Fashion Board 11-2-03 - 12-09-03

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Bad_Rich_Chic
a caring, supportive society is very nice, but come the revolution/apocalypse/global famine/flesh-eating zombie infestation, the unfit will be left behind

We will still have a place for them. The zombies have gotta eat, you know. Think veal.

[Atticus Grinch]

Bringing the rap discussion back to fashion, Nelly has introduced a clothing line for today's woman --- the sassy urban woman who desires to accentuate the rump and celebrate it. And who doesn't mind attracting men who project a public image of coldness, distance, the vague unrealized threat of violence, and a complete lack of talent.

http://www.applebottoms.com/

Gotta love the classy logo.

[Bad_Rich_Chic]

Originally posted by dtb
I remember some short story about how a futuristic society would administer some kind of intelligence (?) test to each child at age 12 (or whatever). The story centers around a set of parents who, although very worried about the outcome of the test (as there is some hint given that a less-than-desirable outcome will have grave consequences), put on a brave face, and send junior into the testing center with smiles and encouragement.

I don't remember that one, but I do remember one (not a "great books" story - might even be Stephen King) where the futuristic society gives the fittest children the option of going through a year-long environmental conditioning of some sort, which basically means giving them every disease & stress to which humans are exposed all at once, and once they recover they are essentially immune to everything for the rest of their lives and live incredibly long lives in perfect health, enabling them to become super-productive, super-educated leaders of society for decades on end. Or something like that.

Point of the story is that they have developed a method by which the pain experienced by the kid during the disease/stress conditioning can be transferred to its closest genetic relative - usually a parent - so the kid is less likely to be psychologically damaged by the experience. So the father consents - but they can't control which relative is closest genetically and thus which will get hit with the whammy, and the feeble mother (who didn't even want the kid to get the conditioning) gets it instead.

[LessinSF]

Originally posted by paigowprincess
You have been reduced to flaming me by LINKING to a website for a prescription drug for schizophrenia, which isnt even your own original flame concept?

What do we want?
Freedom!
Who do we want it from?
Paigow Now!

Disclaimer: Although Olanzapine has been shown to have less likelihood than other anti-psychotics of patients stopping taking it, please consult your doctor before taking it as there are risks of sexual side effects.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by dtb
The grotesque, O'Henry-on-psychotropic-drugs ending is that junior never comes back from the test as he is put to death -- not for doing poorly, but for doing too well.

Law school enforces the same policy and accomplishes the same ultimate result, albeit more slowly.

[Dave]

Originally posted by str8outavannuys
THE WESTING GAME, by Ellen Raskin. It's fairly well known, but that shouldn't dismiss its worthiness or its hipness. Synopsis. Sam Westing, the town millionaire, dies. His heirs are the 16 tenants who have all recently been sold apartments (or have leased commercial space) in a new apartment building. The heirs don't get the money though, they have to play a game. The Westing game. Great characters, great story. It's got it all.

Concur. Good story, and it also made for a good early-computer era non-video computer game, much enjoyed by young Dave. Those were the days.

There is an interesting site about the writing of the book, with manuscript pages and such at this U of Wisconsin page

[Anne Elk]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Bringing the rap discussion back to fashion, Nelly has introduced a clothing line for today's woman --- the sassy urban woman who desires to accentuate the rump and celebrate it. And who doesn't mind attracting men who project a public image of coldness, distance, the vague unrealized threat of violence, and a complete lack of talent.

http://www.applebottoms.com/

Gotta love the classy logo.

Anyone else catch the search for Miss Applebottom on VH1 Sunday afternoon? No stick figures in sight! They did a fairly good job of keeping the drolling to a minimum (or they edited well).

[Dave]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Bringing the rap discussion back to fashion, Nelly has introduced a clothing line for today's woman --- the sassy urban woman who desires to accentuate the rump and celebrate it

This reminds me. Was Lisa Guererro's outfit last night part of Snoop Dog's new Pimps N' Hos couture line? That hat was straight pimp.

Da (daaaaaamn) ve

Frindle - recent book about a boy who coins a new word for an everyday object. Funny

All the Junie B. Jones books -- they are hysterical

Golden Oldie -- Stone Soup -- book about soldiers who make a soup out of a stone. Their is a recent imitation with a small boy making the soup, which doesn't cut it. Go for the original.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
PLF, mold me in your divine image.

Interesting. Is this a hint?

Even if it is, I'll answer anyway.

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
I'm thinking of expanding the depth of my collection of rap and/or hip-hop, to the extent there's a difference.

Albums I admit to owning:

• De La Soul - Three Feet High and Rising
• De La Soul - De La Soul Is Dead
• De La Soul - Buhloone Mind State
• A Tribe Called Quest - Low End Theory
• A Tribe Called Quest - Anthology
• Public Enemy - Fear of a Black Planet
• Us3 - Hand on the Torch (haven't listened since 1993)

Albums I don't yet own but agree everyone should:

• Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique
• N.W.A. - Straight Outta Compton
• Dr. Dre - The Chronic

From your list, it looks like you dig offbeat stuff -- creativity with the samples and different musical influences. Cool enough.

You would like Outkast, most likely. E/O will be the expert on Outkast, being that they're from south of Staten Island. But you'd probably dig ATLatiens and Stankonia. I haven't bought their newest yet.

As for Tribe, I would recommend Midnight Marauders (one of my favorites) as well as Low End Theory, but you have the Greatest Hits, so you might not want to buy the others. However, both of the albums I just mentioned are fantastic.

Looks like you dig De La too. You should search for an MP3 of "Fallin'," a track they did with Teenage Fanclub on the soundtrack for Judgment Night. Great song.

For the newer, creative stuff, Missy Elliott's Under Construction is fantastic. One of my favorites. Her producer/partner in crime, Timbaland has a very unique, distinctive sound. Lots of different influences (including a lot of old school hip hop that you probably won't recognize).

You should buy all of Eminem's stuff, homophobia and misogyny notwithstanding. He's a genius.

Ludacris is doing some interesting stuff. I like the first single (Stand Up) off of his new album (Chicken & Beer).

Do yourself a favor. If you're not going to buy all his stuff, at least buy 2Pac's Greatest Hits. He's one of the last rappers with something to say.

I feel the same about Biggie on the skills tip. He didn't have much to say, but he said it better than anyone in my opinion. I would buy Ready to Die and Life After Death (the two albums he made while alive -- it's amazing how much stuff Pac and Biggie recorded, because they keep coming out with albums long after they're dead).

Nas has a few fantastic albums and is widely recognized as a rapper who won't sell out and has a huge underground (and I guess, now, mainstream) following. Illmatic blew people's minds and Stillmatic wasn't bad either and has One Mic, which is a great song.

Jay Z is widely respected and is considered one of the greatest lyricists in history and I dig his stuff, but I don't own much of it.

Mos Def and Talib Kweli are my current favorites. From when they were together (Blackstar) to their solo efforts (Mos Def's Black on Both Sides and Talib Kweli's Quality are both good), they bring new flavor to hip hop with a tip of the cap to the old school. I love Kweli's song, Get By.

Obviously you know about Lauren Hill and the Fugees.

You asked about Cypress Hill. If you're not a stoner (is it a coincidence you can't spell "spliff" without "P" "L" "F"?), I would recommend only buying their first two joints: Their self-titled first album is a must-have and Black Sunday is good. But after those, I lost interest.

I would recommend some Wu, but based on your list, I doubt you'd like it (although, you do like Public Enemy, so it's possible).

You would like Black Eyed Peas' first, Behind the Front. Sorry to say I haven't bought any of their others.

That should get you started, though. I'll be interested to read other responses.

TM

[Sparklehorse]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
I remember reading somewhere that it's only been recently that people worried about scaring or grossing out kids and that kids are much more resilient to gore and blood than we think. The article pointed out the Hans Christian Andersen stories, and how graphic they are, but children love them all the same. I think they were discussing how prior to TV / movies / etc. most entertainment was for the whole family, and the goal was to entertain both the adults as well as the youngsters in the crowd.

This is roughly the theory put forward by Bruno Bettelheim in his book The Uses of Enchantment. Very briefly, kids learn how to survive the cruel, chaotic world through lessons learned from fairy tales.

Amazon link here

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by dealtoy
Golden Oldie -- Stone Soup -- book about soldiers who make a soup out of a stone. Their is a recent imitation with a small boy making the soup, which doesn't cut it. Go for the original.

Wonk Monster has a buddhist versionof the story. Not only does the story lend itself very well to a zen style, the illustrations are very clever, e.g., the stones on one page cast a shadow which is a silhouette of the Buddha. He loves reading it to me.

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Sparklehorse
This is roughly the theory put forward by Bruno Bettelheim in his book The Uses of Enchantment. Very briefly, kids learn how to survive the cruel, chaotic world through lessons learned from fairy tales.

Amazon link here

Not even the toys are dangerous any more.

http://money.cnn.com/2003/11/18/news...ex.htm?cnn=yes

This article describes the toys on the "10 Worst Toys" list. You'd have to seriously try to hurt yourself with any of these. Not a lawn dart in sight. And what happened to metal erector sets? How is one supposed to build weapons to fend off Big Brother when he comes to hang you from the door by your tightie whities? The damn water yo yo (#1 on the list) sure isn't going to do the trick.

[dtb]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Not even the toys are dangerous any more.


This article describes the toys on the "10 Worst Toys" list. You'd have to seriously try to hurt yourself with any of these. Not a lawn dart in sight. And what happened to metal erector sets?

Didn't SNL do a skit about this where Dan Akroyd was a sleazy salesman trying to sell dangerous toys? The only one I can remember is "Bag of Broken Glass" (although there may have been something like "Plastic Bag with Neckrope" or some such thing.)

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally posted by Pretty Little Flower
e/o is right on to recommend Pharcyde's Bizarre Ride. Classic!

I thought I mentioned this enough for everyone to know that it goes without saying that I'm mostly correct when I say that all of you, whether you like rap or not, should own this album.

Originally posted by Pretty Little Flower
Again, I second e/o's Blackalicious rec.

Never bought this. But I hear good things. I'm going to have to get it.

Originally posted by Pretty Little Flower
I think the first Cypress Hill album is one of the best hip hop albums of all time. DJ Muggs is brilliant.

Excellent album. Bonus points for the hispanic afro when it dropped too.

Originally posted by Pretty Little Flower
I think you will definitely like Jurassic 5 - either of the CDs or the EP.

I was going to recommend this, but it seemed more for true hip hopsters (white or black, paigow), so I left it off the list.

Originally posted by Pretty Little Flower
I think you should get Brand New Heavies' "Heavy Rhyme Experience" - one of the first "live band with rappers" experiments. Very melodic stuff.

I bought the first two (along with Guru's first Jazzmatazz), but got tired of the many other volumes.

Originally posted by Pretty Little Flower
The first two Brand Nubian records are great - in the first, they are just kids (w/Grand Puba), espousing an upbeat sort of pro-Africa message; on the second, they turn somewhat regrettably gangsta with a few unforgivable homophobic lyrics, but I will admit that I still think the album has some of the best grooves and rhyme flows. It is not just spare beats and street rhymes.

Great albums and I agree with you on the homophobia (sad to hear). Puba was going to be the next big thing and then, poof. Gone. But I wouldn't have recommended these for Atticus.

TM