June 2011
1 post
It's Gonna Be Tonight
That’s right. This is happening. I’ve talked a lot of shit over the past few weeks, threatening to set aside this and riff about that. No more talk. I’m done bullshittin with y’all. To quote my man Kevin Hart: It’s about. To go. DOWN.
Why I abandoned perhaps the greatest collaborative writing space I’ve ever inhabited this side of OnHoops I’m not...
August 2009
1 post
RIP Blue Bomber, Chicken Run, Not Guilty y'all got...
Unfortunately the lovely people at Universal wouldn’t let me embed the song I originally wanted to, so this will have to do. When Obama won the election I rocked this song, when I try to exercise I rock this song, when my pleasure bucket is filled to the brim with pride I rock this song. But I digress.
Today is probably the last day I’ll rock a Saab, and I want to give a shot...
July 2009
5 posts
5 tags
Smooth Breaks AKA My High School Edumacation
Peshay - Pacific
In the brief span of our last dalliance a lot has gone down. The Financialocalypse has caught up to my ass, puffy tacos were discovered & dark and stormy evenings developed in a weather system isolated to northside of the Chi. In the wake of these events I have been left ponder. So like our fair blog I’ve taken a break while I ride out the turbulent times as...
Pick up the Pace, aye?
More Today Than Yesterday - Charles Earland
Interesting choice of phrase, that. They are words I found myself screaming often whilst matriculating my way north up I-95 this morning. And none of my breath made a bit of difference. The traffic still snarled and snarled as I seethed and seethed. But then this number came up on the XM radio. Now, I know we’ve already spent a bit of space...
Breaks
We all need breaks. Summertime just begs for breaks to be taken. Some need breaks from school. Some need breaks from the NBA season. (SEAson!) Some need breaks from the city. Fili sounds like he’s needing a break from planet Earth. I need breaks to jam to. And this cut from Layfayette Afro-Rock Band has ‘em in spades (I really don’t know what that means but… it has...
Been Sooo Long
I’ll even italicize and hyperlink for reinforced effect: it’s been so long, lads. Too long, if I’m honest. Much has gone on and little has been said about it—but that’s alright. A world gone wrong shouldn’t keep us from our busy summers. Still, even though I’ve (improbably) seen all of you in the last two weeks—and was even gifted by one of you (you know...
June 2009
6 posts
Deuce AKA The Goals Spain Didn't Get
We’ve been gone for a minute but with the US’s upset victory over #1 ranked Spanish team well it just had to be done. Clint Dempsey aka Deuce and The FCK’s favorite rapper Big Hawk (RIP) get it in on this 2006 World Cup Classic.
Ricky Rubio Ain’t Shit AKA Landon Donovan Sucks
Relaxing on the Axis of the Wheel of Life
The weekend is nigh, lads, which means one and only one thing: I will either be texting or receiving slivers of lyric from Lush Life, our reigning party anthem. And I think we can all agree that it is in this, the iteration birthed by Johns Coltrane and Hartman, that the anthem is truly at its most regal. Whether buzzing or flailingly drunk, happy or withdrawn, bored or being pursued by an...
BONUS POST: Mash-Up Session - Cookin Soul
This is meant to break up the flow. Figure this will be a musical filler post cuss it’s just cool. I will do this from time to time until I get some street beef.
Anyway I think you guys will dig this.
Stack Mo Cheese AKA Guapo Slim
Damn Smooth AKA Going back to Cali
I gotta respect the smoothness and dark sarcasm of that last post. Mercury, if you change I hope its only for the better.
Every few months I get this uneasy feeling. I sit in my cube and I ponder what life would have been like if I had stayed out west after graduation. Now the hyphy movement was in vogue during my time there and I still got respect for it. Yadadamean?! But no song ever...
Steely Dan - Glamour Profession
Fiction, set to rhythm
If, in a few weeks, I come back to post this video, then you know I’ve changed.
But you know I won’t change, right?
Tell me I won’t change.
— Mercury’s Mustache
May 2009
8 posts
Kashmere Stage Band - Super Bad
Some Pep in My Step
So Fili wants some live funk to accent his NBA viewing? Sign me up. I’m getting a little tired of those played out stadium hits myself. And why does live music accompanying live sport have to stop at college? I remember our high school pep band being far more entertaining than the action on the court. Granted it was more this than this or (so help me God I can’t believe I found) this, but it got...
Get the Funk out of my Face?
I’ll admit, I’ve been in a bit of one—but rest assured, it’s the good kind. And that’s in spite of the bushel of reasons the world keeps handing me to go emo. It started with this, then this, then—because irony makes the world go round—this. (Oh, and then there was this, but I’ll save that rant for another forum.)
So how have I been managing,...
Hiram! Toots!
Embedding disabled by request! Bastards!
David Sanborn’s hair looks like a wig Will Forte would wear at about 12:56 on a Sunday morning. Just sayin’.
— MM !
Local Hero
I love this movie.
I love that movie.
For three days I felt horrible about not wishing a certain top face the credit he deserved for making it another year, for fear of ‘aving anyone expect the same warm hold for me.
I love this song. I love this movie. Knopler’s a Red by way of the Scots but … damn, what a lovely song. Love it. Love it. Love the movie. Love the hope.
...
This is for Dr. Zeus AKA where the F*ck is Dr....
I’m dropping soundbombs everyday until someone post. The first one is dedicated to the good doc.
Yes I’ve been watching Yacht Rock. Tomorrow it will be you Filibuster. Judas Shuttlesworth AKA Kevin Garnot (I still hate Skip Bayless)
Take it back aka The System
The System - You Are In My System
I have nothing against Chromeo. They make fun music. If I were single and chilling in Williamsburg with a certain grifter I’m sure awesome times would ensue. But if she said I like them for the same reason the FCK did, please believe said person would not have been loaned any money by me. She may have also had a hammer thrown at her ass.
/Rant
But my...
April 2009
17 posts
Mott the Hoople - Saturday Gigs
Not the easiest day, if I’m honest. Perhaps I need to start treating 4-20 like everyone else seems to. Then again, allergies. Coughy-cough cough. Nah. Not fo’ me.
A strange run. Into the city, my city, for scant seconds. Then (for various reasons) had to immediately turn around and leave the city, my city, and listen to the game on the radio. Then, with nearly four minutes left and the...
S.E. Rogie - Do Me Justice
Simple Enough
The love for early 90s hip-hop runs deep on this tumblin tublweed of a blog. I’m certain we could blow it clear ‘cross Texas just focusing on the sweet, sweet samples from that era.
But in the interest of branching out to see where we might end up, I offer this song. The Joe Pass guitar sample from Q-Tip originally brought this to mind. I copped it off one of these African music...
Once a Main Source of Conflict
Being the only native in a household full of immigrants, you fight your share of culture wars. And the surest way to inflame tensions when I was a kid was to tell my parents I was just hangin out. I dunno if they couldn’t grasp the concept or simply didn’t want to; all I know is the most tone-deaf was Moms. When you said “hang out,” she heard “party.” (Hang...
Hassan Gonsalves Drops Truth Bombs AKA Native...
The vibe is nice right now. That Williamsburg rooftop on warm spring day jam nice. That Dave Vortex nice. Like Jesus Shuttlesworth kicking it with Lala Bonilla on Coney Island nice. The guitar riffs are flowing, we have some classic native tongues music playing and it’s the stuff a Bud Lime commercial is made of. At the end of tax time I guess this is what we all needed. So I now...
Puttin in That Abstract Work
Now seems like a good time to disclose my swelling Obama complex—especially given how sharply recent posts (and events, I suppose, as well) have brought it into focus. The hope is that this admission will answer some of the background questions raised in our running subplot (like provenance, politics and swag, for example—sorry, readers, can’t go all the way; who am I if...
John Coltrane Quartet - On Green Dolphin Street
Why? Because it’s time we got our act together, that’s why.
Wynton Kelly? He’s so good that I have a Japanese bootleg of his that only features characters on the side of the disc cover. You think I know how to spell “Kelly” with a brush and a stroke? Yeah, you guessed “no,” and you guessed correctly.
Listen to the first 30 seconds of his intro, and...
The Sylvers- “Misdemeanor”
Free Shyne!!!
Shyne’s not guilty of any crime he is a political prisoner… like er Mumia.
I’ll play your Sylvers sample game. “Misdememeanor” was the sample used in Shyne’s early single “That’s Gangsta”. I heard the song once maybe a year after this single came out and proceeded to spend the next 4 years looking for this illusive Jackson Five song that I...
Brian Auger's Oblivion Express -- Beginning Again
Because this is what you should listen to while taking in the Masters.
Or, it’s what I listen to while taking in the Masters. Yes’m.
— Mercury’s Musatche avec his ES-335
Two Can Win - J. Dilla
Knowing Me Dr. Zeus, Knowing You Blog Reader - AHA
I’ll play your game AKA.
But before you click that little white triangle, just listen to this. Wasn’t that a nice, but ultimately forgettable slice of 70s soul? Now commence the white triangle clickage. Oh sweet Jay-sus, look what Jay Dilla has done to that mid-tempo Motown knock. According to my iPod he’s just Frankensteined the most played song on my playlist. This is only...
Roxy Music -- Same Old Scene
The music is so good, the LED lights on the console need to spell out the band’s name, even before the song begins in earnest.
There is so much bass slappin’, the camera will be forced to shake.
There are so many keyboards, we need to ask the saxophone player to play keyboards. Extra keyboards.
The harmonies are so tight, so rich, we need to split that screen into fours.
This is such a...
Welcome Back AKA During which We've been on our...
Young Jeezy - Welcome Back
So the Chinese Whisper is back to levels of full discourse. This gives me an excuse to put up this song and try something new. Why this song, because none of lyrics really make sense. At the end of song Jeezy finally admits he doesn’t even know what the fuck he is saying. You listen to a Jeezy track, and most other modern rap (not hip-hop, hippy-hop, true-school or...
Killin the Game: A Lesson in Swagger Jacking
I don’t know about y’all, but I simply can’t risk AKA abandoning our merry music blogging Voltron. In case you’re wondering I’d be one of the humerus lions, natch. (Rimshot!) But AKA? He’s a femur. Without him, we don’t have a good leg to stand on. So to appease him I’m posting some of that dope Killa. I love Cam (no homo) because in a lot of...
March 2009
22 posts
Well, if that's how it's gonna be...
…then I’m just gonna retaliate by posting my favorite Paul McCartney duets. This one needs no introduction, no long and winding disquisition into its awesomeness. It’s just a great collabo between one of the most gifted artist of our time and the dude who owned all his masters at the time. (Burn! Wait…too soon?)
Anyway, classic, classic jam. Enjoy, and get your balls...
Hold the Line
From now on I’m going to post some of my favorite jams from Sir Paul McCartney whenever the line goes dead for over a week. Why? Why not?
I love this one off the Back to the Egg. Just another case of Paul showing he can McCartney-ize any genre of music (and I define McCartney-ize as “to make more awesome.”) I love everything about this. Even Linda’s shoulder pads.
...
Phil Lynott - Yellow Pearl
King Phillip
In case you didn’t notice, Phil Lynott is held in great esteem on this here blog. Maybe it’s his badass delivery, maybe it’s his racial composition, maybe it’s from the time half us Whisperers shared some brews under a starry Michigan night sky as “Cowboy Song” played from the 3BMB speakers, Probably it’s because Phil just brings it.
You might say he can...
None More Metal AKA The Emerald Law
The FCK has opened the door to all that is metal. If you ever need to kill an hour at work, just go to wikipedia and follow the magical tree of metal. I think there are no finer musical cartographers then those brave souls who have tried to classify that which is metal. Where does one go from here? Some would say to Kuma’s. I say yes, and then when you get back partake in some Probot!
Why Probot?...
Bill Withers - Harlem
It’s bound to happen. Two-car garages. A deck that needs treatin’. Extra shelf space that leaves you stroking your chin, wondering about “what could go here … avocado pits?”
The ability to talk and walk something out in mid-afternoon, for a post you’ll never use about where Marc Iavaroni fell short, in the time it used to take to fill up the glass full of Brita water … without knocking knees on...
From DZ to MM
I figured this would happen. Busy signals. Poor service. Unpaid bills. I know how life gets. But it looks like I’m going to have to make direct calls now and again to keep things flowing and growing on Whispers. Sometimes I just miss hearing people’s voices.
I don’t have to spell out who this one is going out to. The moniker is in the message.
This Queen track is so epic and so...