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Shop at Amazon though these links and this site gets a kickback.
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When I think of what defines postmodern popular music, I place my criteria into two groups: sounds and subject matter. Sonically I think of music that draws on the forms and sounds of the two last great traditions in popular music: rock and hip hop. Topically, I think of the sometimes kitschy, always ironic critique, or maybe just deconstruction, of late capitalism that’s often associated with authors like David Foster Wallace.
The act that has best satisfied me in this way, sonically and . . . continue reading, and add your comments
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<A HREF="http://ws.amazon.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&MarketPlace=US&ID=V20070822%2FUS%2Fconversatio07-20%2F8014%2Fca6ec0ee-5127-483d-8cca-26bcd1a4a688&Operation=NoScript">Amazon.com Widgets</A>
I’m using the Amazon clips widget to preview J-Live’s new album here. Click on the above box to listen to clips from any one of the album’s tracks.
J-Live has been one of my favorite MCs for going on 7 years now, and I constantly am surprised that more people don’t listen to his music. This guy is like your favorite unknown author . . . for years he’s been making music that’s better than, at least, 90% of all the hip . . . continue reading, and add your comments
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It just doesn’t get much better than this. Wait, of course, for the last 8 words.
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Here’s a classic for you all.
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Now this is what its all about–a rapper whose name is a literary reference. That’s nice.
I’m a pretty big fan of Little Brother and, since Edgar Allen Floe is a part of their crew (also known as the Justus League), I figured I’d give his album Floe Almighty: The Remixture a shot. Turns out it’s pretty nice. The track featured on this post isn’t my personal favorite off the album (I couldn’t find that one in the public domain), but this is . . . continue reading, and add your comments
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Now that he’s had as many number 1 albums as Elvis, people are finally beginning to recognize the kid of cultural force that Jay-Z represents. You can argue whether he’s the MC that deserves all this attention, but it’s pretty clear to me that American Gangster is his best album in years. It might be the best thing he’s released since his very first album, Reasonable Doubt. "No Hook" is one of the best tracks on this album.
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Here’s a live version of one of my favorite songs by one of my favorite hip hop groups. If you are at your job, I recommend not doing what Phonte recommends.
This track is off of this album. If you like hip hop, you should definitely hear Little Brother.
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They don’t get much more classic than this.
Check out Eminem’s homage at the beginning of verse three on I’m Back.
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Recommended Books DeLillo's major work before White Noise is probably his most underrated novel. Its all right here--the politics of paranoia, terrorism, the unnamable--set in an evocative, timeless Greece.
The most bizarre Abe novel I've yet read, which is indeed saying something. About a subclass of Japanese men who go around wearing boxes from the waist up (and then use them as domiciles in the evening), the book is also an experiment in perspective shifts, a highly unstable, metafictional first-person narrative, and an exploration of voyeurism, consumerism, and aberrant sexuality.
Charting the path to three gunshots--the one that killed filmmaker Theo Van Gogh, the one that disabled his Islamic extremist assassin, Mohammed Bouyeri, and the one that led to Vincent Van Gogh’s one hundred years earlier--Olsen tells three separate stories that resonate with one another on numerous levels: the logic of extremism, the role of the dissident in Dutch society, the limits of tolerance, the purpose of the artist, the feeling of the most important five minutes of your life. Read my interview with the author.
Creatively structured, well-executed epic novel of rural South Africa from 1950 - 2000. Takes on a lot and lives up to it magnificently. Highly recommended.
A book that's an interview about the book you're supposedly holding in your hands. Creative, potent, and full of life. Just what metafiction should be. Read my post on it. |
A Note on Links
More Essays by Milan
Speaking of Distraction
The Shallows by Nicholas Carr
Another Review of The Novel: An Alternative History
The Orange Eats Creeps
The Unconsoled and the Annihilation of Plot
The Names by Don DeLillo (1982)
The Box Man by Kobo Abe (1973, English 1974)
Head in Flames by Lance Olsen (2009)
Agaat by Marlene van Niekerk (2006, English 2010)
The Weather Fifteen Years Ago by Wolf Haas (2006, English 2009)
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