Beautiful People

South Asian Massive

I just discovered this segment on MTV called Roots, which features music that has some sort of South Asian influence. I checked out the website and it seems like a good mix of traditional Hindustani music, Indian fusion, straight up rock/blues/alternative made by brown people, and some lame Desi-wanna-be-American stuff. In any case, I think it's pretty sick that 1) South Asian music has become culturally pervasive to the point where it's played on a mainstream, worldwide music channel, and 2) that MTV has a show that actually plays music. Fuck you, Jersey Shore!

Check out Shankar Tucker on this week's episode [Friday @ 8:30pm]. He's dope!

Dhun in Raag Mishra Pilu

This is a northern Indian khayal with clarinet, sitar, and tablas in raaga mishra pilu (one of few raagas that can be played any time of day). Classical Indian music generally starts slow and builds up throughout the piece (which is the beauty of it), but start around 4:24 if you just want to get a feel for the raaga without the alaap, etc.

Yusef Komunyakaa

Not enough people know who this man is. In the '80s, he developed this brand of poetry that combined jazz rhythm/syncopation with modern, colloquial language and some ridiculous imagery. I'm going to resist the urge to bold and underline the lines that make my eyes pop open. Getcha mind blown:

Safe Subjects 

How can love heal

the mouth shut this way?

Say something worth breath.

Let is surface, recapitulate

how fat leeches press down gently

on the sex goddesses eyelids.

Let truth have its way with us

like a fishhook holds

to life, holds dearly to nothing

worth saying -- pull it out,

bringing with it hard facts,

knowledge that the fine underbone

of hope is also attached

to inner self, underneath it all.

Undress. No, don't be afraid

even to get Satan mixed up in this

acknowledgment of thorns:

meaning there's madness

in the sperm, in the egg,

fear breathing in its blood sac,

true accounts not so easily

written off the sad book.

Say something about pomegranates.

Say something about real love.

Yes, true love - more than

parted lips, than parted legs

in sorrow's darkroom of potash

& blues. Let the brain stumble

from its hiding place, from its cell block,

to the edge of oblivion

to come to itself, sharp-tongued

as a boar's grin in summer moss

where a vision rides the back

of God, at this masquerade.

Redemptive as a straight razor

against a jugular vein -

unacknowledged & unforgiven.

It's truth we're after here,

hurting for, out in the streets

where my brothers kill each other,

each other's daughters & guardian angels

in the opera of dead on arrival.

Say something that resuscitates

us, behind the masks, 

as we stumble off into neon lights

to loveless beds & a second skin

of loneliness. Something political as dust

& earthworms at work in the temple

of greed & mildew, where bowed lamps

cast down shadows like blueprints of graves.

Say something for us who can't believe

in the creed of nightshade.

Yes, say something to us dreamers

who decode the message of dirt

between ancient floor boards

as black widow spiders

lay translucent eggs

in the skull of a dead mole

under a dogwood in full bloom.

Watch the Throne

Here's a full stream of the new Kanye/Jay-Z album. So far, I like "No Church in the Wild" and "Gotta Have It." It seems just kind of okay overall, but I need to spend some more time with it.

UPDATE: This shit is wack.

Lil Mama Had a Swag Like Mine

Okay, this is going to be my last video post for a while, semi-promise. I usually hate covers, but I'm diggin' this one. What do you think?

UPDATE: (Click on the link, song starts around 2:18 -- embedded video is no longer available).