MCA is dead. Goats have not been paid. And I didn’t hear nearly enough Beastie Boys when I was out last night. I can only even begin to help remedy one of these things. The Beastie Boys are legends of hip-hops. Giants of the B Boy generation who kept turning out landmarks for hip-hop and pop culture throughout their careers. Every radio station, every DJ, every house party should be bumping their sh*t this week. Period. If you go somewhere and you don’t hear it, make a big deal about it.

“(You Gotta fight) For Your Right to Party”

“Fight For Your Right”/Interview on the Joan Rivers Shows/”Time To Get Ill”

“Right Right Now Now”/”Shazam” w/Doug E Fresh and interview on Late Night with Conan O’Brien

MCA discusses his Documentary about basketball and the Rucker “Gunnin’ for that 2008 #1 spot” (Kevin Love, Michael Beasley, Brandon Jennings among others in this video):

Beastie Boys Perform Shadrach on Soul Train.

Fab-5 Freddy with the Beastie Boys on Yo! MTV Raps Introducing Shadrach and Paul’s Boutique

And some tributes:

Q-Tip, Diddy and Fabolous tribute the Beasties at the 2006 VH1 hip-hop honors Before the Beastie Boys come out and represent:

Jay-Z subs in for Beastie Boys at All Points West when they had to

Don Cornelius and “the supreme with the most seniority”, the legendary Mary Wilson take their turn down the Soul Train Line.

“…and as always in parting, we wish you love, peace… and SOUL!”

HuffPo Most Popular List from the Politics Home Page the morning of 12/18

Kinda hit me that Barbara Walters annual special to honor famous people for being especially famous over the last 365 days was one of the predecessors to those stupid “most e-mailed” or “most popular” lists on news sites. Except these lists are much more pervasive. It’s fitting Walters critique of the Kardashians as being talentless and famous just for being welcoming of fame (admitting that the K’s are not that fascinating) is in HuffPo’s version of this stupid list.

It doesn’t trip me out that a black person works with Pat Robertson. It doesn’t trip me out that a black woman works with Pat Roberston. It “trips me out” that a grown black woman sits with Pat Robertson and is surprised he (and apparently the 700 club crew in the room) are not down with mac and cheese and that he would also assume it’s undeniable blackness.

A show is a feature of a network’s lineup. A season is a release, when a show goes on hiatus (aka a feature disappears) at minimum an explanation is needed. Community is a show, each season, that has had some of the best episodes of any TV show I have seen in the last few years. This season is no exception (“Remidial Chaos Theory”, shown in parallel timelines above, is fun to watch every time).

Putting aside the fact that NBC didn’t even acknowledge the series in their lengthy release discussing Midseason 2012, let’s look at the bright side. At least it wasn’t moved to Saturdays… right?

[..]

While it would have been nice if NBC had included a mention of the series to give fans some indication of what they’re thinking, at least they haven’t cancelled it (yet) or sentenced the comedy to some other night on television. Short of airing it via picture-in-picture over episodes of Law & Order: SVU, it’s unlikely that the series will score more viewers on any other night besides Thursdays. Aside from cancellation, the worst case scenario would be for NBC to do to Community what CBS almost did to Rules of Engagement in sentencing it to Saturday night.

It seems NBC feels they have another Friday Night Lights. And they are planning on splintering the viewer base like they did with that critically acclaimed drama even more by doing webisodes, some kind of alternate asynchronous delivery based upon the television provider (Directv, Comcast, Time Warner, etc.) you use.

But at least with Friday Night Lights there was warning. With Community, nothing. Just a mid-season update with the show conveniently disappeared. It’s weird that 3.49 million/week is not even worth a pro-active blurb unless you again consider, we are not the customer, we are the product.

In my opinion our watching eyes would best be served to advertisers on tier 2 cable or special on demand delivery (eg Hulu Plus, Netflix or provider based on Demand). Comedy Central, USA, TNT and TBS have been able to support wide variety of niche shows of varying degrees of the critical acclaim spectrum. The NBC Universal family has plenty of options. Nothing wrong with that if it allows creators of shows like Arrested Development and/or a Community to have less pressure to be crowd pleasers and affords them more freedom to grow the characters past two and a half seasons of development.

Heavy D and the Boyz - Living Large (album cover)

It was all a dream
I used to read Word Up magazine
Salt ‘n’ Pepa and Heavy D up in the limousine
Hangin pictures on my wall
Every Saturday Rap Attack, Mr. Magic, Marley Marl

-Notorious BIG, Juicy

Dwight Myers aka Heavy D died of pneumonia related complications on Tuesday in his home. A damn shame. Heavy D was universally respected and he was last of the “regular life” rappers. They didn’t have to be the hardest, the illest, the richest or the most gangsta. I could play most of his music in front of my parents without getting my tape collection broken (Mom did stomp out my whole tape drawer after my little bro had found my DJ Quik tape…for millennials: tape drawer smashed = someone deleting mp3 library by smashing the computer it’s on..pre-cloud. nevermind). Miss this hip-hop, but it’s been A&R’ed out of existence (yes consolidation of radio stations kills music’s breadth and rap’s diversity because gangsta is the biggest bang for the buck). My all time favorite Heavy D video…Nuttin But Love:

As a 16 year old. The women in this video. Damn. Chris Tucker calling out the Noxema girl FTW.
Final Interview with Tim Westwood:

Ashford, commonly known as the Ashford in Ashford and Simpson passed away at 70:

Gaye and Terrell also sang the duo’s songs “Your Precious Love,” “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing” and “You’re All I Need to Get By.” Diana Ross sang their “Reach Out and Touch Somebody’s Hand,” and when she rerecorded “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough“ in 1970, it became the former Supreme’s first No. 1 hit as a solo artist.

“They had magic, and that’s what creates those wonderful hits, that magic,” Verdine White of Earth, Wind and Fire told The Associated Press after learning of his friend’s death. “Without those songs, those artists wouldn’t have been able to go to the next level.”

Nickolas Ashford was born in Fairfield, S.C., and raised in Willow Run, Mich., where his father, Calvin, was a construction worker. He got his musical start at Willow Run Baptist Church, singing and writing songs for the gospel choir. He briefly attended Eastern Michigan University, in Ypsilanti, before heading to New York, where he tried but failed to find success as a dancer.

In 1964, while homeless, Mr. Ashford went to White Rock Baptist Church in Harlem, where he met Ms. Simpson, a 17-year-old recent high school graduate who was studying music. They began writing songs together, selling the first bunch for $64. In 1966, after Ray Charles sang “Let’s Go Get Stoned,” a song Ashford & Simpson wrote with Joey Armstead, the duo signed on with Motown as staff writers and producers.

They wrote for virtually every major act on the label, including Gladys Knight and the Pips (“Didn’t You Know You’d Have to Cry Sometime”) and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles (“Who’s Gonna Take the Blame”).

via Nick Ashford, of Motown Writing Duo, Dies at 70 – NYTimes.com.

I guess the coolest thing about Ashford and Simpson was that they were two folks in love writing and singing love songs. Looking at these old album covers brings back memories of my parents LPs.

Bernard Wright, Who Do You Love:

And as a bonus, LL Cool J, Loungin (who do ya luv) ft Total:

Two Words: Summer Jam!

Work Out by J. Cole

Single: J. Cole - "Work Out"

“Remember nights when my team blew it all on the tables
I write this alone in Vegas
I’m the only one left and the memories fading so
I write this alone in Vegas”