Educate and excite, inform and infuriate.
May 8th, 2008 — Black Music, Controversy, Entertainment, Music Video, Pop Culture, Sex
And we’ll grow 40-ish together: Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon begin their married life…and Month #2 of knowing each other
Is Mariah Carey getting stupider with age?
Like most, I didn’t get the Nick Cannon connection, when I heard she’d secretly married him. That is, until I read The Daily Mail, yesterday.
May 6th, 2008 — Animation, Entertainment, Film, Humor, Politics, Pop Culture, Science-Fiction
![[insert heavy labored breathing here]](http://harryallen.info/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/screen12.jpg)
Come on: What more do you really need to know? : ) Just click on it.
May 5th, 2008 — Animation, Black Music, Dance, Entertainment, Hip-Hop, Music Video, Pop Culture, Sex, TV
“Now, pretend that you’re Corey Clark”: Paula and Skat role-play
Was Paula Abdul on drugs?
Not last week, when she tried to judge American Idol contestant Jason Castro’s non-existent second performance. No, was she high in the early ’90s, when she agreed to a cameo in the video for MC Skat Kat’s solo debut, “Skat Strut,” a Fresh Prince-ish piffle over Earth Wind & Fire’s “Let’s Groove” bassline.
May 5th, 2008 — Advertising, Controversy, Design, Fashion, Magazines, Media, Photography, Pop Culture, Sex
Further proof that, especially planetarily, there’s no accounting for taste: The above ad, notes Boinkology, for Tom Ford Sunglasses, has been banned in Italy by that country’s Institute for Advertising Self-Discipline (IAP).
May 1st, 2008 — Black Music, Entertainment, Hip-Hop, Journalism, Music Video, Pop Culture, Race
If you get a chance, do please take a gander at my review, in Wednesday’s Village Voice, of the Roots’ new, this-is-the-way-the-world-ends-ish album, Rising Down, above.
“Get Busy,” the first single, burns like the bombing of MOVE, mating a weighty kick-and-snare to a morbid chorus of fuzzy synth drones. “My squad half-Mandrill, half-Mandela,” rapper Black Thought intones. “My band ’bout 70 strong, just like Fela.” Coupled with guest lyrical maestros Dice Raw (“I’m half-dead/Never felt more alive”; “I’m kinda W.E.B. DuBois meets Heavy D & the Boyz”) and the reedy Peedi Crack, the whole fest bristles with the nervous energy of riot control on dust.
It’s a jaunty read, if I, myself, say so. Enjoy!
April 29th, 2008 — Books, Controversy, Entertainment, Journalism, Media, Pop Culture, Race, Writing
Keepin’ it real unreal: Margaret “B. Jones” Seltzer gets into character
Who, exactly, is Margaret Seltzer? Empathic writer? Gangster wannabee? Estranged daughter? One-time aspiring eco-terrorist?
MEDIA ASSASSIN has obtained what appears to be the only known copy of a damning video that Margaret “B. Jones” Seltzer’s publisher, Riverhead/Penguin, buried last month, once the book documenting the author’s foster home-living, gangbanging, drug-running past—Love and Consequences: A Memoir of Hope and Survival, right—was revealed to be completely and totally fabricated.
The 10:10 video, shot and edited before she was exposed as a liar, may be the only existing footage of Seltzer in her full-on “hood” persona.
April 28th, 2008 — Art, Controversy, Design, Entertainment, Gaming, Media, Pop Culture, Satire, Technology, Work
I missile you much: GTA IV‘s Niko Bellic sends his regards
The worst job I ever had was working in the car loans department of the now defunct Chemical Bank, at the Huntington Quadrangle in Melville L.I. It was a small office of about ten to twelve mutually limited, small-minded people, held under the managerial thumb of a doughy, mouse-faced, unsmiling, bespectacled woman with yellow smoker’s fingertips and a bad perm.
Our task was taking in loan requests by fax or phone from GMAC finance dealers, processing them, and passing them up the chain for approval. What I remember most was how tense this office was, as this woman kept us under the grind to turn out precious loan apps. My solace was ducking into my ’75 Impala at lunch time, loudly playing Grandmixer DXT and Herbie Hancock’s Future Shock album, and sleeping.
But pristinely nested on the other end of my employment karmic balance is the job I loved the most: The 2 1/2 years I spent, from 2004 – 2006, working in public affairs at Rockstar Games, maker of the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series of video games.
April 24th, 2008 — Advertising, Controversy, Fashion, Military, Politics, Pop Culture, Sex
“Schtupp” just didn’t test well: The new Teutonic scent
The Germans: They went there. They totally went there. (Respect due to BoingBoingTV for the tip.)
Because it’s the question overloading your neurons right this moment, yes, this package, above, is totally real. The scent is called VULVA—a rather pretty word, it occurs to me—Original.
April 22nd, 2008 — Entertainment, Film, Humor, Politics, Pop Culture, Satire
April 22nd, 2008 — Entertainment, Film, Humor, Pop Culture, Satire, Science-Fiction
As you can see, it’s nearly time for lunch in the Old West…or, rather, time for a brutal slaughter!
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