petra's friday top eleven [chart]

spring is starting to warm the city and it's got me in a funky-chill mood.
these tracks are perfect for cruisin around town or hangin out on a sunny afternoon.


1. THE TEMPTATIONS "sweet gypsy jane"
from the 1976 album WINGS OF LOVE
listen on youtube

2. AZ "sugar hill"
laid-back rap from east new york, brooklyn
from the 1995 album DOE OR DIE
listen on undergroundhiphop.com

3. BLACK UHURU "party next door"
the classic jamaican reggae band, going strong since 1977
listen on last.fm

4. OUTKAST "ain't no thang"
rappers big boi and andre 3000 from atlanta
from their 1994 album Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik
listen on last.fm

5. MAC DRE "something you must know"
gangsta rap legend from vallejo, ca
listen on imeem.com

6. SOUND DIMENSION "real rock"
old-school dub from the studio one in-house band of the 1960's
listen at last.fm

7. SANTOGOLD (FT. SPANK ROCK) "shove it"
new, eclectic artist from brooklyn
listen on imeem.com

8. T.I. "ride wit me"
established rapper from atlanta
from his 2006 album KING
listen on youtube

9. DIGITAL UNDERGROUND "freaks of the industry"
throw-back funky hip hop from oakland, ca
listen on last.fm

10. STEVIE WONDER "higher ground"
classic from his 1973 album INNERVISIONS
watch the live performance on youtube

11. DR. DRE "let me ride"
gangsta rap legend from compton
from his classic 1992 album THE CHRONIC, sampling PARLIAMENT'S "mothership connection"
watch the music video on youtube

ise lyfe, dom jones, big dan-- imagine peace [videos]

check out this powerful unscripted project
artists and activists define peace:


ise lyfe


dom jones


big dan

downtown graff [pics]

novacaine & phantom idenidy-- gemini chronicles [EXCLUSIVE RELEASE]

B-TOWN'S WATERFRONT & SOUFSIDE COLLABORATION




FIRST ALBUM FROM NOVACAINE & PHANTOM IDENIDY
RELEASED SUMMER 08
RECORDED LAST YEAR
SWIMMIN, FLOATIN AND RIDING THE TIDES
WHILE EVERYBODY ELSE DROWNIN...

you won't find these tracks nowhere else

download mp3:

lemme get some

berkeley market

get make money

turf pasta

BERKELEY!

graff in wash heights--who is this guy? [photos]

busta rhymes v the narcicyst-- arab money [video]

a lot of people found this video offensive, including emcee the narcicyst:



busta rhymes is muslim himself, so i'm not sure what his intention was...

more btown graff [photo]

--photo by petra--

lisa russell: diallo anniversary film shoot

check it:
Lisa Russell's Film Blog: Feb 4th Diallo Anniversary Film Shoot:

davey d on oscar grant [video]

check out davey d's hip hop corner:
daveyd.com

l.e.s.-- street art [photos]

--all photos taken by petra--

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sic btown graff

--photo by petra--

krs one-- boss freestyle & a millie remix [listen]

STOP THE VIOLENCE!!

check out The Teacher's newest stop the violence tracks:

the boss freestyle

a millie remix

mind over matter-- sf dance fest [video]

Choreographed by Allan Frias. a mix of hip hop with west and central african and caribbean traditional and popular dance

up...up...up... the nypd

paulo freire's theories about oppressive systems illuminates this nyc subway ad:

"...the oppressed, striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors, or 'sub-oppressors.' the very structure of their thought has been conditioned by the contradictions of the concrete, existential situation by which they were shaped. their ideal is to be men, but for them, to be men is to be oppressors...the one pole aspires not to liberation, but to identification with its opposite pole.... in the example [of slavery] the overseer must be as tough as the owner--and more so." (freire, paulo. pedagogy of the oppressed, 1970.)

our police system is directly founded on the overseer and slave hunter systems, which relied on 'free' blacks, poor whites and desperate native americans to control the slave population, out of fear of being slaves themselves, or out of compliance to the slave masters' ideology.

you can "rise further" if you keep your fellow people down.

same shit today in nyc.

super n [video]

a short film by alrick brown:

police murder anthony roman on 163rd st.

a few days ago in washington heights, nyc, a 16 year old named Anthony Roman was murdered by a undercover cop (shot three times)
but we didnt hear shit about it on the news
an article in the daily news mentioned the shooting, but said that roman's wounds were not life threatening (when he is in fact dead). they also reported that roman tried to rob the undercover cop at gunpoint, after selling him drugs, so the police shot him in self defense...

another story:
the decoy arranged to buy drugs from roman in an attempt to lock him up. roman thought he was a cop, so he sold him crushed alcasetlzer instead of cocaine, but the decoy chased him down the block anyway. roman had his gun on him, so they used it as evidence against him, to justify the murder.

THIS IS NOT A SOLUTION! THIS IS NOT JUSTICE!


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sic lic graff [photos]

from the 7 train in long island city, queens




--photos by petra--

NY times: underground movement

check out this article published in the NY Times:

"Talk About Underground Movement" by claudia la rocco, oct 12, 2008


in the summer i see lots of crews of young breakers on the A train all the time
often specifically for the 7 min uninterupted space/time between 59th and 125th st



this is a much better use of the subway
but still... get the cop dogs out of the subway

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justice for oscar grant! police murder at fruitvale bart (video)

on january 1 2009
infront of a train full of people (three different people filming)
officer mehserle murdered oscar grant, 22, at the fruitvale bart station
in cold blood
grant was cuffed and lying face down on the ground
when mehserle shot him in the back



wut is goin on??
i cant even begin to understand this

hold on take it baaaack for a min: public enemy

Chuck D said in 1988:

"The point is that there's no hard information in any of these formats [radio, tv,journalism, records, etc]. Where's the news about our lives in this country? Whether or not radio plays us, millions of people listen to rap because rap is America's TV Station. Rap gives you the news on all phases of life, good and bad, pretty and ugly: drugs, sex, education, love, money, war, peace--you name it."


back in 1988, Chuck D and Public Enemy saw the power music, film, tv and journalism has over everything. they knew that the people who tell the stories about what happens, create what happened. and our country has survived by telling its citizens lies to make us compliant, fearful and hateful of each other. . every story, song, dance, novel, highschool text book or news report, is a reflection of a past experience and an influence on our brains and guide our future tastes, emotions and choices. and the more times a story is told, the stronger it gets. this discursive power has been wielded by companies like disney and clear channel, essentially a small, conservative, elite circle. 20 years ago, public enemy reached to harness this power for the better good of the black nation, particularly urban youth.

now what are the stories that are most often told and heard?

it looks like another cycle of corporate consumption got flav caught up, but where do we really stand now? some people say hip hops dead but i think its really just getting its feet. there are many people using different forms of hip hop to process and challenge the confines on our existence, to discuss lineage, heritage, "progress," civilization, exploitation, representation, stereotypes, performance, power, race, sex. and shit, just to have fun, to make and exprience something beautiful when the world is so ugly, to get down and let it all out. but we're not on mtv.

i wonder what chuck d thinks of flavor of love...