Archive for September, 2009

You, Me, and a Party it be

Posted in Music on September 29, 2009 by Jack
Photo by Guzman

Photo by Guzman

This photo is all about context. My good friend, Robert Guzman, took this photograph last Saturday night at Red Sky Record store. It was a Dubstep after-party for the night. I started DJing at midnite, thinking I would be spinning for about an hour. Keep in mind, this is an afterhours – as in, after the bars close at 2 am, so there were only a few chill cats there hanging out waiting for Boxcutter to go on downstairs at 3 am.

But I spin deep, funky tech house and deep minimal techno – nice melodies, expansive bass, and it has to have that swing in the beat. But these were some younger cats who only listen to Dubstep. But I was working out the 4/4 beats, keeping it deep and chunky. I could see them digging it. It was cool: an easy vibe and the space to play the music I love to hear on a very solid system.

Well, apparently, a couple DJs flaked and my one hour set got stretched into a 3 1/2 hour. I couldn’t have been happier. The place was minimally filled, the sound was perfect, and Robert and I rocked out for three hours, dancing to my choice sonic selections. That’s all you need. One DJ, one dancer and a lot of love for music – it was a perfect night. He got it, I got it, and it was pure catharsis.

And, you know, I saw some of those Dubstep cats nodding their heads to the beat – don’t fake, you know who you are. When you feel it, you feel it; allow your mind to get out of the way and just let it happen.

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Quantum Observations

Posted in quantum physics with tags , , , , , on September 5, 2009 by Jack

I am completely fascinated by the alternate reality of Quantum Mechanics, the machinery beneath the matter. The inability to resolve Newtonian Physics with the subatomic world – and really, to even imagine how the two are even related – belies the only truth: we can never really know anything.

The Nobel-prize winning physicist Richard Feynman once stated, “If you thought science was certain – well that was just an error on your part.” Although we may never fully understand the machinations of the universe – currently, we understand extremely little. In fact, the matter we are made of is only five percent of the known universe. Thirty percent is dark matter and sixty-five percent has been coined with the equally ominous term, dark energy. The connotation of the word “dark” is perhaps too negative, it simply refers to the fact that we are unable to see them as they do not register within the electromagnetic spectrum. I wonder sometimes if these things which exist beyond the limits of our comprehension are perhaps more beautiful than light itself. Perhaps not. But the joy is within the process of observation and discovery.

Richard Feynman also said, “Our imagination is stretched to the utmost, not, as in fiction, to imagine things which are not really there, but just to comprehend those things which ‘are’ there.” The further we move forward in our ability to observe our universe, the more complex and beautiful it becomes. Here are some scenes of the subatomic realm.

circles

electron motion

dot Janus particle

neutrinos-img

quantum dots

nanoparticles

scanning

FinalC

photon
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Robot by KRS-ONE and Buckshot: Calling your sorry ass out, Hip Hop

Posted in Blogroll with tags , , , , , , , , on September 2, 2009 by Jack

As you all know, hip hop is dead. Well, the diamond age of hip hop is dead. The Krystal and bling bling has been reduced to a piece of cubic zirconia and a bottle of Korbel. All the people who meant anything during the period know this. Kanye West said he’s done doing hip hop. Timbaland is doing dance music. I saw Lil Jon with Diplo at the WMC in Miami this past year rapping about Dubstep.

It’s a natural cycle in some regards. There are a few innovators and a lot of haters, playaz and imitators. But in regards to hip hop, the cultural phenomena that was and the monetary mountains reached only magnified the monotony of production and reproduction. Someone breaks new ground and twenty others bite their style, their swagger and their synth lines. The Cure had it right when they said “Someone’s always jumping someone else’s train.” It doesn’t just apply to pasty white boys with tears of black eye-liner staining their mopey faces. It’s different players, but the game remains the same.

So that’s why I was so refreshed to see this video for “Robot” by KRS-One and Buckshot. The call out the entertainment industry manufacturing the mass-produced, boardroom-designed, artless, auto-tuned, talentless hacks who decide they can sing and perform. Not because they are compelled to or have anything to say but in some neurotic obsession to be famous. It’s the disease of fame that compels people to begin to believe the mythology of the media.

But this song is spot on: hot beat, catchy chorus, and dropping knowledge. Talking about Africa Bambaataa and Kraftwerk, and then laying out how people keep following each other around like pathetic dogs, trying to lick the ass that feeds them. Boogie Down Productions was one of my favorites – “My Philosophy” is one of my top five hip hop songs of all time. I’m glad to see KRS-One still being relevant and keeping it real. Now if only listens.

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