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Excuse Me, I’m On The List!

23-Jul-08

A few days ago, a buddy of mine asked a few friends what the definition of the “A-list” was and if any of us were on it. Responses varied.

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When called to the same task, music industry entrepreneurs Eric Nicks and Shanti Das admit that they scrutinize the A-List on a bi-weekly basis for their popular music showcase, R&B Live in NYC’s Times Square. Although they’ve shut out some of America’s Next Top Model’s, they’ve been keen on making space for the likes of Denzel Washington, Sylvia Rhone, L.A. Reid and Beyonce.

I recently did an interview with Nicks and Das for Radio One/Interactive One’s The Urban Daily.

Peep an excerpt:

Interns and assistants all around the music industry will have to work a little harder to intercept this invitation from their high powered bosses, R&B Live adheres a strict guest list. Recently, a few of America’s Next Top Models were denied entry. And rightfully so; the biweekly live entertainment showcase at Times Square’s Spotlight Live has not only seen the talents of Ne-Yo, Fantasia, Trey Songz, Brian McKnight, Mario, Lyfe Jennings and Mya but has hosted some of music and Hollywood’s elite as guests.

Those lucky enough to get inside can commingle with everyone from Denzel Washington, Jay-Z, Diddy, Beyonce and R. Kelly to Terence Howard, Gabrielle Union, Anthony Anderson and more. Still, the masterminds, behind one of NYC’s hottest events, Shanti Das and Eric Nicks, still believe the biggest draw isn’t the star power on the stage, it’s the collective of heavy hitting music industry insiders in attendance.

[Read full article here.]

If you haven’t been to R&B Live in NYC… beg, borrow or steal whatever is necessary to get your name on the guestlist. It’s definitely an experience. [Peep this video on FaceBook of Janelle Monae @ R&B Live]

Filed in music, streets of nyc, ww4p | Comments (0) »

Thrillist!

21-Jul-08

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If I take you from behind, push myself into your mind when you least expect it. Would you try to reject it? If I were in charge and I treated you like a child. Would you let yourself go wild, let my mouth go where it wants to?

Filed in sex, imagination, travel, ww4p | Comments (1) »

August Shoe

17-Jul-08

Today I was out with my favorite ladies and ended picking up my August shoe.

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Thoughts?

Filed in fashion, family, hood rich | Comments (4) »

It’s Complicated!

16-Jul-08

I hate when I do this– when I leave this blog suspended… caught in an angle of song. I have been dealing and doing so much lately and not turning to the therapeutic practice of writing like I use to.

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So here is a quicklist of the things I’ve been up to:

  • I met up with my mother for the first time since 1992 (waaay more to come)
  • I vacationed in Myrtle Beach, S.C. [view photos here]
  • Wrote a few articles, took a few road trips
  • Went to a step show [view video]

But as they say, “… and the beat goes on!”

Here a few photos I took today on the way into the house.
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MUSHroom IV

[View Full PhotoSet Here]

Filed in internet, travel, family, dancing | Comments (1) »

Dub Land 6.20

23-Jun-08

On Friday I headed over to Dub Land on the East End for a Long Island Iced Tea and live set. This trumpet player killed it. Peep the video.

Filed in music | Comments (1) »

Sing Along / 7 Songs Meme

19-Jun-08

I was tagged by Lynne d Johnson for this (there aren’t too many of you out there that don’t know Lynne, but if by chance you don’t, head over to her site and get a feel for how dope she is).

“List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring summer. Post these instructions in your blog along with your seven songs. Then tag seven other people to see what they’re listening to.”

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1. Madonna - “Shanti/Ashtangi”

2. HotStylz feat. Yung Joc - “Lookin Boy”

3. Bjork - “Gling Glo”

4. Mariah Carey - “For The Record”

5. Jayms Madison -”Room Service”

6. Jonte - “The Kids”

7. Lil Wayne - “A Milli”

I am tagging the following peeps in hopes that they will share their songs of the moment.

Linda K

Joshua A. Washington

The Modest Bastard

Soul Rebel aka JaneeTMB

Danica Dow

SeanMichael Rodgers

ShawnQT

Filed in hip-hop, music | Comments (5) »

Treadmill Trinity

12-Jun-08

Let me start by saying, I hate cardio. I despise it. However I recently up’d my time on the treadmill from 20mins to 30mins and then added a 10min session on the row machine or the elliptical or the cycle. Essentially doubling the amount of time I devote in my workout to cardio.

I HATE CARDIO. But, I wanna maintain that tight super toned look to my muscle so I submit to the will of the cardio gods.

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(i created the photo above using a basic light graffiti technique)

I was listening to Madonna’s Ray of Light one day on the elliptical during the second half of my cardio workout and “Nothing Really Matters” comes on. If you aren’t familiar, learn it.

“Nothing Really Matters”

The track is insane. Electronic. Organic. Honest. And enchanting. It’s said Madge was inspired by her children for this one. Both the lyrics and the bounce are nurturing. No track at this moment was more appropriate for hitting my stride on the “Around the World” setting on the elliptical.

“Nothing Really Matters” is the perfect introduction to the poetically perfect, “Sky Fits Heaven.” What…. you don’t know that track? Get in.

“Sky Fits Heaven”

By the time this track hits, the elliptical has switched to the highest incline and I am eating it up– You feel me?

Madge confesses, “I think I’ll follow the sun…” The drums are running faster. And faster. Getting in my head. My eyes are closed. I am imagining that I am chasing the swift bass line. It’s quicker than a ray of light moving a mere mile per hour faster than I can, as I hit the strides on this incline.

I increase the resistance. It’s torture. It burns. The bass line is within sight, yet just outside my grasp.

My head is bowed and the sweat is pouring. Enter “Shanti/Ashtangi.”

“Shanti/Ashtangi”

This Indian inspired prayer dances on the bed of drumbeats for about 4minutes and 30seconds. “Ohm Shanti.” More sweat. The hill of my last climb is surmounted.

I open my eyes, awakening from Madge’s Bjork inspired trance.

By this time the heart rate meter reads 178. And I have to wonder if my fellow gym go-ers on the neighboring machines took notice of the outer body experience that just occurred on the second floor of this here YMCA.

Ahh who cares… Cool down begins with “The Power of Goodbye.”

[related video]

Filed in fitness, hip-hop, music, gym | Comments (2) »

The Evolution of the Cell Phone

11-Jun-08

All the hoopla around the new $199 8gig iPhone coming out on July 11th [watch the new ad here] got me thinking about how when I was a kid growing up in South Carolina, we would take a house phone into the car and try to freak out people on the rural town by pretending to be on the telephone in the car.

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Now I freak out if I get in a car and don’t have my cell phone.

Until I get an iPhone, the device of choice is my BlackBerry Pearl– in crimson of course.

TIME has this dope photo essay titled The Long Odyssey of the Cell Phone. It takes a look at the first mobile phone and even shows how the coveted gadget became everything from a WWII mode of communication to a Barbie doll accessory.

Peep that.

When I get an iPhone, I plan to load up this new track I’ve been running in my Nano.

Robin Thicke - “Magic”

Good shit. And Imma Timberlake stan so that’s big of me.

Filed in internet, news, music | Comments (3) »

Imma Do Me!

07-Jun-08

Today I made up all the excuses possible not to have an article to write or an errand to run or show to attend. I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t drop off anyone at work or pick up any prescriptions from the pharmacy or organize anything.

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Today I did me. And all that involved was a spot by the water, an Arizona Southern Style sweet tea, the newspaper, my iPod, the crimson B’Berry and a cool breeze in 90 plus degree weather.

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Last night was cool too. I went down to the East End Festival to hear the jazz bands with a buddy of mine.

Peep the pics here if you give a damn.

If I could explain how wonderful it felt today to be in the moment of just pure relaxation, it’d sound something like this:

Bjork - “Gling Glo”

Tonight… CABLE!!!!!!!!

Filed in travel, life, music, ww4p | Comments (2) »

Ashanti Declares Her Independence

03-Jun-08

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The good people over at Radio One/Interactive One (owners of GIANT Magazine) asked me to judge R&B chanteuse Ashanti’s declaration of independence. Her new CD, The Declaration, hits shelves today.

Peep an excerpt:

This latest effort proves that in many ways Ashanti is like a Snapple. Yeah, a Snapple. You know how Coca Cola and Pepsi spend so much time trying to outperform each other? Well, Ashanti is like Snapple in that she is equally as satisfying, just a distinctively different choice. She can come out with all sorts of flavors (remix CDs, sci-fi flicks and perfumes) yet she still have her own set of fans despite not necessarily being the caught up in the hype of who is the hottest chick in the game. Instead, she just does her own thing.

[CLICK HERE TO READ FULL REVIEW]

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H.A.M.-burgular At Burger King!

20-May-08

Only in New Orleans can a 6 foot drag queen pull up to a Burger King, climb in through the drive thru window and get it crunk.

The gag is, after robbing the place, he/she went out through the same window in which he/she came in. How unbecoming of a lady! 

Filed in crime, food, life | Comments (1) »

I Wanna Go Outside

18-May-08

“I wanna go outside, in the rain.”

Well not exactly. Like the next anti-social, angry black man, I love to sit at home on a rainy day and do any thing as long as it doesn’t involve dipping and dodging out in the streets.

This morning it rained.

I along with of my two aunts were due at a fundraising walk-a-thon for a cancer hospice at the marina in B’lo. One aunt sat it out at a nearby cafe while me and the other registered, took group photos, got t-shirts and made memorial notes for our relative that died of cancer.

–And it rained.–

I wasn’t dressed for the weather because not only was it raining, but the wind down at the marina was kinda cold. So I opted out and joined the first aunt at the aforementioned cafe.

Rain or no rain, my Aunt P. held her own. Refusing to chicken out, she got out there and completed the walk in a big bright yellow poncho, soggy sweats and a big bright smile on her face.

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Filed in volunteer, travel, family | Comments (3) »

Shootback Exhibition

15-May-08

As a former Newsweek employee, I have been programmed to hate TIME magazine. Their art direction and photography are unrivaled, however their editorials pale in comparison.

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In one of their recent photo essays, TIME photo editors featured the Shootback Exhibition.

American photographer Lana Wong started the Shootback Project in August 1997 with MYSA youth leader and reknown footballer to help give young people in Mathare a voice to tell their own stories. Equipped with $30 plastic cameras, a group of 31 boys and girls, aged 12 to 17, photographed their lives and wrote about them every week for almost two years.

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The Paris exhibition shows how young photographers from Mathare capture a truth outsiders miss. “SHOOTBACK: Photos by the Children of the Nairobi Slums” is on in Paris between May 15-30.

[VIEW FULL PHOTO ESSAY HERE]

Filed in africa, art history, photos, life | Comments (1) »

I Got A Love Jones

12-May-08

Over the weekend I re-fell in love with the Love Jones soundtrack.

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Come on… don’t front. No matter how old you are, if you are a lover of R&B, then you must admit that the “Love Jones” was not only a benchmark in modern black American cinema, but a benchmark in music.

I use to run this CD to death til the peeps in my dorm/suite wanted to kill me. But I didn’t give a damn.

One of the reasons why I love this CD so much is because it introduced me to Cassandra Wilson. The track “You Move Me” stuck in my craw — which led to me going out and picking up New Moon Daughter. And everything else Ms. Wilson sang on.

Cassandra Wilson - “You Move Me”

DAMN! Even typing this sets me off. Cassandra Wilson is magic personified, but more on that later.

So back to Love Jones… is anybody else out there stuck on stupid for this collection of songs that include everyone from Lauryn Hill to Trina Broussard to Meshell Ndegeocello? If you aren’t familiar, then get acquainted or re-acquainted.

Filed in movies, music | Comments (2) »

Click This: Links for 5.12.08

12-May-08

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Filed in black male, education, photos, hip-hop, music | Comments (1) »

Behind The Scenes w/ Barack Obama

08-May-08

TIME has this dope photo essay on what it’s like “Behind The Scenes With Barack Obama.”

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The above shot was taken in Pennsylvania after Senator Obama learned that his opponent for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton, had just won the primary there.

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This one was taken the night before the polls opened in Indianapolis.

[PEEP THE FULL PHOTO ESSAY HERE.]

Filed in black male, politics, news, life | Comments (1) »

Getting Body Beautiful Part 1

07-May-08

I’ve been in the gym getting ready for summer. And I know/hope I am not the only one. The weather is warming up and I plan to spend every available weekend on a beach somewhere. (If you live near or in a beach community please send ya boy an invite.)

The first summer holiday is Memorial Day weekend. Where are you going, what will you be doing? Is your body ready for the beach?

Filed in travel, life, gym | Comments (2) »

Addicted!

03-May-08

I got up early this morning and ran down to this lil hood breakfast spot on 125th and Amsterdam Ave. I am addicted to the pancakes there. Everything else is crap shoot. I think they deep fry the bacon. I prefer the beef sausage.

I left my camera at home so here are a few flicks from the BlackBerry.

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Filed in friends, food, streets of nyc | Comments (4) »

Pay Your Student Loans!

01-May-08

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If I knew then what I know now, I would have never globetrotted with those insane student loan refund checks all through undergrad and grad school.

I had the brains and the test scores for scholarships and fellowships and what not, but I was too busy being grown (re: ignorant) letting student loans fund the fiestas.

I’m paying for it now.

A brotha is considering a PhD program of some sort, partly because I want to one day be a professor at some prestigious university, but also because I want to put a freeze on these damn loan payments.

Education should free. No?

Filed in money, education, life | Comments (3) »

Revitalization / Regentrification

29-Apr-08

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Can we prevent the revitalization of urban neighborhoods from turning into regentrification? I won’t pretend to have the answer to that question however, the residents of a small upstate New York community are entering a long rumored revitalization. Many fear that it will ultimately lead to regentrification where long standing residents will be displaced once the new curbsides, coffee shops and couture arrive.

I recently penned a story where I interviewed local councilmen about the thoughts and concerns of their constituency. Peep an excerpt:

“Once you get the residents to buy into the idea of revitalization, you have to educate them on what the process is going to be,” says Lee. “You cannot expect them to understand all the advocacy that needs to take place and who are going to be the players. Right now, most people are questioning ‘what’s in it for me?’ And if you can’t help them to understand that job opportunities, programs to assist their families and their children are going to come out of this process there is going to be difficulty in getting their support.”

[Read full article here.]

Filed in rochester, life | Comments (1) »

CLOSER!

28-Apr-08

So NeYo is out with a new song, video– whathaveyou titled “Closer.” Has anyone listened yet? Anyone give a damn?

I love the “new” sound… Hell, it makes me feel very very. I blasted it while getting dressed the other day.

NeYo - “Closer”

Filed in photos, music | Comments (3) »

Early Morning Walk On The Beach

19-Apr-08

I was floated a memo that hibernation season was over and us grouchy bears had to come up for air. So this morning I left my hideaway and headed down to the beach for a moment of sunshine.

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[Peep more photos on FLICKR!]

Filed in travel, photos, life | Comments (3) »

Dear Mariah….I Apologize For Being So Brief

15-Apr-08

I was asked by GIANT magazine to put together a 300 word (or less) review of Mariah Carey’s new project E=MC2.

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For a fan like me… 300 words ain’t shit. But I did my best….

Peep an excerpt:

Say what you will about Mimi and her long-time partner in hitmaking, Jermaine Dupri,  but cuts like “I’m That Chick” and “I’ll Be Loving You Long Time” walk the line of crunk and classy like MC in some Jimmy Choos and low rider jeans. “For The Record,” “Love Story” and “Bye Bye” are carefully laid ballads but “I Wish You Well,” with its glass-shattering vocal flourish, is the icing on the cake. And around here… we love cake.

[READ FULL REVIEW OF E=MC2]

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Peep This!: Divinity School Revitalizes Black Church Studies Curriculum

14-Apr-08

I recently wrote a story for the Minority Reporter on how Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School (who claim Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as a graduate) initiated an endowed chair in King’s honor and revitalized it’s Black Church Studies program.

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[click image to enlarge]

The announcement of this effort was timely as the American public just recently swallowed all the hoopla surrounding Senator Barack Obama’s former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright– which the school and several of it’s black alum have addressed.

“There are large segments of the American population, particularly the white sections of the American population who have little understanding of the black church,” said Bay. “…Here at the school the Black Church Studies program does not just prepare leaders of the black church, but exposes all of our students to the history, the legacy and the importance of the black church experience. We also think we have an obligation to the larger community not just to our students and the Black Church Studies will have impact on that as well.”

~ Eugene Bay, CRCDS President

[read full article here]

Filed in religion, money, politics, education | Comments (1) »

Click This!: Links for 4.10.08

10-Apr-08

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Filed in magazines, education, photos, news, music | Comments (3) »

Photo Story: Bullshittin’ w/ the Boyz

06-Apr-08

I hung out with some of my friends on Saturday night. At this point, it’s all a blur… good thing I take a camera with me everywhere I go. [I got careless with the clippers and had to shave off my beard.]

Filed in friends, travel, photos, life | Comments (2) »

Click This!: Links for 4.04.08

04-Apr-08

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Fela Kuti -”Mistake” (Live At The Berlin Jazz Festival 1978)

Filed in politics, relationships, links, movies, news, photos, drugs | Comments (3) »

Faith Community Endorses Barack Obama

03-Apr-08

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[click image to enlarge]

The local faith community in the city that I was born and raised (Rochester, NY) is in full support of presidential candidate, Senator Barack Obama. However, don’t assume it’s because ole boy is black.

Peep an excerpt from an article I wrote for the Minority Reporter.

Rochester, NY Faith Community For Barack contends that its endorsement of Senator Obama is based solely on his beliefs, his proposed policies, his opposition to the war in Iraq and major poll results and is in no way related to race as many have assumed.

“There may be a tendency to think that we are supporting Barack primarily because he is of African American persuasion, when in fact he is bi-racial. He is just as much white as he is black,” Bishop Melvin asserted. “We support his policies. We believe that he is the best person to bring this country together.”

[read full story here]

Filed in politics, rochester | Comments (0) »

Lou Dobbs’ Freudian Slip– Calls Condoleezza Rice A Cotton Picker

03-Apr-08

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s recently told the editors of the Washington Times that the United States suffers from a national “birth defect” with regard to race.

“Black Americans were a founding population,” she said. “Africans and Europeans came here and founded this country together — Europeans by choice and Africans in chains. That’s not a very pretty reality of our founding.”

“That particular birth defect makes it hard for us to confront it, hard for us to talk about it, and hard for us to realize that it has continuing relevance for who we are today.”

[read full article here]

Later, CNN’s Lou Dobbs expressed his sentiments on Rice’s statements– letting out a racist, Freudian slip.

I guess Condi was right and I guess this is still the good ole U.S. of A.

Filed in politics | Comments (0) »

Click This!: Links for 4.02.08

02-Apr-08

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Peep this old school Letoya Luckett that has the fire and spunk of the Queen Bey.

Filed in food, fitness, links, travel, hip-hop, family, music | Comments (1) »