Archive for Culture
Odetta, Voice of Civil Rights Movement, passes at 77
Odetta, the singer whose deep voice wove together the strongest songs of American folk music and the civil rights movement, died on Tuesday at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan. She was 77.
Election Day Old School Playlist
Suggested music to inspire you while you wait in line….Might as well party while you cast your historic vote!!
Marvin Gaye - Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)
Stevie Wonder - Frontlines
Sly & the Family Stone - Every Day People
Donny Hathaway - Young, Gifted and Black
Kool and the Gang - Celebration
James Brown - Say It Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud
Bob Marley - Get Up, Stand Up
Frankie Beverly and Maze - Happy Feelin’s
Stevie Wonder - Higher Ground
Isley Brothers - Fight the Power
Earth, Wind & Fire - Shining Star
Funkadelic - One Nation Under a Groove
Curtis Mayfield - Move on Up
Otis Redding - A Change Is Gonna Come
…..add your own….
Daring to Dream of a Black President
Some of America’s leading black voices, including Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Spike Lee and Tiger Woods share what it means to them.
Maya Angelou: It’s time to lift America’s spirit
…you have to continue to prepare yourself, continue to build yourself, continue to elevate yourself and be a benefit, be a blessing rather than a curse, and things will get better. And they have, so when I think of Dr. King and Malcolm, Fannie Lou Hamer, Medgar Evers, I also think of Chief Albert Luthuli, one of the first Africans to earn the Nobel Prize.I mean that after Chief Luthuli, apartheid was so rigid, unbreakable that men had to carry their IDs on plastic cards that were too large for any suit, so they flapped, reminding them constantly who they were. It was my blessing to meet Nelson Mandela before he went into prison and I’ve seen him many times since. He knew this day would come, and to be able to stay in prison for 27 years, knowing that the day would come.
Four Tops frontman Levi Stubbs dead at 72
DETROIT – Four Tops frontman Levi Stubbs, whose dynamic and emotive voice drove such Motown classics as “Reach Out (I’ll Be There)” and “Baby I Need Your Loving,” died Friday at 72.
The Dunbar in South L.A., once a landmark, has lost its beat
The hotel that once was the pride of the Black community and resting spot for jazz greats is now in decay as it houses low-income tenants. Its future is riddled with uncertainty.
Bernie Mac’s sister-in-law Speaks
BERNIE MAC’S FINAL MOMENTS: Sister-in-law says family was at bedside; funeral scheduled for Friday, friends release statements.
*A sister-in-law to late comedian Bernie Mac has opened up to People magazine about the entertainer’s final moments at the hospital with his wife, Rhonda, and their 30-year-old daughter, Je’Niece.
Community activist Najee Ali says a candlelight vigil for Mac, as well as Isaac Hayes, will be held at 6 p.m. tonight in Los Angeles at 5th Street Dicks coffeehouse in Leimert Park (4305 Degnan Blvd.)
More than ‘Shaft’: Hayes was goldmine of influence
With its riveting orchestration, definitive guitar play and signature sensual baritone vocals, Isaac Hayes’ theme song for the 1971 movie “Shaft” not only became one of pop music’s iconic songs, but also the defining work of Hayes’ career.
Yet the “Theme from Shaft,” which would earn both Grammys and an Oscar, was just a snippet of the groundbreaking music for which Hayes — who died Sunday at age 65 — was responsible.
Actor and comedian Bernie Mac dies at age 50
Bernie Mac lookin clean and talkin real talk on Tavis Smiley.
Bernie Mac, the actor and comedian who teamed up in the casino heist caper “Ocean’s Eleven” and gained a prestigious Peabody Award for his sitcom “The Bernie Mac Show,” died Saturday at age 50.
The Role Hip Hop Organizations and Groups Play in Politics
A report from the National Hip Hop Political Convention by Davey D via ThugLifeArmy.com
During the recently held Hip Hop Political Convention we had an explosive panel that addressed the issue of Electoral Politics and how they intersect with Hip Hop music and Culture. We wound talking specifically about the impact or lack of impact Hip Hop organizations have on the voting process.
Sitting on this panel were the following people;
Rev lennox Yearwood of the Hip Hop Caucus, Professor Lamont Hill of Fox news and Temple University, Tony Cani- Young Democrats, Honorable George Martinez of H2Ed and former elected Official & emcee, Rosa Clemente-Vice presidential candidate of the Green Party.
Paterson, at N.A.A.C.P., Warns of Racism’s Power
CINCINNATI — David A. Paterson, in his first major speech to a national audience since becoming governor of New York, said on Thursday that even as black Americans rejoice about the possibility that Senator Barack Obama could become president, they cannot lose sight of the serious social and economic ills that plague their community and should remain mindful of the racism that still exists.
A voice of reason.
Democracy Now! | George Carlin: Legendary Comedian Challenged Status Quo Throughout 50-Year Career
Legendary comedian George Carlin died of heart failure on Sunday evening at the age of seventy-one. Carlin was one of the most well-known comedians of the past fifty years and was widely considered one of the top stand-up comics of all time.
Listen to some of his best social critique at Democracy Now!
In case you’re wondering why we’re remembering George Carlin, check out these exerpts:
America and war….GEORGE CARLIN: It’s the old American double standard, you know, say one thing, do something different. And, of course, the country is founded on the double standard. That’s our history. We were founded on a very basic double standard. This country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free. Am I right? A group of a slave owners who wanted to be free, so they killed a lot of white English people in order to continue owning their black African people, so they could wipe out the rest of the red Indian people and move west and steal the rest of the land from the brown Mexican people, giving them a place to take off and drop their nuclear weapons on the yellow Japanese people. You know what the motto of this country ought to be? You give up a color, we’ll wipe it out. You got it.
So, anyway, about eighty years after the Constitution is ratified, eighty years later, the slaves are freed. Not so you’d really notice it, of course. Just sort of on paper. And that was, of course, during the Civil War. Now, there’s another phrase I dearly love. That is a true oxymoron if I’ve ever heard one: civil war. Do you think any country could really have a civil war? “Say, pardon me†[gun shots]—“I’m awfully sorry. I’m awfully sorry.†Now, of course, the Civil War has been over for about 120 years, but not so you’d really notice it, because we still have these people called Civil War buffs, people who thought it was a really keen war, and they study the battles carefully, and they try to improve on the strategies and the tactics to increase the body count, in case we have to go through it again sometime. In fact, some of these people actually get dressed up in uniform once a year and go out and refight these battles. You know what I say? Use live ammunition, [bleep], would you please? You might just raise the intelligence level of the American gene pool.
But what do you expect? Hey, come on, this is a warlike country. We come from that northern European, basically the northern European genes, the blue eyes. Those blue eyes. Boy everybody in the world learned real quick, didn’t they? When those blue eyes sail out of the north, you better nail everything down [bleep]. Nail it down, strap it down, or they’ll grab it. If they can’t take it home, they’ll burn it. If they can’t burn it, they’ll [bleep]. That’s what happened to us. And it’s a warlike country. C’mon, I mean, forget foreign policy. Even the domestic rhetoric is warlike. Everything about our domestic policy invokes the thought of war. We don’t like something in this country, we declare war on it. The war on poverty, the war on drugs, the war on crime, the war on AIDS, the war on cancer. We’ve got the only national anthem that mentions [bleep] rockets and bombs in the [bleep] thing. You know what I mean?
Language in Amerca…GEORGE CARLIN: When I was a little kid, if I got sick, they wanted me to go to the hospital and see the doctor. Now they want me to go to a health maintenance organization or a wellness center to consult a healthcare delivery processional. Poor people used to live in slums. Now the economically disadvantaged occupy substandard housing in the inner cities. And they’re broke! They’re broke. They don’t have a “negative cash flow position.†They’re [bleep] broke! ‘Cause a lot of them were fired. You know, fired? Management wanted to curtail redundancies in the human resources area, so many people are no longer viable members of the work force.
Smug, greedy, well-fed white people have invented a language to conceal their sins. It’s as simple as that. The CIA doesn’t kill anybody anymore, they neutralize people. Or they de-populate the area. The government doesn’t lie, it engages in disinformation. The Pentagon actually measures nuclear radiation in something they call “sunshine units.†Israeli murderers are called commandos. Arab commandos are called terrorists. Contra killers are called freedom fighters. Well, if crime fighters fight crime, and firefighters fight fire, what do freedom fighters fight? They never mention that part of it to us, do they? Never mention that part of it.
Any other white men that can talk sh*t like George Carlin, please stand up.
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