the Music, but exclusively focusing on urban music acts. Check the TV One website at http://www.tvoneonline.com to see the entire episode stream online, as well as to see when it will be aired again. In the meanwhile, this author penned a review of the group's greatest hits compilation, originally released in 1997- an updated hits set can be found on Itunes and Amazon.com.

Fat Boys

All Meat, No Filler - The Best of the Fat Boys

label- Rhino
As of 2003, despite there being over 20 years of recorded hip-hop and rap music, the genre still has a relative dearth of archival collections. Part of the problem is most rap acts have not sustained careers beyond one or two albums.

Another is that many early rap acts recorded for independent - and now defunct - labels, which make it that much harder to assemble a proper compilation.

Rhino Records' All Meat, No Filler - The Best of the Fat Boys hopes to satisfy hip-hop aficionados with a jones for Reagan-era rap. The disc covers all the bases, from "Jailhouse Rap" to "Falling in Love" and more.

In 1984, Mark Morales, Darren Robinson and Damon Wimbley were all still in high school in Brooklyn, NY, when a local rap talent show was announced.

The contest featured a first prize of a recording contract with the indie label, Sutra. The young trio, calling themselves the Disco Three, joined the competition, but their eyes were on a different prize - second prize was a home stereo.

Morales (Prince Markie Dee) and Wimbley (Kool Rock-Ski) would do the rap vocals, while Robinson (Buffy) did vocal percussion as "The Human Beatbox." They got the top response and the top prize.

Early rap personality Kurtis Blow took them on as a mentor and producer. The trio would soon abandon the Disco Three name when, according to their manager,they ran up a $300 bill in room service at a hotel, prompting him to complain, "You fat boys! You making me broke!"

Produced by Blow, their self-titled 1984 debut sold over 500,000 copies, making it one of the first rap albums to be certified gold. Their follow-up albums, Fat Boys are Back and Big & Beautiful, continued the hit streak.

Despite earning three gold albums in a row, the group left Sutra Records. Subsequently, they signed with Mercury Records, making them one of the first rap acts to sign with a major industry label. The year 1987's Crushin' paired the band with the Beach Boys for the unlikely collaboration, "Wipeout". It was a pop smash, and it propelled the group to double-platinum heights.

"The Disorderlies" was a film comedy built around the Fat Boys, where the industry promoted them as "the Three Stooges of Rap." It didn't do great at the box office that summer, but the soundtrack did feature the Boys' cover of the Beatles' "Baby You're a Rich Man."

1988's Coming Back Hard Again featured hit covers of "The Twist" and "Louie Louie". They would perform at that year's MTV awards with Chubby Checker.

They also did a song for that year's "Nightmare on Elm Street 4" soundtrack, featuring a rap by Robert Englund.

But the Boys had become weary of reworking oldies for material. Rap's street audience had started moving on to heavier stuff, and pop radio was catching on to newer faces like the Fresh Prince and Young MC.

"On N On" in 1989 arrived with little fanfare, and was their least-selling album. By this time, the Boys had launched a lawsuit against Sutra over alleged unpaid royalties, that was finally settled out of court. In a 1990 press conference, they announced plans to take some time off, but essentially, it would be their last group appearance as a trio.

Since then, Wimbley and Robinson recorded an album as a duo, and Morales has recorded two solo albums, working intermittently as a producer for artists like Mary J. Blige and Mariah Carey. In 1995, Robinson died from heart-related problems, scuttling tentative reunion plans.

As of 2007, Morales is an on-air personality at a Miami, Florida radio station. The catalog for the Fat Boys has morphed even further since the release of this compilation: In the late 90's, BMG Special Products (now Sony/BMG Special Products) purchased the Buddah/Kama Sutra Recordings catalog, from which their first three LPs belong; also, in the late 90's, Universal Recordings purchased Polygram Entertainment, where the masters of their three albums recorded for Tin Pan Apple/Polydor lie. Rhino Recordings, a subsidiary of Warner Music, apparently allowed this compilation to go out of print.

Any new compilation will have to license the songs from two distinct recording catalogs: Sony/BMG and Universal- never an easy task. Currently, the first three albums from the group have seen limited re-release on CD in Europe. Hopefully, a proper stateside re-release will follow from Sony/BMG, which would include the first three albums and bonus material on each CD, and maybe a bonus DVD with the music videos. Though the Tin Pan Apple recordings are not considered as vital, Universal could do the same, though, at least re-releasing the "Crushin'" and "Coming Back Hard Again" albums.

2010-09-19T16:20:00.001-07:00

2010-09-01T16:41:00.000-07:00

DETROIT MARCH FOR ECONOMIC JUSTICE

On Saturday, August, 28, 2010, a gathering of several thousand participants took place in downtown Detroit, Michigan. Coinciding with the Michigan Democratic Party's nomination convention, the rally was headed up by activist Rev. Jesse Jackson and recently elected United Auto Workers union president Bob King.
The march was held on the anniversary of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s march on Washington in 1963. The march and rally were organized by the Rainbow PUSH Coalition and the United Auto Workers union.
Along the way, the march grew as convention goers and others joined in, culminating in Campus Martius Park downtown, where a stage was set up. Among the other notables who participated in the march were Mayor Dave Bing, U.S. Rep. John Conyers, D-Detroit, U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., state Sen. Hansen Clarke, D-Detroit, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Virg Bernero, and his running mate Brenda Lawrence.
Conyers, for his part, reminded the audience that a similar march took place in Detroit in 1963 before Dr. King’s legendary “I Have a Dream” sermon, and that a form of the speech was delivered in Detroit during that event.

2010-08-19T16:52:00.000-07:00

THE HATE THAT HATE PRODUCED

“Whatever happened to the Gods and the Earths/ They thirst for a pot of gold God worth his birth/ Knowledge is worth more than diamonds/ When the mind is shining, surprise us”
Poor Righteous Teachers, “Gods, Earths and 85-ers”, 1996

So, a group of developers plan to build a house of worship in an urban area. As it so happens, this house of worship—combined with a cultural center and recreation gym (open to anyone)—would be built mere blocks from where a terrible crime was committed. Not necessarily a big deal. Considering that houses of worship are generally considered to positively add to the color and appeal of a community, the furthest thing that building such a center should inspire would be accusations and counter-accusations of hate and intolerance? Right?

Wrong.

In New York City, plans are currently in limbo for an Islamic community center (including dedicated rooms for prayer and religious activities) to be potentially built just a few city blocks from the former location of the World Trade Center, which was laid asunder in the terror attacks of September 11th, 2001. If the construction is allowed to take place, it can be a powerful statement to the world about the best of America: its social tolerance and upholding of personal and religious freedoms in particular.

A few months after the controversy first unfolded, President Obama met the controversy head on—inadvertently. At a recent White House dinner acknowledging the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, the President stated that Muslims "have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country," according to a White House speech transcript. He went further to state that such liberties include "the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property… in accordance with local laws and ordinances." Subsequent comments from the President and White House spokespersons clarified that the President was not endorsing the facility construction, but merely pointing out the legality for it to take place.

The usual suspects among right-wing media pundits—Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh and company—offered that allowing such a facility to be built anywhere near ‘Ground Zero’ as tantamount to spitting in the face of patriotic Americans, in particular the family of those people who lost someone in the disaster or in the subsequent war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Ditto for ex-officials like Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich. Gingrich, in particular, made the bafflingly incendiary comparison of building an Islamic-themed community center to allowing a Nazi-Germany themed facility to be built next to a Jewish synagogue.

Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) initially balked at commenting, to the consternation of Tea Party flag-wavers. Also, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, an erstwhile Republican who in recent months officially declared himself an Independent, called the President’s comments "clarion defense of the freedom of religion."

“Back in the days of Sherlock Holmes, a man was judged by a clue… Now he’s judged by if he’s Spanish, Black, Italian, or Jew…”
Boogie Down Productions, “Who Protects Us from You?”, 1989

Not that the political right have a lock on taking a really ignorant stance in all of this: While progressives (or "the professional left" as described by White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs) might be fooled into thinking that Democrats across the board have their back in the debate, they would be dead wrong.

A spokesperson for Senate majority leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada, who is up for reelection this year) said in a statement, "Senator Reid respects (freedom of religion) but thinks that the mosque should be built someplace else.” This sentiment was echoed by former Vermont senator Dr. Howard Dean, who opined that the mosque should simply be built elsewhere . Well, if Dean still wanted to reach out to the Americans ‘driving around with Confederate flags on their trucks’ as he did during his last presidential bid, he sure did this week.

Florida U.S. Senate candidate Jeff Greene—a Democrat—jumped into the fray, bashing the President’s statements- "President Obama has this all wrong and I strongly oppose his support for building a mosque near Ground Zero… since Islamic terrorists have… celebrated destroying the Twin Towers and killing nearly 3,000 Americans”. Greene’s a billionaire, so presumably, having the President visit his state to help fundraise—or at least offer moral support—just wasn’t a priority, so all was clear for Greene to take potshots at the guy he wants to serve under.

Perhaps ironically, a more reasoned statement came from Florida’s Republican Governor Charlie Crist: "I think (Obama’s) right — I mean you know we're a country that in my view stands for freedom of religion and respect for others…This is a place where you're supposed to be able to practice your religion without the government telling you you can't." Incidentally, Crist for some time now has already been tagged as being dead weight to the staunch right-wingers of Republican activists for taking occasional moderate stances.

NOT IN MY BACKYARD—OR CITY—OR COUNTRY

“I’m not a Muslim, but I do support them… My Father in Heaven taught me and taught them…”
Boogie Down Productions, “Ya Know the Rules”, 1990

According to the nonprofit activist group Democracy for America (who broke ranks with co-founder Dean on his stance), there exist current several legal conflicts involving proposed mosques to be built in such locales as Southern California, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, and Illinois, among others. New York City boosters often proudly uplift the city’s cosmopolitan, multi-cultural history, citing it as a classic example of the great American ‘melting pot’ metaphor. Yet, if a facility that connects to Islamic culture can’t be built there, what chance does a similar project have in the less-intensively ethnically diverse Heartland states?

If a drunk driver kills someone while driving a Ford Focus, I doubt if there will be legislation to ban such cars just to appease grieving family and friends. Respectfully, it’s just not realistic.

The reactionaries who hate the idea of a mosque near the Ground Zero site are basically standing by the following premise:
· People who bomb buildings are evil.
· The people who bombed buildings on 9/11 were Muslims.
· Therefore, all Muslims are evil.
This is a classic logical fallacy that anyone who graduated high school should be familiar with.

Then again, maybe being familiar with such things as ‘logical fallacies’ places one in the company of the ‘cultural elitists’ that conservative-culture mouthpieces like to rail against. Too much book-learnin’s a bad thing in some social circles. This may explain why George W. Bush was elected twice in a row to the White House. But I digress.

I wonder would the same vigorous standard be applied, to, say, the site near the Oklahoma Federal Building bombing 0f 1995. Let's say someone wanted to build a Christian Church a few blocks away. The late Timothy McVeigh and his sympathizers in the right-wing Militia movements without fail tend to align themselves with a fundamentalist strain of Protestant Christianity. So would people be up in arms about a church being built there, or instead embrace it as a potential source of healing and proof that an act terror cannot quash the ideals of those of good faith?

But because many Americans are willfully ignorant whenever they feel like being so, because many Americans like to boast of the freedoms and tolerance that our nation is said to offer until something they don't like comes along, now the NIMBY-Americans are openly calling to revive Jim Crow culture concerning houses of worship (again)..

“I bow my head to the east five times a day… I put my face in the dirt every time I pray”
House of Pain, “Pass the Jinn”, 1996

You might be led to think that this is 2001-02 all over again, and legislation like the Patriot Act and most of the Bush-Cheney-Rove-Rumsfeld doctrine gets passed without any resistance at all from Democrats. People like Dean, Reid and likely other conservative-district “Blue Dog” Democrats have shamefully kowtowed to right-wing culture vitriol, if only to potentially score points with moderate Republican loyalists and self-described Independents who tend to skew conservative in their voting habits.

Progressives are being treated by establishment Democrats like the geeky kids in middle/high school who get ditched by their own when one of them gets invited to the Cool Kids’ table by somebody who needs help with their homework (or more to the point, someone to do it for them). It’s temporary, and before long the erstwhile defector is getting beaned in the head with raisins and shoved into lockers again. But hey, they got a taste of the ‘good life’ for a minute, right? Democrats want to dominate the midterm elections so badly that several clearly are willing to sweep their allegedly core values on diversity and tolerance under the rug in order to appease a constituency that will never—and I mean never—waver in their animosity and obstructionism.

So, if New York state governor David Patterson’s 11th hour efforts work to sell state land far from Ground Zero to the mosque developers is ‘successful’ then the facility gets built far from Ground Zero: the patriotic are vindicated that Al-Qaeda USA (TM pending) have been stopped in their tracks from having an obvious training house; visiting tourists and the still-grieving won’t have to glimpse anyone nearby wearing a kufi, turban, or hijab, except maybe for the taxi driver that takes them there and the vendor who sells them a hot pretzel. All the good folk win.

Somehow, I get the feeling that there are kids of the Muslim faith who might not agree.

2010-08-08T12:54:00.000-07:00

NIGNORANCE 2010

“I’ma put it in hard, help these kids…”
Shyne, XXL interview.

Professional wrestling has more in common with hip-hop than most folks are willing to admit. Most popular rappers tend to have some kind of don’t-test-me attitude. They give proud speeches about how they're going to roll over the competition. Ask them whether all of this is 'fake', you might get a verbal beat-down, or worse. If the mainstream press buzzes about a real-life violent incident with a connection to rap (say, a shooting before, during or after a concert), the favorite retort is, "Hey, it's entertainment, don't blame us." Vince McMahon would be proud.

Atlanta native Young Jeezy, interviewed in XXL, maintains that he should be given the crown of authenticity compared to other rappers whose past lifestyles allegedly don’t match up to the themes in their songs.

Native Belizean Shyne was recently released from a 10-year prison bid following a trial involving himself and former mentor Sean ‘Puffy’ Combs—in the aftermath of a nightclub shootout in 1999. For his part, Shyne professes that he acted in self-defense, and stresses that his prison behavior kept pace with ‘street codes’.

Whether or not one concern themselves deeply about this depends one's tolerance level for ‘nignorance’.

Nignorance is when prison and drug-game morals and ethics spill from those subcultures into the general community, and are allowed to creatively and thematically stifle the political depth of hip-hop music. The inane debate over ‘no snitching’ in urban neighborhoods illustrates this.
“Ain’t nothin’ wrong with my people.”
Shyne, XXL interview.

Incarcerated folk catch fits about who is more of a genuine 'street' artist, writing lengthy letters to magazines like XXL, The Source, Don Diva and others. Of course, 'keeping it real' is what lands any number of heads behind bars to begin with. Here’s the breakdown for blacks and Latinos in U.S. prisons: (http://www.project.org/info.php?recordID=174). ‘Captive audience’, indeed.

Nignorance is rappers concocting (and their hangers-on supporting) elaborate stories about being major drug-gamers before their record deals. It’s accepting the notion that a young black/Latino aged 15 - 25 can have a self-contained million-dollar drug empire, not become a marked man for the Mob and/or police, and not come out the other end of this in jail, dead, or broke. To do so ignores a slew of American realities. This goes for Jay-Z, Rick Ross, and everyone else who has claimed ‘street king’ status in their past.

Nignorance is a prosperous 'street merchant' choosing not to invest their gains in legitimate endeavors like real estate, waste management, credit unions, Laundromats, grocery stores, etc., but instead start chasing down label reps, hawking CDs from their car trunk, competing in open-mic-nights, to ultimately settling for a cash-advance from a record label, then arguing about the deductions from their semi-annual royalty statements.

Rap musicians should know that life is more important than a record, or even their pride. If any of them have a violent demise, can you call it ‘street credibility’ if their childhood street gets renamed for them?

President Obama recently signed legislation that cuts down the disparities in sentencing of those caught with crack-cocaine vs. powdered coke. A great development, though we still have the issue of folks from the underclass who look at dope-trafficking as just another career choice—or a stepping-stone move that will give them credibility as they seek rap fame.

“I think, at the end of the day, it’s just all entertainment. It’s like wrestling.”
Young Jeezy, XXL interview.

Hip-hop needs to get out of the squared circle. Real lives are at stake.

2010-08-05T17:34:00.000-07:00

'DETROIT 187'

IN THE CROSSHAIRS

Detroit City Council recently has had a public hearing about the upcoming television drama Detroit 187 (http://tinyurl.com/25okbjp). The series, due to air on the ABC network this fall, is filmed in and set in Detroit, focusing on a group of police detectives and officials and the crimes they solve. Michigan's nascent tax-incentives for the film industry played a role in the TV show coming to Detroit; the pilot for the show was filmed in Atlanta, Georgia.

Considering how the Law & Order and CSI franchises have long been TV staples, I'm somewhat surprised that it took this long for someone to come out with a Detroit answer to the typically New York-and-Los Angeles-centric police shows. Likely hundreds of people will end up getting direct or indirect jobs as a result of the show's presence. Not only the featured actors and the film production crew benefit, but also local caterers, clothiers, paid extras and various small businesses will get a boost.

As spearheaded by city councilman Kwame Kenyatta, the concern of council concerns the name of the show. '187' is a regional California police-code for murder, which, perhaps ironically, was in this writer's opinion thrust into the public pop-culture lexicon by various hardcore-themed hip-hop music and movies-- who else easily remembers Dr. Dre & Snoop Dogg's hook from "Deep Cover"-- ("..and you don't stop, 'cause it's 1-8-7 on an undercover cop...")

I feel that the council have a certain point-- to me, 'Detroit 187' comes across as kind of corny, since, well, '187' really isn't used by local police here. 'Detroit Streets', in comparison, still lets the viewer know that this is likely a gritty show, without appropriating a vaguely misleading term. At the same time, Kenyatta's threatened to play hardball with the producers, floating the idea of withholding city permits to close streets for filming, if the 'demands' aren't met.

It would be reckless of city council to really follow-through on such a threat. Kenyatta and those who agree with him would be side-swiping all of the jobs that were and are being created by the show to make some temporary political points with those who feel that Detroit's rep as a crime-heavy town is completely unfounded. It would set a bad precedent, potentially scaring off other filmmakers (including home-grown ones) on the notion that Council is yet another board of suits who want to dictate art content, and who are prone to shut down anyone who doesn't glibly accede to every 'suggestion'.

Say-- I wonder if the producers of the show could be convinced to take on the costs of blowing up the old Michigan Central Station (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Central_Station) in the season finale. Seriously. Here's the scenario-- a mysterious mad bomber starts targeting abandoned buildings throughout the city, and the countdown is on for stopping him. Several rickety structures will go "ka-boom!" on a recurring basis throughout the season; we only see the culprit in shadow or behind their back.

When the remains of innocent squatters are found in the rubble, the charges are upped from property destruction to murder. Clues eventually reveal that the culprit sees his vandalism as rebellious works of art, and his "piece de resistance" will be detonating the Train Depot. The heroes race down Michigan Avenue, confronting the villain, but he has his hands on the killswitch.. and in the final seconds..3-2-1.. 'baroooooooommm'.....Who is buried alive? Who is just buried? Stay tuned next fall! (Dun-Dun! Or however that Law & Order sound-effect goes...)

Reference: http://detroit.blogs.time.com/2010/07/28/all-puffed-up-about-detroit/comment-page-1/#comment-5088#ixzz0vmVrU51b

2010-08-05T17:01:00.000-07:00

SYSTEM OF SURVIVAL

The City of Detroit is still embroiled in a public debate on whether to dissolve the currently existing Detroit Public Schools system and reform it under mayoral control-- in this case, current mayor Dave Bing. Most members of Detroit City Council have publicly opposed mayoral control. A ballot initiative was presented to council last month, but council routinely waffled on voting on whether to allow for a ballot initiative to be given to Detroiters this fall that would give citizens the chance to vote on the proposal.

http://www.freep.com/article/20100730/OPINION01/7300343/Mayor-must-step-up-on-schools-where-council-failed

City Council meetings have turned into depressing gripe-fests, with those opposed to mayoral control being the loudest commenters. One commenter compared the idea of mayoral control reverting Detroit Public Schools to almost a slavery-era state of being. Most polarizing is the suggestion that mayoral control would, by default, rob Detroit citizens of voting rights on the composition of a school administration.

I stop short of assuming that the worst-case scenario will happen if Detroit's public school system falls under mayoral control. I have a problem with people who say they 'hate' the current board/system (and the behavior of board members) but mayoral control is automatically a non-starter for them. You either want change or you don't. People act as if DPS didn't have grave problems until emergency financial manager Robert Bobb was appointed by governor Jennifer Granholm.

And let's address the elephant in the room: I also have a problem with the way some local activists and officials have latched on to the existing structure of DPS (as well as Cobo Hall, the Water Department., etc.) as a "black owned business" by cultural default, and so any existing proposition for reform, especially radical reform, is categorized as a power-grab by quasi-anonymous Caucasian power-brokers in Lansing or the Metro suburbs. I hear "They want to" (as in, "they want to take over fill-in-the-blank) so much you would think that "T.H.E.Y., Inc." was a corporation based out of Bloomfield or somewhere. I'm dead sick of it.

Black political leadership has been at the helm of Detroit local government for nearly 40 years now. And here is where we are. Doesn't mean that local leadership is corrupt or inept by default, or that everything that has gone on here is all the fault of Detroit leadership. But Detroit leadership of the past and present must bear some culpability as well for not having the vision to address the things that Detroit faces now.

Too many folks here have come to embrace a certain myopic form of Afrocentrism that automatically assumes the worst of all other ethnic/racial groups while overly romanticizing our own, uncritical to a fault in many cases. Look at all the folks who still see former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick as a blameless victim of a (white) plot against a "powerful black man". Same goes for jailed political consultant Sam Riddle.

I'm weary of the political schizophrenia here. To me, it speaks ill of my fellow urban Detroiters when this reflexive nativism that exists just beneath the surface here comes up on every important local issue. Look at the recall campaign already against Bing. Let's say it goes through and Bing is recalled by November 2010-- then what? another go-round of special elections throughout 2011?

2010-08-05T15:29:00.000-07:00

DETROIT ON TRACK FOR RAIL SYSTEM

In a press conference hosted by Detroit mayor Dave Bing and US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, the federal government has just this past week authorized a year-long study into the implementation of a light-rail line in the core of urban Detroit. This would be the first major transit development in the city since the mid-1980's unveiling of Detroit's People Mover downtown elevated rail service. http://tinyurl.com/2bzocv8

I think that it's about darned time that this project got going. No, it's not what it really needs to be, which is a fully comprehensive transit system for the entire metro area.

I feel that since the US taxpayers are majority owners in General Motors and minority stakeholders in Chrysler, both these companies should be forced to get on board with manufacturing for the transit industry- rail cars, hybrid/electric buses, train tracks, etc. Re-open those factories that were shut down. Open new factories, especially in previously abandoned locales like urban Detroit and elsewhere. I have written letters to officials, appointees and activists from the President on down, but so far this angle has only barely reached public discourse. The whole "quick-wash get-in-get-out" hands-off managing of the auto bailouts has been maddeningly wrongheaded. But at least the American public will get to drive those neat new Chevy Volts, at only $41,000 a pop. Save your pennies.

Progressive tax reform is needed to help keep a more expanded transit system alive. Unfortunately, there are folks in various suburbs who adhere to anti-tax absolutism and barely veiled racial animus, who do things like have their cities opt-out of SMART (the privately owned bus line serving most area suburbs), and thus adding more headaches for anyone who wants to travel to or from said cities for work, school, etc.

Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson, long considered in local politics as an iconic foe of urban Detroit interests, wisely supported the SMART millage renewal, but he is still an obstinate crank when it comes to actually forming a southeast Michigan Transit Authority (which would be a coalition of several city/county local governments.) Even parties within the Bing Administration's Transportation Dept. are likely fearful for their jobs "if" a real Transit Authority gets going, and so they are stonewalling, too.

The grudges of the past may end up derailing this project (pun intended) if the ultra-cynics have their way. I suggest that folks go to the 'TRU' website, http://www.detroittransit.org/ and keep up on the developments.

2010-05-25T16:13:00.000-07:00

REQUIEM FOR THE

'HIP HOP MAYOR'

"Out goes his hand and I cough, he once stole from me, now I wanna cut it off"

Public Enemy, "Nighttrain", 1991

Former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was sentenced today to do a minimum of 14 months and a maximum of 5 years in state prison, as ordered by Judge David Groner (http://tinyurl.com/27pptgx). The ex-mayor, 39, was the youngest elected mayor of Detroit when he took office in 2002. His youth, flamboyant charisma, snazzy attire, stud earring, and musical tastes led him to be called 'the hip-hop mayor' by many, an unofficial title that he embraced for his first term in office. Kilpatrick cultivated the image of a conscientious, spiritually-grounded family man who was all about spearheading Generation X's leadership role in turning changing the fortunes of a long-embattled city.

However, beginning with his reelection bid in 2005, things began to unravel for the married father of three. Local television and newspaper outlets began citing strange expenditures during his tenure, such as a luxury SUV truck that was officially purchased by the police department but apparently for the use of Kilpatrick's wife Carlita. Other news items around that time period included a series of lavish purchases made with city credit-cards (ostensibly to entice potential investors and developers), and the sustainability of an entourage of police escorts that rivaled the Presidential secret service. After coming in second place during 2005's August primary, Kilpatrick managed to beat his opponent Freman Hendrix in that November's final election.

Subsequently, Kilpatrick's tenure continued to have problems. A police officer claimed to have been verbally chewed-out by Kilpatrick's chief of staff, Christine Beatty, following her being pulled over for a traffic violation. Kilpatrick's original choice for police chief, Jerry Oliver (who was once detained at the Detroit Metro Airport for attempting to bring a gun in his luggage), resigned. His replacement, Ella Bully-Cummings, presided over a department that was under ongoing federal supervision, ongoing community complaints about slow response to emergency calls, as well as complaints of alleged misconduct by officers.

Most portentiously damaging was the whistleblower lawsuit filed by former Detroit police officers Gary Brown and Harold Nelthrope. The lawsuit contended that the pair, who were internal-affairs officers, were unfairly fired when their investigation into alleged police overtime-misuse inadvertently led them to evidence of an extramarital affair between the mayor and Beatty. The alleged overtime misuse concerned members of Kilpatrick's mayoral security officers, and the investigation also attempted to discern whether a 'stag party' had taken place at the mayoral residence, the Manoogian Mansion. This long-rumored but never officially-proven party is also core to the murder case of exotic dancer Tamara Greene, who allegedly danced at this party, was assaulted by Kilpatrick's wife on-site, and ultimately was shot dead in a drive-by attack months later: http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/5062699/detail.html (the city still faces a civil-lawsuit by family members of Greene.)

The civil lawsuit by the ex-cops was handled in a federal court. Sworn testimony was given by Kilpatrick and Beatty, among others. Ultimately, the jury found the city liable in a decision in October of 2007. Kilpatrick publicly balked and vowed to appeal. Several weeks later, however, he apparently changed his mind, and signed documents agreeing to a settlement of $8.4 million for the plaintiffs on behalf of the city. Little, if any, reasons were given for the abrupt turnaround.

However, in early January of 2008, those reasons were laid bare. Text-messages on city-owned cell-phone/pager devices were discovered by the plaintiff's counsel (Mike Stefani), and privately revealed to Kilpatrick and his legal staff, thus leading to the abruptly brokered settlement. Acquired via the Freedom of Information Act, the text messages revealed a litany of quasi-private conversations between Kilpatrick and various other members of his administration: chief among them were the numerous messages between mayor Kilpatrick and Beatty, which directly talked about the firing of Brown and Nelthrope, a charge that was disputed by Kilpatrick and Beatty during their court testimony. The affair between Kilpatrick and Beatty was also revealed: the pair would often send each other amorous, sometimes explicit, messages, and discussed the ways in which they would have secret rendezvous, frequently using city money to buy gifts for each other and rent hotel rooms.

“To sell, to lie, to try, stand up and deny, they are getting everybody high/ high on a cable, cash under the table, currency is how they’re able, to buy the cops and props..”
Boogie Down Productions, “Jack of Spades”, 1989

The revelations about the text-messages and the secret settlement deal hit the city and the Metro area like a hurricane. The scandal became the default watercooler topic for most of the year. The saga had all the trappings of a fictional legal potboiler, only this was soberingly real. Kilpatrick initially balked at claiming ownership of the text-messages: His first addressing of the scandal took place at a Detroit church where cameras broadcast live statements from both mayor Kilpatrick and his wife Carlita. The mayor only admitted to non-specific mistakes, but also vowed to never quit on the city.

At the State of the City speech that followed circa March, 2008, Kilpatrick gave what was otherwise a straightforward speech about progress in addressing Detroit's quality of life (the audience, with the exception of city council members, was hand-picked by the mayor's staff); but toward the end of his hour-long speech, he launched into a tirade against his detractors, alleging internal game-playing within city council and racial bias in the press concerning ongoing coverage of the scandal. Outside of the on-site audience, the rant did not play well with many who were watching; in particular, his mentioning of the N-word (within the context of citing himself as the target of racial taunts) was criticized. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3WBeXBjjZA

An obscure Michigan law gives the sitting governor the power to remove a city official from office if said official's behavior is considered destructive. Rarely used in the state's history, it nonetheless became a point of contention with those unsatisfied with Kilpatrick's conduct. From the scandal's January onset, various people were opining that the governor should step in and remove Kilpatrick. Initially, governor Jennifer Granholm refused to take the bait, citing the law's rare usage, and stating that Kilpatrick's legal matters should be allowed to play out without interference from the Governor's office in Lansing.

A few months later, Kilpatrick had a bizarre run-in with Sheriff's deputies who were attempting to serve a Kilpatrick family member with court papers. This incident found the mayor initially facing assault charges on top of the perjury charges he was already facing. A few weeks later, Governor Granholm finally relented to a formal request from members of Detroit City Council and initiated a non-judicial hearing presided by herself that would determine whether Kilpatrick's behavior was egregious enough to warrant removal by the governor's office.

Several days of grand-jury style testimony took place-- but before mayor Kilpatrick could be summoned to speak on his behalf, he decided to take a plea agreement with the Wayne County Prosecutor's office. Subsequently, he pled guilty in 36th District Court, was stripped of his law license, and was sentenced to 4 months in prison, as well as a $1 million in restitution to the city. The evening after making the formal plea declaration, Kilpatrick made a 'final' public speech that was televised, again dodging any direct addressing of his behavior other than "mistakes were made". He also seemed to infer that Governor Granholm's inquiry was politically motivated (she was already term-limited and ineligible for reelection), and admonished that his current circumstances "set me up for a comeback."

"I might stumble, but still won't lose; now I'm dressed in the county blues; 'cause I'm the type of brother that's built to last, we had some in the present, some in the past..."

Ice Cube/N.W.A., "Gangsta, Gangsta" (radio version), 1989

Onlookers saw Kilpatrick's political career crash-and-burn while seeing another African-American's political career reach the ultimate height: While in prison, Kilpatrick missed being a delegate to formally nominate Barack Obama as the Democratic candidate for US President. He was also in prison for the election and inauguration of Obama. He was released a few months into 2009, and immediately left Michigan for a suburb of Dallas, Texas, where he had a new job as a software salesperson for the Covisint Corporation (owned by Detroit businessman Pete Karmanos). Purportedly, Texas has a state law that prohibits garnishment of wages except for child support cases.

“They'll look you straight into your face/ and tell you that your money's going to a good place/ Like Social Security or Welfare/ But if you go to the Bahamas you'll see them all there..”
Boogie Down Productions, “Who are the Pimps?”, 1992

Despite facing a daunting restitution, Kilpatrick wasted no time in securing a luxurious setting for his new life. His home was in a gated community, and valued at around $1,000,000. Soon, however, Kilpatrick would be claiming that his living expenses only left him with $6 to pay on his restitution. This signed affidavit seemed to prompt the Wayne County Prosecutors' office to be more aggressive in finding out Kilpatrick's exact financial status, leading to a series of court appearances capped off by Tuesday's sentencing.

During these hearings, Kilpatrick seemed to have threadbare knowledge of his current financial status: he claimed to not know whether his wife was employed or not. He claimed that she exclusively handled the family's finances, now. Counsel for the prosecution discovered that following Kilpatrick's release in 2009, several prominent Detroit-area businesspeople (including the aforementioned Karmanos) gave Kilpatrick and/or his wife financial gifts and/or 'loans' totaling in the hundreds of thousands. Also discovered were payments to Kilpatrick's criminal-defense counsel from his political funds, which are considered unethical.

“Show me the work & put it on the scale/ I always hate to see a black man in jail/ If I could tip the scales & talk to Lady Justice/ the cops will be on trial the government be busted”
Pete Rock, “’Til I Retire”, 2008

On several Detroit newspaper websites, a new mugshot of Kilpatrick is now displayed. Removed are his suit, replaced by pale-yellow prison attire. The length of his sentencing demands that he not be remanded to the Wayne County Jail (in Detroit) as his previous stint, but to a state correctional prison, such as the one in largely rural Jackson.

Predictably, the decision has polarized some residents of the metro area. Some feel like the sentencing was fair, given Kilpatrick's seeming "Why me?" stance and defiant adherence to a wealthy lifestyle even in the face of costing city taxpayers millions in the whistleblower settlement. Others-- typically, though not exclusively black Detroiters-- feel that the sentencing was unfair. One Detroit state legislator claimed that the decision reveals that the court system "is without mercy"; a Kilpatrick spokesperson likened the decision to South Africa's now-defunct Apartheid regime.

The case isn't quite yet over. Kilpatrick has the right to appeal, and will likely do so. He is also still considered a person of interest in an ongoing federal investigation into corruption by Metro-area officials-- just today Detroit political consultant Sam Riddle will be reporting to authorities after pleading guilty to bribery and other charges. Kilpatrick's father Bernard, a longtime political consultant, is also under investigation, but to date no federal charges have been filed against he or his son. Meanwhile, Kilpatrick's mother, Congresswoman Carolyn Cheeks-Kilpatrick, faces re-election this year, and competing for the Democratic nomination with state legislator Hansen Clarke and local televangelist Glenn Plummer. Whenever Kilpatrick leaves prison, he will also have to face paying the remaining tab on his restitution (over $800,000). How he will do so remains to be seen, given that he was fired from Covisint the day of Judge Groner's decision.

In the interest of full disclosure, this author voted for Mr. Kilpatrick twice, because I thought he had better ideas and vision than his opponents. I am not thrilled at seeing an African-American father and husband taken away from his family in handcuffs to spend time in prison. This should not please anyone. I am not pleased at seeing a talented, intelligent man fall so precipitously from grace. However, I am also not pleased at the egregiously transparent attempts by this man to cover-up his questionable choices with more questionable choices, while currying favor of his African-American constituency within the context of Christian forgiveness.

I am not in the camp of fringe, bigoted people who hate urban Detroit on principle and who felt the judge should 'throw the book' at Mr. Kilpatrick. But I stop short of looking at Mr. Kilpatrick as simply a victim. If he is a victim, he must include himself among the obstacles in his path. I hope that urban Detroiters, particularly African-Americans, seek to come together regarding the more pressing issues currently affecting our community, such as the school-education crisis and curbing violent crime.

To conspiracy-theorize and add Mr. Kilpatrick to a list of blameless black martyrs siezed upon by a semi-anonymous cabal of racist conspirators damages our political capital: giving the impression that urban, black Detroiters are generally undemanding of their leadership, politically schizophrenic, and prone to feel that malfeasance when done by blacks is justified because there are whites who "get away with" similar misdeeds.

2010-05-23T13:31:00.000-07:00

KEEP TRANSIT ALIVE

On May 22, in downtown Detroit's Hart Plaza, there was a rally organized by a public transit worker's union in support of greater federal help in appropriating funds to develop and bolster improved mass transit opportunities in Detroit and greater Southeast Michigan. Metropolitan Detroit is one of the few major urban centers in America without a comprehensive mass-transit system of high-quality bus service, light rail, and other transit options. If one lives in urban Detroit, they are almost surely paying high-end costs for automobile insurance, let alone the annoying cost of gasoline. Urban Detroiters also face a lack of mainstream-quality grocery options. The city government's belt-tightening has cut back on some bus-line services, as the Bing administration attempts to design a comprehensive plan on how to 'right-size' overall city services to a shrinking population. Despite the federal government-initiated taxpayer bailout of General Motors and Chrysler, little, if any, trickle-down effect has come to ordinary citizens, especially in the geographical backyard of these two corporations (Michigan overall still has unemployment hovering at 14%, and urban Detroit's rate is at least twice that.)

The keynote lecturer was Rev. Jesse Jackson, who stressed that bus-system drivers, train operators, and other public-transit-industry workers represent a green-jobs initiative that is being under-stressed in the public dialogue: "The steel can be made in Gary (Indiana), in Birmingham (Alabama).. the (rail cars & infrastructure) can be made in Detroit", pointing out that during World War II auto-industry related factories converted into producing military vehicles and other materials for the war effort. Other speakers included the US House representatives of Detroit, John Conyers and Carolyn Cheeks-Kilpatrick. Also on hand were two Detroit city councilpersons, local Detroit labor union reps and local transit-improvement activists.

All parties stressed that for Detroit and other urban centers, public transit is a core service that is needed to keep the local community on its feet, providing an affordable means for people to get to work, school, run errands, and to seek recreation. Organizers of the rally plan to follow up with continued community outreach, including another march planned for August 2010, and promise that they will eventually make a formal pitch to the White House with their platform.

2010-05-13T17:41:00.000-07:00

Detroit Turning Over a New Leaf?

http://tinyurl.com/2u643pa

Looks as if there are potential proposals in the Michigan state legislature that would clear the way for a ballot proposal to legalize possession of marijuana in the city of Detroit (Medical marijuana is already legal in the state, but laws are fuzzy as to who can produce it). Well, we know what Snoop Dogg might say.. Among the disparate array of individuals interviewed in favor of decriminalization or legalization are Democratic state rep Lamar Lemons, former Republican state rep Leon Drolet and prominent Detroit-based businessman Pete Karmanos. The coalition of professionals involved with the proposal, as well as advocacy organizations like the non-profit Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, go against the cliche' of pro-legalization efforts by aging ex-hippie activists like actor Tommy Chong, or even the fallen-academic example of the late Timothy Leary and his "tune in, turn on, drop out" philosophy.

This author believes that all currently illegal substances should be legalized, taxed heavily and regulated. Having a universal set of standards in place would actually cut down on the unpurity that most street-level product has (and its the other stuff that also adds to side-effects for users). There should be age limits for access, say, age 21. Schools and workplaces can still have anti-drug statutes, same as before. Just like you can't drink on the job, you can't get be high on the job, and can still be fired for failing a drug test. You'd still be arrested for driving while high. Feel free to make the penalties harsh with fines. Also, there should only be licensed outlets for sales of said substances, say, pharmacies.

Now, many mainstream pharmacies (Wal-Mart, Walgreens, Rite Aid, CVS) may balk at selling metered doses of 'coca', but, maybe this is where smaller-scale, independent pharmacies can make their niche, and become thriving small businesses again, since so many of them in recent decades have lost ground to the Big-Box pharmacy outlets. It's interesting that journalist Darrell Dawsey interviewed some fellows who 'allegedly' are involved in street trafficking and are opposed to legalization (http://tinyurl.com/25xoyc4). This would mean that they would have to go to school and be licensed to sell drugs now to make any real salary. I'm for it. The Tax money can be used for prevention programs, rehab programs, public schools, transit improvement, and more.

However, there would be nearly impossible obstacles to overcome in getting traction for this at the legislative level. No one really wants to hear the logic in the decriminalization argument, let alone the legalization/taxation/regulation argument. Almost literally no mainstream politician looking to get reelected again, Democrat or Republican, will get behind this. The super-patriotic, tough-on-crime absolutists (mostly suburban residents) will insist that society has "waved the white flag" to drug gangs. Some black activists will insist that it is a "white folks thing" trying to get pushed on black Detroit (and potentially, other heavily-minority municipalities). The religious community will harp on this incessantly as an example of "turning away from God" and "embracing hedonism"-- look at Marvin Winans with the Detroit strip-clubs debate. You will have people trying to flip the argument that legalization means you're telling school-aged Johnny and Jane that it's okay to shoot up heroin (No, that's not what the argument is). I find it curious that there are any number of folks who don't mind the "legalized sin" of casinos, and who would throw a fit if alcohol were banned (again), and who get upset at public-smoking restrictions, but they absolutely are against any form of drug legalization because it's a "slippery slope".

2010-05-06T12:19:00.000-07:00

LGBT Activism and the Black Community

On April 30, 2010, the Freedom Institute think tank, led by Rev. Wendell Anthony of the Detroit NAACP organized a town hall meeting as part of the Institute's "Freedom Weekend" string of events leading to the annual Detroit NAACP dinner. During the convention weekend there were seminars focusing on employment and educational opportunities, social assistance agencies, and more. This evening's town hall meeting focused on LGBT activism and urban communities of color, in particular African-Americans: Where do these groups have common ground, where do they differ, what can be mutually learned? Footage from said event can be viewed here:

2010-05-05T17:00:00.000-07:00

DETROIT RALLY FOR WORKERS' RIGHTS
On Saturday, May 1, 2010, a multicultural gathering of people from Metro Detroit gathered in the Southwestern district of the city, to participate in a march for workers' rights and a reform of American immigration policy.

The March took several thousand participants down West Vernor street, where they finally coalesced in Clark Park for a rally where speakers exhorted the crowd to push for a repeal of the recently passed legislation in Arizona that places undocumented immigrants under extreme scrutiny, giving local and state law-enforcement broad powers to stop and question anyone who looks suspicious-- they must produce the proper ID and/or paperwork or risk being jailed and ultimately deported.

Speakers at the rally spoke in Spanish and English. Attendees were told to advocate for workers' rights, including union workers, also for a moratorium on home foreclosures.

2010-05-05T15:57:00.001-07:00

2010-04-28T12:36:00.000-07:00

IN MEMORIAM:

KEITH 'GURU' ELAM

Rap musician Keith ‘Guru’ Elam has died (born July 17, 1961). Long considered an elder statesman of hip-hop music, Guru was a founding member of the hip-hop group Gang Starr (above right, started in the 1980s), as well as having had a parallel solo career of importance from the 1990s forward. According to a recent article by his brother, Elam was 48 years old, who graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Morehouse who veered into rap music where other family members became attorneys or joined academia.

As a lyricist, Guru joined contemporary ‘street intellectuals’ of hip hop, delivering a mixture of MC battle-aggression on certain songs as well as thoughtful moral observations on the contemporary music industry and social conditions in the inner-cities of America . On his solo albums, Guru eased off of cursing and invited an assortment of veteran and contemporary musicians to collaborate on his Jazzmatazz offerings. Some of the collaborators included Donald Byrd, Me’Shell Ndegeocello, Herbie Hancock, and Branford Marsalis.

In recent years, Guru’s life and career took an unfortunate turn for the bizarre: Circa 2004, less than a year after the release of Gang Starr’s last group effort The Ownerz, a press release was distributed indicating that the group had been dissolved, and that Guru would now by default be a solo artist, and starting up his own independent label, 7 Grand Recordings. His new business and musical partner was John Mosher, aka Solar (not to be confused with the Afro-French hip-hopper MC Solaar who contributed to the first Jazzmatazz LP).

Despite Solar seemingly being a newcomer to hip-hop industry insiders, Guru heaped fawning praise on his new partner, declaring this to be his new permanent career path. Guru, who was almost never interviewed outside the company of Solar, was defiantly evasive about the reasons he split from DJ Premier, and would come to be increasingly dismissive of their time together. In certain interviews, Guru went so far to say that he and Premier were ‘never’ friends, and that their collaboration was simply a ‘business arrangement’, and stressed that the concept of Gang Starr went back further than his meeting Premier, and thus Premier’s claims on the Gang Starr legacy were tenuous at best. Guru and Solar would insinuate that others in the Gang Starr extended family of artists and associates were taking advantage of Guru and disrespecting him, prompting his cutting of ties.

Guru delivered three more solo albums in collaboration with Solar. Critical response was positive, but sales were minimal (to be sure, Gang Starr/Guru rarely went gold, even on their most acclaimed albums). By now, urban radio was a closed yard, but Guru managed to maintain his fanbase by touring, especially internationally, headlining select festivals and other events.
Still, questions followed him wherever he went about the separation from Premier, and the possibilities—however remote—of an actual Gang Starr reunion. Anecdotes started popping up on the Internet hip-hop blogospheres, about alleged diva-like behavior on Solar’s part (example- allegedly insisting on being in all fan photos with Guru). Rumors began to circulate, mostly centering around Solar having some kind of Svengali-like influence over Guru— and perhaps the most inflammatory idea being that Guru and Solar were romantically involved.

Tragically, Guru apparently suffered a heart attack in early 2010, and slipped into a coma; accurate information was fleeting concerning his condition, which eventually was revealed to be cancer; some family members claimed that they were blocked from seeing him in the hospital; at one point Solar released a letter allegedly penned or dictated by Guru, that once again trumpeted Solar’s credentials, while managing to take sharp jabs at DJ Premier, allegedly requesting that he not be allowed to participate in any tribute events, and lastly gave mention of a non-profit foundation allegedly started by Guru, where fans could make donations. Ultimately Guru died on April 19 from complications. He left behind a son, K.C., who is 9 years old.

Since the death of Guru, there has been an outpouring of fan sorrow for the rapper and his family, and fan anger (at the mysterious Solar). A recent interview was conducted by HipHopDX.com with Tasha Denham, a former employee of 7 Grand Records, friend to Guru and, apparently, ex-lover to Solar (she has a child by him). If her statements are to be believed, the bombshell interview reveals a scandalous level of alleged manipulation of Guru’s life by Solar, including verbal and physical abuse. For his part, Solar has given a public interview with MTV personality Sway, effectively denying that there was anything negative or manipulative in his relationship with Guru.

The aftermath of Guru’s death is still an ongoing saga. Some form of a tribute event has been promised by his family members, and DJ Premier has already recorded a free mixtape in tribute to him. Public opinion has largely condemed Solar; it remains to be seen what his next career move will be, but already allegations exist that the nonprofit described in Guru's alleged deathbed letter is formally owned by Solar's ex-wife, and its 501-c-3 status may not be in good standing.

I think the first songs from Gang Starr that I ever heard were from the second album, 1990’s Step Into the Arena; the songs were the singles from those albums, “Just to Get a Rep”, “Love Sick”, and “Who’s Gonna Take the Weight?”. I missed out on Spike Lee’s Mo Better Blues film that year, and I barely remember seeing the accompanying Gang Starr single/video, “Jazz Thing”. I thought the group was pretty good, and I probably taped the singles as they played on my radio, but I hadn’t been compelled yet to seek out their work in cassette form.

The first Gang Starr album I actually owned was Daily Operation, when it came out in the spring of 1992. I was at the tail end of my first year in college, and “Take it Personal” was the first single, which I thought was banging. I’m thinking I purchased Operation and the Beastie Boys’ Check Your Head LPs on cassette the same day. I ended up playing the Operation album on a regular basis throughout the next year. Guru's unique, smoky monotone voice fit in just right with the rhythm tracks by his partner DJ Premier (Christopher Martin). The trend had recently crept into hip hop of using vintage jazz recordings to create breakbeats and samples, and Gang Starr were among the primary pioneers of that style of hip-hop. They always stressed that their love of jazz was genuine, and not just a hipster gimmick to get fleeting attention. Unfortunately, crossover fame seemed to elude the group compared to A Tribe Called Quest and the short-lived US-3 collective, who also made prominent use of jazz backdrops to their recordings.

I never got to see the group (or a solo Guru) play live in concert; I’m not sure how often they visited Detroit, but with them being primarily based out of New York City, my guess is that it wasn’t a standard part of their touring jaunts. I still checked for the songs on urban radio and the cable video shows.

He will be missed.

2010-04-12T16:14:00.001-07:00

2010-04-08T18:25:00.000-07:00

WWJB? (What Would Jesus Blog?)

On the Afro-Punk website message board (I think my link to the right still works), someone started a discussion on contemporary religious practices in the USA and the views towards non-mainstream faith practices. At some point, this author chimed in regarding his general preference for a more liberal-leaning faith community. The poster Something Else wanted me to elaborate on this angle. And so:

In short, I'd define such a community as one where, philosophically, it is not inordinately focused on dogma.. Pragmatically speaking, this would be a place where, for example, gay folk are not called out for being part of the "reason" why there is suffering in the world/USA; where Intellectual honesty is uplifted rather than baseless rumormongering, i.e., Obama is a closet muslim & Marxist-style socialist/communist. This would be a community of folks who genuinely look to the examples of Jesus in the Gospels (reaching out to the sick, outcasts, foreigners, promoting communal sharing, critiquing fundamentalism among 'scholars') instead of reflexively holding onto Old-Testament worldviews and judgement on everything that they don't like (http://tinyurl.com/yje3et7 ).

This would be a community not hung up on how "The liberal culture" promotes social tolerance, and spinning that into the notion that, having a sex-ed class in school effectively teaches kids to be gay and/or promiscuous.. As far as it relates to popular culture, this would be a community of folks who don't have inordinate hangups about trends in popular music, fashion or movies, even if certain films, TV, or music are really not their thing.. In other words, they're not trying to thump in your head that you're going to Hell for liking the Terminator, The Simpsons, hard rock, rap, and they don't uplift the angle of "Pagan Fantasy" when it comes to things like Harry Potter, Pokemon, Dungeons & Dragons, Star Wars, etc.

This would be a community of folks who don't have a problem with 'leftist' activism at least where it concerns labor rights, civil rights, environmental respect, financial reform, health care reform, etc. This would be a community that promotes gender respect-- uplifting the role of men & women as leaders, giving respect where it is due (i.e., rejecting the trend of a male pastor getting sole credit for an event where most of the grunt-work is done by women); This would be a community that rejects the hyper-formality of many contemporary churches where the pastor is "only" referred to as 'Pastor', even in non-church, non-event settings, and one-on-one conversations can only be arranged through a string of go-between deacons, elders and/or secretaries. This would be a community of folks who are troubled by developments like prolonged wars and jingoistic foreign policy. They would not uncritically accept the idea of Jesus bombing anyone, including "nonbelievers".. This would be a community of folks that, despite their own strong beliefs in Christ and His message, they hold no grudge against interacting with those of other faiths, even the tacit bigotry of "gosh, they're nice enough folks, too bad they're Buddhist" types of attitudes.

This would be a community of folks that rejects "Prosperity Gospel". They would believe in supporting their home ministry but not at the downgrading of one's own existence; these folks would blanche at the notion that their pastor(s) have to be so much more wealthy than the congregants, just for the sake that church leadership can "hold court" with other affluent people (i.e, captains of industry, politicians, etc.).

Lastly, this would be a community of folks who are not hung up on the idea that Armageddon/The Rapture will be coming in their lifetime, or even in their children's lifetime, and therefore uncritically support chaotic middle-east conflicts, instead of supporting-- and demanding from elected officials-- peaceful diplomatic solutions. In short, these would be folks that bypass all the right wing demagoguery (in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, etc.) that defines much of ministry in the contemporary world, and the United States in particular.

Especially among the 'religious' types who now form the base of the Republican Party/conservative activism, the hardliners among my Catholic contemporaries would see me as a recalcitrant backslider for being pro-choice (among other things) and the most hardcore of Evangelical types see me as an Illuminati sympathizer/Vatican apologist/child-molestation advocate by default.. I would respect black Republicans a lot more if I heard anything from them that was different from Newt Gingrich, Pat Buchanan, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Pat Robertson, etc.. I have my own issues with what I feel is a hyper-centrist culture in contempoary Democrats, but i'll take their general platform vs. what Michael Steele & co. have to offer.

2010-04-08T15:17:00.000-07:00

TRIBUTE: MALCOLM MCLAREN,

1946 - 2010

Malcolm McLaren, a British-born music industry impresario, has just died, as documented in the New York Times- http://tinyurl.com/yhlyffh.

In mainstream pop culture, McLaren is most famous (or infamous?) for his managing and promotion of the pioneering Sex Pistols punk-rock band during their meteoric rise and fall during the 1970's. At the beginning of the Reagan era, however, he found himself dabbling in another underground music culture with roots in New York City--hip-hop.

The CD Buffalo Gals: Back to Skool compiles virtually all of the hip-hop related recordings that McClaren had a hand in producing, primarily with the World Famous Supreme Team: According to McLaren, they were a duo of part-time 3-card-Monte hustlers who caught his attention in Times Square, who happened to also host a community-access radio show in New York City where they showcased early hip-hop records, and eventually their collaborations with McLaren.

"Buffalo Girls", "She's Looking Like a Hobo", "Hey DJ" and several more good-times party songs all show up on the CD (largely culled from 12-inch recordings, as most of the material never surfaced on a proper album). Recorded before sampling technology had become common, the original songs feature mostly live instrumentation from session musicians, that still holds up to today's standards. Lyrically, the rhymes are much more simplistic compared to today, and may come across to contemporary listeners as quaint: "Two buffalo gals going 'round the outside, 'round the outside, 'round the outside" (as voiced by McLaren himself), but their work was also free of profanity and gangster themes. The Supreme Team never hit the mainstream, but was an important outfit to know in the pre-Run-DMC era of hip-hop. Also collected with the archival songs are new cover recordings, including legendary hip-hop musicians like De La Soul, Rakim and KRS-One.

Interspersed between all the songs are interviews with McLaren himself, where he candidly talks about his encounters with hip-hop's early figures and his attempts to help the music get a foothold in the industry; frequently being scolded by industry gatekeepers, A&R reps from pop, rock and even soul divisions of the establishment labels turned a blind eye, clearly not knowing what they were missing.

Between the old and new songs, this is the definitive compilation/tribute to an unlikely early champion of hip-hop music. May he rest in peace.

Buffalo Gals @ Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/ykklu9z

2010-04-05T15:53:00.001-07:00

GETTIN' JANKY WIT' IT

“Janky Promoters” is the latest gleefully low-brow buddy comedy pairing Ice Cube and Mike Epps. Here, the duo star as a pair of improbably incompetent concert promoters. Russell Redds (Cube) and Jellyroll (Epps) have just struck a deal with popular hip-hop artist Young Jeezy (playing himself), and have less than 24 hours to finalize the logistics, despite the fact that they have less than $1,000 between them.

Thus begins a series of increasingly grating misadventures, as Russell and Jellyroll seek to con their way into having a successful show. The filmmakers could have made the lead characters more likeable, despite their slacker status. As it stands, despite the efforts of Cube and Epps, Russell and Jellyroll mainly come across as boorish clowns that you want to fail—Russell steals his fiancée’s checkbook to pay his share of the concert costs, and Jellyroll brags to a reality-TV crew that he’s sleeping with a married woman (Character actors Tamala Jones and Glenn Plummer are wasted as the unfaithful wife and her cuckolded husband, respectively.)

It’s hard to sympathize with most of the characters here; they to be reflexively foul-mouthed and defiantly ignorant. Among the parade of eccentrics are a sex-starved manager, star-struck hotel maids and a mom who prepares crack like it’s Sunday dinner. One of the few bright spots involves Russell’s teen son ‘Young Seymour’ (James "Lil’ JJ" Lewis), an amateur rapper who nonetheless thinks he’s entitled to a room-crowding entourage. Russell’s unabashed encouragement of Seymour’s dancers to rump-shake more inadvertently highlights the recurring critique of rap-as-sexploitation.

Taking into account such film phenomena as the Farrelly Brothers, Wedding Crashers and The Hangover, ‘slob comedies’ clearly have a place and an audience. Still, Promoters isn’t likely to entice viewers beyond the converted. Looking at the broader themes in the film (fly-by-night promoters, vapid stars and their hangers-on, dope-dealers who want in on the action), it could have been a more clever satire of behind-the-scenes goings-on in the hip-hop music industry (the screenplay credit goes to Ice Cube.) Yet the film functions as an unofficial sequel to the Friday movie series—in fact, given the cult popularity of those films, it’s unclear why the filmmakers didn’t go that route. Unless viewers are Ice Cube or Mike Epps completists, Promoters is a rental at best.

2010-02-28T15:38:00.000-08:00

SNOOP’S BLUEPRINT LAID THE FOUNDATION

The West Coast Blueprint is a compilation album from Priority Records, chronicling the general history of the storied hip-hop label. Snoop Dogg, recently signed to an executive position at the label, has personally compiled this set of songs featuring rap artists based out of California. The set culls its songs from the EMI umbrella of label imprints including Priority, Virgin, and Capitol.

Pros
Starting with the release of Eazy-E’s Eazy Duz-It LP, Priority Records started a now-legendary relationship with hip-hop that has included artists such as N.W.A., Ice Cube, the Geto Boys, Master P, Mack 10, and others. Presented in largely chronological order, listeners will hear King Tee’s “Act a Fool”, The D.O.C.’s “No One Can Do it Better”, the Luniz' “I Got Five on It”, Mack 10 & Dogg Pound’s “Nothin’ but the Cavi Hit”, Kid Frost’s “La Raza”, and more. Listeners will hear the evolution of California’s hip-hop music, which brought expanded themes to the genre about contemporary gang problems, the drug war, police misconduct and more.

Cons
Depending on how old the listener is in hip-hop, they may well already own a ‘best of’ set (or several studio albums) based on the artists in this compilation, making this particular mixtape somewhat redundant unless there was a handful of songs that they managed to miss in the process (none of the selections here are particularly rare, being standard album cuts or single edits). The bonus song, Snoop’s cover of Ice Cube’s “Check Yo Self” is decent but unremarkable (compared to his total-makeover rendition of “La-Di-Da-Di” from 1993, which would have made a nice inclusion.)

Snoop cheats slightly on a few of the selections here: “No One Can Do it Better” was from the D.O.C.’s debut LP released on Ruthless/Atlantic (and not even a single), making it one of two songs on the set not from the EMI media catalog. The other is Yo-Yo’s “You Can’t Play with my Yo-Yo” (East-West/Atlantic), which to its credit includes iconic Priority artist Ice Cube but also serves as the only counterpoint to the casual sexism in many of the songs here: on that note, crate-diggers may remember the Oakland act Conscious Daughters (produced by the militant-minded Paris) who released Ear to the Street and Gamers on the Scarface/Priority imprint in the 90s. Why not include a song from them?

Other Issues:
Priority first dipped its toes into hip-hop via a string of themed compilation LPs in the 1980s called (without a touch of humility) Rap’s Greatest Hits. In the years since Priority’s 1990s heyday as a powerhouse independent label (and its subsequent absorption by EMI/Capitol), it has recurrently released anthologies based on various affiliated artists, leading to a lot of overlap.

Since this album ostensibly celebrates the Priority label’s hand in the history of West Coast rap, it is understandable that going outside of the catalog for licensed songs would be kept to a minimum. Still, it comes across as glaring that no Death Row singles are included here: Priority served as distributor for an assortment of Death Row albums in the 90s.—but instead of Snoop’s “What’s My Name” or “Gin N Juice”, listeners have to settle for the so-so “Trust Me” (featuring Sylk E. Fine and Suga Free) culled from Snoop’s early 2000s stint on No Limit Records.

Regarding other worthy artists, Ice-T’s Warner Bros. material may have been off-limits, but he recorded two lesser-known albums for Priority in the 90s—despite this, he gets squeezed out in favor of Rappin’ 4-Tay. “You Gots to Chill” or “You’re a Customer” by EPMD (whose first two albums fall under Priority’s care) could have been included—despite being an East Coast act, the ominous synthesizer-bass riff in the songs were a kind of proto-G-funk offering that West Coast rappers expanded upon. The aforementioned Paris released Guerrilla Funk on Priority in 1994, whose political stances gave some thematic diversity to the morally gray gangsta-tales of Priority’s roster.

In summary, this album may entertain some Generation-X’ers who initially had most of these songs on cassette tape but it’s only a decent West Coast rap sampler for unfamiliar listeners. Seek out the original studio albums where possible: of course, this may likely be the point, as many of the LPs referenced here have been re-released with bonus material. Fo’ shizzle.

2009-11-14T11:21:00.000-08:00

EMERGENCY ROOM THEATER

A 'final' vote on American health care reform may not come by the end of the year. A recent Associated Press article discusses this- http://tinyurl.com/yc6zp4a
Apropos of nothing, yours endearingly has an anecdote to share:

So i have this infrequently recurring condition where a knee and/or foot will swell up, get painful & stiff.. usually it's only moderately annoying, but this time it's laid me out and I had been more or less bedridden for a few days before grudgingly heading out to an emergency room.. ..after check-in, I’m laid out on the gurney, with a hospital gown on. My roughly 6'5" height leaves my exposed feet clearly hanging over the edge (which adds a slight amount of pressure to my already ailing left foot), and it’s chilly; so I’m frequently shifting my legs to get comfortable, and it doesn’t work..

I've got my own 'space' here but it's crowded in the service area, and people are being attended to in hallways. Alternately to my own chagrin, amusement and/or enlightenment, I can't help but overhear any number of conversations: The 82-year-old Arab immigrant, apparently a recent widower, who argues with his adult son alternating between English and their mother tongue on why he won't visit more often; an out-of-town couple, where the 40-ish husband had a mild heart attack while shopping; the insurance-check clerk whose husband has been laid off for a year and the self-paid plans available are prohibitively expensive; the 30-ish female cancer patient discussing coping by faith with the visiting Chaplain, and wishes that she hadn't eaten those darn raisins that make her ill; an elderly woman who recurrently scolds the attending staff as "heathens and devils", and apparently admonishes one to the tune of "you really are a killer" while being given an IV needle..

After spending some 8 hours there, I finally get to be part of the "entertainment" myself; the Orthopedic attendant arrives, and says she needs a fluid sample from my hurting knee.. Only, well, local anesthetic won't do much since she has to go deep.. And so, with grim resignation, I give her the go ahead, the needle goes in, and before I know it, I'm involuntarily howling; it's taking longer than expected to get a sizable sample. Anyone from the Gary/Chicago area who grew up with the Son of Svengoolie TV show and remembers the ‘Ow! Ow! Ow!’ sound effect, amplify it exponentially; actually, the first image that popped in my head while I was enduring this was the scene in “Predator” where the creature is tending its wounds and injects himself with a syringe.. and then I jump to the Carl Weathers death scene…

It only vaguely helped that one of the attending doctors was a young, cute blond... In my head I had one of those "Scrubs" old-guy moments like 'wait a minute, you're out of med school?' While talking with her, I felt vaguely ashamed of myself for briefly seriously wondering if the local economy here hadn’t prompted a phantom program that promoted candy stripers to physicians. I wanted to ask her what she’s doing later on, but hey—I’m in a hospital gown, mussed hair, with a bum knee & foot, with a bum bank balance—and that’s about typical for why I don’t ask out women anyway, but I digress...

So, test results time.. I don't have gout or an infection, but I'd need to check in with a rheumatologist soon.. Ah, can’t forget about the prescription for Vicodin (score!). It sure has helped Eminem write any number of songs. Wonder what it’ll do for me..and now the pain after the pain.. I've been laid off a little over a month now, my health coverage is in nebulous territory.. even with 'Cobra' assistance it would be ex$pensive.. another heavy bill, here I come..

Mr. President and Congress... PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-09-17T16:14:00.001-07:00

2009-09-16T15:07:00.000-07:00

J. Carter Takes on the Haters

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter recently said in an interview that the heated animosity directed towards President Barack Obama is largely inspired by racial bigotry:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/16/jimmy-carter-racism-barack-obama

I happen to agree with Mr. Carter's assertions. Some concerns, though:

Those folks who reflexively hate Carter don’t care (“rawr! The peanut farmer who let us get punked by Iran?! Whatever!”)
Most ‘mainstream’ media pundits (papers, radio, tv)—even in editorials—won’t call it racism for fear of being labeled biased, or even ‘Politically Correct’.
Don’t expect Prez Obama to speak on this, except to “respectfully disagree” with Mr. Carter, especially after what happened with the Skip Gates case.
I can empathize that the Prez doesn’t want to get caught up constantly discussing racial conflict at every perceived opportunity, and it "is" a distraction; President Obama definitely has serious policy issues to spearhead like health care reform, which I hope is accomplished (and substantive!); but I have to chuckle when the White House has to constantly defuse someone calling out the clowns among neo-con culture..

South Carolina congressman Joe Wilson's "You Lie" outburst was not in a vacuum. There's the relentless equating by pundits of of 'socialism' with 'communism' (ignoring the roots of Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security); the birth-certificate obsessionists; the Tea Party activists who hold up picket signs depicting Obama's face transposed with Adolf Hitler's mustache & Nazi regalia; all of this exposes the coded but barely-veiled racialized animosity that a certain demographic holds for Obama. "Pulling the race card" becomes the de facto response to any public charge of racial bias even if its framed within a logical context. Purely fiscal objections to any Obama policy proposal take a back seat to making sure that the general public is "informed" of alleged ties to radical Islam or Marxian theory.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell expresses grave concerns about contemporary GOP culture, and he gets openly bashed & marginalized by Rush Limbaugh and company; Michael Steele, despite being head GOP cheerleader as the Republican National Committee chairman, is constantly at risk of his official powers being whittled away-- http://rodonline.typepad.com/rodonline/michael-steele/. But of course, nothing racial about it.. just business...

2009-09-02T12:38:00.000-07:00

Mouse, Meet Spider

http://tinyurl.com/mls974

It took a Jimmy Fallon monologue for me to find out about it. According to recent reports, The Walt Disney Corporation is acquiring Marvel Entertainment for 4 billion dollars (US). This offers new possibilities—and complications—for both media companies. This author's first reaction was one of shock, then denial, then, acceptance.

The buying-out of Marvel makes the latest in a series of entertainment-property acquisitions for the Disney Corporation, spanning the last 20 years or so. In 1990, Disney acquired the Jim Henson Company, home to the Muppets characters and TV shows. Skeptical Muppet fans quickly were turned off, pointing out Disney’s very mainstream (read: boring) output and the satirical edginess (Sesame Street notwithstanding) of the Muppet Show-derived characters. Jim Henson died before the deal was finalized however, and the new corporate relationship soon became contentious as Henson stakeholders fought in court for a separation, which finally happened a few years later. By the early 2000’s, things apparently warmed between the stewards of the Henson empire and Disney, as Disney once again merged with Henson and now controls DVDs and new film projects starring Kermit the Frog and friends.

Also around the year 2000, Disney acquired Saban Entertianment. Beginning in the early 1990s the latter company created a dubbed-dialogue goldmine in the Power Rangers franchise of TV shows and DVDs. Marked by segments of live action featuring Western actors spliced in with battle footage of Japanese action-hero shows, the Power Rangers updated import shows of the 60s, 70s and 80s like Ultraman, Battle of the Planets and Voltron.

Marvel Publishing was sold to Cadence Industries in the early 1970s; by the late 80s Marvel was acquired by New World Entertainment. New World announced a slew of new projects, including an Iron Man live-action film that never happened (the 2008 film is unrelated). Beginning in the early 1990s, Marvel was acquired by Ron Perelman who initiated an unprecedented move to acquire media properties on Marvel’s behalf, including Fleer trading cards, indie publisher Malibu Comics and even Diamond Distributors, a comics distributor. documented in the book "Comic Wars" http://tinyurl.com/6oov9g

For several years now Disney (via its Buena Vista Video arm) has owned Marvel’s catalog of cartoon shows produced before the year 2000. Online fan chatter has been critical, accusing Disney of basically sitting on the properties. Circa 2002, a DVD release of Spider-Man cartoons was met with a lawsuit by Marvel, who at the time alleged it used unauthorized artwork and interfered with the then-new first Spider-Man live-action film (a subsequent release of the entire 1960s Spider-Man cartoon series on DVD soon went out of print, and has become a collector’s item of sorts). In 2009, Disney has been quietly releasing DVD collections of the 1990s X-Men cartoon series.

Starting in 2007, then-Marvel executive Avi Arad gathered private investors to create Marvel Films, an independent studio to produce a new series of live-action films based on Marvel characters: The first to arrive in theaters in 2008 was Iron Man, followed by Incredible Hulk. Iron Man 2, Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers are in varying stages of development.

Possible Developments include:

Comics- It remains to be seen what the long term developments will be. Comics sales as a publishing form are way down from an early 90s peak. Industry insiders regularly debate ways to get beyond a now-largely adult male comics buying public. Other issues include pricing and new retail outreach. Paid-digital downloads (including a ‘motion comic’ based on Spider-Woman) are a development too new to gauge but likely worth continuing.

Disney’s financial resources may allow more of a window for Marvel to expand their line of series (again), after a late-90s trend of contraction. Both Disney and Marvel have extensive archives of back issues, most of which are out of print. An aggressive collections initiative could find much of it reprinted—possibly farming out Disney titles under the Marvel Publishing brand. New comics series based on Disney’s characters (including live-action films and TV) could also be published soon under the Marvel masthead. New Disney films may see comics adaptations from Marvel. The ‘Disney Adventures’ magazine may feature material based on Marvel characters.

Some comics fans may be concerned with Marvel’s MAX imprint—where R-rated dialogue and action occur. The Punisher has a long-lived series under the imprint, and Marvel also publishes other mini-series and specials under the brand. The Icon imprint allows creator-owned properties to be published by Marvel, including titles originally published in Europe. Disney is famous for its family-friendly branded entertainment products—and while Disney owns and operates Touchstone Studios for PG-13 and R-rated features, some fans may fear Disney execs may order MAX titles deemphasized or eliminated altogether.

Live action- Starting from the 1980s forward, several Marvel comics franchises have been licensed to other film studios for development. Initially it was to little avail, as most projects announced languished in ‘development hell’ until the first Blade film hit theaters in 1998. 20th Century Fox became the most prolific film partner for Marvel, so far releasing four X-Men films (including 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine), Daredevil, Elektra, and two Fantastic Four films. Paramount Films currently has first-refusal for distributing Marvel Films movies (Universal was tapped for releasing 2008’s The Incredible Hulk). Sony/Columbia has released a trilogy of Spider-Man films since 2002; a 4th, 5th 6th film are in varying stages of development.

Marvel’s film properties are lucrative endeavors. So—does Disney now own the Marvel Films company by default? If so, what does this mean for live-action films in development? What, if anything, does this mean for Marvel’s plans to open their own brick-and-mortar studio to film various segments for their movies? Will Paramount be out of the picture as a distributor? What will this mean for currently licensed properties at other studios? Will Disney look for those options to be ended as soon as possible? Motions to end these licenses prematurely may be met with lawsuits. A contentious lawsuit over release rights to DC Comics' Watchmen film involved Warner Bros. and Fox and was finally settled shortly before the film came out. Marvel’s flagship character Spider-Man is currently locked into a production deal with Sony for both live-action and animation projects.

Hopefully parties at Disney will treat the Marvel properties with their due respect, and genuinely push for new developments with them in live-action, including television shows. Fans have long clamored online for a Marvel analog to the Smallville series which is based on DC’s Superman comics.

Animation development- Since 2006, Marvel Films has had a partnership with Lions Gate Entertainment for direct-to-video animated films based on their characters. Releases so far have included Ultimate Avengers 1 & 2, Iron Man, Dr. Strange, Avengers Next, and Hulk Versus. Marvel has had several animated TV series released to varying episode-counts since 2000, including X-Men Evolution, Spider-Man: The New Adventures, Fantastic Four, Iron Man: Armored Adventures, Wolverine and the X-Men, and Spectacular Spider-Man. Series currently in the works include Marvel Super-Hero Squad, Mighty Avengers and Thor.

Hopefully Disney will assist in the development of forthcoming animated TV and film projects, including the future direct-to-video films as well as cartoon TV series. Disney has several broadcast outlets on which to air shows and films, including major network ABC. Some of the ‘kiddie’ characters developed by Marvel from the 1980s included Spider-Ham, the X-Babies, Royal Roy, Top Dog and Planet Terry. During the 1940s and 50s, Marvel—then called Timely, later Atlas—published a series of ‘funny animal’ titles as analogs to the Warner Bros. and Disney stables of characters, many of whom had their own comics series for rival publishers at the time. Time will tell whether any of those characters will see attempted revivals in some form.

Several superhero properties exist at Marvel that—as yet—have yet to be featured (beyond the cameo level) in animated form in a series or special: Some of them include Power Man & Iron Fist, Cloak & Dagger, Daredevil, the Defenders, New Mutants, Power Pack, and more. The high-end animation allowed by the Disney-owned Pixar Corporation (Toy Story, Cars, Wall-E) will likely have some fans in high anticipation. There are also Japanese-anime' adaptations already forthcoming based on Wolverine, Iron Man, the X-Men, and Blade, promising to re-interpret the characters with a cultural lean towards the sci-fi settings of Japan's animated shows.

Other licensing: Amusement Park rides (and an assortment of merchandise) based on Marvel characters are currently featured at Universal Studios Theme Park in Orlando, Florida—a rival to Disney World. Circa 2007, Marvel announced a deal with Middle-Eastern entertainment developers for a Marvel-based theme park in Dubai. Will the Disney seek to scuttle the Middle-Eastern theme park deal? Will the Marvel-based attractions at Universal Studios soon end, with Marvel-based attractions developed for the Disney parks? Will Marvel characters now be walking the concourse at the Disney parks?

Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark is a Broadway musical starring the Spider-Man characters. The play, featuring original music by members of rock band U2, is scheduled to premiere in 2010 but has been marred by allegations of an out-of-control budget. Disney has backed Broadway adaptations of The Lion King and Beauty & the Beast; Theoretically, Disney could be convinced to offset costs for a trial run.

2009-08-20T15:32:00.001-07:00

2009-08-05T13:39:00.000-07:00

DJ Marley’s Magnum Opus

In Control Vol. 1, Deluxe Edition is a 2-disc re-release of the first album from pioneering hip-hop musician/DJ Marley Marl. Traffic Entertainment oversees the release, poring from the Cold Chillin’ Recordings catalog. Starting in the mid-1980s, Queens-bred DJ Marley Marl (Marlon Williams) was the primary producer for the indie label Cold Chillin’s roster of rap artists and hosted a rap radio show in New York City, ‘In Control’. He produced a long string of singles (and later albums) for rap artists like Big Daddy Kane, Biz Markie, MC Shan, Roxanne Shante, and more. In 1987 “He Cuts so Fresh” was credited to Marley on the Uptown is Kickin' It compilation (Uptown/MCA Records, 1987). A full-length followed in 1988 on Cold Chillin’/Warner Bros. Marley’s profile as a producer expanded well into the 90s, working with artists like LL Cool J, TLC and others.

The unfamiliar listener might assume that Marley was a rapper since he gets top billing here. However, he simply calls the production shots here, Quincy Jones-style, with some occasional vocal ad-libs during the songs. His production style reflected then-current trends in hip-hop sampling, with James Brown as the most frequent muse. In Control featured all of the Cold Chillin’ label artists, loosely affiliated as ‘The Juice Crew’. Most of the cuts are solo expositions, like Craig G’s “Droppin’ Science”, the album opener. The then-teenaged Tragedy kicks his ‘Intelligent Hoodlum’ style on “Live Motivator” and Master Ace does well on “Simon Says”. MC Shan gets a nod with “Freedom (remix)”. Roxanne Shante gives a whimsical response to J.J. Fad’s “Supersonic” with “Wack Itt” (a far cry from the ultra-personal disses of contemporary rap).

In stark contrast to today’s hip-hop albums, there are only a couple of multiple-MC collaborations here- first, Biz Markie and Heavy D on “We Write the Songs” where Biz borrows a hook from Barry Manilow of all people. The other is arguably the greatest ‘posse cut’ of all time, "The Symphony". A simple piano riff bolsters the rhythm track, as each MC gives their best battle-rhyme in succession: Master Ace, Craig G., Kool G. Rap and Big Daddy Kane.

This edition features interview interludes from Marley where he reveals some behind-the-scenes information about each original song from the album (allegedly, Shan was a last-minute no-show for the “Symphony” session). The second disc features several alternate takes, remixes, unreleased songs and live-in-concert performances. One minor quibble is that in this multi-media content age, the “Symphony” video (and any other period footage) could have been included in DVD form. A booklet contains extensive liner notes and period photographs (the memorable cover casts Marley as an airline pilot). This set is well worth it for anyone who is passionate or curious for ‘golden age’ hip-hop.

This release also is a welcome alternative to the undercurrent at most major music labels that allows hip-hop/rap music archival recordings to simply languish in obscurity. Seminal releases in hip-hop rarely get the upgraded treatments that exist for the rock/pop, soul, jazz, and country genres.

2009-07-27T15:42:00.000-07:00

‘BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATERS

“Go to the door, get frisked, just in order to get in.. and if you wasn’t from this town, then you couldn’t fight and win…” MC Shan, “The Bridge”, 1986

So, as President Obama made his pitch for health care reform at a White House press conference, a seemingly left-field question asked him to address the recent confrontation between Harvard Professor Henry Louis ‘Skip’ Gates and members of the Cambridge, Massachusetts police force. What is known is that Professor Gates had recently returned home from a trip overseas. Apparently at the time, there was a call made to local police alleging two black men were trying to break into a local home. The slightly built Dr. Gates had trouble opening his front door, and asked his driver’s help. Shortly after entering his home, police showed up.

“The bridge is over, the bridge is over… biddy-bye-bye.. the bridge is over, the bridge is over, hey-hey…”
Boogie Down Productions, “The Bridge is Over”, 1986

Arrested Developments

From there, the accounts vary on what exactly happens next. Dr. Gates claimed that the police were being hostile and belligerent—refusing to leave after he confirmed that he was a resident of the house and refusing to give him their names and badge numbers. The arresting police officer, Sgt. James Crowley, claims that Dr. Gates was being hostile and belligerent. Dr. Gates was ultimately charged with disorderly conduct—a charge that was dropped as the story went national.

“..The term they apply to us is a n-----; call it what you want ‘cause I’m coming from the corner, same applies with a PH. D.”
Chuck D, “Tales from the Darkside (Endangered Species)”, 1990

President Obama’s initial statement was to say that the police acted “stupidly”, which caused a firestorm of backlash, certainly from conservatives who feel that a President should not be commenting on a private citizen’s legal problem (funny, that wasn’t the case with Terry Schiavo), let alone openly criticize law enforcement authorities. Certain pundits now seek to use this as an example that Obama is out of touch. Plenty of folks are looking at it as just another ‘liberal intellectual elitist’ seeking publicity. “Racial profiling? Pfaw!” Once again, where people fall in this debate depends on their cultural position. For sake of (relative) brevity, I’ll defer to some statements I made in a blog well over a year ago (3/21/08; in italics):

It’s like this. Say I’m minding my own business in my house. Looking out the corner of my eye, I see the neighbor’s kid in their yard; he’s trying to hit a baseball by himself. Suddenly, crash! A window breaks, and I see there’s a baseball. Looking directly out the broken window, I see the neighbor’s kid with the bat, still in his yard, staring right at me. So I walk over, knock on the neighbor’s door, and the kid’s dad answers. I explain to him nicely that apparently his son hit the ball that broke my window. But Dad isn’t trying to hear any of this. “Not my son! He’s too classy!” Incredulous, I still try to nicely explain what I saw with my own eyes and the evidence at hand. Says Dad: “What ball, and what bat?” I’m more than a little flustered, now, but I’m keeping my cool.

Then the son shows up, and I ask him to tell his Dad what happened. The son starts parroting Dad, claiming he was trying to fry ants with a magnifying glass. Then Dad takes it to another level: “How do I know you didn’t break your own window?” Only when I finally blow up and start cursing him out, then I can probably find myself getting labeled as A Troublemaker, and maybe the next day I find myself with a citation for not having my front yard bushes trimmed to some arbitrary figure. Insult upon injury. Your intelligence, your ways of reasoning, your method of interpretation, is always called into question when it contradicts something within white cultural defaults. Your grievances, your concerns, are not addressed, ultimately, because they are not even “real”. This is the burden that black America bears that white America has never truly had to deal with in the aggregate.

It’s Miller Time… ?

Allegedly, the President has attempted to broker a peace meeting between Dr. Gates and the Sgt. Crowley, ostensibly over beer at the White House. I will not attempt to speak for Dr. Gates. I will say on my own behalf that that if I feel that I’ve been deliberately mistreated, I have no interest in trying to settle things by bonding over beer (and not just because I’m not huge into beer). Even if there was unlimited iced tea being served, I would have no interest in invalidating my experience to appease the skepticism of others.

“Siberians no better than Nigerians.. My nationality’s reality; And, yo—a prejudiced man is of a devil mentality…”
Kool G. Rap, “Erace Racism”, 1990

I don’t feel obligated to convince anyone (in particular, law enforcement apologists, or self-described moderates who feel that racism officially ended with Obama’s election) that I’m not the kind of (black) person who constantly looks for any angle to whine or seek victimhood. I am not, for example, someone who finds fault with the fact that most commercially available paper is white (and, apropos of nothing, I would be remiss not to point out that its original form tends to be brown before bleaching makes it just right for our printers). Still, I feel that searching for common ground in situations like this—even as espoused by the President—is quite overrated; especially if the other party feels I have to pass some litmus test just to prove I belong. If someone considers that as ‘burning bridges’ then so be it: Perhaps the toll is too great.

2009-07-23T15:12:00.000-07:00

Black Is Back (All In We’re Gonna Win?)

“Radio stations, I question their blackness; they call themselves black but we’ll see if they’ll play this”
Public Enemy, “Bring the Noise”, 1987

Longtime U.S. congressional representative John Conyers is promoting a bill (H.R. 848) that would revise practices in American radio stations. Specifically, it would call for royalties to be paid to artists whose songs are played on the air (even if they are not the composer or hold the publishing rights).

Cathy Hughes—who is African-American—is one of the most prominent voices against the bill. She’s CEO of Radio One Network, which in the Detroit area owns WCHB 1200 AM (Gospel & Talk), Hot 102.7 FM (Hip-Hop/R&B) and 105.9 KISS FM (Contemporary/Classic Soul). The ‘Save the Radio’ campaign seeks public support to stifle the bill. The argument is that the implementation of paid royalties for every spin would bankrupt minority-owned and low-power radio operations. The website http://www.saveyourradio.org/ offers a litany of reasons why the bill should be blocked from passage. Such figures as Duke Fakir of the Four Tops has come out in support of the bill. Select politicians and activists (including Al Sharpton) have come out against it.

I have to say that I really don’t feel a heck of a lot of sympathy for these stations who are complaining the loudest. The current state of ‘urban radio’ (decades ago, simply ‘black radio’) could be a hell of a lot better than it is now. As it stands, not much if any stylistic diversity is being given any love on the playlists of these stations. In this current era of heavily corporate-owned-and-managed radio, almost nobody is allowed to break "format" and push anything new that could catch on, so a status-quo of styles is constantly reinforced. A regional program director for a Clear Channel-affiliated station in Detroit may not even have to live in Detroit.

Local up-and-coming artists tend to be barely heard, with scant few exceptions. I went to a Michael Jackson tribute event at downtown Detroit venue Chene Park a few weeks ago, and most of the artists who performed were local; most were pretty good. A few months ago I checked out a concert from a hip-hop group that hails from Senegal. You have to check for these artists’ material on the Web, though; it’s not on terrestrial radio.

My take is that a lot of it has to do with the undercurrent in black America of looking at non-American black cultures as "foreign/weird/backwards", and tacitly if not blatantly assuming that black-American derived artistic contributions are the only "standard" that matters. There’s also the undercurrent of overdependence on radio for information in general.

"You can fool some people sometimes... but you can't fool all the people all the time"
Bob Marley, "Get Up, Stand Up"

Look at how during Bob Marley's life he wanted to be on black/R&B radio, but it didn't happen. During the 1970s, outside of Caribbean-American neighborhoods, reggae didn’t seem to have much pull in black America, though plenty of white hipsters got into it. It took Stevie Wonder doing a song like "Jammin" (http://tinyurl.com/3wpoo5) to introduce a reggae-style song to the "mainstream" of the black American community (also, Rick James' "Mary Jane" (http://tinyurl.com/5frut8), the main rhythm track, was reggae-derived.) Stevie and Bob were supposed to do a joint tour circa 1980, but Bob's cancer worsened and he died. Going into the 1980s, Eddy Grant's "Electric Avenue"(http://tinyurl.com/3awcmd) and Musical Youth's "Pass the Dutchie" (http://tinyurl.com/3mgm3e) were looked at as novelty hits. It took the eventual rise of hip-hop and its reggae connections to finally get Caribbean-derived songs on urban radio on a regular basis. Even today, no reggae is on the "classic soul" stations.

Black musical diversity is not really promoted. ‘Classic Soul’ and ‘Smooth Jazz’ stations don’t play anything from the late Fela Kuti. How about some reggae beyond the most obvious hip-hop-dancehall artists? How about some black rockers? Even the exalted Prince doesn’t get the spins that he used to in his 1980s heyday. Lenny Kravitz might as well be from Mars.

Watching cable TV, I like to check out MTV-Tres. Plenty of the programming features videos from Latin hip-hop and reggaeton artists; songs which would seem to have a welcome home on urban-format stations—but they’re totally absent from 'standard' urban radio. Active middle-aged rappers like Chuck D, KRS-One, even LL Cool J have been shunt into a limbo where they’re apparently not hot enough to be played alongside Soulja Boy but obviously too hip-hop for an ‘adult soul’ station. Where’s the hip-hop equivalent of a classic-rock station?

When it comes to AfroBeat-type recordings, like Youssou N’Dour, etc., they have a cult of black American fans (usually well in their 20s or older, or maybe they’re children of African immigrants) who have awareness and who are into this. But these artists are not remotely uplifted compared to others.At minimum, the urban format stations should have an ‘alternatives hour’ every day of the week, showcasing funk/jazz/hip-hop/soul from different parts of the globe. Local artists shouldn’t have to make their name known in New York or Los Angeles before Chicago or Detroit stations give them a chance to be heard.

There is a wealth of interesting music (especially from global artists) that is not getting the exposure it deserves. Conyers’ bill definitely needs to speak to these issues in addition to fairness in royalties.

2009-07-21T09:20:00.000-07:00

Health Care Scare

President Barack Obama is defending his initiative to overhaul America’s health care policies this week. He defends his plan from not only Republicans but the so-described ‘blue dog Democrats’ in Congress who are known for being fiscally conservative (or they represent socially conservative districts and they squeaked by in the last election). On the Today Show, the President explained his views further- http://tinyurl.com/l7n3nc

"We can't afford the politics of delay and defeat when it comes to health care,"- President Obama, at Children's National Medical Center, 2009.

Instituting a national health care plan is important for me because I believe that in the wealthiest country in the world, no one should have to suffer from the lack of health care. It is virtually unconscionable that as of 2009, the United States still does not have a comprehensive national health care plan. In this regard we lag behind Canada, the United Kingdom, India, and several other nations. Seniors and children are among the most vulnerable population who are affected by having either no health coverage or an inefficient plan. Far too many working adults put off seeing doctors or having important medical procedures done because of the prohibitively high costs incurred, and the comparatively minimal benefits from their current health care insurance plan.

“If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him.”- South Carolina Senator Jim Demint.

South Carolina governor Mark Sanford

Even after being busted with his side chick from Argentina, I wonder if South Carolina governor Mark Sanford intends to hold on to his job if only because he knows he’s got a cushy health care plan (I can hear some of his supporters now- ‘stop badgering that man, he’s a Christian!’). Anyway, his salary is just over $106,000 a year; the state employee insurance plan can be found here- http://www.eip.sc.gov/index.aspx. At the risk of being presumptuous, my layman’s point-of-view would classify the good governor and his senatorial confederates (pun intended) as ‘haves’. Those who are our poorest citizens tend to be affected the most regularly by being a ‘have-not’, though everyone is affected by this.

Housing, food and transportation are already major expenditures for most American households. Many seniors and the middle-aged have to declare bankruptcy due in great part to health-care debt (http://tinyurl.com/pm79ol). Younger adults are saddled with debts that inevitably affect their credit rating- affecting the results of trying to rent an apartment, buy a house, get a business loan, or lease a car. The heavy debt that goes along with such things as hospital visits tends to make people ambivalent about seeking proper medical care for themselves.

My own health care coverage (through my job) is ‘okay’, as in, better than nothing but hardly all-encompassing. Let’s not forget about dental care, typically considered separate policy coverage altogether, which may have similarly daunting costs incurred. I have been affected by this myself, as high health-care debt makes me recurrently anxious about physician visits. I suspect that I’ve needed braces on my teeth for years, but I can’t afford the steep co-pays. I also remember being ultimately sued by a medical equipment supplier, relating to a doctor’s prescription that they lost and my insurance carrier’s subsequent balking at covering any costs (Appearing at Michigan’s 36th District Court, parties representing the equipment company failed to appear—twice—but they apparently had deep pockets for appeals, which is how yours endearingly finally got zapped in the end. But I suppose judicial system loopholes are a rant for another day.)

A national health care plan should also be looked at as an opportunity to redefine the ‘war on drugs’. Look at California (http://tinyurl.com/n96847): If marijuana alone were legalized across the board, taxed and regulated, it could also become a source of tax revenue. It could partially subsidize the national plan. Social conservatives may blanch, but decades ago, well-meaning but short-sighed teetotalers wielded their influence to give America the 18th Amendment. Alcoholic beverages were rendered illegal. Lasting from 1919 to 1933, those years padded the coffers of assorted gangsters and the like before the law was repealed. Going back even further, American-grown tobacco was—and is—a major cash crop, especially when slave labor was supporting it (whoops, sorry to bring that up, the Senate finally apologized this year.) Both of these substances have since been regulated and taxed.

The national health care plan must be bold enough to include basic health care coverage for all, regardless of race, gender, age, income or national origin. Money can be raised for the plan by raising taxes on well-to-do corporations, cutting back on certain federal spending earmarks (such as two prohibitively costly foreign wars- http://zfacts.com/p/447.html. http://zfacts.com/p/272.html ), and more. As the woes of Chrysler and General Motors came to a head during this past year, one of the prominent issues that both executives and rank-and-file workers had was the status of health care coverage for employees. A national health care plan could arguably take much of the burden away from both big-time companies and smaller firms alike in terms of having a baseline alternative to coverage.

The old ways of thinking about health care must be cast aside. Reactionary obstructionism must be overcome with logic and facts. Proponents must point out that the current status quo on health care is no longer sustainable. We must cast aside such politically negative and emotionally misleading terms like ‘socialist’ or ‘welfare’ when talking about a national health care plan. We need to evolve and embrace the 21st century and be a true leader in the developed world on this issue. Nothing less is acceptable.

“All I can say is, this is absolutely important to me, but this is not as important to me as it is to the people who don't have health care.”- President Obama

2009-07-20T08:44:00.000-07:00

Comix Reviews for the Month, pt. 1

The Brave and the Bold #24 and 25

DC Comics, 2009

SPOILERS CONTAINED

DC Comics’ The Brave and the Bold is an anthology series featuring team-ups with various characters from the publisher’s fantasy universe. #24 allows Static and Black Lightning to meet and team-up for the first time. Teen hero Virgil Hawkins (Static) is resentful that the reputedly corrupt Jefferson Pierce (Black Lightning) is the keynote speaker at his high school’s latest commencement (Virgil is still an underclassman). Flame-throwing villain Holocaust shows up to kill Pierce on the assumption that he took a bribe without proper ‘kickback’ (he didn’t, but many villains aren’t known for their deep insight). Since Pierce’s identity as Black Lightning is publicly known, the fracas starts right away—after young Virgil changes into his costume (his identity is secret), Static joins the fray and the pair join their electricity-driven powers.

#25 gives the spotlight to two technology-heavy superheroes: Hardware and Blue Beetle. Both Hardware and Blue Beetle wear high-tech suits of armor which assist them in fighting crime. Their story involves Hardware tracking down shipments of armored battle-suits being sold to gangsters and terrorists. Since the action starts off near the teenaged Blue Beetle’s hometown, he joins the fight, to the sardonic Hardware’s chagrin. The two get off to a rocky start, but start to get used to each other when the Beetle helps Hardware recover from being short-circuited (with literally shocking results).

These issues give welcome attention to ethnic minority heroes: Static, Black Lightning and Hardware are African-American; the current Blue Beetle, Jaime Reyes, is Latino. Indie publisher Milestone Media recently entered an agreement with DC to integrate (no pun intended) their characters (like Hardware) into the DC canon to fight alongside such longstanding crusaders at Batman and Superman. These are a pair of good done-in-one stories, hopefully leading to more appearances from these characters in the near future.

Punisher #7
Marvel Comics
Writer- Rick Remender
Art- Tang Eng Huat (pencils/inks), Lee Loughridge (colors)

SPOILERS CONTAINED

The latest issue of Punisher continues the second story arc from series author Rick Remender, paired with pencils & inks by Tan Eng Huat. The story involves protagonist vigilante Frank Castle—the Punisher—taking on New York City’s legion of super-criminals, who are largely led by Parker Robbins, a.k.a. the Hood. The Hood’s vast supernatural powers have enabled him to resurrect 18 formerly dead super-criminals, who are then charged with killing the Punisher or returning to the grave. The resurrected villains include a baker’s dozen of ‘Z-list’ crooks like Mirage, Turner D. Century and Birdman who were murdered in a long-running Captain America series subplot in the 1980’s. Most of them are portrayed as simpletons with little but bungled bank robberies in common. Female members Letha and Lascivious step up as de facto leaders within the group. However, Basilisk and Death Adder have already defected, kidnapping former federal agent G.W. Bridge and coercing him into helping them track down the Punisher.

The conceit of the series—so far—is that the Punisher has shifted his focus away from purely human gangsters to super-powered scoundrels. Castle’s chief assistant is Henry, who in this issue starts chafing with his boss’ s monomaniacal focus on killing targets. A brief scuffle is abruptly stopped with an ultimatum by Castle, who means to kill more criminals before the day is over. The issue closes with a look at the Human Fly, an insect-powered villain whose mental faculties have clearly been drastically affected by his mutation. After the Fly makes short work of a group of policemen, the Punisher appears in the last panel, offering himself as a substitute for Spider-Man.

Author Remender has a good handle on Frank Castle, pitting him against costumed criminals on a regular basis. The magic-powered Hood has become as legitimate an adversary for the Punisher to overcome as the various Mob bosses that have come and gone since the Punisher’s adventures first became a regular series in the 1980’s. A subplot involving tension between sidekick Henry and Castle seems to be reaching a boiling point; something to keep a look out for in future issues.

2009-07-02T18:14:00.001-07:00

2009-07-02T17:43:00.001-07:00

2009-06-25T19:33:00.000-07:00

MEMORIAM FOR MIKE

Michael Jackson: 1958 - 2009

Okay, when did I first listen to the Thriller album..I was in the 4th grade.. Mrs. Slamkowski was our teacher at St. Mary's Elementary. I remember it was a big deal that year that we now went to class on the second floor of our school building. I scarcely remembered that Mike had a new album out.. I definitely knew about first singles "Billie Jean" and "The Girl is Mine" which were already on local radio. We didn't have cable at the house, so whether MTV or BET was playing any Mike videos was a non-issue, really.One afternoon I came home from school, Mom had apparently bought the "Thriller" LP vinyl for me, from K-Mart.

I was.. Thrilled! I really didn't own much pop music "of my own" at that age, mostly just an assortment of kiddie records/story records, among them the Chipmunk Punk album where they covered "My Sharona" and Billy Joel. My oldest siblings were already high school-aged, and they did the neighborhood DJ thing, so they had a lot of the record catalog already, going back to the Motown Jackson 5 era. So that evening I started listening to the record, and enjoying it, trying to dance; but on side B there was a problem. The record was warped... Mike's voice all of a sudden was getting wobbly and slow and, uh, weird in parts.. I was devastated.. Mom took the record back to exchange it for another LP. She brought it home. I put it on the record player. Only this time-- bad lightning struck twice! I forget what song it was, but THIS record was warped, too! Even back then, my personal trend of bad luck was keeping pace.

So, mom takes the record back for another exchange. At last-- Mom decided to opt for a cassette copy. I played it in a portable tape recorder-- this is the era before everybody had a Walkman, of course. Finally, the album played perfectly. Every song. Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'. Baby Be Mine. The Girl is Mine. Thriller. Beat It. Billie Jean. Human Nature. Pretty Young Thing. The Lady in My Life.

Needless to say, Mike and his family were hometown heroes to everybody in the Gary region. During Thriller's chart run, I still have dim memories of the Michael-dancing contests, the debates on whether he or Prince was bigger, and classmates openly wondering just how did Mike seem to be singing backup vocals on his own songs (overdubs, of course).

I had the 12-inch doll that had the ‘Grammy Awards 1984’ outfit. Mike made me want to get a jheri curl. Mom said hell no. Thank God for small favors.

In 5th grade, when the now-defunct department chain Zayre’s was having a sidewalk clearance sale, Mom bought me this red shirt/jacket with slight shoulder padding and ostentatious gold buttons which looked like the top Mike wore at the American Music Awards in ’84. I wore it to school on maybe the last day of the second semester-- which was a treat, since we normally had to wear conservative uniforms every day. It was so cool to be me that day, for once. On a side note, I remember Mrs. Slamkowski (who was still teaching 4th grade) remarking to me that I looked like "Sergeant Pepper". It took me some years before I understood just what she was referring to.

I held on to this tape for years. Even as time went on and other music acts became more immediate for me- Run DMC, LL Cool J, Living Colour, Public Enemy—I still occasionally went back to the Thriller tape, and I usually would listen to “Lady in My Life” which, for me, has become the most personally enduring song on the album. I think I may have sold it in a mass-purging of most of my cassette tapes about 10 years ago.. Since then, I've copped the remastered deluxe editions that Sony came out with circa 2001.

I wasn't even born when the Jackson 5 were an up-and-coming group out of Gary. I was too young to have been interested in seeing them when they were at their boy-band peak in the early to mid-1970's. I definitely went out of my way to see him perform on television over the years. During the original chart run of the Thriller album, local Chicago-broadcast TV finally got on the music-video bandwagon and started having music-video shows; I would come home after school and watch WPWR TV-50 's programming, always hoping that a Michael clip would be shown. Mike’s music videos helped make the medium into a genuine subgenre of short films for mass appeal, elevating them from perfunctory lip-synching clips for a presumably limited audience.

I also remember the Motown 25 anniversary show where he "surprisingly" performed "Billie Jean", which we now know was clearly staged. Regrettably, his televised performances were as close as I'd get to seeing him perform live. I remember the Victory tour tickets sold out in hours back in 1984 when that tour was first announced-- and I was too young to realize that Gary was, well, just not on any superstar's touring map once they made it big. During my time growing up in Gary I harbored a fantasy that he'd have some kind of "Homecoming" concert and I'd score a ticket for a good seat (looking back, I don't know where the hell it would have been held-- The creaky Genesis Center? Gilroy Stadium? Ehh... Maybe the Holiday Star..)

I also remember when it became favorable to not be into Mike anymore. It wasn't "hot" to still have a poster of him, or to pick up the latest single (especially going into the alternative-rock & hip-hop-heavy 90s). There was the gradual lightening of his skin, and plastic surgery. The private carnival, zoo, and other exorbitant lifestyle eccentricities. The tabloid stories. The backlash to "They Don't Care About Us". The scandalous allegations which finally erupted in a criminal trial (and acquittal) in the 2000's.

I wish he had lived at least 20 more years-- at the very least, he'd have avoided the cliche' of a celebrity who dies relatively early after a meteoric rise to success early in life. I was intrigued by his recently reported recording sessions with the Black Eyed Peas, Kanye West, and other hip-hop personalities. The 'comeback' album was on the way. Maybe even a Jacksons reunion. Still, no one knows when the sand's going to run out of the hourglass.

If Mike's memory is to be uplifted, we can uplift the positive effect his muscal legacy has had on everyone who else who came in his wake. Play one of Mike's records. Whether you have it on vinyl, cassette, CD, or MP3. Play it at home. Play it at work. Play it while driving.

"Looking out, Across the night-time/ The city winks a sleepless eye/ Hear her voice, Shake my window, Sweet seducing sighs/...Get me out , Into the night-time, Four walls wont hold me tonight/If this town, Is just an apple, Then let me take a bite"

Michael Jackson, "Human Nature"

Blessings to Mike and all family & friends!

2009-06-24T16:31:00.001-07:00

2009-06-02T10:14:00.000-07:00

GM Needs to be Railroaded

Blessings to all who read this:

Those who live in the state of Michigan bear some of the greatest burdens in light of recent events concerning the automotive industry companies. Indeed, the now-nationwide trend of closing factories and dealerships brings to light just how serious the crisis is. Now that the federal government, via taxpayer money, are majority stakeholders in General Motors, I feel that the engineering and mass-production/assembly resources at GM (and if possible, Chrysler) can and should be used to help design and implement comprehensive mass-transit systems like high speed rail, light rail, and green-friendly alternative-fuel buses for use both regionally and nationwide.

Weren’t the auto factories refitted during World War II to build tanks and such? The American auto industry’s backyard of Michigan would be great to start pilot projects connecting cities with 21st century transit systems. It would be a means of bolstering America’s workforce nationwide and go a long way toward strengthening the economy. In the midst of public debate on what its restructuring means, I feel that there is a potentially missed opportunity not being explored.

Public Transit systems help lessen the overall fuel emissions made by the vehicles we drive. It also helps those who currently can't afford their own vehicle meet family, work and school obligations. Feel free to contact these elected officials about taking better advantage of GM bankruptcy and restructuring plan to directly address the shortcomings in America's transit issues-

Mr. Barack Obama, President of the United States
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
www.whitehouse.gov

Mr. Ray LaHood, US Secretary of Transportation
U.S. Department of Transportation
1200 New Jersey Ave SE,
Washington, DC 20590

Mr. Matt Welbes
Federal Transit Administration
East Building
1200 New Jersey Ave SE
Washington, DC 20590
Dept. of Transportation website- www.dot.gov

US Senators- www.senate.gov

US House of Represenatives- www.house.gov

2009-05-27T09:59:00.001-07:00

2009-05-26T11:37:00.001-07:00

2009-05-24T15:39:00.000-07:00

Black and Green

Screenwriter and Author Toni Ann Johnson writes about her efforts to plant trees in her urban Los Angeles neighborhood: http://tinyurl.com/pln75j . It's a very good article, hopefully her efforts will take root (pun intended). There is some movement for similar green-based initiatives in Detroit, including a potential remodeling of the city. It will likely face the same obstacles as Ms. Johnson's efforts faced. Of key interest is the education of an extremely skeptical urban public: http://www.greeningofdetroit.com/, http://tinyurl.com/os8cws, http://tinyurl.com/pnjx7q, http://tinyurl.com/ohfas6

I believe that many people (e.g., racial minorities) who have grown up in starkly urban environs have become socialized to think of our immediate surroundings as the only way things could/should be. We believe that smokestacks and smog equal civilization. The much greener suburbs/exurbs are 'the boondocks' and 'the sticks' at best, Klan-land at the worst. Environmental activism has become synonymous with the "tree-hugger" cliché' of relatively affluent Caucasians who insist on all-organic foods, don't use deodorant and whose toilet paper probably has wood-flakes in it. Dilapidated urban parks have become more known as hang-outs for the homeless or thugs/gangs, and not much is thought of it.

In particular for Detroit, the population has hemorrhaged over the decades to the point where there is less than half the population than the city had in the mid-1950s, and dropping. News reports indicate as much as 30% or more of landspace in the city is vacant. Public schools designed to serve 2,000 students now serve 400. Many neighborhood blocks have half the houses they used to, and not all that remain are even livable due to abandonment. Long-defunct factories, empty warehouses, burnt-out storefronts, and condemned apartment complexes still stand as glaring eyesores, and are also ripe for not just innocuous squatters, but criminal types doing drug business and predators who may take victims there. The gaps in population density make it tougher on having a regular police presence everywhere (in a city of shrinking budgets/deficits). Decaying water mains breaking are a regular occurrence; the rationale against proactive infrastructure reform is that the city tax-base isn't sufficient to cover the costs of a radical overhaul.

If the ongoing crisis for American automakers hasn't sent the message home, the era of being a high school graduate/GED holder (or at one point, even a dropout) and then segueing into a family-supporting career at a steel-refining/vehicle parts/assembly factory is done. It just is. There is no mass-manufacturing movement that attracted black folks (and others) in droves to Detroit and elsewhere. People here have to accept that the population won't ever be what it was. It's way past time to embrace new industries, and seek resources to provide the training for adults and younger people to get involved.

Part of that involves thinking outside the box for creative uses of available land. City schools should have plots of land to work on with students for credit-- push curriculums in schools stressing agriculture, soil science, botany, forestry, urban planning, etc. Why not have fruit & vegetable farms, why not have forest preserves, why not have some bikes-only paths? Unfortunately, once the more cynical, jaded, and uneducated sorts in local leadership/activism get introduced to ideas like urban farming, shutting down depopulated neighborhoods, and "re-greening" in general, the tendency is to start accusations of suburban land-grab, or "They want to turn Detroit into a Plantation" which adds a totally unnecessary racialized spin to redevelopment efforts. Of course, if one is to look at this through the lens of African-American history, agrarian-based skill sets were common to our ancestors but were generationally lost as the industrialization boom manifested. Maybe this needs to be revisited.

2009-05-16T11:13:00.001-07:00

2009-05-05T16:08:00.001-07:00

2009-04-28T18:27:00.001-07:00

2009-04-14T14:59:00.000-07:00

HYPE'S STATE OF DETROIT 2009

The NAACP will have its annual Freedom Weekend workshops by the end of April, 2009. I will be in attendance, and intend in particular to attend the 'Town Hall' meeting(s). I want to ask the panelists what their general views are on encouraging accountability and cultural cooperation internal to the city of Detroit and external.

Even in acknowledgement of the continued presence of racial prejudice, systemic or otherwise, and the fact that there are various individuals who consider themselves adversarial to the city of Detroit and its residents, I feel like Detroit leadership can’t get out of its own way when it comes to rising above the bitter blame games of the past.

Often times it seems that city leaders, activists and others want to stress their pro-black credentials when it comes to election time or if a regional or local community issue comes to a head- The Cobo controversy is just one of many recurring standoffs-- ‘they’ want to take over the water department, , they’ want to take over the school boards; ‘they’ want to take over Belle Isle.. people say ‘they’ so much you would think it’s a corporation based out of Lansing, Rochester or somewhere.

And as much as that kind of rhetoric gets black Detroiters to circle the wagons and support a particular candidate or position, it does little to address substantive reforms in policies that need to take place to improve the quality of life here. It also perpetuates the assumption that there are no people of good will from other cultural groups outside or even inside the city, or the racial landscape of the metro area is the same as it once was in 1965, and it’s just not.
Because Detroit’s population is predominantly African-American, it seems like city leaders adopted the premise that these public city-based institutions are “black owned” by default and therefore free to use as political trump cards just to more or less benefit themselves. I have a problem with that.

African-American leadership has either been at the helm or have held key positions in these institutions for well over the past 30 years, and as of 2009, the state they are in is self-evident., but it seems like such a chore for Detroit residents to get some basic competency and transparency that other communities seem to take for granted. So when it comes to things like city government, city utilities or Detroit Public Schools, it’s like I’m being told “hey brother, we run this, and even if we want to run it into the ground, as long as ‘we’ run it and not ‘them’, then that’s all that matters". What are your thoughts?

2009-02-27T11:51:00.000-08:00

VOTE EARLY AND OFTEN!

In 2009, the City of Detroit will have no less than four elections to determine who will be its mayor for (presumably) the next four years. The resignation of former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick in 2008 after pleading guilty to perjury and obstruction charges meant that Detroit City Council President Ken Cockrel, Jr. became mayor by default. A clause in the city charter states that any abrupt removal/resignation by a sitting mayor means that a special election must be held within 6 months to determine who will be mayor for the remainder of the term. The primary on February 24 leads to a face-off on May 5 to determine the sitting mayor for the rest of 2009. This being the last year of the current term, another primary was already bound to take place in August, with the final two candidates being placed on a November ballot for a four-year term. Based on the results from the February primary, Cockrel and former Detroit Piston & current steel-magnate Dave Bing will be the candidates to choose from in May. Incidentally, voter turnout was barely 15% of the roughly 650,000 registered voters in the city.

In the interest of full disclosure, this writer voted for Cockrel in the primary-- not that I necessarily think of him as "the ultimate", but for better or worse, I'd rather see him get the chance to "do something" for this remainder of the current term that he took over from Kilpatrick. Based on his state of the city speech, I do like the idea of merging DDOT and SMART bus systems, also the pro-greening/environmental initiatives, but he would have to be a lot more aggressive in this regard, and on other issues. I guess we'll see what happens in May-- of course, then, it's happening all over again in August, with the 'final' election in November.

Just for the sake of getting someone 'completely new' in office, I'm prone to lean toward Bing, but he-- and the other candidates (before the August primary) have to step up in a major way with some clear-cut vision for radical change in the city. Regarding the Cobo Hall controversy (http://www.freep.com/article/20090225/NEWS01/902250310/0/BUSINESS06), I felt it was a bad move for the council members who voted to squash it. Unfortunately, it is reflective of the subculture of territorialism and non-cooperation that has held back the city—and to a great degree, the region— economically, for decades. Regionalism—sharing public resources, sharing public services, is the key to the city & the region's future, not grandstanding.

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009902250307

I am incensed at the city leaders who insist that the state of the city is not as bad as it seems. Downtown redevelopment deals don’t trickle down to the neighborhoods. So there’s a new, expensive hotel that reopened. Hey, that’s nice. Meanwhile, I’m thinking no one who lost their house recently or was evicted from their apartment will get to stay there. Heck, I can't stay there, and I'm working. So Council President Monica Conyers said this vote was in the interest "of Detroiters". Okay. How many people in the city realistically go to Cobo Hall every day if they don’t work there? Or even every week? Every month? To imply that there is some super-windfall of money just waiting to come if Detroit holds onto exclusive control of Cobo is ludicrous. Already the interested parties of the North American Auto Show are talking about Chicago and other cities. Even the premise that Detroiters won't get "preferential" jobs at the facility is flawed. Even if, say, the janitorial contract were awarded to some group headquartered in Roseville, how much you want to bet that at least 50% or more of the people cleaning the bathrooms and buffing the floors will still be black & hispanic? Already, Detroiters are having to find jobs via suburban-based firms. The deal as structured was already giving Detroit board membership & full voting/veto rights; unanimous decisions would be needed to enact internal proposals. I'm not in Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson's fan club, but if even he finally got on board with this.. well, anyway...

Detroit is in too desperate a state to continue to rely on the specter of ‘T.H.E.Y., Inc.’ (Terrible Humans Envying You) as the excuse for not enacting substantive changes in governing the city of Detroit. “THEY” want to seize Cobo; “THEY” want to take over the city water department (that recently raised rates on urban residents, hello); “THEY” want to take over downtown; “THEY” want to take over the Detroit Public Schools. But it doesn’t matter if “THEY” allegedly want take over an institution, when said institutions fell into horrendous disrepair and mismanagement under the control of “US” (Unadulterated Stupidity, or Unchecked Simpletons). Anonymous suburban business/political interests are nothing compared to the publicly-known business/political interests in Detroit that are directly making decisions daily that don’t contribute to the improvement of the quality of life in the city. Despite the pockets of redevelopment and moderately successful community initiatives that deserve to be uplifted, the city is still 'dying'. Children are not being educated. Adults who run the system are more concerned with personal perks than passing grades. You can't tell me that a 30% high school graduation rate is okay. You can't tell me that 48% adult illiteracy in the city is okay, or that it doesn't play a role when people try to look for work or maintain a job. You can't! There is no honor in being king, queen or provincial lord of a ghost town. There are no practical benefits in holding onto a proven drain on city resources, but insisting “well at least we control it, and not them!” Guess what? For the folks who want to hold onto 'Chocolate City' idealism, Black people are leaving, too! Local politicians depending on reflexive, divisive rhetoric to get people behind you just isn’t cutting it anymore. Despite what some folks are too willfully ignorant to acknowledge, there are other people besides hardworking black folks who live—and work—in the city, who are of good will, who want to see the city thrive again, and have no problem with fair cooperation. The current structure of city council needs to be totally dissolved. Ideally, the entire city charter should be rewritten (by an independent commission), but just for now I’d settle for a charter revision that requires the city council to have an aldermanic system, separating the city into distinct precincts (perhaps sharing precinct designations with police) and having one individual representing that area who must also live there! remove the power of city council to stonewall on projects like Cobo. Yeah, it's going to be a wild ride until May and beyond. Strap yourselves in... ;)

2009-02-07T16:58:00.000-08:00

THE NIGNORANCE MUST STOP

That was not a typo in the title.

Professional wrestling has more in common with the contemporary hip-hop scene than most within hip-hop are willing to admit. Both the 'good guys' and the 'bad guys' tend to have bad attitudes. People give vainglorious speeches touting how they're going to roll over the competition. If asked if all of this is 'fake', you might get a verbal dressing-down, or worse. If the mainstream media comes calling regarding a real-life violent incident, the favorite retort is, "Hey, it's entertainment, don't blame us." Vince McMahon would be proud.

Hip-hop's latest "when the hell did this happen?" beef stewing is between 50 Cent and Rick Ross. Both of these performers have new albums coming out, promised by spring. Of particular interest are questions concerning each artist's much-vaunted street credibility. Last year, Ross (real name: William Leonard Roberts) weathered scrutiny because of leaked photos showing him completing a correctional officer's training course circa 1994. The former Mr. Roberts also based his stage name on the infamous 'Freeway' Ricky Ross of Los Angeles, who loomed large in the 1980's crack epidemic in California. Circa 2003, a DVD hit shelves chronicling the short life of Kelvin Martin, a Queens-NY hoodlum who originated the moniker of '50 Cent', years before street-level crack peddler named Curtis Jackson (also from Queens) decided to adopt the name as he started his career in rap. In interviews posted on YouTube and elsewhere, 50 interviews an ex-girlfriend of Ross (and mother of one of his children), as she dishes about his allegedly meager financial status in the years before he signed a major record deal. Ross, for his part, alleges that this woman was an ex-maid of his (if so, real classy, Rick, screwing the help, literally) and that 50 is just paying her money to make waves. Ross also asserts that 50 is desperate to refurbish his star status after his Curtis LP was eclipsed in sales by Kanye West's Graduation in 2007. Other hip-hoppers like the Game and Fat Joe have made public statements concerning their take on the matter.

And now, as of the night of the Grammy Awards, 2009, hip-hop/soul singer Chris Brown turned himself in to the Los Angeles Police Department where he was booked on aggravated assault charges. Curiously, singer Rihanna (the pair collaborated on her song "Umbrella" and have been rumored to be dating) was supposed to perform at the Grammys, but dropped out abruptly; a spokesperson for Rihanna described bodily injuries as the reason for the no-show. Wonder how that happened? http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/02/rb-singer-chris.html

In this writer's estimation, whether or not one concerns themselves deeply about these type of misadventures depends one's tolerance level for nignorance (what?).

Nignorance is when young people (of whatever background) are made fun of and/or targeted for harassment for sticking with school and avoiding the street life.

Nignorance is when Prison and Drug-game moral and ethical boundaries are allowed to overtake a young person's worldview at an early age, and further are allowed to creatively and thematically stifle the social-poltiical depth of hip-hop music. Straight-up crime-culture magazines like FEDS and others regularly feature articles with and about rappers.

The term "captive audience" has taken on a new life as the mass-incarceration percentage of blacks and hispanics is higher than their percentage in the general U.S. population (http://www.ppic.org/main/pressrelease.asp?i=635). You have people doing hard time catching fits about who is more of a genuine 'street' artist, writing lengthy letters to hip-hop culture mags like The Source, XXL, and others. Never mind that 'keeping it real' is what lands any number of heads behind bars to begin with.

Nignorance is rap artists not being genuine and upfront about about their lifestyles before they became big names ("i had some tough times, did some things i'm not proud of, but music was my ticket out, and i'm trying to elevate"), but instead concocting elaborate backstories about being major drug-game figures before their record deals.

Nignorance is accepting uncritically the notion that a young black man aged 15 - 25 can have a self-contained drug empire pulling in a 6 - 7 figure income annually, not become a marked man for the Mob/Mafia and the police authorities, and not come out of this in jail for life, dead, or broke. To do so ignores a slew of American realities.

Nignorance is a purportedly prosperous 'street merchant' choosing not to divest from crime and invest their gains in otherwise profitable and legitimate endeavors like real estate, construction, waste management, medical/auto/life insurance, starting a credit union, opening other neighborhood businesses like laundromats, grocery stores, etc., but instead they choose to start chasing down record company A&Rs, hawking CDs out the trunk of their car, competing in open-mic-night contests where the grand prize is a bottle of champagne, to ultimately settling for a few hundred-thousand in advance money from a record label, then arguing with them about all the deductions from their semi-annual royalty statement.

Nignorance is these folks choosing to indulge their vices and bad habits with their newfound affluence instead of easing away from those things that led to trouble in their past.

Nignorance is these folks preferring the title of 'hustler', 'gangsta', and 'thug' over 'entertainer', 'artist', or 'musician'.

Sherdavia Jenkins was one of the deceased victims of the recent Miami, Fla. (Ross's hometown backyard) shootout where a street-corner dice game became deadly. The 9-year old Ms. Jenkins was standing on her porch when one of the bullets from an automatic rifle hit her. http://www.miamiherald.com/multimedia/news/sherdavia/index.htm

One only hopes that both 50, Ross, and Brown both know that life is more important than a record, or even their pride. If 50 or Ross end up having an early demise due to violence, I'm sure that somebody out there will probably propose that one of their childhood streets be renamed for them (so can you call that 'street credibility'?). Whatever the legal consequences end up being for Brown, he's young enough to still have a career ahead of him. But would that really be worth it?

2009-02-07T16:05:00.000-08:00

EPMD Means Business on Latest

Artist: EPMD
Album: We Mean Business
Label: EP/Fontana

We Mean Business is the seventh studio album from hip-hop veterans EPMD. In the midst of the glaring absence of Golden Age hip-hop personalities, EPMD attempts a bailout for the boom-bap. Erick Sermon and Parish Smith seek to prove that there is still a place for hip-hoppers whose careers date back to the Reagan White House. Nine years since their last effort (1999’s Out of Business) E and P are still issuing smackdowns to sucker MCs, only now it’s under the premise of elder statesmen showing the young guns how it’s done.

Some standout songs include “Bac Stabbers” (where the pair address rumors of falling out with each other) and “Puttin Work In” with Wu-Tang’s Raekwon. On “Actin’ Up”, Sermon and Smith trade lines like “I’m the blueprint for those who can’t lose/ I wrote them checks so I paid them dues.” In keeping with their self-contained tradition, the LP is mostly self-produced by Sermon & Smith, but 9th Wonder avails himself on “Left 4 Dead”, in addition to work by DJ Honda and newcomer JFK. They maintain the group’s East Coast funkateer roots without sounding dated.

Guest rappers are overly ubiquitous on today’s hip-hop albums, but EPMD manage to make the most of their features here, mostly sticking to longtime associates like Redman (“Yo!”), Keith Murray (“They Tell Me”) and Method Man (“Never Defeat ‘Em”). The best guest-appearance is easily “Run It” featuring fellow classic-schooler KRS-One. Here, a chopped-up-and-revised Just-Ice groove provides the backdrop for the Teacher to drop knowledge: “Y’all are young so you need to be gangsters/ while real g’s want to sit home and read the paper/courtside view at the Lakers/ but there’s always some young’un you gotta send to his maker..”

Teddy Riley manages to not be annoying with Auto-Tune crooning on “Listen Up”, but “Jane” seems like a throwaway interlude more than a fully realized song. The duo’s early turntable collaborator K-La-Boss (now called DJ 4our 5ive) returns to add scratches over the rhythm tracks, something that has also been missing from most contemporary hip-hop.

With radio play increasingly rare for any rap act with 10 years or more under their belt, EPMD probably aren’t trying to hook the Plies and Soulja Boy audience. E-Double and the Mic Doctor act as if a day hasn’t gone by since their heyday, and the album is better for it.

2008-12-30T11:01:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year??

In stark contrast to romantic notions of Peace on Earth and Good Will Toward Men, the seemingly perennial conflict between Palestine and Israel have most recently come to an alarming height- Hamas-led militants launching missiles at Israeli communities, and Israel-led airstrikes turning Palestinian-territory neighborhoods to rubble:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-12-30-israel-hamas-gaza_N.htm

Leftist conspiracy-theorist types are not pleased with the choosing of Rahm Emanuel for President-Elect Barack Obama's chief of staff. I have to admit, I was not familiar with him before his impending selection. A former member of the Bill Clinton White House cabinet and later a Chicago congressman, he was the inspiration for the Rob Lowe character on "The West Wing" and his brother Ari, a real life hollywood agent is the inspiration behind the Jeremy Piven character in "Entourage", a 'type-A-jerk' played for laughs in the show.. More on Rahm's background here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rahm_Emanuel

..I'll stop short of saying that Emanuel is a closet agent of the Mossad, but it's probably fair to say that he is a hawk on Israel security (though in fairness, his reputation is that of a hawk in general, having openly derided oppositional forces like Republican congressmen and even the 'liberal' wing of the Democratic party while an advocate for President Clinton). He was apparently in favor of the original Iraq invasion, like Senator Joseph Lieberman (who initially lost in the Connecticut Democratic primary of 2006 to an anti-war platform candidate; he then he switched his affiliation to "independent" and won the November election.)

Technically, since Mr. Emanuel is not Secretary of State, he shouldn't get first dibs on foreign policy advice-- that would go to Hilary Clinton (though I'm not ultra-pleased with that choice, I'll leave it at that.)

Israeli native Daniel Barenboim released this statement recently- that there is no military solution to this ongoing conflict:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_PEOPLE_BARENBOIM_ISRAEL?SITE=MIDTF&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

The Bush White House aggressively lays blame on Hamas, but only gives Israel the mildest admonition for seemingly reckless retaliation. Is it that because the ‘offenders’ in this conflict (Hamas, Hezbollah, etc.) are 'brown' that most Americans in general are inclined not to care about civilian Palestinian deaths, with a dismissive rationale of “Well, they shouldn’t be living in neighborhoods with terrorists.”?

An interesting article about the conflict was published in Playboy back in 2007: (scroll down after link)- http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2007/10/03/playboy-magazine-goes-anti-semitic/
In summary, the author (who self-identifies as Jewish) asserts that while most Americans of Jewish cultural descent, especially younger folks, may identify as political moderates or even liberals who don’t have a problem with the idea of a two-state solution and who feel that at least some of the moves made by the Israeli government are indeed wrong, most established, prominent, and politically influential organizations based around the Jewish identity tend to be very hard-line conservative, with uncritical support for Israel as their “ride or die” dealbreaker.

Contemporary Black Christian culture doesn’t really help matters in terms of awareness about the conflict. In this respect as well as others, they often take their cues from white Evangelical customs by default. Many of the most devoutly religious of black folks will talk about how it’s a dream of theirs to visit Israel. In fact, many of them don’t even refer to Israel by name, instead sticking with the Sunday sermon analogs of “The Holy Land/The Promised Land”. Most don’t mention they’d like to go anywhere in Africa but I guess that’s a discussion for another day.

Frequently, in the black American community there is relatively little intellectual research or inquiry into the history of modern-day Israel/Palestine, let’s say, for the past 100 years. All many people know (sort of) through rote memorization of passages in Revelations and a few other scriptures, is that when Armageddon/The Rapture comes, “Israel” will be at Ground Zero, so anyone who wants to get on the “up” elevator needs to be lock-in-step with Jehovah’s people. And right now, that’s contemporary Israel. Most black pastors tend to reinforce the worldview that when modern Israel was established in 1948, that it was one of the key signs of The Last Days.

A hopefully non-loaded question comes to mind: Just how are the black people treated in Israel? The black people. When you see news reports about Israel (not necessarily concerning violence, just everyday life) when do they ever show black people? If this is supposed to be such a multicultural, tolerant society (and I'm not saying it isn't), where are they? There are at least several relatively credible news articles out there detailing that the lives of native black Africans, black American expatriates and others who live there are not experiencing the romanticized “Promised Land” that Sunday school here in the States teaches us about.

War is profitable. All those who manufacture guns, bullets, rockets, bombs, will profit from the destruction on both sides. The USA needs to totally divest from any and all involvement in this conflict, and that includes ‘unofficial’ involvement, i.e. the CIA.

I am not in the camp of crazy people like Al-Qaeda, their copycats, or right-wing Islamic clerics who wish to see Israel rendered to dust. I am not a Holocaust denier. Still, I believe that American opinion and traditional U.S. stances on the Middle East matters have been severely unbalanced for far too long. What does it mean to me that Israel gets high-tech radar equipment, missiles, road construction and other help from the USA, when infrastructure is disintegrating in Gary, Detroit, St. Louis, and elsewhere? People can’t meet their basic needs here. Heck, in Baghdad plans are underway to build a subway system, while Gary and other cities are still stuck in the mid-20th century as far as transportation options are concerned.

My hope is that Barack Obama has the foresight to practice a moderate stance on Middle Eastern issues. I don’t want to see the USA dragged into World War III via Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan or whoever else overseas who has an ethnic beef. It can only cost more US soldiers their lives and cost billions to the overall US economy that is already teetering.

2008-12-23T11:14:00.000-08:00

Trick Trick Plays "The Villain"
Artist: Trick Trick
Album: The Villain
Koch Recordings, 2008

Chris Mathis, aka 'Trick Trick', has a history of being a Detroit-area underground/local rap personality since the 1990s, and is a contemporary of people who have since come to national prominence like Kid Rock and Eminem. “The Villain” is his second official LP on a mainstream label.

Music-wise, the bulk of production on the album is credited to the artist, incorporating live keyboard and funk-bass riffs with drum-machine rhythm tracks. It will bring to mind post-millennial West Coast hip-hop. Lyrically, the usual targets are here as befits gangster-rap standards (player haters, cops, disloyal associates), amidst shout-outs to Detroit neighborhoods and Trick’s extended posse the Goon Sqwad. Perhaps incredibly, Trick also includes Rosie O’Donnell and Ellen Degeneres on his list of folks to be mad at (on the self-referential “Trick Trick”).

Trick Trick enlists various Detroit-based friends for collaborations on the album. Among them include Eminem, who contributes vocals to “Who Want It” (he also produces here as well as on “Follow Me”). Royce Da 5-9 guests on “All Around the World”. “2 Getha 4 Eva” is a posse cut featuring Kid Rock (who contributes a now-rare rap verse), Esham and the late Proof of D-12, updating Run-DMC’s “Together Forever”. Other collaborations include “Let it Fly” with Ice Cube, who makes a humorous reference to a recent political scandal involving a former Detroit mayor. One of the best songs on the LP is “Hold On”, produced by Dr. Dre’, which should have been a lead single.

One of the closing songs on the album is “Let Go” where Trick reminisces about his spiritual journey and belief in higher power. That this track is preceded by over 40 minutes of violent threats may come across as disingenuous, but like DMX before him, one can only presume that Trick is being sincere.

If there is a downer on this album it’s the relentless homophobia on certain songs. It may be par for the thug-culture worldview, but if Eminem can work with Elton John and not blink… In any case, hardcore rap enthusiasts will find a standard-bearer in Trick Trick, but this is likely not the LP to make him a breakout star like his pals.

Grade: B

2008-11-24T09:04:00.000-08:00

MC BREED: 1972 - 2008

Flint, Michigan-bred hip-hop performer MC Breed has died. Just this past weekend, public statements confirmed his death in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

In the summer of 1991, “Ain’t No Future In Yo’ Frontin’” became a regional, then national, hip-hop hit, especially in clubs and for underground rap enthusiasts. The song remixed Zapp’s “More Bounce to the Ounce” and the Ohio Players “Funky Worm” for its rhythm track. The original music-video shot for the single included a now-prescient hanging of a Saddam Hussein stand-in (the 1990-91 Gulf War had only recently ended; a second video was filmed once the single went national). Detroit figured greatly in the promotion of the single, as urban station WJLB and a few others added the song to playlists. Breed soon found himself in the company of hip-hop’s major stars of the 1990s before his career cooled off toward the end of the decade.

Lyrically, Breed’s style earned him respect from East coast, Southern and West coast fans alike. He spent most of his recording career on Atlanta-based independent label Ichiban Recordings, and relocated to Atlanta’s growing hip-hop scene not long after “No Future” became an established hit.

Breed’s success helped to increase hip-hop’s geographic diversity, helping Midwestern rappers to have a national platform. His backing crew, the DFC, was spun-off and recorded two albums of their own. His Atlanta sojourn found him aligned with local producers including future standout Jazze Pha. Other collaborators would include Warren G. and Too Short, who had also adopted Atlanta as his home base. Outside of “No Future”, Breed’s most enduring hit was 1993’s “Gotta Get Mine”, featuring Tupac Shakur.

In recent years, Breed’s fortunes began to wane. He separated from Ichiban in the late 90’s but subsequent albums failed to get much attention. He ended up moving from Atlanta back to Flint, and as recently as early 2008 was arrested for child support arrears. In October of 2008 he was reportedly playing a game of pick-up basketball when he collapsed. A physician’s diagnosis identified kidney instability as a factor. As recently as November 3, 2008 he did a radio interview with Detroit’s WJLB, and announced plans of a comeback album, planning to collaborate with Scarface, Jazze Pha and the D.O.C. among others.

2008-11-21T11:36:00.001-08:00

Hype's Retro Reviews: Public Enemy, Greatest Misses, 1992

"Greatest Misses" was the first `anti-concept LP' (according to an interview with bandleader Chuck D) from hip-hop group Public Enemy. Originally released in August of 1992, it hit stores just following the Los Angeles riots of that year as well as being in the midst of the U.S. Presidential campaign that year as well. Perhaps for the first time, the group reaches outside its traditional Bomb Squad production team for remixing select album cuts and singles from previous albums. Those remixes comprise the second half of this release, the first half containing all-new recordings.
1. "Tie Goes to the Runner" - Some wah-wah guitar samples anchor the rhythm track, where Chuck goes off on recent events: "Not surprised at all about the riot zone... This was predicted not self-inflicted By the rap outta the 'hood.."
2. "Hit Da Road Jack" - The group gives a middle finger to racists but also lament the apathy for some in the black community "When I come they all run and hide and they quit, and yell loud, here comes Chuck with that black..."
3. "Gett Off My Back" - Flavor Flav's solo opus (previously heard on the Mo' Money soundtrack) finds the rapper warning people about substance abuse, ("monkey, get off my back!"), with a nice Parliament-inspired hook.
4. "Gotta do What I Gotta Do" - Congas percolate on this track where Chuck explains his role as an activist and agitator- "They come & try to get some They had the nerve to call the president/ An' I wasn't hesitant, To scream I was a resident"
5. "Air Hoodlum" - Rhyming over a deceptively smooth jazz-based rhythm track, Chuck tells the sobering tale of a basketball prodigy whose dreams go terribly wrong. "The fall began When Mickey Mack fell; Hell ripped his knee, Drafted last by personnel."
6. "Hazy Shade of Criminal" - For the first single on the album, Chuck re-interprets the title of an old Simon & Garfunkel tune to indict the imbalances on how the American justice system deals with minorities- includes a timely swipe at the serial killer "Jeffrey Dahmer, enters the room without cuffs, how the hell do we get stuffed in the back of a cell on an isle..."
7. "Megablast" - Horns blast away on this remix of a Bum Rush the Show album cut, Chuck and Flav trade verses about the ills of dope addiction: "An antique fork, how long would it last.. we'll see in 12 minutes when he wants that blast.."
8. "Louder Than a Bomb" - Run DMC's Jam Master Jay helms a relentless heavy-bass uptempo remix of this Nation of Millions album cut, and the second single from Misses.
9. "You're Gonna Get Yours" - A scratch-heavy tweaking of the group's first single from their first LP.
10. "How to Kill a Radio Consultant" - New York pioneer DJ Chuck Chillout remixes this Apocalypse 91 album cut, with a special message for anti-hip-hop radio programmers. 11. "Who Stole the Soul?" - Ice Cube producer Sir Jinx gives PE a left-coast flair for this Black Planet album cut remix, including a hilarious audio clip of Eddie Murphy.
12. "Party for Your Right to Fight" - Live bass & guitar make for an engaging re-interpretation of the Nation of Millions album cut.
13. "Shut Em Down" - a live performance on UK television of the Pete Rock-produced remix. Note: liner notes include an art piece from comics artist Bill Sienkiewicz..

2008-11-05T11:13:00.000-08:00

HOPE IS HERE AND NOW

"Although it seems heaven sent, we ain't ready to see a black president"

2Pac, "Changes", 1998.

Had he lived, the late Tupac Shakur would likely have been glad to eat his words in light of the events of November 4, 2008. Illinois Senator Barack Obama is now the President-Elect of the United States of America. Besting his opponent Senator John McCain of Arizona, Senator Obama has cleared over 300 electoral votes, nearly doubling the count of Senator McCain. Key to this were reputed battleground states of Ohio and Florida, both of which went to Obama. Other developments included Obama making strong stands in normally Republican strongholds like Montana and Indiana. Footage has been shown of not only American celebrations in many communities but in communities around the globe: Japan, Kenya, France, Haiti, Indonesia. People are rightfully celebrating a man whose vision, sophistication and determination clearly resonated with a global audience.

Despite my own enthusiastic support, up until Tuesday, I had to fight off a lingering skepticism, wondering if most of America could ‘go there’ and vote for a black presidential candidate (on either side of the party coin). Bless me, most of America did. Black Americans who lived through Jim Crow and the tumult of the 20th century Civil Rights Movement (including many family members of mine) are seeing what was once thought to be an abstract dream finally made manifest.

A black woman will soon become the First Lady. Two black children will spend a good portion of their childhoods in the White House. America’s armed forces now have a black Commander-in-Chief. In a bit of nice turnaround, predominately African-American Washington D.C.’s status as a ‘Chocolate City’ now has reached its full potential, to have black faces residing both inside and outside the White House.

As far as the issue of America being ‘post-racial’ goes, this is certainly a big door to kick down. Still, the challenge now becomes for people to continue to work on their personal and family goals as well learning to work together with people from different backgrounds to achieve change locally, which feeds into what communities need regionally and nationally.

Despite the unassailably progressive step that was made in most of the electorate voting for Barack Obama, many of America’s individual cities and towns still suffer from racialized tensions which plays out in varying ways depending on the ethnic population of a given region. In Detroit, the biggest political controversy in its history has only recently begun to wane—former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is currently in the second week of a four-month stint in county jail, relating to guilty pleas on four felony charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. Even in jail, Kilpatrick is still a polarizing figure—supporters who appeared at his formal sentencing called for him to be freed and Kilpatrick’s father called it a railroading. Bernard Kilpatrick and several others (including staff on the current city council) are currently under an FBI probe into possible corruption involving city-contractor grants and whether Kilpatrick’s non-profit civic & political committees (officially he has five) were being used for private purposes (including paying his criminal defense attorneys) . Meanwhile, Christine Beatty, the former chief of staff (and former mistress) of the ex-mayor still awaiting her trial on perjury charges, not set to begin until January. Meanwhile, there are still thousands in the metro area who are culturally allergic to urban Detroit, who take every opportunity (especially online) to bash it on principle, assuming the worst of the local electorate, who will loyally wear sports gear from local teams but are quick to tell anyone from out of town that they are not from Detroit, per se’.

Now that there is a President-to-be who is genuinely from an urban background who has worked to improve conditions for urban districts, hopefully most if not all his planned urban initiatives will have traction, especially working with sympathetic local and regional officials. Implement mass transit. Push for progressive educational reforms. Radically rethink the war on drugs.

I credit Senator Obama with reaching out to those who did not vote for him at his acceptance speech. Just the same, I can’t feel sorry for any of those people who were in the McCain-is-Superman camp, who carped that Obama was a closet Muslim and therefore terrorist in disguise, among other canards. As the right-wing cranks like to say, “why don’t you just get over it?” Oh, before I forget: Barack. Hussein. Obama.

Here’s to at least four years of some truly revolutionary change.

Election Night 2008!

2008-11-04T19:45:00.001-08:00

Redman

2008-10-26T13:26:00.001-07:00