SONG OF THE DAY: PE vs The JB's (DJ A-L Remix)

Bootleg everything. Intellectual property is colonial thought. I don't even believe you own your own thoughts. Why would you own some shit that just randomly fired up inside your mind? I thought about that recently when I described my artistic processes as "world building". It seemed very conquest-like, that I'm developing an unexplored territory from a capitalist perspective. I'm fuckin' lucky the universe lets my mind see all the wild shit it sees. I'm blessed. Why would I want to start acting like I own all that shit and piss off the universal muses? Disgusting behavior. So I think of it less as world building now and more just cultivating my internal mythologies.

SONG OF THE DAY: Black Superman (kudzu'd)

Another West Coast Classics bootleg 45, one of my favorite bootleg series on 7” 45s. Above The Law is highly underrated, as later stage Ruthless Records group, but man, Screw used to have them on his tapes all the time. This is obviously their biggest hit, which is also funny to call “hit” because it’s not like that shit was on the charts. It just bubbled through the underground, making noise and leaving marks that stand to this day. I got 3 or 4 of the West Coast Classics series, but sadly, still missing the DJ Quik/Snoop Dogg one. Lack of DJ Quik 45s is the most glaring omission in my 45 stacks to be honest, especially since I read that L.A. Times article about Suga Free the other week, and been thinking about how Quik/Suga Free are underrated geniuses. Give Quik a MacArthur Grant, in my opinion.

SONG OF THE DAY: Nubian Lady (kudzu'd)

My home internet was broken today so I had to put on clothes and drive into the ol’ office space to work, which means I had to put on “office clothes” which means I also wore underwear, which my dick is violently resisting this oppressive garment so now I gotta keep fiddling with my dick to have it sit right in my boxers, and this is what happens when you don’t have to go to the office no more. You forget how the fuck to be in public, but like not a real public, just the fake performative public space that is an office. Also I had to talk about some inane shit for a while, accidentally, and you get hung up in that “how do I get out of this conversation?” mode, which I always have never liked. We should respect people just walking the fuck away better if they get bored, not just in offices, but life, meaning I’d like to just walk away from this life and take a shot at what’s behind door #3.

SONG OF THE DAY: Nobody Loves Me

Gimme that old timey sad ass depressing message but hyper speed bluegrass. Let me lament no one loving me nor remembering me in as upbeat and crazed a way as possible. This is music for future ghosts.

4T 0VR 3SS3NC3, 34CH B31NG...

at our essence, each being 
just wants to exist freely, 
easily as possible 

1N T1M3S WH3R3 N0TH1NG 1S R34L...

in times where nothing is real 
(including time), to think too 
much on it can drive one mad 

TH3 M4RKS W3 TH1NK W3 M4K3 ST1LL...

the marks we think we make still 
just sand castles worn away 
by the ebb and flow of time 

4LPH4 M3NT4L1T13S PR0WL...

alpha mentalities prowl 
through an omega era, 
unable to do real work 

3XT3RN4L 1D3NT1TY...

external identity 
is superficial at best; 
nowadays, deep don’t exist 

W0RR13D 4B0VT 4PPR0V4L...

 worried about approval 
from others will always leave 
you lacking satisfaction 

S0M3 F0LKS B4SK 1N 1GN0R4NC3...

some folks bask in ignorance 
and pretend it’s bliss; ain’t no 
Paradise City for fools 

WH3N STR1PP3D D0WN T0 MY 3SS3NC3...

when stripped down to my essence, 
no industrial purpose 
causes my heart to vibrate 

SONG OF THE DAY: Girls Can't Do What The Guys Do (kudzu'd)

If you’ve worked at a college or university in America, you’ve likely been blessed by working with an intelligent but under-degreed Black woman administrative assistant, as they are actually the glue that has held together America’s higher education system for at least the past couple decades. And if you’re not an asshole and have been able to build a relationship with that woman, in conversation – if you are lucky to be expressing some solid shit and not just talking about tv shows or something – you might get a, “I know that’s right.” This is the cultural counterweight to the far more resigned “it is what it is.” I’ve mostly heard gruff under-degreed white dudes saying the “it is what it is,” but I’m sure it’s far more cultural than that; but even so, it’s a sad sort of giving up and accepting that everything is fucked. It’s not necessarily negative, because you’re practicing acceptance, but it does have a certain doomed feeling to it. On the other side, “I know that’s right!” is a usually joyful proclamation that, yeah, that shit is true. It has more hope to it. Anyways, I work from home now, so nobody says shit to me, except in Zoom meetings, and I always remember to keep pretending to smile until I’m sure the camera is completely cut off, because I don’t need to be breaking kayfabe with these people and have them know I’m losing my mind over here pretending to care about this shit. Oh well, it is what it is, I guess.

41N'T N0 R1PT1D3S 1N R1V3R...

ain’t no riptides in river… 
think I’ll sit here and practice 
concentrating on nothing 

34SY T0 F33L 0V3RWH3LM3D...

easy to feel overwhelmed - 
riptides of obligation 
can start to feel like choking 

SONG OF THE DAY: Groovin'

I got a bootleg “edit” 45 of this recently, and man do I love a bootleg “edit”. Fuck copyright law and fuck intellectual property, especially with record labels when the actual artists usually don’t own shit. Anyways, this gained newfound popularity because it was in RZA’s mom’s record collection, so he looped the fuck out of it, as one did in the ‘90s when that Ensoniq 16 plus was calling your name from the basement when you were lying in bed at night.

41N'T N0TH1NG WR0NG W1TH S1MPL3...

ain’t nothing wrong with simple 
thinking, leading a simple 
life, keeping it to yourself 

D0M3ST1C4T3D 0VTL4WS...

domesticated outlaws 
swear they’re wild and wonderful, 
but it’s all performative 

SONG OF THE DAY: Love Story

My youngest is a Swiftie, and we got lucky enough (I guess) to get tickets for one of the upcoming shows. But being an annoying ass dad, can’t help but make playlists of songs that are the same title as a Taylor Swift song, but not Taylor Swift. They never fall for it, plus they only stream, and I’m an old fool from the old school that still relies on mp3s, which is also nice because we live in a rural dead zone, so they’re shit stops working sometimes, and I can be like, “WELL, I GUESS IT’S TIME FOR OL’ POPS TO PLAY DJ SCREW CHAPTER 046 SYRUP AND SODA!” It’s hard out here being the teen Swiftie born to a Screwy.

Sunday Slowdown Chapter 005: Redbuds Poppin', Lounge Unlockin'

REDBUDS POPPIN', LOUNGE UNOCKIN'

Another Sunday Slowdown for your spring vibes benefit, with another slowed down funk stroll through the back roads of both old and new jams. This one is dedicated to the redbuds. (Click the title for 2 hours of vibes.)

W3 0FT3N D3S1R3 3SC4P3...

we often desire escape, 
because what we’re doing ain’t 
living, in natural sense 

W3'V3 PR0GR3SS3D 4S 4 CVLTVR3...

we’ve progressed as a culture 
where work has little meaning 
beyond keeping bills at bay 

SONG OF THE DAY: Electric Boogie/Break Dance

I can't breakdance worth a shit. Is it too late to learn? Perhaps not but it feels like it. Instead I shall rock electro rap jams at the wrong speed and shuffle around in my old slides while the cats look at me inquisitively. "Play the hand your dealt," like my pop taught me. But also cheat if you get to deal.

F1ND1NG 0N3'S 0WN PVRP0S3...

finding one’s own purpose 
easily gets lost behind 
trying to survive our days 

SONG OF THE DAY: Hard Steppin' (kudzu'd)

I try not to dig too hard into the modern funk movement, or if I do, I try and do so with an open mind, because often times you find out the band is a bunch of white-appearing dudes from post-gentrification Brooklyn, or like based out of Finland. But at the same time, they often also try to put on their heroes from the past, and do so with full support and credit to those legends. So even though this particular music scene has a lot of what would be described as hipsters, it also has given new life to old, forgotten artists as well. I don’t know man, everything is always more nuanced and complicated that simple internet discourse can handle, and if folks are doing something they love with respect for those who came before them, it’s hard to get mad at. And I don’t know how to be part of a horn section, like at all, so I got no room to complain.

L00K 1NT0 4NYB0DY'S...

look into anybody’s 
eyes, and you’ll see their true 
focus (beneath the surface) 

WH3N 3X1ST3NC3 F33LS FVT1L3...

when existence feels futile, 
our streams of consciousness veer 
further into chaoses 

SONG OF THE DAY: Overflowing

Saw these guys play earlier this year, and had come out that show promising myself to practice love in my daily life. But then life got hectic and busy and unrelenting and I became exhausted. Struggled for a bit but getting back to my self now (thankfully), and trying to remember that despite all the negativity our poison culture feeds us, the world itself is usually pretty decent. I mean, it’s a lot of assholes out here, only motivated by their own wants, and they hide that narcissistic greed behind perversions of individual liberty, but fuck it man, I can’t fix them. And if I get to arguing with them, it’s like punching mud, and I just get stuck in that mud and life sucks and everything is horrible. Actually, I kinda noticed now that I’ve returned to fucking around on Twitter how negatively that affects my stream of consciousness. Like, I end up thinking about shit I never would’ve thought about if I just opened the window and sat there or chilled on the porch or walked down the road for an hour. Purposefully pushed into negative thinking by technological progress. People out here getting hung up on wild ass conspiracies that got zero chance of any truth to them, when the real conspiracy is right there in our hands.

3X1ST3NC3 1S 4 PR1S0N...

existence is a prison 
only for the physical 
self; the mind always wanders 

C0NST1TVT10NS GV4R4NT33D...

constitutions guaranteed 
natural rights meant less than 
what wealthiest men decreed 

Sunday Slowdown Chapter 004: Fresh! From Out The Kudzu

FRESH! FROM OUT THE KUDZU

Another lounger from your boy. 2 hours of 45s at 33 speed, fresh from out the kudzu behind my house. It's a magical place. (Click the title to rock it out.)

P4R4D1S3 W4S P0SS1BL3...

paradise was possible, 
but western thought destroyed it 
with industrial purpose 

FLY1NG FL4GS T0 R3PR3S3NT...

flying flags to represent 
ourselves by the boundaries 
they attempt to illustrate