~notes~ (Vol. 7)
Japanese beatboxers & the last true hermit
Mad’s Music Mix
La Roux, “Sexotheque” La Roux is killing it this summer, this time with the latest single off her new album, Trouble in Paradise. Catchy and jangly, this has all the sweet makings of a tune you walk down the street to, mouthing the lyrics to yourself and bobbing your head side to side (you know the move I’m talking about). While I haven’t listened to the whole album, the couple of songs I have checked out have been great pop. I highly recommend Trouble.
William Onyeabor vs. Hot Chip, “Atomic Bomb” David Byrne’s world music label, Luaka Bop, is honoring William Onyeabor this year with shows and an album. I know, I know: I knew of only one of the three proper nouns I named in the previous sentence before I came across “Atomic Bomb.” Onyeabor was a musician who was active in the late ‘70s and mid-‘80s before he became a born-again Christian who refused to speak about his music or himself. Don’t we all love a good mystery? Some say he went to the Soviet Union to study cinematography while others paint him as a businessman living in Nigeria. Hot Chip pays homage to the enigmatic performer with its signature chugging rhythm and colorful melodies to rework the originally slower groove.
Emile Haynie ft. Charlotte Gainsbourg, Dev Hynes, and Sampha, “A Kiss Goodbye” Haunting. Ethereal. Producer Emile Haynie brings together an eclectic cast of collaborators to bring forth this poignant track. Sampha crooning, “Did it ever occur that you forgave yourself before I did?” makes my heart hurt, even only as an innocent eavesdropper.
Juicy J. ft. Nicki Minaj, Lil Bibby and Young Thug, “Low” Playing this song right after listening to the Emile track provides a wonderfully jarring listening experience. “Low” also opens with a sweeping, dark intro, but Juicy J launches into his charming third-person, “Me Juicy J got too many hoes,” so we’re okay to turn up. Nicki spits fire and Young Thug’s modular sing-songy rap is quite guap. Banger!
Music Vid Pick: Ariana Grande ft. The Beatboxing Hikakin, “Baby I” While you may have fended off the earworms Ms. Grande has brought this world (damn that peanut butter mouth of hers!), you can’t help admit she is at the very least entertaining. This video was from earlier this year, and features a Japanese beatboxer wearing cat ears. Coolest part is when Yung Mariah herself gets caught off-guard by how awesome Hikakin is.
Jeff’s Journo Jems
Difficult Girl [The New Yorker] My level of Lena Dunham fandom probably rivals some Directioners’ love for Harry and Niall. I make a sport out of watching and reading reviews of each episode of Girls, I read her leaked book proposal cover to cover, and I’m convinced I’ve watched every TV interview she’s given — this one with the B.S. Report’s Bill Simmons is my personal favorite. With that context, it’s hard to see how I couldn’t include Dunham’s most recent personal essay from The New Yorker in this week’s newsletter.
The Strange and Curious Tale of the Last True Hermit [GQ] I have romanticized ideas of living off the grid. I did it for a few days at the beginning of this summer — okay, so I was in the Redwoods and had one bar of cell reception but couldn’t send photos — and let’s just say I was starved for Internet by the end of the week. So this story about a real life hermit, who lived in the woods of Maine without any contact with other humans (save the food, clothing and supplies he stole from them) for nearly three decades, piqued my interest. The fact that the story is full of contradictions — a man who wants to remove himself from society but needs to return to steal life essentials — makes it an even more intriguing read.
Fleetwood Mac’s Christine McVie is Ready to Rock. Again. [Elle] I was brimming with the widest of smiles when I opened my Ann Friedman Weekly last Friday (guys, if you haven’t subscribed to her newsletter, you should!) to find out that my journalism crush had interviewed the keyboardist and lyricist extraordinaire from one of my favorite bands. Plus, Ann put together a Spotify playlist of all of the songs written by Christine McVie. It’s basically half of Fleetwood Mac’s Greatist Hits album.
The Masked Avengers [The New Yorker] At this point there have been plenty of stories written about Anonymous, the loosely connected Internet collective of hacktivists and pranksters that defaces or crashes prominent websites and publishes personal information of people at the center of controversial stories (a practice known as doxing). Long exposés appeared in Wired, Slate and The Guardian. This week, the group gets The New Yorker treatment. Despite being late to the game, this feature is probably the best primer on Anonymous that I’ve come across. The story simultaneously shows some of the praiseworthy cyber vigilantism efforts of Anonymous while also explaining how its members can often be categorized as hateful and vindictive pranksters.
Throwback: The Hanging [The Atlantic] Our news cycle seems built for our short attention spans. One week the focus will be on ISIS, the next on Crimea, and then on Syria. The worthiness of coverage doesn’t disappear, but we lose interest in them before we get an understanding of the big picture. That’s exactly what happened in 2009 when a census worker was found hanged from a tree in rural Kentucky with the word “FED” scrawled across his chest using a black Sharpie. News pundits from MSNBC to Fox were quick to connect the dots and call this a bizarre crime carried out by the backwards people who live in the backwoods of our country. The story is not so simple, as this amazing feature in The Atlantic from early 2013 explains.
