Around the Holidays, I have a tradition. It’s called putting on a bathrobe, and listening to R. Kelly. Eventually after sipping Silk Nog and Vodka, I get bold enough to send text messages offering backrubs and sex with a naked thug.
While this isn’t true, watching this R. Kelly and Roots performance from Fallon made me decide I’m really wasting my life not doing such things.
I know its someone’s birthday somewhere.
1. El-P, I’ll Sleep When Your Dead (Definitive Juxtaposition)
Rap music is great because it hypnotizes you and convinces you that caring about anything but making money is a sign of mental illness. And I thank rap music for this, normally. But El-P’s album reminded me the reality is that we are still paying “30 Percent a Year to Fund the World’s End”. And the everday conversation with many of youse may be worse than the government’s intentions. El touches on that as well.
Video:El-P performing TPC and Smithereens at Little Brothers in Columbus
2. MIA, Kala (XL/Interscope)
M.I.A.’s record is kinda like a futuristic Robin Hood if Robin Hood was a female that made music that people will dance to in Third World Countries 50 Years from now after the American dollar becomes more worthless than a Congolese franc. I also want to be the first to point out that MIA is not physically attractive. I’d hump a terrorists daughter on GP, but she still is pretty average looking.
3. Times New Viking Presents The Paisley Reich (Stiltbreeze)
I have a friend that paints graffiti a lot and works a really shitty job. He is really nice and only listens to Lil Wayne and Nirvana because they sing romantically about despair, love,drugs, and death. Lil Wayne is a lot funnier than Nirvana as is TNV. My 2008 resolution is to get him into TNV.
Video:Some Guy in Canada named “DipsetMuthafucka” Dancing to TNV’s Little Amps.
4. Wu-Tang Clan, The Eight Diagrams
Most of all the other Hip Hoppers were out here trying and failing at trying to figure out the formula to sell records, ring tones, and themselves. Wu remembered that they are the sole controllers of their universe, and it is their duty as poor righteous teachers to civilize the uncivilized in the Wilderness of North America. So they made a Wu-Tang album that sounded like a good Wu-Tang album. Can a devil fool a Muslim?
Hypem:Wu-Tang Clan-Campfire
5. Lil Wayne, The Drought
Lil Wayne boasted in Fader that he does nothing all day but take xtc, and receive oral sex while constantly recording. The result of drug use, work ethic, and an inability to keep his music from being uploaded meant we got to experience exactly what was going on in Wayne’s brain at all times.
HYPEM:Lil Wayne-Dipset
Comments Off on Donewaiting.com Staff Favorites of 2007: Wes Flexner
Posted in 2007 Favorites, Wes Flexner
Tagged , Lil Wayne, MIA, R. Kelly, Times New Viking
Ok. The new Kells is so amazing to me that I was surprised it hasn’t been universally heralded as a classic by the critics of the world. But I guess it isn’t, according to metacritic.
In my mind, Justin Timberlake is Radiohead. You know. Anyone with taste would see that its great music.
And if Timberlake is Radiohead, then Kells is Bjork. You know—>acclaimed music by a quirky weirdo pervert. (watch a Matthew Barney movie. I dare you. Thats Bjork’s boo. His films are borderline as bad as Kells’ urinating video)
After the break.
It’s Your Boyfriend!!
Kells.
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MP3: “Beyond the Beyond” by RJD2
Tonight in Columbus OH, RJD2 presents the worldwide debut of his new live band at the Wexner Center. We caught up with RJ on the eve of his big change.
Wes Flexner: Do you foresee yourself going back to sampled-based composition?
RJD2: I don’t know. I can foresee what I am going to be doing in the future, but at this point I am a little too “out there” as an artist to go around sampling shit, and without clearing it it’s a very limiting form to be working in.
WF: When creating the album, did you use equipment from the eras of sound you were striving for?
RJ: Yeah, I spent a lot of time and money buying the instruments that were on my favorite records and then even more time restoring shit. Clarinet, Hammond organ, electric pianos, synths, vibraphone. There are only one or two instruments in my studio that were made after 1980.
WF: Was the transition from producer/deejay to front man, difficult for you? Was it out of necessity or a rooted desire to experience the extreme extroverted side of musical performance?
RJ: I don’t think too much about it. I think there is an inherent disparity in being primarily an “instrumental artist” that’s not part of the group. Because naturally you need to be the “front man” of your own act. But the music is inherently introverted. So it can make things hard. I’m kind of relieved to just be in front of the mic since my name is top on the marquis anyway. It was really hard to headline shows when I was primarily using turntables and a sampler and present it like a big deal.
WF: Has singing been like forcing yourself to skydive, or a natural comfortable process?
RJ: Yeah, a little. Really, preparing to go out and sing the songs is the most like skydiving. In the studio, it’s just…”ok, take 13″. But that’s what makes it so exciting. There’s such a chance for mistakes. I’m looking forward to those kinds of things. I think it’s more interesting to see a performer succeed when they occasionally fail.
WF: All of your band members had their various impacts on Columbus music. Can you recall and memories of being a young man in the crowd and watching Howling Maggie, New Bomb Turks, RC Mob, etc?
RJ: It’s funny, cause Happy is such a humble guy. It’s almost hard to think of him as a rock star, but every now and then I think about that song “Alcohol”, and I think hey, this guy was on the radio when I wasn’t eve thinking about wishing I WAS as musician. Same with Sam. These guys need to work a little harder at being dicks if they’re going to convince someone they are big shots.
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