Monday, July 30, 2007

Photos of RTB


ZDLR on the right in redStage & crowd

Stage bathed in yellow

Flava-Flav & his clock

Fuck you I won't do what you tell me!

So, I was at Rage Against the Machine Saturday night and it was fucking amazing. ZDLR can rally 35000 fans to scream along to anything he says. And generally, he's worth listening to. Now more than ever they need to come back to the scene & make noise about the political situation. While some lyrics were written 15 years ago (yes, "as we move into '92"), they're still absolutely applicable to today.
I think that people give us ("young people") a lot of grief because we fell out of the protest movement. We volunteer a lot, we sign petitions, we're generally concerned with the state of the world, but we've lost the inability to rally ourselves and protest something, regardless of how strongly we feel about it. But I think RATM could mark a solution. Just imagine a protest on the mall against the war- speakers like politicians, activits, celebs, etc (Jim Webb I'm looking at you) that brings in hundreds of thousands of people. The way to bring the young people is akin to bribery - have a band show up and rock out and watch what happens. Come on, if we had like "Rage Against the War" as a protest, we'd finally see civic involvement from those of us who seem to have lost hope.

I'm not sure why we feel that way either - disenfranchised and hopeless and like our actions don't matter.

BUT ANYWAY, MORE ABOUT THE SHOW!
So after yesterday's weather I am pretty glad that I bought tickets the minute they went on sale for the Saturday show, because Sunday was pretty nasty. And I heard that Erykah Badu canceled anyway, so it was pretty much the same groups.
Flava-Flav was ridiculous, he brought 3 of his kids on stage and sort of hemmed & hawed for a while. The Roots were good, Talib & Mos Def were good, and Cypres Hill was a waste of my time (kind of like the last time I saw them at a festival, it's like everyone here is already pretty stoned so we don't need you around to get them to smoke more, right...). Wu-tang clan wasn't nothing to fuck with, and that was fun because I didn't appreciate them the last time I saw them (at age 13).
And then... The moment I'd been waiting for for months - or longer, a long time ago I was supposed to be at the Rage/BBoys concert that got cancelled, so I hadn't seen them in about 10 years.... Rage comes on stage. The press of the crowd was ridiculous - people surged forward, mosh pits broke out to the left and right, I could have picked my feet off the ground and been supported by so many strangers that I would have still been standing. It was pretty ridiculous. Nice part was not a lot of crowd surfing during rage. Just AWESOMENESS! Lots of awesomeness. It was amazing. ZDLR made an intense statement about the White House's resident idiots and every single thing that they played moved the crowd. We were all there for Rage, it was clear. It was fucking awesome.... Ahhh, I'll post some more photos here too although they aren't that great. AWESOME!

Friday, July 13, 2007

Street Smarts

So apparently a 22 year old woman gets into a van with a strange older man who offered her a ride to Crystal City, and then is attacked and assaulted. I just don't understand how this girl's street smarts could be so non-existent...
Situation - you're at a party & drunk & the metro is shut & you need to get home. Do you a) hail a cab b) get hailed by a strange man. From the men I've seen around here he probably hollered out the window to her in a pretty crude way too.
I don't know, I guess she was from Dallas and maybe that made her a little more trustworthy, but HONESTLY?

Don't ever do something so stupid as to get in a car van with a stranger.

Read about it.

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Dear Ms. Erway...

From Washington Post: "During the whole campaign, he was hugged-up on black people," said Michelle Erway, 26, a black federal government contractor from Northeast, whose 3-year-old son will enroll in a charter school this fall. "Now that he's in office, he's hugged-up on white people. I lost a lot of respect for him after he was elected."

Oh, seriously! You think he's flip-flopping on his race choices? Let Mr. Mayor choose the best (wo)man for the job, regardless of the color of their skin or whatever.

How would you feel if Hilary was "hugged-up" on women during her campaign, then wins the election (god help us) and gets "hugged-up" on fellows. FELLOWS. MEN. Good lord, but there are more women than men in this world, what is she doing? What if all the women are incompetent?

(Disc. I'm white & female. I think Hilary is shady & that Fenty should fix this city with the best resources available. They could be green kitten-eating aliens for all I care, but if they can make DC magic happen then let it be!)