Perhaps Joy is Still Alive

You've all heard the song "Last Night a DJ Saved My Life" once or thrice. Granted there are other things that might truly 'save you', but often times music can be incredibly healing, I think that is why we are all so obsessed (or just plain bored).

Lately, to cure my own doldrums, not really all that bad by the world's or even my own standards, I've stumbled upon a few old-skool Congolese Rumba records that are blowing my mind. The rumba was the precursor to another Congolese form, soukous. I don't claim to know much about soukous, and really can't comment intelligibly on any African music. However, I can claim that the soukous and rumbas I've heard make me very happy in a way that nothing else is! (musically I mean)

This concept is not new and travel writer Frank Bures wrote on soukous' joyful qualities in an article titled The Sound of Sunshine, an excerpt:

It was a dark time, and looking back on it now,sometimes I think the only thing that saved me was soukous, a sound I had brought home with me from Tanzania. On bad days in that room, when I hadn’t seen sunlight for what felt like days, I would put my headphones on, put on Dalle Kimoko, or Kanda Bongo Man, or Pepe Kalle and be lifted up to a place where the sun was shining, a place that was green, a place where people were laughing.

Perhaps my enjoyment of such retro-genres is some sort of romanticized Afro-escapism, and it very well may be. And this time, for once, I do not care. Everyone else is into such romantic escapism; they dream of early 80s NYC, Havana in the 50s, or some glamorous hip-hop life. I don't wish to be living in a 1950s Congo or to live in a hippie fantasy of global harmony (though that'd be nice). I just like good music, music that might be very foreign to me and my upbringing and which isn't played much anymore. I don't care.

There's been a dearth of musical reissues as of late, primarily non-Western, now that all the classic rock and soul records have been reissued. However, there remains thousands of old albums from across the globe that are still new to our ears. Haven't you noticed all the compilations of Nigerian Funk from the 1970s, 1960s Thai Go-Go, or Ethiopian Jazz? So far I've been very resistant to these reissues because they seem kind of absurd and nostalgic. But, I realized that I might be absurd and listening to old esoteric recordings from some far flung place I may never go to maybe isn't all that bad. If I can truly enjoy the music for the music and not some 'escape' into a palm tree and exotic girl laden fantasy, then it is a-okay. In fact, maybe, just maybe, listening to 'world music', current or not, will open minds and foster dialogue and understanding across borders. Again, I'm being idealistic here. Maybe music can heal, or maybe it is just going to further slanted National Geographic-esque exotic fantasies. What I do know, is that this stuff is very joyful, something lacking in most music (across the globe) today. ENJOY this video from Kekele, a super group of classic rumba players. These are the cats that laid the groundwork for soukous, and the rest is history. Enjoy!

Why blogs are no good

5. There are too many to try and navigate them all without successfully wasting your life.

4. If you are lucky enough to find a good blog it is usually defunct after a few months and the decent links long expired.

3. They are narcissistic looking glasses that serve no purpose but to help one kill time online and show off the useless trash the writer finds on the net.

2. Only 10% of those people posting blogs have anything interesting to say. Do I really need to know that you once played bass in a shoe-gazer band in 11th grade or have a fetish for grape Hubba-Bubba?

1. No one reads them! Why don't we all stop this nonsense and go back to journaling. Then the only person forced to trudge through someone else's self-absorbed ramblings are relatives that dig these journals out of the attic once you die.

In Case You Missed It...

In case you missed the Rolling Stone or Vibe promos you gotta check out Pittsburgh's own Wiz Khalifa. Though his lyrics aren't ground breaking I'm glad someone with skills and pride in the Burgh is out there making waves. Enjoy!

Salsa Vs. Reggaeton

In total my formal dance experiences, not counting House music where it is acceptable to walk in a circle with your eyes closed and hands in the air, is limited. Experiences include 2 salsa lessons and 1 night swing dancing over a decade ago. The rest of my endeavors (however limited) run the usual gamut of trying to dance to ska, reggae, Motown, r&b, house, 80s, and hip-hop.

It was with great enthusiasm that I decided to go out and dance at a salsa club with about 8 other friends (mostly beginners) on Saturday night. We got to the club for a free one hour lesson. It took me 1 hour the night before to learn the basic step so another hour to learn about 6 twists and turns, fancier footwork, and more just didn’t cut it. A neurotic white guy cannot learn how to dance (let alone loosen up) in 1 hour! I spent the better part of the evening on the floor figuring out the steps and keeping rhythm; trying to lead someone to moves which I don’t conceptualize let alone understand or have confidence in drove me insane.

The frustration of this dance (while fun anyway) was having a pretty girl complain “lead me, lead me”, when I in fact had no idea where or how to lead her in a dance I barely understood (this sorta thing comes up and derails relationships I imagine). That was very, very frustrating for a passive individual like myself who normally spends weekends in the library.

For myself, being the embodiment of passivity, ‘leading’ someone on a dance floor (or in any endeavor for that matter) is quite overwhelming. I have studied and perfected the passive life of Haruki Murakami's characters whose only pursuits involve excessive and solitary reading, cooking, exercise, cleaning, and drinking. Like Repo Man’s Otto I’ve lived my life in the passenger seat, taking it all in, while doing nothing. However, my passivity has yet to carry me on any Murakami-esque adventures with psychic, crippled, 13 year old girls to Hawaii or into deep wells. Realizing that as a purely passive human being I need to be proactive and lead people in life, even in something as simple as a dance, is very daunting.

That being said, I gave up on dancing to the salsa and meringue (I found cumbia to be easier) and found solace in reggaeton, of all things. I’ve never been a fan of reggaeton prior, finding the lyrics a bit misogynistic and the beat boring. Compared to the complicated and proactive salsa rhythms reggaeton was a relief. To reggaeton I could dance with abandon without having to lead, figure out moves 3 steps ahead or worry about complicated steps, yet it is just as sexy and fun as salsa. No wonder everyone is into this stuff! Maybe I need to rethink music, it is hard to criticize music when your dancing to it, while it is just too easy to do while sitting on the sidelines. I will no longer deride reggaeton!

What I leared from this night was that without serious study of the various forms of Latin dance I will continue to remain frustrated and in the dark and reggaeton won’t always come to my rescue. I enrolled in a beginner’s salsa class and will figure out this ASAP. Until then I'll stick to dancing to House in my kitchen and to try and 'dance like no one is watching'. I urge you, dear reader, to do the same.

March Madness

Another weekend come and gone. My NCAA basketball picks are proving to be quite off this year, but Pitt and Georgetown are advancing so it's all good. Went to Chi-town to catch a few games this past Friday. An odd situation, the tickets were procured through a “friend of a friend of a friend” who was told to meet ‘a guy’ in a rest stop near O'Hare International Airport. After unsuccessfully selling my friend on a pyramid scheme we got the tickets and headed to the game.

First game, Georgia Tech vs. UNLV. Kind of boring. I picked GT, but they lost. The true highlight was the pathetic mascot of Georgia Tech, Buzz, the Yellow Jacket, which had NO SPIRIT! Clad in Chuck Taylors he seemed to be an indie rocker drafted into this position at the last second as he had perfected only two moves: a celebratory fist pump more suitable for punk rock shows and an apathetic shaking of the ‘stinger’. Poor Buzz didn’t dance or rev up the crowd, he spent more time flirting with the UNLV cheerleaders! Buzz also failed to perform his patented ‘Buzz flip’. This pathetic critter is a previous winner of mascot of the year. The results of this Atlanta based poll are dubious at best, either way the person playing Buzz needs some serious training to live up to the Buzz legacy. A friend recommended that 'the bee' be hoisted up on strings and fly around the stadium. That would have been wonderful, at least emerging from some sort of hive would have added character. The GT cheerleaders were equally boring with only 5 men and 3 ladies who just stood around and CLAPPED to the music, occasionally hoisting the gals up and letting them shake their pom-pons. UNLV’s Showgirls style performance was more worthy with serious booty shaking and a cowboy (Runnin’ Rebel) mascot who danced around and could sorta keep rhythm.

The Badgers barely won against unknowns Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, but the Texas Islanders won based on the mascot alone. I don’t know what an “Islander” is in Texas. Perhaps it is a part-Polynesian, part-German/Mexican Texan with a tiki face and grass skirt. Izzy the Islander danced it up and had some real pride is his/her job with slides, shaking, fist pumps, and serious movement (Izzy had rhythm, so probably was a woman). The Texas A&M CC Blue Crew also did a good job with their cheering (rather boisterous and animated) despite being outnumbered and overshadowed by the local Badgers squad.

Besides the shoddy performance by Buzz I was struck by the fact that most songs by the bands were old rock tunes. What was once a novelty with DJs sampling the Compton High School Marching Band’s rendition of 'Low Rider,' it is now commonplace for college bands to play such anthems as ‘Ring of Fire’, ‘Low Rider’, or ‘Iron Man’ --so much for fight songs.

NCAA consumption with the unhealthy food, high prices, regional rivalries, sensory overload, and sitting all day was too much for me, add to that a long car ride, and stomach full of heavy Chicago Pie and I was beat. Let’s hope Pitt wins this thing and we can move on with our lives.

Heard It All Before

We hear it all the time. Low income, often immigrant, blue-collar neighborhoods being turned into hipster playgrounds. This has affected most cities across the nation, but perhaps none more than NYC. From the South Bronx to Brooklyn, Lower East Side to Queens, hipsters and yuppies move in, drive up the rents and drive out their poorer neighbors. It appears that the Dominican stronghold of Washington Heights is joining that list. You can read more in this NYTimes article.

Is this a bad thing? Probably, but that isn't the point, it is happening all over the place and will continue to happen whether it is 'good' or 'bad'. Remember, the decision maker here is profit. If someone can make a buck and it so happens that others are displaced so be it. That is just an inevitable inconvenience. But what do those of us who are bothered by this change to do? Remember, this movement isn't caused by Dominicans 'moving on up' because of an increase in their incomes, they're being forced out because of rising rents.

What to do? Probably nothing. Visit Washington Heights as a tourist, grab a bite to eat, sip some coffee, have a beer or three, take a photo and move on.

I am not bothered by this because I'm a post-modern liberal who decries not merely the injustice but the loss of some authentic ethnic-enclave which is more 'real' than my suburban roots will ever be. Okay, I sorta am. But what really bothers me is the displacement of the working class and the continued homogenization of our culture. Do we really want our cities to be yuppie and hipster playgrounds of consumption?

I suggest that our society does want everything to be like a mall and if there are losers along this path so be it. Just pray you're on the winning side or else you'll find yourself living in a ghetto suburb without a mall or be doing time in prison.