A Rudeboy Awakening

and the days are clearer than ever...too bad i'm sleeping through most of them.

even after yesterday's 17 hour slumber long after a 17 hour plane ride, i still feel like i just woke up from taking an aquatic beating from Mr. Phelps himself. I just landed in Beijing yesterday, and jumped right back into the life I left hanging about a year ago without a hitch: late nights in Hutongs like a Beijing Bastard, television interviews, and digital photography. I linked up with my boys from 阴三儿 (pronounced YIN-sar, meaning "in three") three full time musicians who are fast approaching stardom, just dropped a new CD, and got some new digs. I was worried that all the restrictions with the Olympics and maintaining Beijing's image to a user-friendly super-saturated facade ( i was greeted in the airport by an olympic "friendly", a six foot tall inflatible stuffed animal with some poor sap inside), would tame my cohorts rock star lifestyle. Good luck with that one; its a zoo out here folks.

If there's one thing that is quite apparent, its that places change, but people, people you can count on, remain the same.

So after all the appropriate re-introductions and rituals, we headed downtown to East 44th Bridge. I tagged along with them to what we imagined was a television interview, but when we arrived had all the formal appearance of a fourth grade mock court trial, complete with snacks. Yellow table and white walls, dentist-flourescent lighting, plums, oranges, cigarettes and a host of others from Beijing's music scene, including dance/electronica DJs, private musicians, and the hip hop contingent. The discussion was run by Maartje Nevejan of Amsterdam, couscousglobal.com and AlJazeerah fame, and the topics centered on youth music in Beijing and beyond, but went as far as opinions on American politics, gay marriage, and musicianship. If the purpose of her discussion was debate on a global scale, she was intent on bringing the heat, and having everyone heard at this square-table discussion. I must admit that my homies were a bit more outspoken (what rapper isn't?), but the questions were often so fundamental that they bore much more response than debate. I got the distinct feeling that they were reduced to embittered "mad rappers" ; an interesting angle for a group of Chinese rahstahs, who idolize Emperor Salassie. When asked why are you so angry? , Jiawei from In3 delivers:






因为我们很饿

(Cuz we hungry!)

I sure hope our global audence understands the concept of "hunger." Its about passion. Its about drive. Its about motivation. Not about being rich, or famous as the end result. Next time I'll bring my Hip Hop Nation English dictionary.

Regardless, I was glad to be a part of this forum. Maartje's couscous & cola documentary has already been featured on AlJahzeerah and has been viewed worldwide. In a few days she'll be headed to New York to work on documenting the oncoming war between McCain and Obama.
Mad props Maartje, looking forward to seeing more of your work. Its all about a global conversation people!The interview will be out in two weeks, peep the website and join the conversation.

And don't forget to visit Hip Hop Magazine, the premier resource for Chinese hip-hop.

If i can draw a few things away from this experience, it is that music, among other things is an international language, whose purpose is expression, pure and simple, regardless of success. Despite how restricted we think China is in terms of access, they are really quite able to find independent music here... just think of the millions of cds produced and bootlegged, internet sites devoted to delivering free content, and the international accessiblity of most music these days. Music is a movement, people, lets get wit it.

Egad. short-winded chinese makes for long-winded english.

Jah Rastafari!


--Jam