Missing Brooklyn

Sharon and the Kings of Dap do well showcasing the borough that's thorough in their new video for "Tell Me":

Today's Funk Special

Paul Dateh & inka one = hip hop, strings style!

Snoop's Sensual Seduction

This being funkypundit.blogspot.com, it seems mandatory to note that Snoop is declaring the G-Funk Era back on:

Well played, Mr. Snoop -- well played.

Today's Funk Special

Beck plays "Nicotine and Gravy" at Germany's Bizzarefest in August 2000:

Thanks my friend Pat, this song has been stuck in my head since Saturday night. Now it will be stuck in all of yours!

Speaking of Sharon Jones ...

In the latest Harp Magazine, Andy Tennille, the brother of a FunkyPundit friend, has a feature on the Daptone Records' origins. In the beginning, label co-founder and Dap Tones bassist Gabe Roth struggled to find an audience for vintage soul and funk:

Obsessed vinylphiles were always looking for old, limited-edition pressings of rare funk and soul 45s, the more obscure the better. A few months later, Desco issued The Revenge of Mister Mopoji by an unknown group named Mike Jackson & the Soul Providers, heralding it as the long-awaited reissue of a soundtrack to an obscure ’70s kung fu movie.

“It was a fake reissue of a soundtrack to a kung fu movie that never actually existed,” Roth confesses with a sly grin. “We would go to record shops in New York to sell the album and store clerks would tell me, ‘I don’t want that. I got the original.’ There was no original soundtrack; there was no fucking movie to begin with. It was unbelievable. That’s when I realized how full of shit most of these people were.”

Should you have an interest, the whole piece is available here.

Funk's Video of the Day

Hot off the editing reels!

It's my hero, mentor and life-long love, Sharon Jones, with her hit "100 Days, 100 Nights" off their new album of the same title. According to the director, it was filmed with two vintage TV cameras purchased off e-Bay for $50 apiece.

Friday Funk

From prison guard to soulstress hero, a short CNN clip on Ms. Sharon Jones.

Completely unrelated but also worth checking out is this compendium of foreign movies nominated for Oscars.

Beastie Boys on Charlie Rose

Part 1, part 2, part 3.

Best question & answer:

Rose: What do you think of the current state of hip hop?

Ad Rock: I think it's fabulous what they've done with it.

(The Beastie Boys, it should be noted, refuse to slam contemporary rap, much to the dismay of the countless music journalists who try to bait them nonetheless.)

New Funk: 'A Sunday Smile'

New single off Beirut's forthcoming The Flying Club Cup. Check it out here.

Saving Columbia Records

Rick Rubin, as we all know, founded Def Jam records in his NYU dorm room in 1983. He's since gone on to reinvent the careers of The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Johnny Cash, Neil Diamond, the Dixie Chicks and countless other acts. This week's New York Times magazine looks at his latest challenge: saving Columbia Records and, quite possibly, the record industry itself.

The piece is an interesting take on an industry in full-fledged panic mode. With CD sales plummeting and companies like Apple reaping the lion's share of music download profits, once-dominant labels are struggling just to stay viable.

My question: Do we even need major record companies? Rubin seems to think so, pointing to their ability to spread new music to the masses. Yet one of his latest obsessions -- British-born Paul Potts -- has achieved notoriety almost entirely through YouTube. The primary asset of record labels is their ability to set artists up with record contracts, studios, and professional producers. But with technology becoming more affordable, there are countless smaller labels able to perform these same functions (albeit with the exception of a long-term record deal, though those aren't much use if all the major labels fold a few years hence).

The piece reminded me of an oped in today's Journal by Michael Lynton, CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment. (Sony, by the way, owns Columbia.) Lynton argues that contrary to assertions by the likes of Thomas Friedman, globalization is not "making the world more homogeneous." Instead, he says, while Hollywood films once flourished in foreign countries, these same markets are now being dominated by locally produced films. This, one imagines, is once again a product of the increasing affordability of technology, with the expanding wealth afforded by globalized trade, and Hollywood itself responding to new market demands.

Wealth and technology are decentralizing the power once afforded to the big players dominating industries like music and cinema, enabling up-and-coming talents to create mass followings unassisted.

So, can music survive without institutions like Columbia and Capitol? Hard to see why not.

'Triumph of the Heart'

Another great video from Bjork:

I Agree With My Friend Seth

Phish rocking Moma Dance at a late-90s Farm Aid concert is a wonderful moment in the band's history. (Trey really hams it up for the cameras.)

Today's Funk -- More Sharon

Via Black20.com: Live at Southpaw, 2005.

'Queen of the Dap Kings'

One good thing about my girlfriend (Amy Winehouse) becoming all famous in America is that her back-up band on "Back to Black," the Brooklyn-based Dap Kings, are finally starting to get some respect. They served as the house band for the ESPYs and are set to do the same for MTV's upcoming video awards. But even better than that, the "Queen of the Dap Kings," Sharon Jones, is, at the tender age of 50, also finally starting to get her props. She's the soul sister who should be receiving the same media accolades currently lavished upon Ms. Winehouse, as her music is actually far better, and -- unlike Ms. Winehouse -- she can actually perform live without falling over or spitting at her fans. And perform she does. Only in a live setting is one able to truly appreciate just the sort of entertainer Sharon Jones is. Not only does she have pipes, she dances, too.

MTV, much to its credit, is starting to notice:


Here's another video, this one a behind-the-scenes look at Daptone Records headquarters in Bushwick, Brooklyn.

Another note about Sharon: She's super nice. I once got kicked out of one her shows at Southpaw due to its draconian smoking policy -- and right as the Dap Kings were starting. My only hope of getting back inside before Sharon hit the stage was through the band's entrance. After waiting for someone to walk out, I snook in, only to be apprehended by a bouncer. Much to my surprise/delight, Sharon, who was waiting to go on, came to intervene, assuring the bouncer that my B.S. story was the God's honest. It didn't hurt that I'd chatted her up earlier at the bar, so she at least knew a little of what I was saying was true.

Today's Funk

Galactic performing live at Bonnaroo with special guest Chali 2na:

Their new album, despite a few misses, is hot. As was their show at Central Park last Saturday. In October they'll kick off a tour to support their new album "From the Corner to the Block."

My Love Hath Scorned

My girlfriend is probably the best young female vocalist around. But that isn't to say I'd actually pay to see her perform live.

Afrodisiac

Femi Kuti, son of the Afrobeat godfather, Fela Kuti, takes the (Summer)stage this Wednesday night in Central Park. Michael Woodsworth, a former colleague, has more on the show here.

More details from SummerStage:

Wednesday, July 11, 2007
From 7:00 PM to 10:00 PM
Central Park SummerStage

The power of Afrobeat is showcased live and on film, as an accomplished son pays tribute to his father’s achievement.

Since the 1997 death of his father, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, Femi Kuti has become the undisputed king of Afrobeat, having taken the style worldwide over the last ten years with his band Positive Force. Collaborating with hip-hoppers like Mos Def and Common and touring with alt-rock icons Jane's Addiction, Femi has expanded the music’s scope without sacrificing its relentless, hypnotic beat or its urgent political concerns. Femi’s performance will be followed by a screening of Music Is A Weapon, the 1982 film by Stephane Tchal-Gadjieff & Jean Jacques Flori that remains the definitive documentary on Fela Kuti and his times. Fela Kuti’s influence on black contemporary music cannot be overestimated; virtually all modern forms of black music (from funk to electronic) owe something to his irresistible Afrobeat groove.

A respected DJ and spoken word artist, Rich Medina has worked with Jill Scott, King Britt, Bobbito, DJ Spinna and many others. With residencies at New York’s S.O.B.’s, APT and Table 50, and Philadelphia’s Tragos and Fluid, Medina is familiar to club goers up and down the East Coast. Marked by a strong message of self-empowerment and hope, his sets are equal parts call-to-party and call-to-action.

See you there.

Today's Funk

Courtesy of Ragged Thots' Robert George, A Tribe Called Quest on the Arsenio Hall show sometime in 1991 (notice how skinny Busta Bust):

Beasties on Tour

Pretty cool. The Beasties have a Flickr page up where they're posting shots from the road. They also have blogs -- one regular, and one for the tour. After (yet another) European tour, they're playing East Coast shows in early August. Sadly, the two NYC shows -- Summerstage in Central Park and McCarren Pool in Brooklyn -- are insanely expensive ($60 after Ticketbastard's $10 rape fee). I'll be attending the show in the BK, and hanging out in Central Park, hopefully close enough to hear the music without having to fork over the remainder of my life savings.

For those who haven't heard their latest album, The Mix Up, you really oughta. Mike D described it as different from The In Sound From the Way Out, despite both being instrumentals only. But he's wrong. It's just as funky, just as dank, and just as worthy of everyone going out and picking up a copy. My only complaint is that it's too short. Each track clocks in around 4 minutes, and with only 10 or so songs, the whole thing's over before you've even put on your leisure suit.

Peep the video for Off the Grid:

Aside from the posted tour dates, they'll also be playing a number of secret shows. From their e-mail:

THE GALA EVENTS will be in smaller spots, more exclusive, more intimate. this will be more like quality time, our time, just you and the band sitting by a fire on a tropical beach late at night being serenaded with love songs. these shows are for people that are into our weird stuff, so if you want to get weird together, this is your call. these shows will be based around the instruments. some songs will have vocals, others will be instrumental. BUT if you'd like to come to one of these shows, then dress to impress, wear a suit, a tie, a dress, a gown or whatever you feel dressed up in... AND PLEASE leave your cargo shorts, birkenstocks and t-shirts at home, this is not that kind of party.

For the Record

Antibalas' new album, Security, is the best CD. Ever.

That is all.