Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Lee "Scratch" Perry
Washington Post, Tuesday, May 23, 2006; Page C04
Last month, reggae icon Lee "Scratch" Perry performed in Jamaica for the first time in 44 years. The surprisingly small crowd attending his show at Crossroads on Sunday must have wondered whether they'd have to wait four decades, too -- Perry canceled his last concert here -- but the genius-madman producer and writer behind some of reggae's greatest songs was merely 2 1/2 hours late.
Perry is a legendary eccentric, but the delay wasn't his fault: The driver from Crossroads was sent to the wrong airport to pick to him up. You can only imagine what the baggage-claim folks must have thought about their extended visit with the 4-foot-11 and 70-year-old Perry, whose beard is red, hair is green and style of speech seems to be that of a visitor from outer space.
When Perry finally took the stage, backed by Dub Is a Weapon, he rambled through a weak set that was appealing only because it was good to see "The Upsetter" in the flesh -- and what fine flesh it is. "No wrinkles, no crinkles, no pimples for Mr. Perry," he mumbled into a microphone elaborately decorated with Rastafarian images and colors.
His face did look pretty good, but his small, nasally voice was another matter. Perry was never a great crooner, so it's unfair to compare his versions of "Small Axe," "Kaya," "Exodus" and "Punky Reggae Party" to those of a true soul singer like Bob Marley. Still, Perry couldn't have sounded more disinterested on tunes such as "Roast Fish and Cornbread."
After an hour, he got a signal from a woman at the front of the stage, quickly picked up his bag, waved to the audience and left the club for good. --Christopher Porter
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Dub Is a Weapon featured legendary percussionist Larry McDonald, who has played with pretty much everybody in roots reggae. He's suffering from bladder cancer, is undergoing chemo, and was walking with a cane because of a severe case of arthritis. But he played great (Dub Is a Weapon did an hourlong set while waiting for Scratch), he looked strong, and there were definitely a few women there just to see him.
This is how empty the club was at 9 p.m. -- Scratch was supposed to start at 8.
I was shocked that so few people were there for such a legendary figure, but a local reggae promoter told me that Scratch isn't very popular in the West Indian community. In fact, a large part of the audience was white: jam-band kids, record geeks, etc. Scratch complained on stage that the show wasn't advertised properly, but it had been promoted for about two months and Crossroads is, by far, the No. 1 reggae and dancehall club in the D.C. area, so word was out there. The place filled out a bit by 10:30, but that's mostly because Dancehall Sunday was supposed to start at 10 and people started to arrive for that -- and they were still forced to pay the $20 cover for Scratch. They weren't happy.
Scratch's show may have been weak but his self-decorated kicks were strong.
 Posted by CP | Link |
Friday, May 19, 2006
Postrock and a Hard Place
You think it's difficult to communicate your love of porn soundtracks, hardcore punk, and upbeat Afropop to East Coast hipsters? Try convincing the Kenyan police that's not your weed.
By Christopher Porter
Washington City Paper, May 19, 2006
Click here to read my article about Extra Golden.
Click here to listen to excerpts from Extra Golden's Ok-Oyot System.
BONUS SIDEBAR - EXTRA VALUE MEAL
Rough Guide to Benga Music
East African music expert Douglas Paterson, who is quoted in the Extra Golden article, offers up a selection of recommended benga recordings:
For older-style benga with shorter tracks, Paterson recommends Ochieng' Nelly and Victoria All Stars International's Komala Express and Collela Mazee and Victoria B Kings Band's Jessica. For the current benga sound with longer tracks, try Okatch Biggy's Nyathi Nyakach. All three CDs are on the Equator Heritage Sounds label.
Two CDs that Paterson compiled feature several benga tracks, including The Nairobi Beat: Kenyan Pop Music Today on Rounder and The Rough Guide to the Music of Kenya.
While the Luo people of Kenya are responsible for a lot of benga music, Paterson also points to a CD made by Kamba musicians: Kakai Kilonzo and Les Kilimambogo Brothers' The Best of Kakai Volume One on Shava Musik.
 Posted by CP | Link |
Monday, May 08, 2006
Joseph Hill and Culture: Age-Defying Reggae
Washington Post, Monday, May 8, 2006; Page C04
If someone tells you a reggae show starts at midnight, it usually means 1:30 a.m. In the case of Culture's concert Friday at Crossroads, it meant more like 11:15 p.m. So a reporter arriving at 11:45 really could do nothing more than curse himself for missing the first 30 minutes of a 100-minute concert -- especially because the 70 minutes he did see proved that Culture leader Joseph Hill is not only one of the best songwriters in the history of roots reggae, but also a charming and charismatic performer. Hill's scratchy tenor sounded a little hoarse when he chatted between songs, but his voice was nothing but golden when he sang, accompanied by fellow Culture singers Telford Nelson and Albert Walker and backed by D.C.'s fantastic Forces of Justice band.
Decked out in a natty knee-length suit coat, a dress hat holding back his dreadlocks, Hill danced, high-kicked and teased the crowd, drawing from 30-plus years of performing experience. During "International Herb," people sang along as they waved their arms and cellphones in the air, but Hill stopped the song and made them scream for more. For "Love Shines Brighter," one of Culture's most uplifting singalongs, Hill went down on one knee to croon.
But for all his playful showmanship, Hill is a righteous crusader at heart. He introduced a cover of Peter Tosh's "Equal Rights" by saying: "I was born for justice. And when I die, bury me in a casket called Equal Rights."
"Two Sevens Clash" is Hill's most famous composition, a classic cut from 1976 that talked about the apocalypse hitting on 7/7/77. It didn't, natch, but the tune still sounds incredible today. Hill introduced it by saying, "If you ever write a good song -- or even [create] a piece of furniture -- good things don't grow old." The same can be said of Joseph Hill and Culture. --Christopher Porter
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[Update, 8/20/06: R.I.P., J. Hill]Posted by CP | Link |
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
Here's the complete interview transcript for a short article I did in the May 2006 issue of Harp. The assignment was to ask Skinner about his drinkin' & druggin'. And, like, music stuff.
The Streets' Mike Skinner:
Light 'Em
By Christopher Porter
Following the success of 2004's concept album A Grand Don't Come for Free, British rappper-producer Mike Skinner indulged in lots of drugs and debauchery while also enduring the death of his father. The Streets' lone member chronicles his wild life on The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living, another top-notch storybook with banging beats. Skinner's lyrics are funny, cutting and intelligent, and he's unrelentingly honest about his indulgences, illegal or otherwise.
With your second album you went into it with the idea of writing it as a song cycle. Was this one more a result of individual pieces that just happen to come together?
I do write the songs all at the same time. I did that on the first album, and I did it obviously on the second. And I did it on this one. In a way it is all one story, there's just no reference to time.
The one story being you dealing with your post-2004 success and the death of your father?
Yeah, but they're all basically [part] of the same story.
The first single, "When You Wasn't Famous," is causing a bit of a stir. It features you having sex and smoking crack with a fellow pop star, who you then see on TV a few hours later looking just fine. Have the tabloids been bugging you to name the person in the song?
I think if I actually spoke to the tabloids they'd probably bug me. They've dug up many things in my career, so that doesn't bother me. That's just the way it is in England. That's the game that you're in.
Were the revelations on the album a way of you devaluing the tabloids, by just putting the information out there yourself about all the crazy times you've had the past few years?
No. Even though I don't ever speak to them, and I have no intention to speak to them, I've got absolute respect for them. All they're really doing is the same as me: They're trying to sell papers and I'm trying to sell records. If I can think of a really good idea for a song, I won't put nothing in my way to make that song happen. The only difference with them is that their songs, so to speak, are involved in real people's lives. But they can't worry about that because they're too busy trying to sell papers.
But you don't name names....
I mean, if I had to.... To be honest, I wouldn't be a journalist. But someone's got to do it, because there are a lot of papers to sell: you name names. If the papers never named names, no one would buy the papers. It's a necessary -- it's not the papers that are really bad; they're just a product of what people so fervently want. Because people who are two steps away from it, they'll spend their quid on the paper, read the story, the scandal about Hugh Grant or whatever, and then mutter at that the papers, "Oh, that's terrible, you shouldn't exploit him like that." But you spend the quid on the paper. So I've got no ax to grind with the papers; I just don't deal with them. More healthy for me.
What prompted the "Two Nations Divided by One Language" song?
All my musical references are American, really. I'm a great lover of America. But that [song's] just my sense of humor. I'm not knocking America in any way. It was originally supposed to be on the Biggie Smalls duets album. I met up with P Diddy when I was here in November [2005], and he was putting the album together. That was the song I did that was supposed to be a duet with Biggie. I wrote the only song I could think of writing. [It was left off the Biggie duets CD.] Rightfully so, to be honest. It wasn't deemed suitable for American mass consumption.
You've made an art of the rap ballad. On this CD it's "Never Went to Church" and "Out Goes Out the Window." Has your family heard "Never Went to Church"?
Yeah. They like it, but it's difficult, because it involves them in a way. My mom's been able to retire and move down to London; I keep her so close, that it doesn't really matter. It's not an issue. We don't really talk about my job too much. We've got a life that's away from that. It is expression, but I'm also making a good life for her. So however that happens....
Was she shocked at anything on the new album?
My parents are quite what you might call liberal. They've seen it all before, to be honest.
Now that this album is done, do you see yourself as having come out of the wild, drink and drug period you document on it, or is that still ongoing?
It's very much a part of my life. It's never what I'd call that much of a problem; I just had to sort a few things out. Because I'm British, I'm surrounded by that all my life. I can abstain, and I can carry on with my business, but it will always be -- that's just what the British do. I've got a really big family as well; that's just the way we do things. But music was always the only real thing in my life.
Since you're so honest about your drug use, do you ever worry about being a target of an investigation?
No. I think because I'm honest, I'm not a target. With the British papers, the only the angle they can find is an inconsistency. So if you're on kids' TV or reading the news or something, and you get found doing drugs, it's like, "That's very naughty" and it's a big scandal. But if you got a photo of me doing drugs, that's not a scandal. In fact, I could give you photos of me doing drugs. There's a whole DVD that we're about to release. It's quite a safe thing to do; just put it all out there. Then there's very few things that might be deemed scandalous.
What's this DVD?
We've been filming this DVD the past few years. You know that last song on the album, "Fake Streets Hat," all that talking you can hear, the stage stuff? That's all from a video from that whole weekend. I don't know when it's coming out. We've got all the footage; it's just turning it into something. I've been too busy promoting the album at the moment, but as soon as it dies down a bit, we'll get on it [the DVD].
Do you have a favorite drink and drug?
Yeah, I quite like the American way, really. I think that's quite funny. What is it? Adderall and Klonopin. I think you guys are bit inhibited about talking about it sometimes, but I actually think you're quite sophisticated with your partying. But we just probably do it a lot more and talk about it a lot more. But you're a lot more open about sex; we're pretty inhibited about all that stuff.
Those are both prescription drugs; what about the illegal stuff?
Well, anything, to be honest. I mean, I rarely decide to do drugs. I don't go out and decide I'm gonna get off my face. But there's always something going on to get involved in.
No worries about addiction?
Not really. I suppose if I were to be addicted to anything it would probably be booze. I don't think it would be all the time. I think I could quite easily get drunk every night, but I think I'd be a long way off from waking up and drinking.
What's your drink of choice?
Brandy, and just beer, really. But not American beer; European beer. It's got to be at least 4 percent [alcohol]. Not Miller Light.
You talk a lot about your gambling habits on the new CD. Is that still going on?
Not really. To be honest, the only addiction that I can ever say I've had is music. That will always completely consume my life. I think if I lost that I'd very quickly go downhill.
What did you like to bet on?
In England we have this thing called spread betting; it's not fixed odds. You bet live. You can bet on the red and yellow cards. You can bet on corners, multicorners, which is like the amount of corners that Man U is gonna get multiplied by the amount of corners Chelsea is gonna get. You can bet on who is gonna be the first to score; you can bet on what minute the first goal comes, what minute the last goal comes. It's just endless. Once you get into it it's like the crack of gambling. There's a lot of little nuances in games that you begin to see the game through. Whenever I watch a football game now, I tend to watch the player's faces more, because then you can hope to predict whether there are going to be any fouls or reds or yellows. That's what I'm really into: reds and yellow cards, mainly. Whether the game's gonna turn ugly or whether it's gonna remain peaceful. Sky, which is our big satellite company, has started putting up those stats on their screen. Betting in England is quite reliable, really; we're quite peaceful. When it really gets nutty is when you're betting on Spanish League stuff. Because if it's a hot day and somebody looks at somebody funny, you can end up with half the players being sent off. African tournaments are pretty cool as well. Because even though it gets really violent, they don't give out as many reds and yellows. So one guy will run in and be literally four foot in the air with both feet karate kicking another player, and he won't even get a yellow card. The game won't stop playing. It makes you realize why all the Africans, when they play on English teams, foul a lot. That's just the way it is. Like with German people, when you're out and about in Germany, they push you out of the way. That's just what Germans do.
What's up next for your label, the Beats?
We got the Mitchell Brothers, we got Professor Green and we just a signed a new guy named Example. To be honest, that is my main priority now. I produced some of the Kano stuff. As a producer, Kano's my biggest success.
A couple of years ago in The Guardian, a professor wrote that your last album was comparable to Dostoyevsky and Samuel Pepys. What did you think of that? Do you have any influences from the literary world?
No. I'm probably more influenced by Nas than I am Dostoyevsky. I didn't know what a poem was until.... As I've gotten older, to be honest, I've read about poetry. What I'm really into is songwriting: the Jimmy Webbs, the Kris Kristoffersons and stuff like that. I think songs can be poetic, but I think comparing songs to poetry, it's not the same thing.
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Lemon-Red and Music: For Robots have video commentary from Mike Skinner about each track on The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living. Stream the whole CD on AOL Music.Posted by CP | Link |
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
On the Road Again
The trip to Canterbury goes by faster thanks to the rump jokes
Washington Post Express, Thursday, April 27, 2006; page 41
If you've ever wondered where Benny Hill came from, look no further than Geoffrey Chaucer's riotously funny and wildly flatulent "The Canterbury Tales." Though it was written in the 14th century, this legendary play has so many jokes about breaking wind, bawdy sex, butts and bosoms that you half expect "Yakety Sax" to start playing as the cod-pieced actors dash around the stage.
The Farrelly brothers might even blush during the masturbation, nose-picking and bare-bum-kissing scenes, but "The Canterbury Tales" is no "Dumb or Dumber" -- it's filthier.
And dirty is just how Chaucer liked it.
"All that is literally as described in the text," said Mike Poulton, who adapted Chaucer's play for the Royal Shakespeare Company. "The backside out of the window, the farting -- it's all in the original."
Yes, there are some serious tales among the 24 in "Canterbury," but the sheer number of jokes that revolve around the rump (and what comes out of it) will be a surprise if you've only read the play in English class but have never seen it performed. But Poulton swore it was all there 600 years ago: "Absolutely. It's very, very close to the original. Nothing has been added."
What Poulton did was tweak the late medieval English for modern ears.
"The intention was to stay as close to the original as I possibly could," he said. "So the language, with one or two exceptions -- one or two rather cheeky jokes -- I've kept as close as I can to the original. Sometimes I've included unfamiliar words because I liked them so much. Where the meaning of the word is obvious in the context, I've left it. Where it's more difficult, then I've replaced it with a word that's contemporary but that's from Chaucer's own time. So you get this feeling that you're not moving too far from the late 14th century."
The Royal Shakespeare Company is "the leading company in England -- and arguably in the world," said Poulton, and it is performing 18 of "The Canterbury Tales" at the Kennedy Center in two sections, each lasting three hours. "The two parts are independent of each other," Poulton said. "But I think it's best to see Part One first and Part Two second, but there's no need for that. People who have just seen Part Two on its own are perfectly happy with that, and there's as much variety in Part Two as in Part One."
In other words: You'll get tons of gas no matter when you go. CHRISTOPHER PORTER
Kennedy Center, Eisenhower Theater, 2700 F St. NW; through May 7, $25-$78; 202-467-4600. (Foggy Bottom-GWU)
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Other articles in this edition of Express:
Louis C.K. (page 46)
Lila Downs (page 52)
I also wrote a preview for an OLD skool hip-hop show at the Show Place Arena on 4/30/06, but it didn't run in the paper. (A version ran online.) See how many lyrical references you can spot (all 3 readers of this site):
Tonight on the mic you're about to hear, I swear, the best darn rappers of the year (1988). The freaks will come out when P.G.County hosts MC Hammer, MC Lyte, Whodini, Doug E. Fresh and Slick Rick. Stop! Oldies time? That's right, la di da di.
Doug E. Fresh is known as "The Human Beatbox" or "The Entertainer" -- no other titles could fit him plainer. Once upon a time not long ago, when people wore pajamas and lived life slow, Slick Rick was Fresh's running partner in the Get Fresh Crew before having a solo career that was derailed by prison. In the early '80s Whodini's R&B rap had crowds of people lined up inside and out for just one reason: to rock the house. And MC Lyte still does her thing with an '89 swing, but the dopeness she writes guarantees delight.
With a legendary lineup like that, sourpusses might be begging, "Please, Hammer: Don't hurt 'em with your weak rap!" But everybody knows MC Hammer is too legit to quit, and you still can't touch his baggy parachute pants. (If you had to cram to understand this preview, don't worry: It'll all become clear at "The Show.") CHRISTOPHER PORTERPosted by CP | Link |
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Who cork the dance?
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