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Jan232013

The Record Volume 1: Live Music Collaborations

This is a very specific post. It’s a list of my three favorite male-male live music collaborations, the best performances. I just thought of it while watching YouTube this morning while trying to wake up for the day (we don’t drink coffee). It doesn’t include every performance; it’s the first three that popped into my head but they did for a reason. They are three of my favorite songs of all time, easily top 100 list for each. Potentially top 10 and probably top 20. Here they are, in order, and why.

1. MOBO 2007 – Kano ft. Craig David – This is the Girl: First of all, this is the second most played song of all time on my iTunes, out of well over 8000 songs over the past seven-ish years. Kano is one of the most underrated rappers ever, and in my opinion, the best out of the U.K. Off his London Town album, this track has a great energy to it and I can use it in any workout. Nothing vulgar, not a bad message. It’s classy. And it has Craig David on it, arguably my favorite artist of all time. Born to Do It is my favorite album of all time and was ranked the 2nd best album ever behind Thriller by MTV viewers in a large poll. As for the performance, it’s pretty simple. Some flashy lights and big screens, but mainly these two guys just going at it. No lip syncing, no faking… this is top notch live performing just the way everyone should do it.

2. The King Stays King Sold Out at Madison Square Garden – Romeo Santos ft. Usher – Promise: This 75% Spanish/25% English bachata based love song was my song of the year for 2011 along with the last live performance. It makes sense that they both make the list then, since they are fresh in my mind. Romeo Santos, the lead singer of Aventura (band of Dominican boys from the Bronx), is a large man with a soft delicate voice that comes out of nowhere. He is the king of modern bachata and royalty in New York City. Not everyone can sell out MSG: it’s big, especially in this economy.

Usher can dance and his style and voice fits bachata nice as well. So what makes this performance worthy of the list other than the fact that I like the song. It was at the end of the concert and no one actually knew Usher was coming. Everyone went crazy when he emerged from under the stage. They both brought top notch vocals, the band has great skill and energy, tons of smooth dance moves and the two worked off one another, harmonizing beautifully. At one point, about four minutes into the over ten minute performance, the band breaks it down and everything melts like butter. One of the best moments in a live performance I have ever seen. Good work, boys, keep making teenage girls across the country happy.

3. SBS Inkigayo 2011/10/30 – Tablo ft. Taeyang – Tomorrow: This performance is on the top three list more so because of its significance than anything else. This is one of my favorite songs, and top two from 2011 along with Promise, but this isn’t the best possible performance they could have done. Tablo, the leader of Korea’s “founding” rap group Epik High, had some background tracks running throughout his verses. I did like how they made it seem that Taeyang, Big Bang’s smooth moving and singing heart throb, wasn’t actually there as they were just using the film from the music video. When he came out for the last minute it made it that much better.

This was so exciting because it was Tablo’s first release after signing with YG, my favorite Korean music label. When the two “dapped” (NY’s terminology for the hand shake hug) it signified Tablo’s joining of YG with one of YG’s most popular and marketable artists. Throw a little big of Taeyang’s dancing and vocals in there, along with Tablo’s lyrics and style and this was one great moment on Inkigayo. (Inkigayo is a weekly television show with small audiences that features popular artists and songs in Korea at the time.)

So there you have it, top three live male-male crossover collaborations. I’m not surprised there is an English, Spanish, and Korean song. Maybe if MC Solaar and Garou threw something together there would have been a French one too.

Cheers! Listen and love your music and don’t let anyone tell you to stop listening to something you like!

Oct252012

Help! I’ve Been Infected with K-Pop!

This article was planned months ago. I mean it! I say that because since then K-Pop has entered our maintstream culture. Not sure what I’m talking about? Psy’s song “Gangnam Style” (pronounced kang-nam) blew up a few weeks ago. His song is actually a satire of a rich part of Seoul in South Korea, about the rich having an empty lifestyle. No matter, his dance moves and catchy song caught on. He was on SNL, Ellen, and so forth. He signed an American contract (with the same guy that manages Bieber). You can see his video below.

It’s a fun song, and it will become addicting. And always fun to try those dance moves. However, I was converted to this K-Pop (Korean Pop) much earlier than this song came on the air. And I’m guessing you might have an idea you could’ve possibly introduced me to such music…coughChris. Yes, ladies and gents, it was Chris who introduced me to this at-first strange and-then addicting music.

I’m going to focus on BIGBANG, a five-man group that we listen to most. Okay I’ve got to admit, and he knows this, I thought it was the most annoying music at first, lots of tech and pop-yness. Not my favorite thing. But I kept listening as Chris always played it and it slowly grew on me like a strange Korean tree moss or something. I caught myself seeking out the songs that I liked the most and their music videos…wow. Blow our silly American ones out of the water. And they actually have good voices. Weird, right?

So in BIGBANG, we have G-Dragon (the leader), Daesung (we call him the Voice, best voice), T.O.P. (the model, has an awesome deep voice), Taeyang (the dancer), and Seungri (the random one, we say).

From left right: Daesung, G-Dragon, Taeyang, T.O.P., and Seungri

They’re pretty great, always tons of different styles, and they really love each other and have that great chemistry. Chris can correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe G-Dragon wouldn’t do one song if their producers didn’t give Seungri a solo album. They’re just great like that. And it’s really interesting, in South Korea, they find these great singers when they’re young and put them into a music-type academy and eventually end up either pairing them together, creating groups, or pushing them out solo. It’s fascinating.

And they are GREAT workout songs. Seriously, I always get incredibly pumped and end up having a fantastic workout. My personal favorite workout songs are “Still Alive,” “Tonight,” and “Fantastic Baby.” But for you to understand their awesomeness, you need to watch the videos (especially “Fantastic Baby” which by just watching makes you want to get ripped). See them below

Sadly no music video for this yet

Just awesome beats and pump-up song

WATCH THIS ONE! And try not to get pumped up (around when Taeyang starts)

And if you’re like me, it’s annoying when you start listening. But give them a chance, seriously. They’re a great group. And they don’t only do up-beat songs, they have tons of love songs as I’ll share below.

“Blue”

“Monster”

K-Pop is a very strange thing, but it’s turned out to be fun and interesting. Something I now listen to on a regular basis. Enjoy!

Oct232012

And After the Presidential Debates…

I’m still sticking with my man Barack, and it’s not because I think he’s an amazing presidential candidate… it’s because I would vote for whoever has the best chance of making sure Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan do not win. If it was someone from the Green or an Independent party, that would work fine with me… just not those two. I’m not voting based on who I think can turn around the economy. In this post, I’m not even going to get into depth about political agendas, policies, plans and all that complicated stuff that just breeds lies and unfulfilled promises.

Official photographic portrait of US President Barack Obama (born 4 August 1961; assumed office 20 January 2009) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I simply cannot vote for a narcissistic liar and a narcissistic liar who cannot relate to the majority of the population of the United States. I don’t mind that Paul Ryan has a normal degree from a so-so institution of higher education. Actually, it’s the only thing that I like about him. I don’t like his pictures of him posing with his backwards hat and poorly built arms. I don’t like the fact that he lied about his marathon time (I believe he said it took him about 3 hours when it was realistically around 4.) If he lies about that, I don’t trust anything he says, so I would clearly never vote for him.

As for Romney, I simply cannot stand the guy. He has no concept of human rights and equality. There is a separation of church and state in this country and he is a religiously-driven man. He claims that he recognizes all religions and the religious freedom in this country, but then immediately says we are all children of the same God. He claims that he wants to give better job equality to women, but won’t let them decide whether they can control their own bodies all of the time. And don’t get me started on his view of gay rights. His smile is fake and evil, he doesn’t care at all about the middle class, and just wants to keep his riches rolling in so he can afford to send his 18 grand children to college. He has no concept of foreign policy, which unfortunately wasn’t highlighted enough last night. I wrote two of my theses on diplomacy and conflict resolution, and the man has no grasp of diplomacy. It’s ridiculous how many people he can offend in one debate. How many tens of millions… hundreds of millions… a billion people he can offend in one debate. And he just lies about way too much. Lie after lie after lie.

Romney

So I don’t care how many accurate statistics relating to the economy he throws out. He doesn’t know anything about struggle. We were nearly living on credit cards, almost dead broke, struggling to find and keep jobs, and we see Obama and we still see change and hope. And while I doubt Mitt actually wants to help us, his plans could help the economy, but they might make it worse. And I would never throw my morals and values away for the small chance that his hidden agenda might lower the price of gas. That is not worth it. I will not let gays be denied their rights, women be denied their choices, and good people be denied the opportunity to continue helping other people, just so I can pay a buck less at the pump. That’s not worth it. Sorry Mitt, someone like me would never vote for someone like you.

But really, Barack was right when he called you out on the military. Are you trying to compensate for a lack of security? You might have thought your privileges growing up made you the best, but in the world stage, you’ll need a lot more than that.

Aug272012

Whole Wheat Oatmeal Raisin Cookies [GUILT-FREE!]

So I’m craving some Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. Good thing we have a huge thing of Quaker Oatmeal (a five pound jar and at least ten more pounds packed away in bags in the pantry). Baking always brings me back to college years (also back to days at home) when I would walk up to my best friend’s apartment almost every night (rain or snow) to bake or cook something, drink some tea, and watch a great series like Modern Family or Beyonce Concerts.

If you’ve baked oatmeal raisin cookies, you know it’s pretty simple. It’s basically measure, pour, mix, and heat. And we only have whole wheat flour in the kitchen, so we’re making Whole Wheat Oatmeal Raisin Cookies. There’s no crap in these, so you don’t have to worry about that. I pulled the recipe off of here and altered it slightly. So, my fellow bakers, get your ingredients ready!

Ingredients

1/2 cup of butter (I use whipped)
3/4 cup of sugar (I used white because we don’t have any brown at the moment)
1 egg
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/4 cup of oatmeal (I use Quaker Old-Fashioned Oats, yumm)
1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
1/4 cup of honey
1/2 cup of raisins
a splash of vanilla extract

Pretty basic. I have faith you can all do it. Remember to always grease your baking sheet first so that you don’t have to scramble at the last minute. I like to use wax paper and butter to grease up the sheet, just dip the wax paper in and rub around, a tip my mum taught me. If you don’t have either, then you can just use PAM or whatever you’ve got. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.

Alright, so pour in the butter, sugar, and egg in before anything else. Mix that up real well. You’d think it’d be hard to bake things without a mixer, or even a whisk, but we have neither and everything comes out just fine. I simply use a wooden spoon. And high-powered arms. 😉 After you beat those first three ingredients, pour in the rest and stir it up. If it’s too dry to stir everything in, pour a little milk in (that’s what I did).

Now if anyone here knows me, then you know I have to literally be dragged away from the cookie dough in order to not eat it all. It was tough, but I held myself back (slightly). So after everything is mixed up, use a spoon (or your hands) and plop ’em down on your already greased up baking sheet in nice rows like below.

And now we wait 10-15 minutes, depending on how thick you made the cookies and what your oven is like. And now you get to see what my kitchen looks like when I cook/bake! (yikes)

Ding! (just kidding I don’t have an oven timer) Cookies are ready! Pull them cookies out (with an oven mitt, of course) and let sit for a little bit and then DIG IN!

Voila. Here we have a healthy guilt-free batch of cookies, easily stored in tupperware if you can’t eat them all in one night (shame). Enjoy!