Monthly Archives: January 2011

01/30/11

Rube Goldberg of Riot

Riots broke out in Cairo, Egypt at the end of last week.  President Mubarak dissolved the government.  Calls for his resignation and immediate transition to democracy persist.  Yemen, Algeria, Tunisia, and Egypt have all experienced similar unrest over floundering economies, failing labor, nepotism, and human rights abuses.  The copy cat effect of successive protests might mousetrap its way down to a deeper democracy than any of our diplomacy or war could entice.  Egypt, more than any of the others before it poses the greatest international uncertainty, considering its size, diverse population, and central place in Middle East politics.  Whatever replaces the present regime, if at all, there is no guarantee that it will be any sort of improvement.

My regards and gratitude to last week’s gPoet, Wonder Brown, who ushered in a banner day, in terms of traffic, last Thursday.  He will be back.

Performed by ipoet.  Music produced by pumpkinFoot.

Today’s mummified audio here:

Dominoin' ('till all of dem go)

01/27/11

A Surprise Delayed: Guest Poetry

What I eluded to last Friday.

It is my privilege to introduce a writer that doesn’t need any introduction . . . Wonder Brown.  A member of the Scribbling Idiots and a poet in the most literal sense of the idea, I’m so thankful to have him.  It’s been my plan and hope to have guest contributors, and I couldn’t have thought of anyone more perfect to be the first.

His song is exactly what this site is about.  Bringing to life contemporary stories that you would hesitate to tackle on a record or that would have faded in relevance by any release of the same.  Enjoy and show him your love.

In his words:

I take so many things for granted, yet still find it difficult to manage, at times, the motivation to get off my keester and hit the gym — and I go to a university where the facilities are vast, and free from the grant monies they take, errr, I give them.  When someone dies, sadly enough, nine times out of ten, even if it’s a headline, I’m not paying attention.  For some reason, something sparked my eye; and I’m glad it did.  Click the headline link on Yahoo! Newsfeed.  Start reading.  96 years is a long time — my grandmother just died at 88 — but, man, this guy looked healthy.  And, Jack LaLane was no ordinary man.  Addicted to sugars as a kid, he ended up going to a speech on fitness where the speaker called him out, and told him his diet was “garbage.”  Maybe for some children such a thing would have been a waste of breath, but for Jack, it was a wake up call, and he answered.  Thanks to Jack, fitness became a national/international calling, as Jack raised awareness with his countless efforts and remarkable feats, creating machines we now use today in fitness centers, shows on television, and diet advice that today seems commonplace.  Thanks for not taking a day for granted, Jack; thanks for caring.

– Wonder Brown

Performed by Wonder Brown.  Music produced by, no reprieve, . . . pumpkinFoot.

Today’s lat pull-down audio here:

Jack

01/26/11

A State of our Union Special: The Kid from Scranton Fist Pump

The ipoet is here.  The reason this site exists.    To rap the news stories that make the average man’s nose bleed.   After a fairly long day at work and then roller skating with my boy (” . . . it’s a Saturday, a Saturday . . .”) and then cleaning my room and making three lunches and preparing small business tax returns, I sat down to studiously watch the State of the Union because I knew you couldn’t.   (Or maybe wouldn’t because it’s so revolting).  Either way, I wasn’t going to let you down.  The event is too essential to your daily lives and too rich in unintentional comedy to ignore.  (Last time I blogged about a State of the Union, I was convinced I saw Gary Coleman.)  For all the constitutional tradition’s ridiculousness, and it runs deep, President Obama brought the affair to a genuinely nice crescendo.  We Do Big Things.

So please pay very close attention to today’s blong hit.  The fate of your day might very well hang in the balance.

Themes include Speaker Boehner’s propensity to cry and other extremely important policy issues.

Performed by ipoet.  Music produced by . . . (drum roll) . . . you guessed it, pumpkinFoot!!

Today’s bonus audio here:

We Do Big Things

01/24/11

Worse. Worser. Worst.

I was traveling again yesterday and scrambled late to make this happen.  Take it easy on me.

As a tribute to Keith Olbermann’s departure from MSNBC on Friday, I thought I would do a “Worst Person in the World” segment, the recurring feature on Olbermann’s show, which identified three individuals of increasing worseness (Worse, Worser, and Worst), in Olbermann’s estimation.  As you might suspect, through the years, Palin, Bush, Beck, and Cheney rotated for top honors.

Although apparently he did a couple of times, neglecting to find the worst in yourself for a windfall of finding the worst in others, while entertaining television, is to forget the human condition common to us all.  That is — to generally be pretty worst.  Only Oprah, Extreme Home Makeover, and CNN Heroes have been able to sell the “best” in people at some profitability (and ridiculousness).  But it can be done by others, I know.  Maybe Olbermann can genuinely, as opposed to sardonically, do a Best Person in the World segment on his return to the 2:00 a.m. Sports Center time slot.  Very high profile.

For today’s entry, I have identified the terrorists responsible for the bombing of the Moscow airport as the “Worst Persons in the World” today, all the while feigning to acknowledge I’m pretty bad too.  I don’t think it worked so well.  But you get the point.  There is probably a hormones difference between me and Dahmer.  Of that I’ve long been convinced.

Themes include belligerent use of a teleprompter to accuse and mock admittedly wicked events.

Performed by ipoet.  Music by pumpkinFoot.

Today’s bitter audio here:

A Terminal Seat (High Alert Pt. 2)

Refresh your recollection with High Alert Pt. 1 here.

01/24/11

A View

From the ipoet’s taxi cab.  Spent the weekend in NYC with some good friends.  Couldn’t get an Olbermann song done.  Hopefully tomorrow.

01/20/11

.406

That’s what Ted Williams hit in 1941, the last time someone hit over .400 in Major League Baseball.  Ted Williams is also the name of the recently discovered homeless man with the golden radio voice, subsequently celebritized and made numerous job offers, including with the Cleveland Cavaliers.  Days into his foisted upon fame, he had an altercation with his family and voluntarily entered rehab for substance abuse.   Some would treat the events as a cautionary tale that charity seldom goes unpunished and that such opportunities are wasted upon vagrants.   But life, like baseball, is a game of failures.  A player that fails at the plate 70% of the time is an all-star.  If you fail 60%, you are immortalized, like Teddy Ballgame.  So when a man comes off the streets, and he has a little trouble, he should just get back up.  And, we should understand.

Thanks to the Twitter contest winners who provided inspiration for this Frankenstein monster of a song.

@paradoxhiphop – Ted Williams

@cj_appa – Jubilee Project

@stephenmaddox1 – Gardena High Shooting

@DwainlBe – Regis Philbin Retiring

@mikey_dooks – Woolly Mammoth cloning project

This cooperative concept is a work in progress.  I’ll get it figured out.  I think I might solicit actual lines next time.  Thanks for participating and for following.

Not as an excuse but just as a reminder, these songs are being produced under extraordinary time pressure and life constraints.  Where they are failing in substance, I hope they are succeeding in spirit.

Performed by ipoet.  Music produced by pumpkinFoot.

Today’s delayed-steal audio here:

Teddy Ballgame

01/18/11

Twitter Topic Contest

Okay, my homeboy paradox, in begging me to rap about the homeless man with the “golden voice,” — recently discovered, offered a job with the Cavs, and then sent to rehab — gave me a great idea.  For this week’s Thursday song, I’m going to take requests.  So hit me @ipoetlaureate on Twitter or at my Facebook page and let me know what current event, news story, sporting outcome, celebrity debacle, or Act of God you want me to cover.

Here are the rules:

* the topic/event has to have occurred within the last 7 days

* cannot have been a topic/event already covered by this site in a song

* must be submitted by 10:00 am Eastern Standard Time, Wednesday, January 19, 2011

* everything else goes

I’m not sure how I’m going to select the winners.  My original idea was to choose my five favorites, drop them in a flat-bill New Era, and pull one out.  I also may just do one colossal mashup.  We’ll see.  The point is we’re in this together!  How often do you get to request a song about something and have it written?  Never, right?

I guess the polite gesture would be to honor paradox’s contribution by simply covering his topic.  But that would not drive as much traffic to my Twitter and Facebook accounts as I’m banking this contest will and paradox would lose time (black out) if I did anything nice for him.  I have a rep to maintain.

I like the idea so much that we’ll do it periodically.  I love rapping about the news.  Thus, this site.  But to rap about the news/events that people want to hear seems even more satisfying.  You guys also might totally screw this up and have me rapping about Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban’s new baby.  No pressure.  Just the weight of the future of rap news everywhere is in your hands.  Get to poking and tweeting.

Something about that last line was off.

New shoes on MLK, courtesy of the local Plato’s Closet.

01/17/11

MLK

To me there seemed this perfect confluence of events between the uprising in Tunisia and our commemoration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.  Dr. King led a march on Washington for jobs and freedom.  The people of Tunisia have awoken their collective senses over exactly the same.

Both civil rights movements have their martyr.  In King, himself, most notably and in Mohammed Bouazizi, the Tunisian vegetable vendor, harassed by the police for likely selling wares without permit, who lit himself on fire in protest.  That is not to imply equivalence.  King’s sacrifice and contribution are of an entirely different order.

This song also speaks to racial misperceptions that endure in subtler ways even today and the rising danger of wage and status disparities.

Performed by ipoet.  Music produced by pumpkinFoot.

Today’s audio here:

Worst Street in Every City

01/13/11

How Can We Sleep?

Horrific flash flooding in Brisbane, the capital of Queensland, Australia.  The river has risen above its banks to an extent not seen since 1974.  It is anticipated that as many as 20,000 homes might be destroyed.

I have family in Western Australia.  Perth, specifically.  They are nowhere near the disaster.  But for them and the tragedy of it all, my attention has been drawn.   There is also a pretty vibrant hip hop community down under as well.

Performed by ipoet.  Music produced by pumpkinFoot.

Today’s audio here:

Beds Submerging

P.S.  My ds5 homeboy, Playdough, recorded an EP in Australia, Goodonya, which can be purchased here.