Way too happy...........

I was goin' through a shitload of photos from all the concerts I been to this year (way too many according to wifey), lookin' for the best ones for the portfolio, and in a group of shots of Dred Skott at Emo's I caught somethin' in the crowd that made me crack up for no reason.


That dude is awesome, but I also kinda hope he got in a horrible car accident that night.

Oh yeah, and Dred Skott are some homos. Word up.

Tequila Sunrise..........

I didn't just wake up hungover today.........I woke up drunk. That's always a frustrating couple of minutes when you realize your cunning plan to sleep yourself sober was pointless, and you coulda stayed up doing jumping jacks and finger painting for 6 hours and still felt exactly the same. Fuck it.

My friends threw me a going away party last night at my brother's house, and boy oh boy did it get wild. Not really, but I learned if you just say "Boy oh boy" in response to any question about a party, it makes people think it was a Caligula-style blowout, and not just a quiet get-together in an apartment with nice platters of coconut shrimp.

"Boy oh boy? Wow, it must have been too wild for him to even describe! What a hip cat, the guys want to be him and the girls wanna be with him!! What a handsome rake! A real ham dinner!"

In case you're wondering, this hypothetical is taking place in a 1927 speakeasy. And I'm pretty sure nobody ever used "ham dinner" as a slang term. But it gets better when Al Capone walks in and shoots this guy in the face.

Back to sane topics, my co-workers also threw me a lil'............don't know what to call it..........shindig?........luncheon. It was a luncheon, I'll go with luncheon. Complete with nachos and beans, and let me tell you, friends and countrymen............nothin' makes you feel better in the middle of the worst hangover of your life than soakin' up all the tequila still coating your stomach with beans, bell peppers and velveeta. If you aint' picking up on the sarcasm yet, don't worry it's probably just hidden underneath all the vomit.

Boy oh boy.

In other news, I got rick roll'd on the street earlier. Now.......I'm no fan or supporter of 2-years-past-stale internet memes, but that had to be the most awesome shit that's ever happened to me that didn't involve a warm vagina. You might be wondering the logistics of how a rick roll works in real life, and what kind of person would even do it. Basically I was standing outside of the state building where I work catchin' some fresh air, when this 30-somethin' year old asian guy pulls up next to me in a pickup truck, literally stops by the curb in the middle of traffic, turns up his stereo to full blast and it's "Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you doooooown!!", and he's singing along and dancing in his seat so hard it's shaking the truck. Complete stranger. Then he just turns the radio off like nothing happened and drives off.

I laughed so hard I almost coughed up my own alcohol diseased liver. That guy deserves to go to heaven, despite having no creativity whatsoever. Small criticism for a great man.

Anyway, that's my friday so far. It's all downhill from here. Thanks and much love to anyone readin' this that was at the party last night, I won't miss any of you simps but you can write me letters when I'm gone anyway.

Good riddance, please don't leave............

Judging by the complete lack of comments/e-mails from non-texan readers on the "R.I.P. DJ Screw" post a couple days ago, and the overflow of e-mails from drunk white friends of mine wanting to argue (with their fists) about the "Chinese DemoCRAPcy" post from yesterday, I think it's safe to say I've alienated a good chunk of my readers. Impressive.

And while there's a weird part of me that wants to just go ahead and get rid of the rest of you by posting turtle porn or "fun" thanksgiving recipes, I think I'll play this one safe and just post some things we can all agree are awesome.


1. The House Party scene from Fresh Prince.

2. Radiohead doing the Smiths live on a webcast. At least one part of that sentence has to warm your cockles.

3. This picture of Rosario. This picture? No stupid.......this one.

4. Japanese children's show from the 70's called "Gimmie Gimmie Octopus". No wonder they all grew up to love tentacle porn.


Okay. That's all I got. If you're still around, please feel free to leave a comment tellin' me what it would take to alienate you and make you never read my blog again, and I'll try to get around to that next week.

Yeah, more like Chinese DemoCRAPcy...........

Sorry, I been waiting a long time to say that, whether or not the new Guns N Roses album was any good or not. It was inevitable, like WWII or herpes.

Anyway, don't worry this ain't gonna be a review. This is NOT a review blog, and if it ever becomes one feel free to load a gun for me to take to the woods and bite. I just came to say that I'm really enjoying myself watchin' all these "hardcore metal" fans bend over backwards to defend an overly-polished pop/nu-metal album (which is exactly what Chinese Democracy is) just because of the name of the band on the cover. It really has been the highlight of my whole year so far.

First black president? Boring. Olympic summer games? Do I look like a pedophile? Nah, my choice for the cover of Time Magazine's "person of the year" is definitely this chick, cuz I'm sure this album release is the best thing to happen to her since the successful conviction of the guy on the right at the date rape trial.

To be honest I don't really have an opinion on the album, in the same way I don't have an opinion on the Jonas Brothers or cabbage soup. I could easily just say "this fucking sucks" and be done with it, but the truth is it just ain't my cup of tea. Cups of tea aren't my cup of tea either, and really just cups in general. I drink everything out of wine goblets. My point is that I don't just write blog posts to be negative. I'm a good person. All I'm sayin' is it's hilarious to me that the same people who shit on douchebag nu-metal bands (and rightfully so) with spiked hair, white contact lenses and zombie make-up from the November 1st Walmart clearance section, are now fawning over an album that makes Static-X look like Black Sabbath. That's all.

And don't get me wrong, I think it's great that 2008 could be the year when all the Metallica and GnR fans collectively found peace in their hearts, and finally got excited about something other than filling their autograph booklets with all the B-list celebrities they give cart-rides to at their airport security jobs...........that really is a heartwarming finale to the last few decades of being condescended to by record labels, stand up comedians, and VH1 rock docs...........but I find it really hard to believe that anyone waited 16 years to hear Axl Rose sing lyrics like "If the world would end, would our love slip away" over Oceans 14 soundtrack-esque strings, with guitar solos that sound closer to skinemax sex scenes than anything Slash ever bothered me with. But hey, keep up the act as long as you can.








And it fucking sucks.

Ok I'm done. Enjoy the record, guys.

Good Mourning...............

"Around that time, I heard my first gray tape/
1994, Hurricane Duck, up on the playscape/
That Soul II Soul intro, ironic cuz it brought me back to life."
- Sandman- Screw Shop Freestyle

So yesterday was the 8th anniversary of the death of the man who had a MUCH bigger influence on my life (along with every other kid from the hood in Texas in the mid-90's) than Biggie, Pac, and Eazy E all put together.

Talmbout DJ Screw, noamsayin'. Robert Davis Jr, fool. The originator. You forgot my gunshots, Screw yoooooooou.



So why didn't I make this post yesterday? Cuz he died on the 16th, but I found out on Nov. 17th, so this is my day of mourning, ya feel me.

I remember walkin' up to the back of Crockett High on that day in 2000, to the woods where all the gangbangers chilled on benches smokin' blunts before class, and for the first time ever it was quiet. No music, no yelling, no shameless girls dancing tryin' to fill the void their foster parents couldn't (yeah, it was a lot more fun than sittin' in the lunchroom next to the nerds playin' with magic cards). Everyone was just sittin' with their heads down. Black, white, mexican kids, all sittin' together lookin' like they saw a ghost. Or maybe hoping they would. When they told me DJ Screw died in his studio the night before, I just sat on the bench along with everyone else and couldn't say anything. The bell for first period rang and nobody moved. After maybe 15 minutes, someone popped in the gray tape of "The Final Chapter" from '96. Not the best tape he ever made but the most fitting eulogy any of us dro-baked dumbasses could put together on the spot.

In retrospect we couldn't have picked a better tape, since a) it was a Tupac heavy tape, and b) it had Lil' Keke flowin' over the beat for Bone Thugs "Crossroads".

8 years later, and every year it seems Screw's legacy is fading more and more, even in Texas. Some people like to blame it on the new generation of Houston rappers not paying homage enough. Others use MTV along with the trendy "hip hop is dead" meme to scapegoat the new generation of young fans out to be undereducated or ignorant. I don't buy into any of that bullshit. To me it's a lot simpler than that. Screw was an isolated phenomenon in one small region of the country. It was a huge movement, but an underground one that never crossed over to the mainstream (though definitely in some dope backdoor ways that few people noticed). Those thousands of kids who it did touch, called themselves (to this day) "screwheads", and that's how I'll always describe myself as well. But look around..............look at your friends...............the screwheads are grown now. Even those of us who were in the youngest group of Screw fans back in the mid-90's (I was 9 when I heard my first screw tape in 1994), are in our mid-to-late 20's now. To put it simply, Screwheads got kids, got married, got corporate jobs, moved out of Texas, and just generally became squares. So who are the ambassadors to carry on the legacy? 30 year old computer programmers drinkin' purple margaritas at Baby A's with their co-workers?

Just face it. It was a moment in time that doesn't translate real well to the new millennium rap scene, and let's be real, didn't much translate to the 90's rap scene either. And that's not necessarily a bad thing. Why does it have to be? Music movements come and go. I'm sure there was a lotta Cocteau Twins fans pissed off when the 80's ended and they realized that the shoegaze walls of sound that changed their lives weren't translating too well to the grunge takeover of the 90's.

Fuck it. The Kids are Alright. Just because the movement you were a part of isn't relevant anymore, doesn't mean it was somehow taken away from you forever. As long as we got the tapes, we have the culture. And really it just makes the music that much more meaningful to the holdovers who don't forget, who I might add were already obsessed with hoarding rare gray tapes back when there was a lot less rares than there is becoming now (shoutouts to TheScrewShop.com, home of the rare-tape hermit crabs).

Still it's weird to think that the next generation of kids in Central Texas won't grow up in an environment where you can't walk past a stoplight without ten cars bangin' screw so loud it shakes your eardrums like maracas.

I remember ridin' with my boy Donnie at 4 in the morning bangin' "Da Funk is on Your Mind" tape over and over, sittin' in the parking lot of Chalmers Court projects for hours jammin' the Fat Pat and Keke freestyle, still one of my favorite tracks ever.

I remember in 9th grade sneakin' a bottle of apple juice filled with Tequila into english class, and gettin' so drunk I fell asleep on my desk with my walkman on. Of course, I woke up with an empty walkman, and someone had stole my "Still a G at 27" tape. Whoever it was, I hope he/she got as much pleasure out of it as I did, cuz I wore that cotdamn tape out.

I could go on like that for pages, but I'll leave it at this.

R.I.P. DJ Screw

Thanks for giving Texas something of our own

Birdies that don't chirp........

2002- Sandman & ESG, backstage @ Dorris Miller Rec Center

From the vault (vault = shoebox)

How I Almost Killed the Mexican Shang Tsung........

I fully planned on coming back from lunch today and updating the blog with just some random youtube clips of blaxploitation flick trailers, that are all just as good (and sometimes better) than the actual movies. But something happened to me on the way back from lunch that is seriously making me reconsider whether there's such a thing as divine intervention. Strap yourselves in because this one is a real nail-biter.

It all started with me driving down Riverside, a.k.a. the taco truck mating fields, just minding my own business (listening to Lionel Richie "Dancing on the Ceiling" on Jammin 105.9 which as I said is MY OWN PERSONAL BUSINESS), when out of the corner of my eye I see this older mexican cat walkin' up a hill from this chicken joint. He gets up to the sidewalk, where logic would follow that he would stop and wait for the extremely heavy traffic flow to teeter off before he crosses the major street............but logic did not follow, dear reader. On this day, logic was blind and it's seeing eye dog was shot with a nailgun by Macaulay Culkin. This guy just keeps walking as if he found a new secret crosswalk nobody knows about yet. Apparently if you drink enough cases of Bud Light, the standard pink elephants turn into crossing guards. He just keeps on goin'.

Fine, I think to myself, I can deal with this. Everyone who knows Sandman can tell you I have the reflexes of a cat (and if any frozen burritos are being microwaved in the general area, the sense of smell of one, too). So I slam on my brakes, thus beginning the time-honored tradition of the near-pedestrian-murder experience we've all been through a million times, on both sides of the coin. We all know the drill. It's a 5-step process:

1. The pedestrian almost gets hit.
2. There's a moment of confusion, like both of you just woke up in bed with St Louis style pizza in your underwear.
3. Blame is assigned to the guilty party through facial expressions and telepathy.
4. The pedestrian moves back to the sidewalk (not so subtle foreshadowing here)
5. Both parties go on their way cussin' like sailors*

It's tradition!

But no.........this guy ain't having it. He's a rebel. A desperado, if you will. He says "chinga tu madre" to tradition and sticks his pinky in it's stinky. Basically what that boils down to is that instead of moving back on the sidewalk like a normal person, he stood in front of my car for what felt like infinity plus uno, just staring into my eyes with a confused look. He never got past the second stage of the process. After a while I'm yellin', honking the horn, whatever to get him to snap out of his stupor and move so I can get back to my very important job, so important that I have plenty of time to relate inane, rambling stories on a blog.

Finally he does move and I do drive off. But is that where the story ends? You'd think so, friend..........but you'd be dead wrong. Prepare for the shock of your young life. The horrible twist to this tale.

See, if this had all been happening in someone else's lane and I was just a spectator, I would still probably be writing about it here right now, because it would have been fucking hilarious regardless. So that this happened to me and not someone else is besides the fact. Also besides the fact is that this exact same refusal-to-move-after-near-accident situation happened to my wife on the same street literally less than a month ago, which in and of itself brings up disturbing trends in traffic laws south of the border. All of that is besides the fact, though. All of it takes a backseat to this new revelation that hit me somewhere around the 340th second of this guy staring into my soul with his unsteady drunken brow waving like a scuba buoy............the revelation was, "Hey, I recognize this guy."

But from where?

It wasn't until I got back here to the safety of my half-cubicle-half-toolbox thing that I'm sittin' at right now that I realized where I recognized him from.

Yes, that means another story, but I'll make it quick.

About 3 years ago, I'm driving past a 7-11 on my way home (yeah, to another apartment complex on Riverside. Who the fuck are you to judge the rate of my progress in life? HUH??!), when I see a circle of people, mostly high school kids, standing around jumpin' and screaming. Which we all know can only mean one thing. One beautiful thing.

FIGHT!!!!

Needless to say, I immediately pull into the 7-11 parking lot and get out to watch. And it's a good ass fight, too, it's two black kids maybe 16 years old, and they both had hands like a good metaphor for something with a lot of hands. But I could barely concentrate on the fight cuz on the other side of the circle, there's this guy........this old mexican guy.........and he's yelling over and over "FINISH HIM!!!! FINISH HIM!!" It was just weird and uncomfortable. He was completely ruining the mood of what otherwise is supposed to be a clean family event. And he wasn't even directing it at a specific fighter. Dude just wanted to see somebody get finished, didn't matter who. Eventually the cops came and everybody ran away. In the words of the great philosopher Cam'ron, "All you hear woop woop, want want, beep beep". But I never forgot that old man sincerely screamin' a Mortal Kombat catchphrase in the middle of a high school fight.

Fast forward to 3 years later, and I swear to zombie christ it's the same guy that I almost "finished" with my front bumper earlier today. With Lionel Richie almost providing the soundtrack to the final twilight of his life, which apparently not unlike mine, was mostly spent on and around East Riverside Lane. Proof that there's a God somewhere up there, who smokes a lot of angel dust. And I don't mean the dust of angels either, we're talkin' huge amounts of PCP, in all likelihood purchased from behind the 7-11 on Riverside.

Truth is stranger than fiction.

Now that I think about it.........whoever made up that phrase was a dummy, cuz I coulda fictionalized the fuck outta that story and made it a million times stranger. Like I could've gave the old mexican guy a duck beak and my car could've been the pope-mobile.

Truth is still pretty strange though, you gotta admit.



Footnotes:

*Or any other profession that's filled with enough morally bankrupt people as to be singled out and stereotyped with an activity that everyone on earth does on a daily basis.