a moment of clarity.
words.
"To defend the place of millions of immigrants and their progeny in American society, we need not only protest of political changes but also more art.
We need to bring the ambitions, the foibles and the soul of immigrant America into the collective American mind. And for that we need television shows and movies, and more novels, poems, paintings and songs. High art and low.
We need stories told in Spanglish and Korean slang, and erudite English, and in bright and moody colors by artists who represent the sons and daughters of the African, Latino and Asian diasporas.
...Art and culture might seem like a luxury at this dark moment, with the Trump administration’s announcement that 200,000 Salvadorans who have lived here legally since 2001 will be forced to leave, and with young Dreamers brought to this country when they were just children left to face an uncertain status after the government reopened without Congress securing protections for them.
But when a people see their humanity denied, art is a defense of that humanity. Perhaps President Trump understood this when he proposed eliminating the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities last year.
...This normalization of Latino and immigrant culture is an essential act in the Trump era, a time when I’ve heard stories about white school kids yelling “Trump!” at their brown-skinned classmates as if it were a slur meant to remind them of their inherently second-class status. Resisting the spread of hatred requires all sorts of actions. Go to a march, call your representative — but also bring a great work of literature by an immigrant writer to your book club and support arts education everywhere.
When we feel powerless to stop the hatred and injustice directed at our people, we should remember art’s potential to enlighten the uninformed and to slowly eat away at prejudice.
...I feel a renaissance coming. I see it in the discipline and ambition of our young people. They eat Oaxacan mole and Korean kimchi, and they read, joke and create in Spanish, Amharic, Creole and Arabic. But above all, they also employ the same language used by James Joyce and James Baldwin: English, spoken with accents from the Midwest, New Jersey and East Los Angeles, and all the other places they call home."
THE NEW YORK TIMES: We Need Protests. And Paintings.
Monday, January 29, 2018
Thursday, January 25, 2018
Saturday, January 20, 2018
Friday, January 19, 2018
call the police.
a playlist.
1/fever ray/wanna sip/3:29
2/hot chip/let me be him/7:41
3/hot chip/flutes/7:05
4/devo/gut feeling (slap your mammy)/4:58
5/lcd soundsystem/other voices/6:43
6/daphni/vulture/4:35
7/daphni/xing tian/4:57
8/com truise/vacuume/3:19
9/junior boys/over it/3:45
10/the pointer sisters/automatic (long version)/6:09
11/rick james/cold blooded/5:59
12/hot chip/always been your love/5:04
stream here.
Thursday, January 18, 2018
Wednesday, January 17, 2018
Wednesday, January 10, 2018
Saturday, January 06, 2018
Monday, January 01, 2018
DON'T LOOK BACK IN ANGER : THE ALBUMS, 2017.
01/kendrick lamar/damn
His cousin Carl told him to know his worth. That power, hustle, flow, ambition residing in his DNA since day one. Know it and own it in order to give the people what they need: this Grey Poupon, that Evian, this TED TALK to help "learn you a lesson". On DAMN, Kendrick places his faith in his lyrics, the text of this talk, hoping to make amends and connect on a personal level while sermonizing calmly and engaging us in a few thought provoking conversations. DAMN keeps it one hundred percent real on Kendrick's current successful Black American existence while confronting those internal struggles grinding within him trying to figure it all out, stay black, and keep hope alive even as outside forces try their damnedest to work against his ever ascendant climb. It also isn't afraid to speak on the subject of fear. Fear that his humbleness is gone. Fear that love ain't livin' here no more. Wondering whether the fear is wickedness or weakness, but never stopping the hustle and that climb. Fear of knowing that "what happens on Earth stays on Earth" and that he can't take these feelings with him "so hopefully they disperse within fourteen tracks carried over wax." The power, poison, pain, and joy, geeked up and fired up in he and DAMN's DNA. With his latest, Kendrick works effortlessly to keep "Mr. One through Five" in the running as a personal title and accolade for himself as he continues to process walking through this here life fully with a sound mind, knowing his worth, in order to speak clearly and bypass all the bullshit and those not worth his time on this journey to the center of who he is and what we stand for.
KEY TRACKS: DNA/Lust/Fear
02/dirty projectors/dirty projectors
03/mac demarco/this old dog
04/demi lovato/tell me you love me
05/jay z/4:44
06/amber coffman/city of no reply
07/priests/nothing feels natural
08/fever ray/plunge
09/sza/ctrl
10/ariel pink/dedicated to bobby jameson
11/miguel/war & leisure
12/ema/exile in the outer ring
13/charli xcx/number 1 angel
14/lcd soundsystem/american dream
15/lorde/melodrama
16/syd/fin
19/cherry glazerr/apocalipstick
21/vince staples/big fish theory
22/thundercat/drunk
23/kehlani/sweetsexysavage
24/palberta/bye bye berta
25/father john misty/pure comedy
DON'T LOOK BACK IN ANGER : THE SONGS, 2017.
01/dirty projectors/up in hudson
When David Longstreth opens his mouth to speak on "Up in Hudson", the first words that come out of his mouth are "The first time ever I saw your face...", setting the table for what's in store content wise with this "Once Upon a Time..." But unlike the Roberta Flack song that shares its name with Dave's opening salvo, the thrill is now gone in "Up in Hudson". She's in Echo Park blasting 2Pac, and he's on the Taconic Parkway listening to Kanye, convinced that this is what love does: burns out and fades away, eventually rotting before it disappears completely as it did here. For close to eight minutes (with two of them wonderfully wordless and rambunctious at the end), David recounts the times of a love that once made his heart leap up from a mountaintop over a slinky and fanciful, horn assisted worldbeat like pop number, and comes to grips with her absence and the absence of that emotional security. Every sound bubbling underneath, plus the extreme patience of the track and that of our narrator, is set about to wash away the anger and the pain. And when you sit with "Up in Hudson" and come back to earth after flying away on that wordless cloud, you know that David has made his peace, as well as something incredibly captivating and ambitious out of that boredom and free time that hit him that one time up in Hudson.
03/sza + travis scott/love galore
04/fever ray/wanna sip
05/jay z/the story of oj
06/cardi b/bodak yellow
07/two chainz/riverdale rd
08/future/mask off
09/ema/breathalyzer
10/lcd soundsystem/how do you sleep?
11/j balvin + willy william + beyonce/mi gente
12/thundercat + michael mcdonald + kenny loggins/show you the way
13/drake/passionfruit
14/kendrick lamar + rihanna/loyalty
15/joe goddard/home
16/n.e.r.d + rihanna/lemon
17/vince staples/big fish
18/charli xcx/blame it on u
19/cut copy/standing in the middle of the field
20/haim/right now
21/ariel pink/feels like heaven
22/harry styles/sign of the times
23/lorde/green light
24/st. vincent/los ageless
25/miley cyrus/malibu
04/fever ray/wanna sip
05/jay z/the story of oj
06/cardi b/bodak yellow
07/two chainz/riverdale rd
08/future/mask off
09/ema/breathalyzer
10/lcd soundsystem/how do you sleep?
11/j balvin + willy william + beyonce/mi gente
12/thundercat + michael mcdonald + kenny loggins/show you the way
13/drake/passionfruit
14/kendrick lamar + rihanna/loyalty
15/joe goddard/home
16/n.e.r.d + rihanna/lemon
17/vince staples/big fish
18/charli xcx/blame it on u
19/cut copy/standing in the middle of the field
20/haim/right now
21/ariel pink/feels like heaven
22/harry styles/sign of the times
23/lorde/green light
24/st. vincent/los ageless
25/miley cyrus/malibu
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