The Glorious and The Dubious

Getting Paid is Glorious.

GLORIOUS:

Will.I.Am. 

Will.I.Am?  The producer for the infamous and highly dubious Black Eyed Peas?  "My lovely lady lumps"?  "Let's get retarded in here"?  Fergie?  The very same.  While I may still have the cassette dub of the first Black Eyed Peas CD sitting around somewhere(a CD that I copied from Herschel back in 1998, back when he was still schooling me about rap music) , I haven't had much use for that specific cassette, or the Black Eyed Peas generally for at least five years.  (I don't mind their cover/re-do of "where is the love" but that is more of a credit to the original than it is to the BEP.) 

So if I don't have much use for the Black Eyed Peas, why is Will.I.Am glorious? Well, it has nothing to do with his six grammy nominations (nominations that he probably deserves to win).  Instead, it has to do with Justin Timberlake (the former mouseketeer that, among other accomplishments, ripped half of Janet Jackson's bra off at the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show).

And rap producer, sample-based musician, and vinyl legend DJ Shadow. 

And soul recordings that were made at 780 Oakland Park Avenue in Columbus, Ohio by the long-overlooked saxophonist J.C. Davis in May 1969. 

Let me explain.

In 2005, DJ Shadow, a.k.a. Josh Davis (no known relation to J.C.), re-issued the complete recordings that J.C. Davis made at Mus-I-Col records in Columbus, Ohio in May 1969 on Cali-Tex Records, his personal reissue label (with great sleeve design by very talented graphic designer, musician, and breakdancer David Castillo - hi Dave).

Being a fan of soul music and DJ Shadow, this record hit my radar screen like a rocket.  Great funky soul music that I would have next to no chance of hearing absent this reissue.  I was just listening to the record again the other night, and like a lazy so-and-so, I left it sitting on the turntable instead of returning it to its home between The Daktaris - Soul Explosion (Desco 1999) and Debarges - Debarges (Gordy 1980) on the soul shelf. 

When I got home from work today, Side A of the J.C. Davis record was unexpectedly playing in my record room.  I theorized that my daughter probably crawled into the record room (which to her is semi-offlimits, especially in its current state of chaos) and asked to hear some "Moo-nee" (music), so the missus pressed play on the turntable, starting the J.C. Davis that had been sitting there on the platter.  But when the missus asked about the record, I knew something was up.  "It's J.C. Davis, why?" 

"The first song on there is sampled on the Justin Timberlake record." 

What?  "Yeah, it's blatantly sampled on 'Damn Girl.'"  I whisked myself off to wikipedia, which dutifully reports that J.C. Davis' "A New Day (is here at last)" is sampled on the Justin Timberlake song "Damn Girl."  (Further proof that the missus is not to be trifled with when it comes to all things Timberlake - "Damn Girl!".)  The authors of "Damn Girl" are listed as J. Timberlake (who I expect wrote the deep lyrics), W. Adams (a.k.a. Will.I.Am) and J.C. Davis. 

Now Will.I.Am is a very serious record collector.  He's got dozens of records that you've never heard that have been haunting you in your dreams.  So the sources available to him for sampling are second-to-none.

Will.I.Am is also a really good producer.  He is the reason that every Black Eyed Peas record has at least three songs that get played to death on the radio, songs that you wish were not stuck in your head.  The man has talent with beats...and hooks.  This has put him in a position to make tracks for artists who will sell millions of records.  Artists like Justin Timberlake.  This makes him powerful. 

In the case of "Damn Girl," I bet that Will.I.Am deliberately chose the J.C. Davis song precisely so that J.C. Davis, who until the Cali-Tex reissue was a largely talented but forgotten soul musician, would make some money.  I have it on good authority that Will.I.Am. deliberately included a sample from the infamous Stark Reality Discovers Hoagy Carmichael's Music Shop record so that Monty Stark, a hell of a cool dude, could make some royalty cheddar.  However dubious you find the Black Eyed Peas to be, making money for well-deserving and overlooked musicians through careful sample selection is glorious.  Good for you, Will.I.Am.  Win that grammy!  (God knows J.C. Davis isn't gonna win one.)

Compare:

Damn Girl (9.8 MB) with A New Day (3.2 MB)

Dubious:

BLACK EYED PEAS. 

No matter how dope Will.I.Am is, the Black Eyed Peas remain dubious.  Let's get retarded in here.

-ALEXANDER

"Now We Must Kind of Redistribute the Pain."

GLORIOUS

1. Robert Sengstacke Abbott (1870-1940)
 
As a student of American culture generally, and black American history specifically, I felt fairly confident in my base knowledge of most of the monumental figures in black history.  Yet somehow, I only learned of Robert Abbott earlier this week.  Robert Abbott learned printmaking at Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Virginia.  Later, in 1898, he earned a J.D. at Chicago-Kent Law School (one of the earliest law schools to accept non-white applicants).  After his law practices in Gary, Indiana; Topeka, Kansas; and Chicago succumbed to discrimination, a local black lawyer advised Abbott that he was "a little too dark to make any impression on the court in Chicago." Doubtless frustrated, but undeterred, Abbott invested a quarter in some print paper, got a loan to start printmaking, and on May 5, 1905, published the first issue of The Chicago Defender, "The World's Greatest News Weekly."

The Defender was a sensation.  Abbott's vision was to provide a mouthpiece and an outlet for black Americans, as they struggled against lynching, terrorism, segregation, and other manifestations of white supremacy. He wrote in an editorial:  When the white fiends come to your door, shoot them down, when the mob comes, you must take at least one with you. DAMN RIGHT.   

Within 10 years, the Defender reached a broad regional and national audience.  Abbott utilized unofficial channels of distribution to be sure that his audience included those African-Americans that were most frequently terrorized by white supremacists in the deep south.  Recognizing that copies of the Defender would be confiscated and destroyed upon arrival in southern cities, Abbott pressed the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters into service as newspaper carriers.  Rather than unload the papers at designated train stops, the porters would throw bundles of the Defender from the train several miles away from the nearest station, where it would be read and shared widely among black folks in the South.  For his efforts, Abbott became a millionaire. 

Students of American history will recall that starting in about 1915, black Americans migrated northward to escape both terrorism and tough economic times wrought by the boll weevil (to whom there is a monument in Dothan, Alabama, for without the boll weevil, Dothan would not have become the peanut capitol of the universe; strange things happen in Dothan, AL, right Geoff?).  Well, a huge number of those migrants (like the family shown above) headed for Chicago  between 1915 and 1918, largely on the basis of information and opportunities the Defender described.

From its founding in 1905 through to today, the Defender brings news of specific interest to a black audience, and it still "brings its A-game." Although the newspaper is a shadow of its former self, that is more of a reflection on the fragmentation of the media today than any shortcomings of the newspaper or its founder.  Robert Sengstacke Abbott founded a newspaper that literally changed the demographic face of the nation, dedicated it to the cause of truth and social justice, and made a million in the process.  That is glorious.

2. Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).
We don't have cable television in our household.  Our artfully hidden rabbit ears give us six channels: PBS (6), NBC (8), CBS (13), ABC (17), Crazy-Religious-community-access-channel-that-sometimes-shows-weird-movies (26), and FOX (38).  Every time I have to fold laundry, I turn on PBS.  And every time I turn on PBS, I'm delighted that I did.  Whether it's a crazy musical program about a sing-along on a town square in the Netherlands, complete with a running carillonneur (the carillon is a bell instrument that is usually housed in a church tower; I learned of it from my friend Tim's aunt, who plays (or used to play) this one every Friday)  or a terrific documentary film about the black press ("Soldiers Without Swords") (which as you may have guessed from the above aired earlier this week on my local affiliate), PBS never fails to entertain and inform me.  This is what my media looks like.  Our airwaves.  Our media.  Glorious.

3. Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Dr. King is in the news a lot this week, as he is every year around his birthday.  The above mugshot was snapped in Montgomery, Alabama during certainly the most well-known, if not the most successful, bus boycott in U.S. history.  Years later, after he was murdered, some Alabama police officer added the graffiti to the picture in the mug shot book, and then the book was left for dust.  Years later still, someone unearthed the book, and the picture of the first time that Dr. King went to jail.  At least the first time I know about.  Dr. King did nothing wrong in the usual sense of the word, but he broke the (racist) law and went to jail.  This makes him a criminal.

We don't hear about Dr. King the criminal, because we are ashamed and we try to forget that we criminalized him.  But that is what this country did and continues to do to people who stand up and fight for unpopular causes.  People who struggle against the wage or the cage, people who believe in the righteousness and necessity of a brighter, better, fairer, safer day, a day when this nation will, to quote the dream speech, "live out the true meaning of its creed." Those type of people go to jail.  Eugene Debs.  Fred Hampton.  Angela Davis.  Emma Goldman.  Martin Luther King, Jr.

We hear a lot about Dr. King's dream, but very little about his vision.  And even less about the garbagemen.  The ones he went to Memphis to support in April 1968.  These ones:

In his final address to these striking garbage workers, Dr. King was very concrete and specific with the direct action that he was encouraging:

We are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk. Tell them not to buy -- what is the other bread? -- Wonder Bread. And what is the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy Hart's bread. As Jesse Jackson has said, up to now, only the garbage men have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute the pain.

In the typical lionizing address that you will hear this week, you won't hear much about how Dr. King wanted to "redistribute the pain."  But this is where the man was from about 1965 until his murder in 1968.  He was fighting for poor people's rights, rights to be employed, rights to be supported by their local banks, rights to have affordable and safe housing.  This kind of talk can get a man arrested or killed, especially a man who people might decide is right.  A man like Dr. King.  The police in Memphis (shown below) were ready to beat the strikers into submission. 

When Dr. King addressed the garbagemen in Memphis the night before his murder (full text of his speech is available here), he spoke to them about redistributing the pain of economic hardship through an effective and coordinated economic boycott.  He spoke to them about the need to remain dedicated to the struggle for freedom and economic equality, no matter what types of obstacles are thrown into their way.  He spoke to them about how glad he was that he wasn't killed by that crazy woman who stabbed him in Harlem at the booksigning.  And he spoke to them about the recent threats that were made against his life.  Threats "from some of our sick white brothers."  And then he gave the most moving conclusion to an address I have ever heard.  Thanks to the wonders of YouTube, I bring you the bone chilling, prophetic ending of Dr. King's final public address.

4. New Orleans Saints playing for the NFC Championship. 

The suffering denizens of N.O. can use something to cheer about these days.  I'm not one to think that sports can ever change the world for anyone other than a very lucky and talented few star athletes (whose multimillion dollar salaries are probably unjustified but nevertheless do change things for their immediate families), but I believe in the escapist power of sports fandom.  If the Saints kick the ass of the Bears and go on to win the Super Bowl, for at least a few minutes, some very embattled folks might be able to escape the misery of their surroundings and just feel good.  With the Seahawks out of the way (thanks, in part, to typically bad Mike Holmgren playcalling), I have no obstacle to rooting for the Saints to win the Super Bowl.  King Cake at my house on February 4. Prince at halftime!

5. Oregon Ducks Basketball 16-1.

This is Aaron Brooks shooting the game winning shot against the Number 8 ranked Arizona Wildcats.  There were two seconds to play.  The game was tied.  We were playing at Arizona.  Did I mention they were ranked eighth in the country?  It went in.

With this victory, the little ducklings have now cracked the top ten in both the AP Poll and the coach's poll.  Someone at ESPN said they could be a number 4 seed in the tournament, predicting an improbable matchup against Oral Roberts (who did defeat Kansas earlier this season) in the first round of the West Regional in Spokane. 

This Duck basketball squad is better than the one led by current NBA players Luke Jackson, Luke Ridnour, and Fred Jones.  And that team reached the elite 8.  I love the Ducks. 

And maybe, just maybe this team stands a chance to not just get to the tournament, but win a game, maybe even two?  Ernie Kent, an Oregon alum, has proven he can lead the team to tournament success in the past.  Can he do it again?  My magic 8 ball says my god I hope so!

6.  SATURDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2007.

The day we have all been waiting for.

DUBIOUS - The dubious need little explanation this week.

1. The Tyranny of Tolerance: A sitting judge breaks silence to expose the liberal judicial assault by Robert Dierker, trial judge in St. Louis, MO.  GIVE ME A SMALL BREAK.

2. MLK Blvd. 

Dr. King's dream has an address, and it sells "Pimp Oil."  MLK Blvd, Chattanooga, TN. 

This is one of many MLK Boulevards (and why does he always get a blvd instead of an avenue or a street?) across the country, usually in poor, segregated neighborhoods.

Can't we do better?

3. Rep. Frank Silvey, R-Clay County, Missouri House of Representatives.

B.A. Interpretive Speech.

Bob Jones University. 

Class of 1998.

Yes, that Bob Jones University.

4. The Surge. 

The only people that this makes sense to are the troops that are already in harm's way, who will no doubt welcome the support.  As a general policy, it's tantamount to trying to fill a sieve by adding more water.  The more you add, the more you lose, though in this sieve it's lives, not water, that we lose.  Sad.

5. iPhone. 

I want a phone that works at a very high level, which to me means that I can dial easily by touch, scroll easily through my contacts, and above all hear what the other person is saying dammit.  I want a camera that takes effective and excellent pictures, especially in low light; a camera whose lens is in my hand while I'm talking to someone on the phone will not do that.  I want a portable music player that will not ring when my phone rings, through which I can have an unmediated listening experience (but I listen to records usually).  Basically, I want each of the components of the iPhone, but I emphatically do NOT want them all in the same "convergent device."  Am I alone?

- ALEXANDER.

That Girl Is Poison

Ruby Payne.  Dubious.  This is not debatable.  The sad thing is that the supremeness of her evilness, which pollutes the world of teacher and administrator "professional development" like the mining of U238 pollutes the soil and water of Native land, has been lost on the institutional field of education.  Those in Ed Schools seem oblivious to the nefariousness of her work.

Payne, for those of you not yet in the know, runs a for-profit company, aha! Process Inc, which claims as its mission “to positively impact the education and lives of those in poverty around the world.”  It supports this mission by selling racist and classist culture of poverty crap to a range of should-know-better organizations, such as the National Association of Elementary School Principals, which I just today learned recently mailed a copy of Payne’s latest book to all of its members.  A very sweet gesture, I must say.  Quite simply put, if you are a teacher or administrator and have attended a professional development session at some point in the last few years, the odds are pretty damn high that you have probably had to sit through a presentation on Paynes’ dubious Framework for Understanding Poverty.

For a less polemic, highly articulate, quite accessible, and pleasantly substantive critique of Payne, please see this recent article written by Paul Gorski and published in the Winter 2006-2007 issue of Rethinking Schools. I encourage all of you to pass Gorski' article along to any educator within your reach.  The proliferation and acceptance of Payne’s shite must end!

-Herschel

Ducks Beat Bruins!

Oregon 68
UCLA 66

Most definitely glorious!

-Herschel

CLEAR BLUE SKIES

In the past week, I spent several hours in the car with Herschel (f/k/a I.G.), driving to record stores, urban centers, barbecue joints, state capitols, university campuses, and, sadly, airports to send him back to the Glorious Pacific Northwest (on the Dubious Frontier Airlines). While he was here, he commented almost every day on how wonderful it was to see the sun shining in the clear blue skies. As we drove around, we listened to music from a rap CD education wallet I assembled to introduce him to everything he has overlooked in rap music since Mobb Deep's The Infamous (Loud) came out in 1995. One of the discs in the wallet was the Juggaknots Re:Release (dubious colon is theirs, not mine), but with straight classics like T-Love's Return of the B-Girl (Pickininny 1999), Jay-Z's Black Album (Roc-a-Fella 2003), and Cyne's Time Being (P-Vine Japan/Botanica del Jibaro 2003) to listen to (along with music representative of the other genres of music that we love – soul (Syl Johnson Is it because I'm black (Twinight 1970)), funk (Dante Carfagna's Chains and Black Exhaust compilation (Memphix/Jones 2002)), and rock n roll (The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls in America (Vagrant 2006))), we never got around to it.

With a two hour drive ahead, I was geared up to give the Juggaknots a second chance. As anyone knows, the best place to give a CD a second chance is in the car, alone, driving on the interstate. Focusing on the music takes your mind off the three worst things about interstate driving: how straight the damn interstate is around here, how many Wal-Marts you pass, and how far you still are from your destination.

For those who have never heard of this group, here's a little history before we get to the point. The Juggaknots released a vinyl-only EP called "Clear Blue Skies" on Bobbito Garcia's Fondle 'Em label out of New York City in 1996. This nine-song record was the start up indie label's second release. It was greeted with critical praise, but once its initial, very limited pressing was gone, it was GWTW. For years, the record was nigh impossible to come by, leading to some significant bootlegging. At the time of its initial release, I was busy mining for indie rock blood diamonds (Elliott Smith and Pete Krebs' split seven inch anyone?), putting me badly out of touch with the goings on in the rap scene.

In 2003, Third Earth music put an end to the whispers, bootlegs, and rumors, and reissued the EP. The Re:Release includes several new tracks and remixes of some of the original tracks, expanding the nine song EP into a full 20 track CD/LP. I got it when it came out, but despite the hype (or maybe because of it – expectations unmet can be a drag) I didn't much care for it on a casual listen. The production and the lyrics are smart, but kind of haphazard. Despite some nice moments ("Loosifa" and "Trouble Man" are both pretty good), it was just kind of forgettable. It gathered dust for at least 18 months before I put it into Herschel's rap education wallet.

As I was driving along, the record was reminding me why I didn't like it. Loose raps over layered beats and loops, some nice moments, but overall, no classic. Fortunately, the moon was coming up large and orange at about 10:00 on the horizon. This gave me something else to focus on, since the music was not really doing it.

And then I got to track 20, the final song on the record, the original version of "Clear Blue Skies" from the EP. I was transfixed.

The first thing that grabs me about the song is the loop. It's a nice slow soul groove that has been unofficially credited to The Meters, but on the first beat- or really just slightly off the first beat- there is this "ha ha". This combination renders the loop soothing and attention grabbing – a rare feat in a four beat loop.

When the lyrics kick in, the "ha ha" drops out and a conversation unfolds over the loop between a father and son, both white, about the son's black girlfriend and his mixed race daughter. In the first verse, the father demands to know whether his son is dating the black woman he was seen "hand-to-hand walking" with on the block. When the son admits it, the father flips out, spits some racist bile, and tells his son that the girlfriend has "got to be a goner." We get the "ha ha" back for the chorus, and then the fight continues in the second verse. With his son scratching under the surface of his bigotry, the father just unleashes it all – from how his property values are ruined when the neighborhood goes past the tipping point into a shocking litany of racist stereotypes about African-Americans… ALL IN PERFECT TIME AND RHYME. The son rejects the father's "vision of perfection/that's your clear blue skies through those clear blue eyes."

Our friends at Groundlift Magazine interviewed the Juggaknots on the occasion of their second album's release earlier this year. Breeze Brewin, the MC who voices both the father and the son (in an inspired moment of analog production genius, he recorded the father's voice to tape running at a higher speed and then slowed it down to regular speed to make it sound lower than the son's voice, but because its him doing both, the two voices sound similar in a very real father-son way), had this to say about the song:

What inspired "Clear Blue Skies"? Was it challenging to write from the perspective of a white father and his son?

Breeze Brewin:It ain't nothing that literary license shouldn't lend itself to. I think it get's the kind of response that it gets because of the timing. It recognized the shift in the fan base, but deeper. It went beyond music. You had two white cultures: One that was trying to preserve the "glory days" and another that was becoming part of a more diversified community. It was never obviously stated that the son was a hip-hop head, but it's implied. I think that it works because it respects both perspectives. Initially, the thought was not that organized, if anything it was more organic. All we knew was there were real, existing people on both sides of the argument. Why not combine and force that conflict?

Forcing that conflict is what we're all about here at The Glorious and The Dubious.

After listening to "Clear Blue Skies" at least five times in a row, I listened to the whole album again, filled with new hope about the hidden genius that I surely must have missed in the other 19 tracks. Unfortunately, most of the rest of the album was still not that great, but my god, "Clear Blue Skies" is Glorious.

Here it is: ClearBlueSkies (7.4MB)

Now I understand that there is some legal DRAMA about the song and the sample that it uses, which is why it appears as a "hidden" track on the album. From a legal perspective, it shouldn't much matter if a track is "hidden" or not - if the sample is uncleared, its uncleared, and folks are taking a risk. I suppose its less of a risk when the track is "hidden", but in the digital age, where iTunes teams up with Gracenote's CDDB to show you even the squirrely track list of the rare psych/funk songs on Chains and Black Exhaust, a track doesn't stay hidden for long. When asked about this legal drama, they took a page out of Dave Chapelle's congressional testimony:

According to allmusic.com, the remix of the song is unlisted on the album for legal reasons? Can you elaborate on that? I understand if that's a touchy subject…

Breeze Brewin: Uhhhm

B-Slim: I plead the 5th

The Fifth Amendment's Right to Remain Silent is Glorious.

Close your eyes and listen to the clear blue skies. 

-Alexander (f/k/a J.R.)

P.S. GLORIOUS: Chuck E's in Love. DUBIOUS: The rest of Rickie Lee Jones - Rickie Lee Jones (Warner Bros 1979).

An Introduction

Our mission is to sustain a discussion on the glorious and dubious aspects of contemporary American life.  The glorious include records, books, sports, academics, and politics.  Of course, all of those things are also among the dubious.  The devil, as they say, is in the details.  If you think that the dubious are glorious or that the glorious are dubious, tell us why.  And by all means, please provide a warrant for your claims.  We may attempt to do likewise. 

WHO WE ARE

I.G. is a doctoral candidate in education at a pacific northwest institution of higher learning that receives more federal R&D dollars each year than the annual operating budget of the local urban public school system ...at least 125 million dollars more.  When not thinking about why everyone in  education insists on calling what they do "critical" this or "critical" that, he spends his time romanticizing his old punk rock band The Goodie Goodies, and wondering how on earth his white (though Jewish) ass received an M.A. in Afro-American studies.

J.R. is a lawyer living at the three-way intersection of the Midwest, the south, and the Great Plains.  He currently clerks for a state court judge, and previously clerked for a federal judge. Between clerkships, J.R. worked in the trial department of a large law firm in Chicago.  Despite his misgivings, it wasn’t that bad…at first. His prior accomplishments include: representing death-sentenced inmates in Alabama, Texas, Georgia, and New York; developing a crush on Attorney General Janet Reno while working at the Justice Department; laughing his way to a juris doctorate cum laude; charting the difference between Debarge and El Debarge; and overstating the significance of the Million Man March in an honors thesis in American Cultural Studies. 

We are both from Oregon and, although neither of us live there (nor are we hippies), we both love it... perhaps because we had the good fortune to leave the state before it became renowned as white hipster paradise (though we do like some of their white hipster music).  We are unapologetic Portland Trailblazer fans, for better (1988-1992) or for worse (2002-2006).  We love vinyl, though we recognize that hip hop (which J.R. prefers to call rap) can be pretty damn sweet on cassette or CD.  And, we are of the left.

WHAT IS GLORIOUS?  WHAT IS DUBIOUS?

Although we intend to provide more in-depth commentary in this space, we will begin with a list. 

THE GLORIOUS

Ella Baker
Blue Note Records
Boise State Broncos, 2007 Fiesta Bowl Champions
The Clash
Eugene Debs
Gator Bait
March Madness
Miller's Crossing
New York Pizza
Oregon Ducks
Portland Trailblazers
Public Enemy
Otis Redding
Utopian visions

THE DUBIOUS

Chiefs Wahoo and Illiniwek
Boston Celtics, Pops, and Red Sox
The Dave Matthews Band
DC Talk
Death Penalty
The Democratic Leadership Council
All college and university sports teams in the state of Florida (with 
the possible exception of HBCUs)
Hipsters
"Informer" by Snow
Lima Beans
Neo-liberalism
No Child Left Behind
Poetic Justice
White Supremacy

We are glorious. 

We are dubious.

                -J.R. & I.G.