(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Publish)

First things first, here’s a biographical essay about Kool Herc* I wrote (almost 3 years ago!). I don’t have a good excuse for posting it so late, but I do have a good reason for being able to post it on my site at all: because I made sure I could. In other words, when […]

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Welcome to Brownsville

Former wunderkind hip-hop critic and now English prof at Vassar, Hua Hsu asks some great questions in his hot-off-the-press Atlantic cover story, itself a question, “The End of White America?” — What will it mean to be white after “whiteness” no longer defines the mainstream? Will anyone mourn the end of white America? I especially […]

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The Milksap Montage

YouTubemusicology c/o Phillip Tagg — who adds — This video is part of the ongoing feature-film length “movie” project “Fernando the Flute – The Film of the Book of the Music”. To find out what the I-vi-ii/IV-V matrix might actually mean you will also need to view “Fernando Museme 3 Part 1” and Fernando Museme […]

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Draft Charlie

In the wake of the Obama administration’s nomination of Elena Kagan, Dean of Harvard Law School, for solicitor general, a movement is afoot to draft my dear dad-in-law, Charlie Nesson, for the deanship. A blogger describing himself as “HLS’s least wealthy and influential alumnus” makes the case: He’s good at building organizations (and getting money […]

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Tonight at Beat Research: DJ Pace

via the Beat Research webpage — Friend, Party Rocker, Bassaholic DJ Pace (aka Pacey Foster) is a multi-instrumentalist with deep hip-hop roots, he was the turntablist in the Franc Graham Band and the experimental live electronic act Elk which included members of Count Zero/Think Tree. He has performed as a club and party DJ for […]

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Earworms of 08

I know that 2008 is, like, totally over — but that doesn’t mean we can’t already begin revisiting it in ironic/nostalgia mode. And what’s the best vehicle for that? The mashup, of course. DJ Earworm, who put together a similar roundup last year, has not only spliced together — super seamlessly — the Billboard top […]

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Audio Theory from a Media Masseur

Ubuweb is a deeeep archive of avant art, music, speech, etc. I spent some time today on Marshall McLuhan’s page, delighted to find his classic work (recently reissued) in audio collage form! Side A [audio:http://ubu.artmob.ca/sound/mcluhan_marshall/Mcluhan-Marshall_The-Medium-Is-The-Massage_01.mp3] Side B [audio:http://ubu.artmob.ca/sound/mcluhan_marshall/Mcluhan-Marshall_The-Medium-Is-The-Massage_02.mp3] a few rndm pull quotes, some sarcastically spoken — We shape our tools and thereafter our tools […]

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Seeing Stars, Punk Hijabi Girls

You all already know that Ghislain P is a mean beatsmith and that I’m an unabashed bass booster. But if you haven’t been paying close attention recently, you might have missed out on a key development: Ghis has been fitting his tracks of late to such striking visual accompaniment as lightbulbs being smashed and, the […]

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Baby New Year Too!

I’m pretty sure this will be the last January 1st that I get to do this, but I’m thrilled to announce yet again that the coming year will bring us a baby! In lieu of any ultrasound mashups this time around, I offer instead a few ultrasound flicks — Kid B, as we’re calling her […]

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