Photo via Brand X
The extensive Frank Fairfield feature previously promised here. I’ll spare the redundancy– I am a fan of Frank’s music. Let’s keep it simple for once.
LA Weekly: Frank Fairfield–”The Man Who Wasn’t There”
Download:
MP3: Frank Fairfield-”9 Pound Hammer”
MP3: Frank Fairfield-”I’ve Always Been a Rambler”
Should you be too stoned to read or outright uninterested in clicking over to LA Weekly to read my diatribe against the Los Angeles City Council and their proposed ordinance banning medical marijuana dispensaries, the above clip neatly summarizes my sentiments. I can’t really add anything here, other than reiterating a phrase once employed by the Beasties: this is some ol’ bullshit.
I have a new column at LA Weekly. It is called Hits from the Blog. It is about what you think it is about. The first installment is a woolly manifesto about what to expect in ensuing weeks, plus an interview with City Councilman, Ed Reyes, about the current state of medical marijuana in Los Angeles. Many thanks to Jeffrey Greenblatt, a.k.a. Some Dude, for giving his blessing to borrow the name from the now-defunct original, Hits from the Blog.
I promise this will only get weirder. Stay tuned while I re-load.
Download:
MP3: Cypress Hill-”Hits from the Bong”
Since sequels seem to be the operative theme of the week, I present the latest Brilliant Comrades-produced video, featuring footage shot in the course of our months-long jerkin’ odyssey (there had to have been a better way I could’ve phrased that.)
In other jerkin’ news, The Pink Dollaz have released their first music video, further consolidating their stranglehold on the title of baddest bitches since Trina. According to my sources, a major-label deal is imminent and overdue.
Download:
MP3: Pink Dollaz-”Never Hungry”
MP3: Cold Flamez-”Killin’ Music”
MP3: JINC Ent-”Doy Doy”
MP3: New Boyz ft. Tyga-”Crickets” (Left-Click)
See also: Matthew Africa’s Jerk Songs Pt. 2
Photo via Timothy Norris
I waited all week to link to my Franz Ferdinand review over at LA Weekly. The idea was to write something in response to Maura’s request that “someone write a really funny and scathing critique of [hipster] culture, so often either rooted in stereotypes that are years and years old, or so obviously written from a personal “everyone but me sucks” perspective that it becomes completely incoherent.”
Instead, a friend came in from out of town and we’re probably going to spend the next several hours smoking joints, listening to Boosie and hitting up In-N-Out Burger and Amoeba Records. You understand–when in Los Angeles, etc. The point was that Franz Ferdinand are a really good band essentially ignored by fickle bloggers and critics because they had the temerity to release an instant-classic debut and become really popular. To me, the definition of hipster has always been someone who treated life as a trend, eschewing the notion that certain art and ideas can be indelible, regardless of how contemporary morays shift. The people who can somehow say things like, “that’s so 2004.” Or as a friend so aptly put it, “the same kids who wore skateboard clothes but never skateboarded.”
While moronic major label meddling remains an inexorable part of blog culture, it’s comforting to know that my Feburary LA Weekly article about Blogger deleting posts made a minor impact. The details can be found here, but any way you look at it, it’s a small victory for the powers of complaint. Blogger, I was only joking when I said I wanted to smash every tooth in your head.
[Thanks to Rawking Refuses to Stop for the heads-up.]
Download:
MP3: The Smiths-”Bigmouth Strikes Again”
Now is the time on Passion of the Weiss vhen ve dance. In addition to my daily routine of chopping o’s, smoking lye and Optimos, and conspiring to kill hip-hop via MF Doom appreciation, for the last three months, I’ve been reporting on the jerkin’ movement that’s swept Los Angeles (no vaseline). Perhaps you’ve heard The New Boyz’s “You’re a Jerk,” the inescapable ear-worming single that branded the Victorville duo the face of the movement. But hopefully, my story illustrates why they’re just one of many talented kids that have helped make this the most exciting and interesting rap trend to hit LA since G-Funk.
It’s a cover story and a long one–5,000 words. So if you’re not into that whole reading ruse (and even if you are), I highly encourage you to check out the above video, produced by myself and Henry Choi, and directed by Jeff Cowan. Hopefully, this will be the first of many videos that we’ll create. In case you were wondering, no, that’s not me doing the narration–I only speak in double-time.
LA Weekly: We’re Jerkin’ (Starring The New Boyz, Pink Dollaz & J-Hawk)
ZIP: V/A–Jerkin’ With J-Hawk (Left-Click)
MP3: Cold Flamez-”Miss Me, Kiss Me”
MP3: New Boyz-”You’re a Jerk”
MP3: Pink Dollaz-”Don’t Need No”
MP3: Y.G.-”I Need Weed”
MP3: Tay 3rd-”I”
The Hedley’s are the only analogue for the Los Feliz household of Foreign Born lead singer, Matt Popieluch and his girlfriend, Glasser’s Cameron Mesirow. In addition to fronting one of Los Angeles’ best bands, he works as a groundskeeper for Coldwater Canyon arboreal preservationists, Tree People, plays with Glasser and Fool’s Gold, and manages Frank Fairfield. The only thing he doesn’t do is weld.
The brunt of my feature in the latest LA Weekly focuses on Popieluch’s work in Foreign Born–mainly, because their album, Person to Person, was recently released on Secretly Canadian and also, because it is very good. But don’t sleep on Glasser or Fool’s Gold either, the latter of which recently signed with local label, IAMSOUND (Telepathe, Little Boots, Black Ghosts).
Few artists deserve the cover of LA Weekly as much as Busdriver, a Project Blowed vet, Low End Theory staple, and one of the most visionary local artists of the last 10 years. Granted, his music is more fun to debate than to dance to, but despite the obliqueness, he remains one of the most trenchant writers around. Succesfully stuffing 42 words into every bar isn’t as easy as it looks, (no Barman), nor is sustaining innovation in a underground landscape that often champions comfort food over creativity.
There are B-sides that I will hopefully have time to edit and re-arrange this weekend. In the meantime, the article is up online, and available all over the city. Jhelli Beam is in stores now too. It’s not as good as actual jelly beans, but what is?
LA Weekly: Busdriver–Crushed Groove
Download:
MP3: Busdriver ft. Nocando-”Least Favorite Rapper”
MP3: Busdriver-”Sun Shower”
MP3: Busdriver-”Cool Band Buzz”
I don’t need to explain the Playboy Mansion. You’ve probably seen Girls Next Door, the E! Entertainment show that managed to successfully de-mystify the estate like the channel did Saved by the Bell, Puff Daddy, and Fabio. But despite the camera’s depiction of Heff as goofy and groping grandpa, with three ditzy but well-meaning Barbies, the mansion still retains a certain cache.
When you tell other males that you’re going to a party there, they tend to lapse into Pavlovian response, as though the per capita rate of orgies and salvers of strawberry cocaine hadn’t been on the decline since Dynasty was canceled. At least, that was the reaction when I told people that I was going to attend the Marijuana Policy Project’s fourth annual fundraiser gala at the legendary Gothic-Tudor mansion.
This leads to a state of heightened expectations. You’re not supposed to go to a party at the Playboy Mansion, sample a few rolls from the sushi bar, devour a few vegetarian paninis, and peruse the Spider Monkey cages. No, conventional logic dictates drunken and drugged debauchery like you were a British rock star named Keith, until you wake up in a cut-off New York Jets jersey, beside three girls named Amber, several drained bottles of Dom P., and smothered in viscous solution. The mansion’s steward does his best to preserve the adult Disneyland image, recruiting a corps of models, playmate manques, and random attractive girls ostensibly recruited off the street.
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