Y: The Last Man: the end

Rewind a few months back- I was doing everything I could to avoid ANY spoilers with the rather intense media attention the last issue of Y: The Last Man received.
Today I finished it. I have read the entire series now.

What a fuckin great book/series!
In the beginning, I really enjoyed all the political details thrown in. Then I was hooked on the character development. In the end, I learned what caused all mammals with a Y chromosome to be wiped out (I think). I also almost cried at the Six Feet Under-esque wrap up.
Do yourself a favor and check it out (even if the inside art is lacking).

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In related news, a motion picture adaptation is already well underway.
In hopes of creating a trilogy, the (first) film will be a stand alone story with sequal possibilities. Does that mean no resolution!?
The producer is in hot pursuit of Shia LaBeouf to play Yorick and Alicia Keys to play 355. hhmmm...

ecko jeans "made with love" or just sexism

Have you seen the new Ecko Jeans ad campaign?

It features a bunch of women in bikinis supposedly manufacturing the jeans. The tagline is "Made With Love. *Hot Girls Make Great Clothes."


To take this shit even further, their site allows visitors to vote for "favorite employee" and has faux news clippings such as "Unattractive Girl Sues", "Locker Room Cat Fight", & "Ecko MFG Named Top Place To Work For Beautiful Women."
_____

Complex Magazine gave a hyped up review of the marketing campaign stating, "If every company would replace sweat shops with a factory full of bikini-clad models, the world would be a happier place. At least for us. With this in mind, Complex’s founder Marc Ecko has put together a program called Ecko Manufacturing"

Ya, I would love to see where and by whom these jeans are actually made!

Feel free to let Ecko know what bullshit this campaign is: eckomfg@ecko.com


(thanx Mel)

flashback: Straight-Edge in Seventeen

In June 1990, Seventeen Magazine printed an article on straight-edge. It is about as out-of-touch or silly as one might expect.
I recently found my copy and scanned the article.
I could never figure out the choice of photos accompanying the article.

8.15.08

Risen = nice guys

John Zerzan is a loon.

Anti-Zionism: Snoop Dogg

SNOOP CANCELS SHOW IN ISRAEL!

My mother-fuckin' man!
Palestinian, Israeli, and American anti-Zionists engaged in a letter writing campaign to stop Snoop from performing in Israel.

I will be honest: I read of this letter writing campaign and I did not take part. I just lumped it in with the countless actions we take part in that never seem to gain much ground.
So what good is getting one of pop music's biggest stars to not perform in a racist state? A lot. Snoop hasn't come out with some sweeping radical critique of Israeli apartheid. He may not have to.
We must keep the pressure on.

Remember this?

Kanye: Patriot

Kanye West did some MTV special where he greets USA troops coming back from occupying Iraq. (I ain't gonna search out a link to place here. Find the show if you want to.)

So, Bill O'Reilly declared Kanye West a patriot.

Now the blogosphere is lit up with how inaccurate O'Reilly's declaration is.
Funny. Kanye West shows his gratitude to US soldiers who occupied a country to protect American wealth and Kanye's economic interests and suddenly his fans think a right-wing bastard has got it wrong. Sorry Kanye fans- you got it twisted.

This all goes to the notion of being "anti-war" but not "anti-troops." As if one can take a stance against a theft but support the thieves.
The wide acceptance of this concept might be one of the biggest post-Vietnam War victories of the US right-wing.
The favorite pasttime of America: Cognitive Dissonance.
We allow people to willingly join and be the muscle behind sinister plans and then relieve them of any fault. Remember a lot of the Nazis were 'just following orders' too.

Fuck the US occupation of Iraq & Afghanistan!

Rick Ross is a fake!

Rapper Rick Ross was a Florida State correctional officer from 1995-1997.

I had problems from the get-go with an entertainer taking the name of a legendary drug-dealer/government scapegoat flunky and assuming said persona.
Ross denied it when asked.

Will there come a day when rappers can break character?
No one sane believes that Al Pacino is a gangster and he keeps playing one on screen. However, the entire marketing of rap is based on Black Death. I remember when 50 Cent and The Game came out. Their skills were never discussed. All I heard was how they had really been shot and really coulda died! The marketing masters went so far as to create a fake gang (G-Unit) and put them both in it even though they had no prior connection. Record labels aren't selling stories to White kids. They are selling some warped reality for these kids to get close to a danger they will never face.

Fuck William Leonard Roberts (aka Rick Ross). Let all the cats he kept behind bars tell us how real he is.
And take that silly medallion of your face.

pay for Oakland pigs

The Oakland City Council has voted to have voters decide to tax ourselves for more police!
Let's all pay more taxes for more police to patrol our streets, protect richer residents' property, and apparently shoot young Black men for fun!

Forget that Oakland HAS money for more police but can't get enough people to sign up for the despicable job!!
We already know it is legal for them to lie to us.


(thanx Mel)

One Day As A Lion

I will admit I only found out about the One Day As A Lion project last week. It is Zach de la Rocha (obviously formerly of Rage Against The Machine) and Jon Theodore (formerly of Mars Volta). The one track they leaked to MySpace was ok but I was geeked on some groovin' radical culture.
The full ep brings it! The songs with the RATM-esque breakbeat + Zach's 1996 flow are a bit tired but the more flowing songs with "singing" vocals make up for it.
I would be curious to see this shit live.

get it while it lasts



(thanx sergio)

FMTM sing

This "episode 2" shows some of the process of what will be a song with more vocals than any other From Monument To Masses song. (Too bad we don't get to hear the choir-like vocals.)

Watchmen Trailer

it is here

From Monument To Masses recording/mixing

Good friends/comrades, From Monument To Masses, just finished recording, mixing, etc a new lp. The lp is due out January 2009 on Dim Mak Records.
Here is the documentation:

This album encompasses a broad general radical politic while focusing on specific topics such as the US occupation of Iraq and the world food crisis.
FMTM is hitting up Europe soon! Ghost of Lenin get ready!

Baader Brains + MySpace

One never knows who one might encounter while dining with Master Ching Hai in the semi-liberated territories of Oakland, CA. Comrade Kyle 487-R whispered in my ear that Baader Brains have infiltrated Rupert Murdoch's empire of MySpace.
Communiques, sounds, and no friends.

I will not fall for the okie doke

New "viral" Nas video for "Sly Fox" done by awesome Rik Cordero.

(anyone know how to post up a YouTube clip that is smaller in size?)

"Destroy & Rebuild"

I like how Nas gave some shine to bloggers; specifically Miss Info and the clever Jay Smooth.

_____

And one of the realest songs I heard in a LONG time:
Joe Budden's Why (Pt.1) & Why (Pt.2)

Joe Budden gets passed up and slept on a lot. I liked the guy ever since I saw a show on MTV that followed him around and showed how unglamorous it is in the rap game.

______

Barack Praises Weezy. Weezy disses Sharpton.

"Bang Yer Head"

I got it in the mail today.
The Portraits Of Past "discography" on Ebullition Records.

I can't remember the last time I mailordered music.
I also forgot how good they were.

"don't shoot, don't show"

If you wanna stay up-to-date on POP shit, you gotta be their friend on MySpace.
Apparently, they are working on new material for the reunion shows (the songs will be written in the vein of 1995 and not just say BellaVista or Vue).

stay tuned...

blast from the past: Salt Lake Straight-Edge circa 1989

I clipped and saved an article about Straight-Edge from the major SLC newspaper back in 1989 (or possibly 1988).
Here it is:

4th of July

...and if you heard we was celebratin', that's a worldwide lie.

Office Tales: "Self-Sufficiency"

In what turned into one of the worst experiences at this hellhole of a job, I got suckered into an inpromptu job review with my boss/CEO. I will spare myself trying to write about the bulk of the "meeting" to avoid the sheer illogic and frustration.

The CEO swore to me that he could and would be more self-sufficient to free up my time. He was very keen on introducing technology as a means to make assisting him more efficient. One example he raved about was having meeting announcements automatically texted to him via his Google calendar (which we had already implemented). So the following day I decided to test out how self-sufficient CEO could be. I did not track him down or warn him prior to any phone call he had scheduled. I figured the Google pop-up screen plus receiving text messages 5 minutes before all calls was enough for a self-sufficient CEO. I did go check to make sure he was on the calls 5-10minutes into the scheduled times. Every single time, he was not on the call. When I verbally reminded him, he seemed surprised. One time when I reminded him that he was late to get on a call, he asked who the call was with. I couldn't recall the name so I looked at CEO's desk IMMEDIATELY to the left of his hands and phone and read the info straight off of the printed schedule I hand him every day.
Self-sufficiency, huh?