Who's Going To Save My Soul?

The riveting, sublime depth of this space-blues cut is a naked cry of the human condition. The over-used line, "It is better to have loved & lost...." stalks this video in quite gruesome yet clever detail, but the point is made. This song reminded me of the work of the great poet Rainer Rilke in his book, "Love & Other Difficulties". That book (one of many) really opened me up to certain realities as a young lad filled with vexatious ambivalence towards my motives as well as the motives of others. Rilke gives us the following letter he wrote to a friend many moons ago which breathes a fantastic rendering of the video:

To love is good, too: love being difficult.
For one human being to love another: that is perhaps
The most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate,
The last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.
For this reason young people, who are beginners in everything,
Cannot yet know love: they have to learn it.
With their whole being, with all their forces, gathered close about their lonely, timid, upward-beating heart, they must learn to love.
But learning-time is always a long, secluded time, and so loving, for a long while ahead and far on into life, is--

Solitude, intensified and deepened loneness for him who loves.

Love is at first not anything that means merging, giving over& uniting with another
(for what would a union be of something unclarified and unfinished, still subordinate--?),
It is a high inducement to the individual to ripen, to become something in himself for another's sake, it is a great exacting claim upon him...

Something that chooses him out and calls him to vast things. 

Whew!! That's intense. Go ahead and marinate on that for a while....







OneLove!

::MixMasterE::

Retro-Cool

(This image aptly symbolizes the 1960's & the revolutionary spirit of the times that shook the world).

I haven't written in a few weeks because of..you know...the recession..credit card interest hikes..gas prices...bad Chinese shrimp scampi... :0 )....I saw the following video recently and was delighted to hear the vintage sound making its way back. Raphael Saadiq did a throwback to the 60's sound with his latest release, "The Way I See It". Other artists have gotten their retro-twist on as well like Beyonce & Colin Munroe. If a trend is starting in this direction, I'm all for it as the 60's (and 70's)produced the greatest music ever made.





OneLove


::MixMasterE::

Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?

The legendary reggae superstar, Peter Tosh, once bellowed, "No matter where you come from/As long as you’re a black man/You’re an African.” Add to these lines,"..As long as you're a white man/you're an African". Most people know (or should know) that the Africans were the first modern human population, but paradoxically lose sight of the fact that the Africans also gave rise to the Asian, European & Middle Eastern as well. Scientists have known for a while through human genetic research in mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosome haplotypes that Europeans and Asians have distant African ancestry. Modern humans evolved in Africa 200,000 to 100,000 years ago. Many left Africa around 60,000 years ago and migrated around the world giving rise to the people that you see today.

Yesterday it was reported that one of Britain's leading forensic scientists reconstructed a face from fossilised fragments of skull and jawbone from 35,000 - 40000 years ago (discovered in a cave in Romania). The picture above represents one of the earliest known anatomically modern Europeans. I have to admit that this reconstructed face looks a lot like Boston Celtics' Ray Allen.

In any case, BBC will be airing a fascinating series entitled. "The Incredible Human Journey" on 5/10/09 which will document human origins and evolution, from our cradle in Africa to the long journeys that led us to populate the most distant lands.

I am sure many "white" people will be dismayed, perhaps angered as the notion of white superiority still permeates through the culture. A lot has been invested in maintaining the differences between whites and people of color--from standards of beauty to notions of intelligence, power & 'high culture'. Indeed "black" still rings loud and clear as a negative signifier in spite of President Obama's achievements. The concrete scientific evidence of Africans being the earliest European ancestors is bitter tonic, but as Churchill once stated, "The truth is incontrovertible, malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end; there it is.” (Or as Miami's Tag Team once chimed, "Whoomp! There it is!")

One Love!

:::MixMasterE:::

A Beautiful Mind - Ernie Barnes (1938-2009)

As some of you may know by now, figurative painter (& former NFL player) Ernie Barnes died on 4/27/09 of a rare blood disorder. I've been a fan of Mr Barnes from the moment I saw the well-known painting, "Sugar Shack", at the end of the hit 70's series, "Good Times" & his "ghost paintings" through the character of J.J. Evans (Jimmy Walker). He painted with so much depth & "knowing" as illustrated in the sharp, angular, muscularly-taut & emotive outlines of his forms. Interestingly, he never painted 'open eyes' and this was because he observed that, " "We don't see each other. We are blind to each other's humanity."

Legendary composer, Bill Withers, who was a close friend of Mr Barnes during the last decade of his life, said of his friend, "He wanted people to look past the superficial into the real vulnerable parts of themselves...He wanted to help people peel away that layer of protection that we all wear to ward off any intrusion into our real private thoughts".

In tribute to this extraordinary artist (deemed a master of the "analyzed moment"), I created a playlist of two brothers who are cut from the same cloth as Mr Barnes: Antwan Patton & Andre Benjamin aka Outkast. I consider these cats the cream of the crop--simply unsurpassed in their originality, openness, eclecticism, poetic fluidity & innovative musicality. Indeed, Mr Barnes own natural rhythmic musicality jumps from his soulful masterpieces & he will be missed. What a life well spent!

R.I.P brother....

MME's OutKast Mixtape


::MixMasterE::