07 Rap Up

For those who haven’t seen this one yet. Here is Mad Skillz take on 2007 in rhythm and rhyme. Some really funny lines and astute observations. I could never get behind his line defending Mike Vick (!) but its dig at war crimes in Iraq is still appreciated. On the whole, this track has a sense of self-reflexive humor that hip-hop (and the world) could use a lot more of.

Happy New Year Ya’ll

wideo muzik

sCrAmBlEd?HaCkZ! facilitates the production of realtime, sample-based video music. check out this amusing, entertaining demonstration

want to know more about the underlying? there’s plenty to check out, chew on, and marvel/laugh at over. dude knows his as well as he knows C++, apparently.

oh brave new world that has such hackers in it!

P. Diddy calls Bjork

This will make more sense if you watch it from the beginning. You can relode the page, or wait till it loops around. Still won’t make that much sense though…

Monkee riddims

Hi all! For my first contribution, I wanted to offer more sound than word, more illustration than analysis. Ever since meeting Tony and Jake and all the other members of the toneburst diaspora I have felt like a member of an extended musical tribe. For me, the roots of this tribe extend back to the sonic/cultural experimentation of Afrika Bambaataa and his vision of “planet rock” - a global people united in rhythm beyond categories (although I am sure others have different senses of their sources). I have always experienced a method behind the madness and have always wanted to articulate it (in all its flexibility and playful improvisation with media and memes of all kinds). I hope that over time, this spot becomes a place where we can articulate this nascent method - the riddim method.


Rather than try to get that all in one post, I offer an audio illustration. In this audio clip from the Monkees episode “Some Like it Lukewarm”, Charlie Smalls explains “soul” to Davey. Not only is this clip hilarious to me, but Davey’s question illustrates a kind of childlike wonder about music that is at the heart of all this for me. The full text for this clip is at but beware the popups!

After Davey asks why he does not have soul, Charlie Smalls lovingly deconstructs the rhythmic intersections of soul and culture thusly:

“You do have soul, but I have to explain it to you, ah, rhythmically. That’s the only way I can really talk, is in music. Your soul would emanate on the accented beats 1 and 3, where my soul emanates on the accented beats 2 and 4.”

Man, its all in there somehow, mixed, mashed and lovingly illustrated across cultural and musical lines. At the end, they do get carried away. Riddim method Monkee style.