Wednesday's Video Picks

My boy Nappy hipped me to both of these... and I went from being completely disgusted to completely disturbed. Check me out...

"Chicken Noodle Soup" done by the Kidz Bop bastards

And I thought the original video was terrible... this is just repulsive. Mass marketing ignorance, and the look on that white fucker's face... *sigh*

Pharoahe Monch's "When The Gun Draws"

Monch is always good at tracks like this. Very disturbing video, but it works well.

Now back to your regularly scheduled internet wanderings...

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OhWord needs your beats

check this out.

strictly hip-hop inquiries. holla at Rafi. he's a good dude, and i know for a fact that this dis is going to be laid down by a hot spitter.

send him your finest, and tell him khal sent you!

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Jay Eff Kay recaps 2006

I got passed this 2006 Year In Review mp3 by this MC I've never heard of by the name of Jay Eff Kay. It's not my normal Hip-Hop thing, but it's kind of hot. It actually reminds me of my weekly editions of the shuffle, which is nice. By checking dude's MySpace page out, it looks like this New Yorker went from Wall Street to crafting some anthems with a poison tongue, which is always nice. Sort of how Eminem came out, honestly, but speaking about the world, and actually saying something. And the fact that he calls Lupe Fiasco "Urkel" is enough for me. I give him major props for that one. I also like how he isn't trying to be something he isn't... you can tell dude is just a white guy speaking his mind, however raunchy or political or real his feelings are, and you have to respect that at the end of the day.

You can check out homeboy's works over at the aforementioned MySpace page... and peep his blog as well. Looks like we might be hearing more about neph in the new year?

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Kwelib get Liberated

There's a pretty hot CD available for FREE download right now, featuring the vocal talents of Talib Kweli over the production of blunted scientist Madlib. You gotta love free music. And you gotta love these two linking up. Even though Kweli assures us that Eardrum will not sound like this at all (is that bad or good?), I will take this any day of the week. You've already heard "Funny Money" if you have an ear to the blog scene, and this is more of that. Dusty samples, Kweli blowing... just listen, really. Nice way to start out 2k7. "Time is Right" is getting nuff burn right now, while "Over The Counter" has some new school boom bap to it. Don't sleep on this. It also features Strong Arm Steady (yay!) and Consequence (yawn), but at 9 tracks, it feels more like an EP than an album, but hey, free is free.

Rappcatts dload page... Kweli's MySpace... 'Lib's MySpace... Burn it to CDR, spread this p2p, blog about it, and let them corporate fucks know that Hip-Hop is hear. We need more of this!

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Last Donut of The Year.

Just some videos to play 'round midnight tonight...

DJ Shadow "Midnight In A Perfect World"

sidenote: DJ Shadow "Midnight In A Perfect World (Gab Mix)": peep Gift of Gab's poetics on that one. Enjoy.


DJ Craze LIVE at the DMC 2006 in London, UK

gotta love his skratch technique. TEKDBZ STAND UP!

MTV Base "About To Blow" Documentary about Dubstep

just because.

Classic James Brown medley from Soul Train

RIP to the Godfather.

Eminem & Proof freestyling for some old MTV show

RIP Proof, where's Shady at?

J Dilla "Nothing Like This"

RIP to the master beatmaker. BTW, sneak attack!


Remember. Reminisce. Realize. Recreate.

2007 - we're ready.

Peace and love.

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Outa 2k6, Inta 2k7

So I'm up at like 6AM this morning or so, mainly because lil' man has this habit of not being able to get back to sleep without being in his parent's bed. I decided to take the couch, and have wifey cuddle with the lil guy. I went downstairs, and although I was tired as hell, I turned on the TV and flipped to HBO, where Wayne's World was just starting. During the "Bohemian Rhapsody" bit, I noticed that dude in the back is fucking Tobias Beecher, the new-age Job in OZ, one of the 3 greatest HBO dramas of all time. How in 5 years he went from random head-banger in a few SNL spin-off flicks to a man who got ass-raped and had a swastika tatt'd on his asscheek in the first episode of a prison drama is beyond me, but it made me realize something... in 5 years, you can do anything.

Almost five years ago, I was just getting into the "living-together" situation with my now-wife. We were pretty much destined to live the rest of our lives together, and we both know that it is for the best. The thing is, if you had told me a year before then that I'd be living with an older woman and becoming a father to her 2 daughters, I'd call you a crazy man. Strange how life changes, no? Now, I am almost 2 years married, we added a third (and final?) seed to our plant, and I am on the course to being a decent human being. No more wildness, no more smoking (the occasional cigar or cigarillo is never out of the question), and just all around homebody. Do I regret anything? No, for if I changed one thing, I wouldn't be the me I am right now, and I kind of dig myself. Do I think I could be doing better? Surely...

Why do I bring all of this up, you might ask? Well, I have to get these things down somewhere. I know many of you out there are, like me, stuck in ruts, whether it's creatively, job-wise, or just life in general. You have things you are thinking of doing, or want to do, but either don't have the balls or the means to get it done. Well, shit, I also figured that, when this magazine The Flow I was writing for went under, I would have nowhere to get my writing out. I finally decided to do what I should have done years ago, and started this blog. Now, look at me... I have a running resume of my works, and have conducted interviews with some pretty ill figures in the music scene. Can I do better? Surely... I should be buying some webspace and making this bigger, but right now, I like where I'm at. I have enough freedom where I have no regrets, but not enough stress where I want to end this at all. All deadlines are self-imposed, and not corporate, so I can keep my cool and not bug out if something is late. I'd love to do this professionally, but I'm not sure of the right outlet for a writer like me - I am not conventional in any sense of the word, and it's hard to get good pay for blogging just anywhere. We'll see.

In any case, I just want to say, you guys have the power to be anything. Don't look at life in some fixed scope of time -- it might take 5 years for your pivotal role to be realized, so headbang your way along until it comes, and once you sense it - seize it. Get naked, get drunk, put on makeup, do whatever it takes to make them know you mean business. You will earn your respect, and with respect comes new opportunities.

Be safe tonight, and catch me tomorrow.

Peace and love,

khal

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The Sickness

That's what I looked like late Tuesday night.

I don't normally get sick like that anymore. I have a semi-steady diet of 40s and wine, but nothing to crazy (if you used to chill we me pre-2002, you'll know what I mean). I think I caught the bug that my wife caught from work, which means possibly more of the up-chuck, and some liquid dookie (my stool looked like soy sauce that night).

So heres how this all came about...

Tuesday night, I'm chillin'. Just finished feeding lil' man, wifey was upstairs knocked out, as were the kids. My stomach was feeling weird - I didn't know if I was hungry or had to drop a deuce, so I figured "why not make some PB&J?!"... I'm eating PB&J and watching a fucking Boondocks marathon that I didn't even know was on (!!!), and decided, let me just DVR some of my fav episodes (Granddad's Fight, Wingmen, etc.), and go to bed. This is about 12:15AM. 1:20AM, I get that acid taste in my mouth... I figured, I can choke this one back. Mind you, I seriously have not thrown up in a good 5 years or so... so I'm not prepared for any of this. I realized my whole world was about to hit the REWIND!!!!!!, so I was Michael Bolton to the bathroom door. I didn't make it all the way... spewed a bit on the rug before I hit the toilet, spewed a bit more on the bathroom floor, then I just upchucked all into the porcelin God.

It reminded me of all of these episodes of Jackass or Wildboyz, where you see these white dudes puking over everything. It was harsh, though. Dinner came up --- pineapple chunks and lil bits of ham. And the actual spew, it felt surreal - like I could see how much was coming out. And it fucking hurt. Got back into my nose, burned something awful. Some of the shit got stuck, and me trying to clear it out ended up making me gag more.

Not a pretty sight.

I spent most of yesterday on the couch, which I came to found out I had a 101 degree fever. Luckily, lil' man was at my mom's for the day (more on that bullshit in another post), and I beat the fever in a night's time. He's here, I'm doing better, and life is semi-decent.

Now I just need a job...

And for those of you who survived this post, here's a lil sneak attack for you. Happy New Year.

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PayPerPost acquires Performancing.com

I didn't realize that, in trying to make money blogging, that corporate measures and "real-life" situations would take over this haven. I guess the seclusion of my computer area had my mind kind of foggy...

In checking out new opportunites on PayPerPost, I came across a headline that was kind of odd... Performancing.com, a site which I've been trying to capitalize with for a month or so now, has just been bought by PayPerPost. I'm all for taking over and building up your brand via acquisitions, but I do not see this one as a wise decision, for if you check out the forums over at Performancing, there are a load of unsatisfied customers over there, including this one.

The way Performancing.com works is pretty simple: set up your account, throw some hypertext into your blog, and if a site digs you and wants to advertise on your site, then you work out a deal. The thing is, unless you are one of the more popular blogs, you won't see any activity. I get a pretty decent amount of traffic, roughly 300+ visitors daily. Not so bad, but not the tens of thousands I am guessing most of these companies want. So, I get the shaft. You can check my right side, the same "Performancing" ads have been running for a month. And the thing that truly bothers me is the fact that the guys who run the site are no help. They basically tell you "hey, advertise your site more" and what not. That'd be well and good if advertising was all that matters. They all want Google PageRanks. Don't know what Google PageRanking is? Look it up. Essentially, if my site is not as popular as you'd wish it to be, you would rather not advertise on it. No matter how many users I could potentially bring to your product with a glowing review, oh no. I mean, I am a pretty good writer. I say that not to toot my own horn, but I get offers to do this, publicity and whatnot, and I rarely get edited down or told not to say something or do something... but it's rare that I get monetarily compensated. Why? PageRanks. *sigh* So PPP, what do you plan on doing to fix this?

The one thing I will say is nice about Performancing is their blog job board, where companies post up job opportunities for bloggers. I never seem to be able to capitalize on those situations, either, but I feel I could if someone gave me a chance *wink wink*.

At the end of the day, if PPP can turn around Performancing.com, they can do a lot of things. Hopefully they will be able to turn that sinking ship around and bring it to new waters.

As always, this post is brought to you by the good folks at PayPerPost.

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Not broke enough...

Is the line of poverty seriously askew these days?

I ask because of my ventures today... I went out to the local "One Stop Career Center" to see if I was eligible to take some test that will then see if I am elligible to get some free schooling from the government of NJ. It's all a fucking scam, but you have to play the game to get ahead, no?

So I go to this office, paperwork in hand, which included my ID, SS card, unemployment stubs and pay stubs showing my year to date earnings. Once I get to sit down with this bitch, she delves into my life, asking about my fam and shit. I tell her I am married with 3 kids. She then pulls out this chart showing what is assumed to be the poverty line, which is $43K a year for a family of 5. With my take home pay added to my wife's, we make slightly above that. I am then told that I have to wait 15 weeks before I can be automatically elligible to take this test to see if I can take some free courses.

Mind you, by that 15 week period (roughly the 2nd week in April, 2007), my unemployment will have run out and I will probably be employed at that time. I mean, they know that you only get a finite period of time for unemployment pay, and the schooling is based on your still being on unemployment. So basically, I'd need to be a fucking deadbeat with no way to attain a decent job and support my family. Fuck you very much, I hustle. I get my grind on how I get it on, with this writing, through eBay, whatever the fuck. You honestly think I'd still be on assistance through April of 2007? Get real.

My thing is: OK, we might make what is considered to be over the poverty level, but really, with student loans, other forms of debt, rent, and the occasional 2 month old getting RSV and pneumonia or the 15 yr old needing special care for rare allergies to the sun, how do they expect me to stay afloat? I hate to fucking harp on my life, but shit, I just had a kid, I'm living in one of the most ridiculous rent markets in the state of NJ, and I am struggling. I got fired over some bullshit about me not being productive, all the while I'm doing the work of 2 and 3 people. Life is a hairy bitch, and I'm tired of being told I do not qualify.

I need to find my own way. Make my own way in this world. I will continue to play by the man's rules, but it's going to work in my favor this time. And in the end, I'll be laughing, holding some mint julep and sippin'.

Sippin' I tell you...

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The Year We Lost James...

It was not even a month ago that I spoke of my affection towards "Funky Drummer", the track I have playin' again, right now. I had no idea that the Godfather of Soul, James Brown, would be leaving this earth come Christmas Day. I mean, he was 73, but if you ever saw him perform, he always looked like he was 18. And for many of the people making money in music these days, you owe a great deal of respect and due to the one like JB. I mean, Funk was not a state of mind until James fleshed out the sound he heard in his head, using artists he knew he could push.

Earlier this year, Rolling Stone published this ill piece on James, following him around in the modern day, showing his demented studio work to his work on the stage. For anyone who has had even a fleeting interest in the man, I highly recommend you check it out and see all sides of this genius.

For many beatfreaks out there who, like myself, take pride in knowing where that producer nicked that break to create a new sonic bed, you know that James has been a constant in the Hip-Hop scene, from his grunts and wails to his drummers' drumming. I wish I could provide a true mix like Edan did, showcasing the guys who paid homage by looping and reworking James' grooves, but I just think, by week's end, I'll provide some of my favorites to you guys, with words about each lick. Not today, I want to let the God rest. Soon though...

One more question, which I just posed to Rafi of Oh Word: How do we lose both James Brown and James Yancey, and yet Puff Daddy is still able to bring kids into this world? God, you are one cruel sommabitch.

PS: I added James "Funky President" to my "America The Ugly" mixtape from Sept. Downloads still available...

EDIT: while hitting up the DOA board, I saw that BlueWater has a tribute mix of classic James 45s up for dload. Check the original thread for the tracklisting (peep the 45 pics), and show some love.

EDIT: Shouts out to eskay at NahRight for posting up this tribute mix by the one like Salaam Remi.

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