Hired!*


*Very probably.

Memo to Kanye, Lupe, & Pharrell: Don't Stop Recruiting Rebel Child Soldiers!

I watched Kanye West's Runaway film so you don't have to.

It's criminal how hilarious I still find Stefan.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRPpvefxLCA&feature=related

This Zoe Saldana piece I wrote that appeared on Splice Today earlier in the week is drawing an outsized, if not surprising, amount of notice, probably because dudes will be dudes.

If you thought you caught this gem while watching primetime TV a couple days ago, no, your eyes weren't deceiving you.

Well Said, Keef

"It's can you hang, can you talk about this without any feeling of distance between you? Friendship is a diminishing of distance between people. That's what friendship is, and to me it's one of the most important things in the world." -Keith Richards, Life

I couldn't have put it better myself.

If any song sums up my mood right now, it's probably this one.

Nine Little-Known Facts About Waka Flocka Flame

Note: This ran in a slightly different form on Splice Today on Wednesday, but because the editors didn't use my second version, which I felt was slightly more amusing, I've decided to post it here.

1. Waka Flocka Flame’s rap cadence is classified as a lethal weapon in twenty-three states.

2. On Waka Flocka Flame’s tour-bus bookshelf: Travels in Siberia by Ian Frazier, Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag, The Birds of America by John James Audubon.

3. YG Hootie, Gudda Gudda, Popa Smurf, Bo Deal, and Slim Dunkin are among the slew of Waka Flocka Flame pals who guest on Flockaveli, the Georgia rapper’s 1017 Brick Squad/Warner Brothers/Asylum debut. Due to scheduling conflicts, microphone murder-row types like Soupy Fishscales, Joe the Plunger, and Flocka Khan were unable to participate, though Waka hopes to corral them “into the lab” for Flockaveli’s follow-up, tentatively titled Da Life of Flocki Gaines.

4. Among the many curiosities on display in Waka Flocka Flame’s Riverdale, Georgia penthouse is an elaborate, flamboyant headdress of indeterminate tribal origin, constructed entirely of dyed dodo feathers and coagulated human blood. The headdress - which Waka typically dons “when we doin’ shows, at the nail clinic, just wildin’” - was a present from conceptual feather artist Virgil M. Walker; the two became acquainted after Walker, under the misimpression that he was downloading a deconstructed amalgamation of Native American chants, found himself enthralled by the Lebron Flocka James mixtape. “Walker’s cool, he keeps it three-hundred,” Waka told ArtForum. “He bumps my shit, you know? He‘s down, he rides with Brick Squad, he’s devilishly pre-constitution with a certain post-ironic modernist/nativist sensibility.”

5. According to an interview with Gourmet magazine, “Fuck the Club Up” was inspired in part by outsized Food Network personality Guy Fieri. “Guy and I roll up in delis on the regular, just straight hungry, shermed out, on the prowl,” Waka explained. “And Guy likes to order club sandwiches, it’s just his thing, them club sandwiches. So the waiter or waitress be taking his order, a club sandwich, and then Guy smirks and waits a beat and he yells ‘FUCK THE CLUB UP!’ which in Guy-speak is code for ‘deep fry that bitch, pile some onions and chilis and tobasco and peppercorns up on that motherfucker,’ go out in left field, out in the boonies, make this some unforgettable Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives bullshit, feel me? Because Guy Fieri is not to be trifled with; Guy Fieri will cap a sucka sous chef.”

6. Waka Flocka Flame was born Juaquin Malphurs in Queens, New York; “Juaquin Malphurs” is an arguably more awesome rap name than “Waka Flocka Flame.”

7. As a personal rule, Waka Flocka Flame limits his consumption of alcohol to bird-related or -inspired spirits like Wild Turkey, Grey Goose, and Peruvian pisco, which he customarily sips from an amethyst-encrusted adamantium chalice - a condo-warming gift from fellow ornithology enthusiast Lil Jon.

8. While Waka Flocka Flame is contractually obligated to holler, blurt, or rhythmically pistol-whip his own stage name a minimum of fifteen times on each song he records, there’s some wiggle room available to him, some legalistic gray areas. Waka may, if he so desires, hit this ceiling by spitting his sobriquet whole, in pieces, or in a post-modern mad-lib style. A special clause stipulates that Warner Brothers executives will uncage three dozen mourning doves each time Waka refers to himself seventy times or more times in a single five-minute banger. Waka’s present self-referential personal best: a staggering fifty-five near-autistic shout outs.

9. Waka Flocka Flame is a licensed, accredited acupuncturist whose clients include Michael Stipe, Of Montreal’s Kevin Barnes, Dennis Rodman, and Birdie the Early Bird.

Do you remember laughter?

If you can't stand to see Jesus rendered in various hues and sizes of plastic, by all means don't click this link.

"YOU'RE BLIND, BABY! YOU'RE BLIND FROM THE FACTS!"

Heavy D, right? May he live forever.

Think you know Bozo? You don't know Bozo.

Seriously: on a literal level, it's crickets out here.

Bring on your rah-rah/rally cap pep talks: I need all the energy and encouragement you can muster to not totally give up at this point.

Rakkasan CD review from Baltimore City Paper. Normally wouldn't link it here but for some reason the webmaster didn't index this article in the regular way, the result being that if I don't link it here and forget about it, it's kind of lost forever.

Two possibly interesting items of note:


1) A Frostburg State University Center for Creative Writing Q&A with Doug Mowbray.

2) The official Crucial Sprawl press release.

Serious question: is this, like, National Anti-Bullying Week or something? Because I can't seem to escape television/online stories/editorials on the subject of students bullying other students. And if it is National Anti-Bullying Week - if such a thing exists - why isn't it the first or second week of September instead? Why wait until after the bullies have settled upon and into a routine of zeroing in on new marks, roughing them up, shoving them into lockers, shaking them down for lunch money, etc?

Are you a fan of atonal collapsing-star noise? Then grab yourself some gratis To Live & Shave In L.A. here.

GLENN DANZIG SHOPS FOR GROCERIES JUST LIKE YOU OR I

Thanks to Thom Hawkins.