Virtual Reality and Fully Flared

I used to skate when I was younger, and in high school I was fully into Plan B Skateboards. In particular, the team video "Virtual Reality," released in 1993, was an absolute gamechanger. I think it was pivotal in shifting skating's focus from ramps to street (for a while, anyway), both the skatestyle and the lifestyle. The fashion was miles ahead (trust me, kids, it might not look it now, but...), the attitude put the "street" in street skating, and the music was all over the place (until then skate vids mostly featured punk or metal on pretty much every skater's part). The whole movie is sick, but I thought Rick Howard and Mike Carroll stood out, and Mike chose a bangin' ass Del joint to skate ("Lose in the End"), which was in heavy rotation in the crew I skated with (Souls of Mischief, De La, Tribe, and Wu as well). Here is both of their parts from that classic film:

Thanks for indulging me down memory lane...Anyway, these two dudes started their own shoe company, Laika, and since it's the 21st century, and cash rules everything around me, they have put out a team video. And they have upped the ante. A lot. Squared. Times infinity. These two have blown my mind again, brah! This might be the next skate vid I actually purchase rather than download!

(cross-posted at mantisounds)

Rock the Bells 2008

So for those of you who don't know, me and my boy Kenny Muthajunksta met up with Drums and Scace (+ Mrs. Drums and Ms. Yvette) at the Rock the Bells tour this past weekend in Mansfield (I still call that shit Great Woods 'cause I'm OLD SCHOOL like that, fuck a Comcast Center, or whatever it's called now). Anyway, as you can see from above, the lineup was golden-era sickness on the main stage, with the youngsters holding it down on the second stage.

We rolled up at about 4pm, so I missed most of the second stage acts I wanted to see (the Cool Kids, Kid Sister, Wale) AND we missed Rakim, Immortal Technique, and Dead Prez on the main stage. Truth be told I'm getting old, and 12 hours in the sun standing on a goddamn 30% incline would have seriously killed my staying power. Sacrifices had to be made....But enough about who I missed, the acts I saw were worth the price of admission.

De La Soul: only caught the end of their set, since we were actually entering, getting our bearings, and locating the Mr. Cesspool port-a-potties (that was the actual name. who are the add wizards...?). What I saw was solid (on stage I mean, not in the port-a-potties).

Afrika Bambaataa: on the Chevrolet (second) Stage. If someone had told my rave-crazy ass 12 years ago that someday I'd watch Afrika Bambaataa perform under a giant Chevy logo I would have asked them to buy whatever drugs they were on. Sometimes I still get floored by how marketable and successful club/hip hop/underground culture has become. We've come a long way from illegal raves at the Boston Public Works garages...but I digress. Bambaataa was solid, played mostly remixes of old school jams (kurtis blow, james brown). I left after about 20 minutes to hit the main stage for:

Redman and Method Man: now I was pretty far away from the stage (and the video screens), and it was hot out, and I wasn't what the kids informally refer to as "sober" at that point, but I don't think Meth was there. If he was, he's 50 pounds heavier now and doesn't like to sing songs with his lyrics in them. Almost the entire set was parts of Red & Meth songs that I'm pretty sure didn't include many Meth verses. And joints from Red Gone Wild. Or Doc's Da Name. So given that it appeared to be essentially a Redman show, it was hot. Redman is not only one of the most consistently tight MCs ever, he also puts on a great live show. Thumbs way up for Redman, sorta pissed Meth wasn't there (I think)...

the Pharcyde: they did almost all of the joints I wanted to hear (no Soulflower, though), and they played with a live band, which was tight, but it was a little too groovy after the ruckus that Redman brought. Tough act to follow, though they did their thing. Also, I had been checking Devlin and Darko, which I was feeling (Bmore & some electro/disco shit), so going from that to live Pharcyde was a momentum shift, to say the least.

Mos Def: the most underwhelming act of the day, for me. He pretty much did all of the groovy/interludie/silky songs from his catalog, and was kind of mumbly and uninterested at times, it seemed. Also, I think it should be illegal NOT to perform the Ghostface remix of "Ms. Fat Booty" if Tony Starks is in the same city, let alone on the same lineup. Totally missed opportunity, and sort of obvious at that. We all decided that either A) Redman dosed his drink, B) his hype man had just died and he was glum, or C) with such a sick lineup prior to Tribe, everyone drew straws on who would phone it in, to make sure Tribe was better than SOMEONE, and Mos Def drew the short straw. I'll tell you who absolutely did NOT draw the short straw:

Nas: holy shit. Nas absolutely destroyed it. There was a mini-stampede as he started and everyone went running for their spots, which was scary, 'cause we were sort of in the middle of it, and when hundreds of staggering, sweating, drunken caucasians come running towards you, I don't care who you are, you kind of freak out. But Nas quickly justified the South Shore stampede. He did like half of Illmatic (wise move, given it's the best hip hop album ever). He did all the good joints off It Was Written, he did "Hip Hop is Dead" and "Made You Look," which pretty much blew my brain out the back of my head. The new songs he did were good too (the O'Reilly/Fox dis joint was cool). But the show pretty much peaked when he did "One Mic" just after it got fully dark out, and the lighters came out, the whole place was flickering, and when the chorus first dropped, and the beat kicked in, Nas just blew, and the crowd lost it (I did anyway). Seriously, if you get a chance to go see Nas live, do it.




A Tribe Called Quest: I was a little nervous, I'll be honest. 1993 for me was Tribe's year (also Timothy Leary's year, but that's another post altogether), and Midnight Marauders is up there on my all-time list, so I was bracing myself for the letdown. Q Tip came out with Mos Def (who drank a Red Bull or 6 after his set and was much better) and they both delivered on Q Tip solo joints like "Vivrant Thing" and "Breathe and Stop." But after three or four songs, all of us started to fear that Tribe might be a no-show, and Tip and Mos were filling in or something. But when the lights went down and the narrator from Marauders started with "A. Tribe. Called. Quest. Consists. Of. Four. Members...," we knew it was on. And sure enough, Phife, Ali Shaheed Mohammed, and Jarobi (!) stepped out and fucking killed it. They did all the shit I wanted to hear: the good songs off of Low End Theory (Bonita Applebum, The Jazz, Buggin Out, Scenario), a bunch of songs from Marauders (Award Tour, Oh My God, Electric Relaxation), and not too many from The Love Movement, which I wasn't that big a fan of as far as Tribe albums go. All in all, exactly what I wanted and more than I expected. So good.

Anyway, I'm definitely going to Rock the Bells 2009, if they put one on (or bother with Boston again). Guerilla Union puts on a tight show. See this tour!

(cross-posted at mantisounds, dopest mix sets on the internets ; )

Friday.

Friday is here..Thank fucking God in Heaven with robot baby Jesus on the turntables mixing in Alien heaven for that blessing. Monday felt like a donkey kick in the face, Tuesday felt like I was fighting a swarm of blood thirsty wolverines all day, Wednesday I felt like Sisyphus pushing a fucking boulder up the face of an endless mountain for eternity while burning in murderous bloody purgatory, Thursday was "eh" and now Friday is finally upon us. Lord, if you are listening inside your fortified laser fortress in the sky, I send you a high fucking five and an upside-down monkey frown for making the last four days come to a glorious end. Happy Friday, monkiacs. It's time to pump up the jams. Let those God forsaken dogs out. Catch the fever. Go all in. Take the highway to the dangerzone. Sweep the leg. Use the force. Ride the lightning. Do it to it. Push it to the limit. Then repeat if necessary.

Praise the Lord.

It's time to Ante Up.

It's The Final Countdown..

So dive right in.

The weekend is here.

(massive nerd props to Mantis and Drums And Scace for the Muppets jammy!)

Picture Of The Day

It must be noted that this crew of superstars get ultra-heavy awesome points for having the word "Boss" in their name. But I still have to get them. Clockwise, starting from the far left:

Meet Rolf, The charismatic front man (BKA the lead singer for Disco Killmeister, a house-infused Mötorhead tribute band), Janek on bass (famed receiver of two Nordic games master awards for excellence in horse-smash and mountain-screaming), a woman clearly being held in captivity by the other members of the band for purposes unknown, Gary Sinise's Danish half-brother Thorben Sinise on keys, part-time sniper and Mark Wahlberg impersonator Ansgar on lead guitar, and finally we have Halvor on Fondue. He's an Aquarius, enjoys masturbating to the musical stylings of the Bay City Rollers, and smells like cheese and hash.

(via Katastrofalaomslag)

Another Tokusatsu WTF Moment

Tokusatsu..I can't fucking get enough of the stuff. The more recent stuff seems to be all Power Rangers type shows..but I personally prefer the older craptacular-giant-shitty-robots-from-the-70's style of program. Some of the old Toku classics are so awful that they go all the way around the back side of awful and actually transform into awesome. And if there's one thing Tokusatsu has plenty of, it's strangeness.

Check out this uber-weird FTW zen moment from an episode of "Fiveman" where instead of fighting in a traditional manner, the robots and monsters decide to "sing" each other into submission. What a brilliant and strange idea. Give me a team with Hanna Montana and the Jonas brothers and I'll raise the dead, make their ears explode, and kill them all over again.

Got Chairs?

As demonstrated on numerous occasions on this blog by the insightful commentary of Matty and Kid Dammit, wrestling fans are fucking die hard. Watch as this over-zealous audience gives these wrestlers exactly what they ask for.. and then some.

(via Break)

(...and on a related note...It's still real to me, Dammit!)

Chiru is my drug of choice

No one can resist his power. Be it man, woman, child, man-child, sasquatch, alien, or robot. His gem studded jackets are made of shiny materialials obtained from parts unknown. His mustache makes Tom Selleck pee inside his Hawaiian capri pants with it's potent masculine power and implied authority. His disco lights are filled with something hypnotic that makes my mind feel like Hal 9000's when that astronaut guy pulls all his chips out. Le's face it. He's pretty great.

Star Wars Vs. Rush Hour

Thank you, giant robot overlord of the internet for blessing unemployed nerds with G4's and Final Cut Pro. Check out this sweet mashup of the Lando ROTJ scene with that totally Boss fish face guy mixed with a scene from "Rush Hour". This is best work Chris Tucker, Jackie Chan, or Billy Dee Williams have done in light years.

(via Unique Daily)

Log Cabin Vacation Fail

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Jammin' on the One

Sprinkle treats on them

I'm The Goddamn Batman

(via Popurls)

I Heart Computer.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Stare into the Void

In the world of hacking the comics, there's a new game in town. Nietzsche Family Circus.



I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't literally a thousand ways to improve Family Circus.

Picture of the Day

I can't put my finger on it, but there's something not quite right about this scene.


(via moonbuggy)

Boom Karate

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Go myself, It's your birthday

Aw, yeah.

Happy Birthday Recon

This birthday video was put together by someone for their friend April, but in the grand tradition of the internets in general, and Monkeys for Helping in particular, I'm just going to steal it and put Recon's name at the end instead (or I would if I was any good at video editing or computers or stealing things). So happy birthday from Joe Cocker and some dude named Jakepride (whose friend April didn't deserve this video tribute nearly as much as Recon!).