Grindin'

Well, I've not had the most productive working week since my arrival. In the next three days I have an essay, an individual programme plan, and mountain of reading to do. And my rather relaxed approach to the first part of this week is catching up with me like a hare would with a tortoise.

Of course, my social life hasn't suffered! This evening (Thurs, 25 Sep) I attended a live music event at the University of Maryland, hosted by the SEE. Get this: Clipse, Wale, Consequence and Southeast Slim at the Grand Ballroom, Stamp Student Union. Not a bad bill for a $7 entry fee.

I must say up front that I wasn't into Southeast Slim, a local rapper from DC's (you guessed it) southeast area. Slim ran through about five songs, all of which documented either how (1) adept he is on the microphone skills, (2) big his "future" (manhood is, or (3) skilful he is with the hoes (excuse me, honeys). Derivative. Trite. Offensively unoriginal.

I felt a bit sorry for Consequence. He's put out a couple of mixtapes. And he's promoting a new album. But he'll for always be in/famous for being a guest on Kanye West's 'Spaceship' and contributing to the train wreck that was A Tribe Called Quest's fall-off album, "Beats, Rhymes & Life". He performed a solid set of songs, except no one in the audience knew them. And the response in general was mute.

Thankfully the arrival of rapper Wale and the go-go band UCB on stand breathed new life into somewhat deflated proceedings. This was my first taste of his Wale's brand of music, and I was impressed with his marriage of hip-hop rhymes and go-go rhythms. He dished up several of his most popular tunes and had the crowd eating out of his hands.

But if Wale was the hometown (technically he is from DC, not College Park, MD, but anyway) hero, Clipse were the stars of the night. They've only released two official albums ( plus three mixtapes), but their catalogue is DEEP. 'Momma I'm So Sorry', 'We Got It For Cheap', 'What Happened To That Boy', 'Grindin'', 'Mr Me Too'. Phew, I could go on...


And they performed with an energy not always evident on their records - which is not to say they're complacent; I was just surprised at how well their songs translated in a live context.

By the way, I am aware that I may be criticised for my praise of the Clipse. And I have to admit that their crack-obsessed lyrics are a guilty pleasure. I just rationalise it all by claiming that their brand of crack music is really a sophisticated critique of capitalism. Brilliance or bullshit? You decide.

Get a sample here for cheap.

* Photographs will be uploaded when it's not 12:15am after a long day at the office.

The Mighty Mos Def

Last evening Mos Def and his band, the Amino Alkaline Orchestra, rocked the house at the concert hall of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The Mos Def I remember from the 90s was 100% B-Boy, but the man who turned up at KC was a very different performer.

Backed by a 22-piece orchestra (including a horn section, strings and a DJ on the ones and twos), this clearly was not an ordinary hip-hop gig. For one, it was at the Kennedy Center, typically associated with the high arts (ballets, classical recitals etc). But there also was a lot more going on in this performance than usually meets the ear at live hip-hop gigs.

Instead of dipping into his back catalogue, Mos and the band ran through a rich mix of new originals and evocative reworkings of hip-hop, R&B, jazz and funk classics. Notable performances included Ghostface Killah's 'Mighty Healthy', BBD's 'Poison' and Slum Village's 'Fall In Love'. Another highlight was Mos Def's Star-Spangled-Banner-turned-anti-war anthem set to a DC go-go backing beat. But the goosebumps moment of the night was when Mos Def asked to see the president of America, and an image of Barack Obama was projected onto the big screen behind the band. Mos urged the audience to vote for change; to cast a vote that would improve the plight of Americans. "Stakes is high," he screamed and launched into a rendition of the De La Soul classic. I was moved (almost to tears).

There were some other important statements: tributes to the late Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes ('Walk On By'), a sophisticated critique of the medical and pharmaceutical industries ('Beep') and an indictment of the poverty of broadcasting ('Black Radio').

The show's only real flaw was that in the first half Mos Def's voice seemed to get lost in the mix of an orchestra that was fully (and unnecessarily) mic'd. This made it hard to grasp some of the intricate vocal word play. To the sound engineer's credit, this seemed to be rectified during the intermission.

I came away from the experience feeling edified, entertained but also challenged (both musically and intellectually) by the performance. And my initial scepticism about the appropriateness of a 'popular' artist performing in an 'elite' venue evaporated when, at the tail-end of the show, Mos Def jumped off stage and ran up and down the aisles to slap hands with members of the audience, transforming the space of the Kennedy Center into a more intimate meeting between artist, audience and Black art.

Falling Water

Well, just over an hour ago the other Humphrey fellows and I returned from our weekend outing to Connellsville and Mill Run in Pennsylvania. This was my first trip into "the sticks" (or a countryside area) in the US.

Aside from our drivers habitually getting us lost, it was a thoroughly enjoyable weekend. There was the promise of white-water rafting, but I'm rather glad that it ended up being a more gentler one and a half hour canoeing experience on the Youghiogheny River. The raft I assisted in steering was first to shore. However another group of fellows was not so lucky, getting carried away by the current and needing some rapid rescue to avoid going over the edge of a waterfall further downstream (no pictures I'm afraid)!

Friday evening ended with a rather raucous supper at the best (only?) restaurant in the area, called River's Edge. The adrenaline rush combined with good food and a healthy supply of alcohol made for rather irreverent proceedings. It also convinced me of the quality of South Western Australian wine. I had an absolutely delicious Shiraz to go with my steak.

After supper some of the men fellows decided to extend the evening and dabble in some poker. Thankfully we played only for plastic chips, because I lost everything in the end.

The highlight of the weekend, however, was our Saturday morning visit to Falling Water in Mill Run, PA. Falling Water is a house built in the mid-1930s by the brilliant American architect Frank Lloyd Wright for the affluent Kaufmann family of Pittsburgh, PA. My experience of the house is still sinking in, but I can attest to its quite magnificent integration of nature and construction. In architectural communities, I understand, this is held up as possibly the most stunningly designed (once) private home in the world.

And with that, I am going to sign off. I've certainly had a most satisfying weekend so far.

Tomorrow night I'm going to see Mos Def and his live band perform at the Kennedy Center in D.C. I realise that Mos Def has spent more time honing his skills in front of the camera rather than his microphone techniques, but I'm holding out hope that there I'll catch some glimpses of the MC who released hardcore B-Boy anthems in the late 90s.

Other Jolly Good Fellows

The University of Maryland webpage dedicated to this year's crop of Humphrey Fellows has finally gone live. Should you be desperate to see the kind of company I've been keeping (and I know you are), please go to this link.

We truly are "people of the world", as my friend Luisa Fernanda likes to say...

Who's a journalist?

So, this is something that I need to get off my chest.

At some point in my correspondence with the >IIE, the organisation which manages the Humphrey programme, I indicated an interest in Hip-Hop culture and popular culture more generally.

Since then, I have become type-cast as the "Hip-Hop guy". And certainly, while Hip-Hop is both a research interest but also central to how I self-identify, it has led to my being separated from the 'journalists' in the group of fellows at the University of Maryland.

It seems to matter not that I have worked at a news desk for an international media company, that I have worked as a sports announcer in commercial radio, that I have educated journalists who have gone on to do prominent work, or that (as a result of my interest in Hip-Hop) my journalistic work continues to be published.

No, my interest in matters cultural seems to render my work of lesser importance in the grander context.

To be frank, I don't covet the title of journalist. But I am perturbed that the apartheid which separated journalists and media scholars at an institution closer to home seems also to have reared its head in the Humphrey program.

Rant over.

The Hip-Hop Guy.

The Cultural Life

Since classes started two weeks ago, my exploratory visits in the D.C. metro area have been limited to the occasional, rather than the regular. However, this past week I have managed to do a bit more than usual.

I attended the 2008 Knight-Barren Symposium and Awards for Innovations in Journalism. As a 'poor student' (TM), my main motivation was the free lunch which would be served to all in attendance, but it proved to be a thought-provoking event and display. US media companies and initiatives exhibited their innovations in new media. First prize went to Wired.com's WikiScanner coverage, but for me the most impressive was the Des Moines Register's special coverage of a tornado which wiped out a third of a town in Iowa called Parkesburg.

Also this week, the Humphrey Fellows participated in an event called the 'Ropes Challenge' at the College Park campus. The other fellows and I participated in a series of tasks (some more physically demanding than others) as we came to grips with team-building issues we might face in the future. The day ended with a pizza lunch (yay, more free food) but before that, all the fellows took a 'leap of faith': strapped in harnesses and donning hard hats, we each climbed a fifty-foot pole and then tried to jump and grab at a trapeze hung just metres away from us. If you managed to make the jump and grab a hold of the trapeze, you succeeded; if you didn't, you'd start making a rapid decent towards the ground. I didn't get anywhere near the trapeze. Fortunately seven other fellows were at the ready to hold on to the cord that would prevent my fatal fall and then let me down easily.

The highlight of this week's cultural delights, though, was getting a taste of the local D.C. music scene. Since I started getting into funk music and digging into literature on this genre, I had read about a funk off-shoot genre called Go-Go, but had little idea of what it actually sounded like. Thanks to a free gig at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, I got to see THE godfather of Go-Go, Chuck Brown, perform live. He also brought along a friend - DJ Kool, who had a hit with the anthemic 'Let Me Clear My Throat' in the mid-90s. I was part of a pretty integrated crowd which showed no shame in bustin' some moves, and I just had to join in on the action. It was the perfect way to build up a sweat on a hot, sticky September night in D.C.

Next weekend's musical entertainment will be provided by Dante Beze (bka Mos Def), who'll be performing at the Kennedy Center.

Now it's time for me to clear my throat and get my day started.

Peace y'all,
E

Missing Pablo

Today I received the news that Pa Prince passed away. Right now I cannot find the words to express how sad I feel or how much I will miss him.

(I have written and rewritten several sentences to follow up that last one, and I can't. I just can't... Nothing seems to capture how I feel.)

E

Class Is In Session

So, since my last post, a lot has happened. I sat in my first classes of the university semester. At the moment, I am auditing* two courses - an undergraduate course in radio skills (College of Journalism) and a graduate course in performance and culture (American Studies).

My rationale for taking these two courses is that I engage both my production interests in radio but also my research interests in popular culture. Whether I'll be able to manage the heavy reading load of American Studies AND the radio course remains to be seen.

In the meantime, there have been positive developments on the home front. On Thursday I moved into my apartment in Summit Hills, Silver Spring. On Friday I went shopping for essential items, and I can now report that I have a bed, a desk and an office chair. My room is even colour coordinated! My roommates, Grace (from Kenya) and Rosangela (Brazil), seem very happy to be sharing with me. And I think we'll get along just fine.

I'm hoping to have internet, cable television and a landline telephone at the end of this week. This will mean I can receive calls without heavy cost from South Africa and I can Skype to my heart's content from my apartment.

On Friday night I was invited out to a 'funk night' at a small venue in D.C.'s U Street area. I really enjoyed the rare funk tunes that were played, even though the crowd was a bit sparse. And I got to talk a lot about hip hop record collecting with my host, Paul Karatsinides. What was a little weird, however, was that the women company in our party were rather reluctant to converse with me. It was explained to me later in the evening that because I had a wedding band on my ring finger, I was considered out of bounds. And there I was thinking I could make friendly conversation...

Well, that's my life lately in a nutshell. I need to do some shopping and then get stuck in the books.

Out.

Eitan

* Taking a course for audit means that I participate in classes and related activities but I am not graded for the class. I may decide to switch from audit to credit in the performance and culture class if all goes well.