...Like My Sister Kate

+Although recommended by the inimitable Kia Davis (currently book learning in Singapore) in 1997, I dismissed Rahsaan Patterson, for spite of his auburn-tipped blow out (he's now balding) I didn't like blown out afros or auburn or blond tipped 'natural' hair styles then or now. In my bopfree teeny world Patterson looked unfresh. He was a failed pretender to D'Angelo's throne. I may have listened to one song from his self-titled debut and I am certain I didn't like it. But about a year ago, after reading Jason King's Voice review of Patterson's After Hours, I thought I'd give him another chance. I just recently got around to downloading the album and I like it. In trying to account for my 180 I'm inclined to say I've developed a taste for corny sh*t in the past decade since Patterson's "So Hot" makes me want to shimmy like tilted texturized (flat) topped Eddie Murphy on the dancefloor with Robin Givens in Boomerang. I want to toss my head hair back in "Maaaarcus" post-youthful abandon. When listening to Patterson I feel like a thirtysomething Negro circa 1992 but I don't want to stop. And I'm afraid of what I'm becoming. Am I no longer the smirker* but the smirked at?! Maybe that's why I don't frequent Williamsburg.**

+In an equally unfresh and middle aged vein, I really really really want to see Hot Feet. EWF + Broadway = Fabulosity™.*** Debbie Allen's daughter Vivan Nixon stars. The Juilliard kids used to brag on how she couldn't get into Juilliard despite her mother's angling. Juilliard debt/diploma notwithstanding, Nixon's come out on top.

+On an unrelated note, some festive Mexicans put on a parade today on Central Park West between 110 and 97th. Great performance including quite a few drill teams and some individuals performing a reverential dance to QUETZALCOATL with incense and everything but not a very big turnout. I'm thinking most Mexicans are a little burnout from all the marching and decided to take this Sunday off.

+And I was going through my papers today and I found a heavily underlined The New H.N.I.C. book review by Armond White for the March 17, 2003 issue of The Nation. Some choice quotes:

Through random descriptions of questionable public comments and performances by a few successful black celebrities (comedian Chris Rock, entrepreneur Russell Simmons, rapper Nas, TV host Arsenio Hall), it merely uses the umbrella term hip-hop and its well-known commercial impact to translate how some African-Americans have unapologetically pursued money and personal wealth into the illusion of genuine political progress.

This is part of what I meant at The Future of Hip Hop retrospective when I wished for hip hop's disentanglement/differentiation from (young) black identities.

Academia has been trying to catch up with hip-hop ever since Henry Louis Gates testified on behalf of 2 Live Crew in 1990. It's always been behind-or wrong.

Academics adore "agency" and black academics (who at best only reach a small portion of black youth) envy the ability of hip-hop artists to seem "in charge."

Despite the neologism of "nigga" (instead of "nigger") the sense of that old phrase cannot be refashioned without reconfiguring its implicit acknowledgement of plantation hierarchy.

White also notes,

This decadent exploitation of black culture through suggestions of its demise is ruthless--and silly.

Speak! Claims of hip hop's demise strike me as not only inaccurate but wholly disingenous. I think they suggest the demise of the claimants specific relationship to hip hop (and youth).

+ Ian's got Fat Joe's "Damn" up at Different Kitchen and indeed its fire-"look how the sh*t bling/piss-stained yellow pebble bezel on the wrist man"-which in no way transforms my indifference to the artist formerly known as "Flow Joe."

+Lastly this funny mini-doc , A Chink in The Armour, found at the very cool blog, Reappropriate: Ramblings of An Angry Little Asian Canadian Girl puts Chinese stereotypes to a series of tests.

*Was I ever a smirker!?!
**In addition to the 'burg's pointed paleness.
***Thanks Kimora.