old people are awesome

_posted in music | 30 December 2005

sigur rós's hoppípolla made me smile... a lot... i love the look of victory they all have at the end... old people are awesome... and it made me think of my grandmother...

and the rule is, you think of her you call her... so this afternoon was made even better by jokes about my five year old badass (but very witty) cousin, old lady giggling and the most important person in the world saying, "i love you." couldnt get any better than that...

_soundcheck: sigur rós, ágætis byrjun

a house of cosbys AND the black eye peas are shit!

_posted in music | web | 27 December 2005

it's been a minute since i checked out waxy.org and damn if he didnt make today just fucking awesome!

one.
a cover of the worst fucking song ever by probably one of the worst groups ever! and i am convinced that fergie is a dude... in drag... she's horrible...

two.
anyone who makes a whole cartoon series around cloning bill cosby, and then calls it house of cosbys is a god... a god i tell you, as in he is omnipresent and necessary... the theme song alone makes me happy in my secret place...

_soundcheck: deltron 3030, the instrumentals

change me

_posted in interactive narratives | photography | web | 27 December 2005

change me: the power of imagery to create a change, is a very nice interactive piece (designed by asterik) ... and's its also a good way for getty images to put there catalog to good use...

they've partnered up with ONE to...

_quote

fight the global emergency of AIDS and extreme poverty, Getty Images is launching an online community to further those efforts as well as raise awareness on the state of the world by leveraging the power of imagery. Whether it¡¦s a call to end poverty or generate greater collective regard for the environment, this is a chance to express your ideas, challenge assumptions or simply make someone smile. In addition to creating this community, Getty Images will donate $10 to ONE for each submission made.

_soundcheck: meshell ndegeocello, comfort woman

google zeitgeist

_posted in web | 23 December 2005

google's 2005 year-end google zeitgeist, as in "the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era" is a really nice breakdown of data on various issues... i may have picked a few other items as examples but you more or less get the idea of how people think... it would have been really cool if you were able to choose your own examples and get graphical representations of those...

_soundcheck: damian marley, welcome to jamrock

Hope Is Vital

_posted in photography | 22 December 2005

http://www.posithiv.nl/eng/

moving images from http://www.pepbonet.com pep bonet of hiv+ individuals...

_posted in dayedayerocks | 22 December 2005

the up side of the valley...

i spent last night having a really great meal with the TA from the class i taught as a visiting professor, and his family. i've only driven out the the valley a few times and holy shit if its not like driving to hell and back... so i avoid the valley at all costs... last night was definitely the upside of the valley...

jeff (my friend), diego, his six year old school, and i walked the natural trail in some huge lovely park that smelled of sage... diego took pictures of geese, egrets and various other large water fowl... in each lookout area a large compose was etched in the stone... jeff asked diego to show us a right angle in the circle, then an obtuse angle, then an acute angle, then a 180degree angle... how amazing is this little guy... him and his father were reading the Sir Cumference children's books. How amazing are these? I read two last night and i'll be damned if it wasnt a nice little refresher on basic geometry.

"it's in the direction of yes"

_posted in music | 16 December 2005

one thing i miss about home is the atlanta bands... and the earl... and cheap liquor at a live show... but that's part of the growing pains of moving to a new city... don't get me wrong, los angeles has tons of clubs and tons of concerts, but the one thing i had in atlanta that i don't have here... friends who are in bands... ive got one friend who's rocking it out in a band here, but it's still not like back home...

having said all that... i add the the selmanaires to my list of favorite bands, as well as one of my all time favorite atlanta bands... i opened my mailbox tonight, no sight of that awaited freelance paycheck, but some great fucking music... you know you want it... so make your way over to international hits and BUY this cd... cause they so deserve the support...

_soundcheck: the selmanaires, here come the selmanaires

two red wines and five stoli and gingerales later...

_posted in dayedayerocks | 15 December 2005

i'm not hung over, but damn if i dont want to sleep the rest of today. and tomorrow. and this weekend.

_soundcheck: rebirth brass band, main event: live at the maple leaf

bound for glory, america in color: 1939 - 1943

_posted in photography | 13 December 2005

i've always been a fan of gordon parks, walker evans, dorothea lange and the other farm security administration photographers, so i was pleased to see the depression era in color...

bound for glory is a set of lovely photos in color that just really make the time period seem personal, more than just a part of america's history at large.

_quote

Bound for Glory: America in Color is the first major exhibition of the little known color images taken by photographers of the Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information. These vivid scenes and portraits capture the effects of the Depression on America's rural and small town populations, the nation's subsequent economic recovery and industrial growth, and the country's great mobilization for World War II.

_soundcheck: vince guaraldi, a charlie brown christmas

"little by little fills the cup"

_posted in africa | interactive narratives | photography | web | 11 December 2005

another lovely interactive piece, little by little outside of being lovely its content is awesome and well worth your time...

produced by 49th parallel productions and the oakland tribune... the accompanying article is rather short, but you get all the info from the interactive piece...

_quote

He saw them walk miles to learn in dirt-floor school houses, sharing books with other students crammed onto wood benches.

They had so little and yet were so determined to learn and so quick to laugh.

_soundcheck: richard pryor, is it something i said

damn!

_posted in news | 11 December 2005

richard pryor is dead... i dont even have words for this... seriously...

all i can say is pryor was a pivotal part of my childhood... i remember sneaking into the living room in the middle of the night to listen to richard pryor records my grandparents hid under the living room sofa... i learned most of my curse words and other wonderfully worldly phrases from pryor...

rest in peace man... with your crazy ass...

_soundcheck: sam cooke, the rhythm and the blues

why!?

_posted in dayedayerocks | 11 December 2005

why have i started playing warcraft again... why!? its not like i dont have stuff to work on... its not like i can afford to play warcraft from 6.30am - 12.45pm... not. that. i. did. that. this. morning. :-/

"black love brown pride"

_posted in dayedayerocks | los angeles | 09 December 2005

this morning i broke my regular routine and listened to music on the way to work today... and who did i blast from palms to westwood you ask... tupac, doing it l.a. style... to live and die in l.a. and there are two lines that put last night's conversations into perspective...

_quote

Cause would it be LA without Mexicans? Black love brown pride and the sets again

coming from blacklanta, um.. i mean atlanta, to a city where i'd be lucky to see any brothers or sisters in a the span of a week, has definitely been an experience to say the least... don't get me wrong, my grandmother always said my various groups of friends were my very own rainbow coalition, blacks, browns, yellows, whites... so shit im down for whatever set, as long as mofos are cool...

but living in "diverse" los angeles means im not living in the mix of diversity. it's funny how diversity really means segregated here in los angeles. if you want to see black people, you need to drive to lamert park, inglewood or crenshaw. and while latinos are everywhere (i love a place where any national minority is almost 50% of a city's population) you still have to drive to their neighborhoods if you want to experience latino culture.

one of the first people i met here in l.a. is half mexican and half panamanian... im sure both of us being half panamanian is what made us connect more than anything else. ever since i was a kid i've had a stronger connection to the latino/caribbean part of my culture. although im jonesing for the black side of l.a., im sure loving the brown side just as much. when i first got to l.a. it was obvious how culture works here, how black and brown are even purposely sectioned off from one another, and how they both are sectioned off from hollywood.

today this is a big deal, cause i got an email from a friend who's a teacher at santee high school in south central los angeles. and yesterday marked " the second day of the Santee High School Riots." the news would have you believe its a black vs. brown war, but like all things, media reduces the complexity of the issue which makes it easier to generalize and misinform. below is some of what my friend has to say... take a minute to read the full email.

_quote

Santee was opened way too soon and the problems at Jefferson were not solved but transferred over to Santee. It opened to soon in the sense that there was no discipline plan safety plan in place, It opened up with 15 substitutes, staff had little training on how to conduct sensitive human relations issues. There is an amassing amount of racism on campus from teachers on to students. Students have complained numerous times to me personally and many complaints have gone unreported because as students say, "Ain't nobody going to do nothing." Moreover the students themselves have internalized hate and all too often used to fuel hatred toward violence against one another.

_update

chris: blacklanta?
chris: come on
daye: hehehe
daye: it is blak
daye: hehehe
daye: dude its one of the blackest cities in the country
daye: you come on
chris: that doesn't mean it should be called blacklanta!
daye: hehehe
daye: thats why i said... um... atlanta
chris: lets change africa to blackfrica while we're at it
daye: ive heard white people say that... thats why i love it
daye: they were complaining...
daye: "fucking blacklanta"

photography tuesdays

_posted in africa | interactive narratives | photography | 06 December 2005

gideon mendel has a nice interactive piece over at the guardian, an answer in africa... i first came in contact with mendel a year ago when i saw his book, a broken landscape. he primarily shoots in various countries in africa and the hiv/aids pandemic...

_other interactive pieces from mendel for the guardian...

eight women one voice
Salvation is Cheap
Gideon Mendel in Mozambique: The children left behind

_soundcheck: me first and the gimme gimmes, are a drag

just to give you an idea of the friends i have...

_posted in dayedayerocks | 05 December 2005

this is from october 7th... i was being my usual charming self over aim and for some reason this came through direct connect... i tell you this boy is crazy... and the fact that i just barely lost to w, makes me sad... sad i tell ya...

"it's strange to think of one's self as an assassin"

_posted in film | 05 December 2005

mostly everyone who knows me knows how i feel about spielberg... one of my top ten favorite movies ever is a speilberg movie, but as of late his films have been EXTREMELY lacking... lacking in truth, heart, emotion, suspense, complexity, all the things that made him great in my eyes.. don't get me wrong... if i had the chance to work with speilberg id jump at it... regardless of the quality of his work in the last few years, this man KNOWS films, knows the art behind it... so imagine my shock when i saw this cnn article about his latest movie, Munich, about the Israeli government's retaliation revenge of the 1972 Munich slaughter of Israeli atheles during the Olympic games.

_quote

"Somewhere inside all this intransigence there has to be a prayer for peace," Spielberg told Time, "because the biggest enemy is not the Palestinians or the Israelis. The biggest enemy in the region is intransigence."

The director also discussed another film project he is initiating in February, in which he is buying 250 video cameras and players and giving them to Israeli and Palestinian children so that they can make movies about their own lives.

my initial thought was, "why now?" and then i saw the trailer and thought, "is it possible that he's actually made a complex movie about complex issues about complex human beings?" i got goosebumbs (albeit a coworker said it was the music that did that, not so much the trailer). chris, so aptly asked, "what happened to him? when did he become respectable again?" and thats a good question. and im glad to see that after making something like war of the worlds he could possibly redeem himself.

i feel that every story that i want to tell is being told right now... that i'm missing my chance to tell these stories, but shit, it doesnt matter as long as the stories are being told... i look forward to spielberg's latest effort and i pray that its one of the those classic spielberg movies, not some cookie cutter thriller that has no soul, or worse, no real purpose.

_soundcheck: pixies, surfer rosa

"everyone always wants to go to the other side"

_posted in interactive narratives | photography | web | 01 December 2005

i've been trying to figure out how documentary filmmakers and photographers have the staying power needed to work on a project for years... it's obvious that it's all small steps that make for giant strides... but it still baffles me...

simon wheatly does an amazing job at photographing inner-city youth in london, a four year effort. it's amazing... magnum in motion is an awesome idea, but the audio aspect of their projects are for shite at times... there are a number of slides, where the audio seems to prematuraly stop, pissing me off, cause everything wheatly says is so interesting and the images are so strong you want to hear the details... listen to what he has to say in slide number 23... ive rarely heard the bastardization of culture stated more eloquently...

alex webb shares photos from a 26-year period at the mexican-u.s. border...

_soundcheck: sufjan stevens, live @ kcrw 2005

world aids day

_posted in africa | interactive narratives | photography | the world | 01 December 2005

today is world aids day... get tested... learn a new fact about hiv/aids... better yet, teach a new fact about hiv/aids... be informed... be safe... be smart... be caring... be...

_links

global business coalition on hiv/aids
keep a child alive
stop aids campaign
unaids: i love the fact that the united nations programme on hiv/aids reads as unaids; as in to release, free, or remove from aids... smart...
we all have aids: kenneth cole's public service campaign... definitely worth checking out...
world aids campaign
world aids day
world health organization

_important things to watch

pandemic: facing aids is a five-part series that shows the effects of aids around the globe... it doesnt shy away from the pandemic and how it effects us all...

yesterday is amazing! i'll talk more about this movie later... you have to watch it! the fact that leleti khumalo is the main character was enough for me... because i can't get enough of the music in sarafina!...

kristen ashburn's photo essay on aids in africa

_soundcheck: damian marley, welcome to jamrock