Jeff S

James Brown, 1933-2006

It's very difficult for me to assess the profound effect James Brown's music, style and essence has had on my personally. I can't claim to be a James Brown expert, and I am too young to have seen him live. Been thinking about it a lot, though, and it is such a travesty. A real hero of mine. Don't really want to intellectualize. Here's a mix I made of my favorite cuts from some of his songs. Hope you enjoy it, and I sincerely hope you can be as excited by his music as I have been.

Jeff Sisson's James Brown mix (12.8 megabytes)

big / medium / small

In the conclusion to his book Ever Since Darwin, Stephen J. Gould addresses our ability to answer nature's big questions thusly:

Really big questions succumb to the richness of nature—change can be directed or aimless, gradual or cataclysmic, selective or neutral. I will rejoice in the multifariousness of nature and leave the chimera of certainty to politicians and preachers.

In the past, I have found myself firmly in Gould's camp, which emphasizes pragmatic, delicate approaches to complex problems. This particular quote, however, made me think of our man, Andrew W.K.

In his wonderful lecture at NYU, Andrew W.K. questioned the typical intellectual resistance towards sincere discussion of "big ideas" (as a related fact, I have a t-shirt which explains the "big concepts" as follows: Who Am I? Why am I Here? What Is My Fate? Where Are The Cookies?). W.K. is certainly no trained academic; much of of his philosophy is not at all rooted in the dialectic tradition. Nor should it be. His approach to epistemology, the study of "thinking about how you think," is what interests me most. Throughout his lecture, he used the phrase "making a conscious effort" to describe everything from his musical influences to how he treats people he doesn't like. In a larger sense, the phrase "making a conscious effort" enables him to take on seemingly-insurmountable topics, because he does so with sincerity and an open mind.

It was interesting to observe the slow trickle of audience-members leaving the show, disappointed that the man who wrote "Party till you Puke" wasn't going to rock their bones. In truth, there was at least one balls-out-crazy moment (video), but the segway to this 11th avenue freakout was born out of his frustration at being unable to properly define how multiple dimensions work. Not to nerd out here, but I started the slow clap that led to this spontaneous moment, trying to re-build his train of thought. It was a fantastic moment in my life.

Anyways, I have begun to try and put to use W.K.'s mindset. I would even argue that this discovery started a while back, with post-awareness. Reconciling concept-based creativity and sincerity can be daunting, especially when so much of that creation relies heavily on referentiality. I take heart, however, that integrating "sincerity" with the party-hard aesthetic/attitude can't be all that easy, either.

More Andrew W.K. at NYU Videos

internet vs. tv battles

I have been watching VH1's countdown show, Web Junk 20. It is a top 100 style countdown of the top Web clips of the year. I got bored, so I started just watching youtube clips
So far, the comedians who present the clips seem to try and extract humor by repeating exactly what happened in the video, i.e. literally just saying "Oh My God! N64"
an actual quote:  "this next clip is like a gift from the internet gods—I don't even have to make any jokes!"

it seems to me that some ideas are better left 2 da net:
Channel 53 is a favorite website of mine, though a little more obscure in content. John Michael Boling and Javier Morales find fantastic clips. I don't really know what their process is, but when I am surfing youtube, I tend to rely heavily on the Related Items sidebar.

Collectables!

In honor of this crazy, but wonderful, semester that we all just wrapped up, here is a calendar of Fall 2006, for Year 2007. Featured: the lovely Julie Cam'ron.
Download (8 megabytes)

and some holiday musical treats:
O Tannenbaum (Soul-sides.com exclusive)
Little Drummer Boyby Javier Morales (from 53 o's)
Rappin' Christmas by the Cold Cut Crew (via the Stones Throw Podcast)

Dade County