AIDES GRAFFITI

Must see. If this aint dope, then I don't know what is.

DEF POETRY JAM DAY 2

J. IVY - NEVER LET ME DOWN

Wuss good martians? Well, as promised, here's my number 4 poem, I really love this one, since the first time I heard it, do y'all know which artist featured this poem and poet in his album? Do your research! Anyways, hope y'all enjoying this segment, catch y'all tomorrow.

Poem

We are all here for a reason on a particular path
You don't need a curriculum to know that you're apart of the math
Cats think I'm delirious but I'm so damn serious
That's why I expose my soul to the globe; the world
I'm tryna make it better for these little boys and girls
I'm not just another individual
My spirit is a part of this that's why it's spiritual
But I get my hymns from him
So it's not me it's he that's lyrical
I'm not a miracle, I'm a heaven sent instrument
My rhythmatic regiment navigates melodic notes
For your soul and your mental
That's why I'm instrumental, vibrations is what I'm into
Yeah I need my loot by rent day
But that ain't what gives me the heart of Kunta Kinte
I'm tryna give us us free like Sinke
I can't stop, that's why I'm hot
Determination, dedication, motivation
I'm talking to you of my many inspirations
When I say I can't let you or self down
If I were on the highest cliff, on the highest riff
And if you slipped off the side and clinched on to your life
In my grip I would never ever let you down
And when these words are found
Let it be known that God's penmanship has been signed
With a language called love
That's why my breath is felt by the death
And while my words are heard and confined to the ears of the blind
I too dream in color and in rhyme
So I guess I'm one of a kind in a full house
Cuz whenever I open my heart, my soul or my mouth
A touch of god reigns out

Enjoy!!

CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY BY GREGOR COLLIENNE

Via gregorcollienne

THE MISA DIGITAL GUITAR

This Cool Misa Digital Guitar with a touchpad that plays digital guitar, watch the video. Cool! By Sydney-based designer Michael. If you are interested in purchasing, you can contact it via mail.
"DIGITAL GUITAR VS ELECTRIC GUITAR - THE DIFFERENCE?

I am obsessed with digital guitar. But I also love electric guitar, and I have learned what it's good at and what it's capable of. Some of its most important qualities and characteristics stem from the very fact that the electric guitar is made out of wood and strings. A guitar string is "beautiful" - because the sound generated comes from the very vibration of the string, interfering with a magnetic flux and inducing an electric voltage, which is then amplified. Why would you want to emulate that? It is perfection. It is pure nature. It is in the analog domain. I did not intend the Misa digital guitar to replicate a traditional guitar.

THE REASON FOR THE MISA DIGITAL GUITAR

Guitars by their very nature have limitations. To create sound you need to hit a string, so that the sound at its most intense point is always the beginning of the pluck. The left hand controls what notes to play, and the right hand controls when to play these notes and the intensity of the notes. Effects can be inserted into the signal chain, but they are usually foot pedals which makes the experience of controlling effects disjointed from what your hands are doing. Plus, you can only really make use of one pedal at a time. Even in the (rare) case that controls are mounted on the guitar, the hand needs to switch between strings and controls. This may be okay if you only use effects occasionally, but when every note you play needs the controls set differently - good luck with that.
There are no strings on this instrument. The right hand doesn't pluck strings, it controls sound."


Via Core77

DEF POETRY JAM DAY 1

I've been a fan of Def Poetry Jam for a minute now and although I haven't seen all of them, the ones I've come across are seriously some of the dopest shit I've ever heard. Anyways, I've decided to have a week of Def Poetry Jam and I would've loved to have all sorts of poetry but Def Poetry Jam have videos that allow us to see the passion these poets have, the different types of delivery and wordplay they use and also the crowds' reaction to the poems. Well, I hope y'all enjoy this segment. Catch y'all with number 4 tomorrow. Uno.

NUMBER 5: SHIHAN - SICK AND TIRED

ENJOY!!

YELAWOLF - TRUNK MUZIK MIXTAPE X POP THE TRUNK VIDEO

Wuss good martians? Anyways, real quick, I liked the hook dude did on Juelz Santana's track but I slept on his music but trust me, you don't wanna make the same mistake, Yelawolf is next up. Download Trunk Muzik Mixtape HERE

Here's his latest video for "Pop the trunk" off the mixtape.

Yelawolf - Pop The Trunk from Motion Family on Vimeo.

A Message From Odysseus

What's good Martians and Earthlings. So my boy Losi and I have decided to have a weekly post on each other's blogs. Nothing major, just a and update on how we're doing or what we're doing. It's all about showing each other support on everything we do.

With that said, I don't know what the fuck to talk about! LOL. I've been home the whole day. Went out last night and got pretty wasted. I lost my ID which was not very smart. Now I don't know if I can go out tonight without one. I don't want to go out with my passport - that's never a good idea unless you really need to. I lost my bank card 2 weeks ago so I'm hoping this doesn't become a habit. Very irresponsible Dru-ey!

How was everybody's New Years? Began working on the resolutions? I hope so. Get to it! I didn't make any this year. Well, I kinda did, but my resolutions are limited to this year, they are more like life choices. For instance, as I grow older, I'm hoping to listen to people more and take their advice. I tend to be a very closed and stubborn person. I never ask for advice or help. Which at times could lead to my downfall. I think I need to listen to people's opinions more. The right people, not everybody. That would be my big resolution (in HD. Blu-Ray type shit).

Oh yeah, changing topic. I watched 'The Book Of Eli' yesterday. GREAT movie! Ya'll should check it out. It's not all action as I was expecting it to be. The message it sent was powerful. It took me until about halfway through the movie to figure out what the "book" was. Great job by whoever wrote the script.

Ok people, I gotta' run. I need to get some food and maybe have a drink. It's a holiday tomorrow so I'm taking advantage of the day off. Shout outs to Dr. Martin Luther King II!

Until next week, God bless.

Uno.

- Dru.

Blog.

Twitter.

DIRTY MONEY FT RICK ROSS - ANGELS REMIX

Rick Ross really goes in...

ADIDAS ORIGINALS - STAR WARS COLLECTION

How dope is this huh??

INTERVIEW MAGAZINE FEBRUARY COVER (JAY-Z)

It would probably be a cliché to state that Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter is the opposite of the all-beef persona he proffers in song and video, but he is soft-spoken and polite. As he finishes his lunch at the Brooklyn studio where we did the photo shoot for this story, he asks for something to drink. “Snapple, I guess,” he says. “Bring me something red with that excess verbiage on the label. Although,” he laughs. “I guess that could be any of ’em.” He pays the kind of attention that’s reflected in his lyric choices.

Whenever he digressed during our conversation, he would invariably interject something along the lines of, “But let me get back to your original question . . . ” and then finish his thought—the kind of attention to detail that he brings to bear as a writer, producer, and performer with a career that, arguably, represents one of the longest running periods of sustained success in the history of hip-hop. It’s a genre that he’s seen grow from its infancy to reach a crossroads, mirroring his own evolution from his twenties to his forties. (Jay-Z turned 40 in December.) In those terms, these past couple of years have quite possibly been among the most fascinating of Jay-Z’s life: from being quoted in gesture by then-presidential candidate Barack Obama, who brushed some metaphorical “dirt” off his shoulder while giving a speech during the primaries in 2008; to signing on with Will Smith as a producer of the Broadway musical Fela!, about legendarily political Afrobeat artist Fela Kuti; to posting an old-school Zeitgeist hit such as “Empire State of Mind” in an era when video or radio play is of waning influence.

It was logical then that last fall Jay-Z dropped an album with the pressure-cooker title of The Blueprint 3 (Roc Nation), as if to remind himself that the pop world still has enormous expectations of him, yet things have indeed changed. He also possesses an acute awareness of who he is and what he has accomplished. We began the conversation talking about movies. He acknowledged Quentin Tarantino as an influence: “Man, the way Tarantino went back and forth in time, that’s it. I love Pulp Fiction (1994). I name-checked it before, but it was a big influence on my writing. If you listen to ‘Meet the Parents,’ the way he uses time as an element is big in that song.” He allows that Chuck D was right when he called rap the CNN of black America, but for Jay-Z, there’s more. “Rap for me is like making movies, telling stories, and getting the emotions of the songs through in just as deep a way. And I grew up in rap and movies the same way. I recently watched Once Upon a Time in America (1984) on a plane. Back in the day, Noodles”—played by Robert De Niro— “was my man. But when he rapes that girl, I couldn’t sit through it anymore. You come to realize that actions have consequences.” He was touching on the way movies bring us into whatever the characters are feeling at the moment. When this was pointed out, he sat back and nodded. His gift for bringing the way people talk into the way he walks in song works on both conscious and unconscious levels, a reminder that even in his music, Jay-Z has never lost sight of who—or what—he is.

ELVIS MITCHELL: Would you have ever thought there would be a time where you could have a song like “Empire State of Mind” blow up the way it has, and, yet, there aren’t any record stores around any more? Isn’t it strange that we got to this point?

JAY-Z: It’s horrible. I mean, you didn’t foresee this specifically, but you knew something would happen because whenever people reject change, things change for them anyhow. I think that’s what happened to the record business when Napster came around. The industry rejected what was happening instead of accepting it as change. Here we are today, more than a decade later, and we still haven’t figured it out.

MITCHELL: Well, it still speaks to the power of music that something like “Empire State of Mind” can pop like that. There’s still an appetite for it.

JAY-Z: Well, I don’t think the appetite is the problem. I think the consumption of music is at an all-time high. But I think the ways that record companies are trying to monetize it is just all over the place. At the end of the day, music is in the clouds. That’s where it’s at now. Before, you could hold it, look at it, turn it around. Now, it’s just in the air. That’s where it’s gonna wind up. You won’t need a shelf or a wall unit like my mom and pop had with all these big-ass records. You’ll just need your phone to call it up.

MITCHELL: I’m sorry, I’ve gotta stop you here. You must hear this all the time, but whenever you say something that’s a phrase from one of your songs . . . When you said “all-time high,” I just went right to “Numb/Encore.” Does that kind of thing happen often?

JAY-Z: All the time. It’s good. . . . It’s weird and good.

MITCHELL: I think it has to do with how you fold certain phrases into your lyrics in the way that people talk.

JAY-Z: I think it comes from me trying to tell the story in the most clear, concise, and truthful way—taking those everyday words and phrases and capturing them in a way that they become something else.

The people who write the headlines at places like the New York Post do something similar. They turn these phrases that you know into hooks. Sometimes they’re clever. Sometimes they’re stupid, like TIGER’S TALE. [laughs] Actually, that was pretty clever. Rakimsaid, “I can take a phrase that’s rarely heard/Flip it/Now it’s a daily word” [from “Follow the Leader,” off Eric B. & Rakim’s 1988 album Follow the Leader]. That’s what I’m talking about.

MITCHELL: But having that power of understanding the way people speak obviously really means something to you.

JAY-Z: I started doing it on a small level, just for the people around me. Then I realized the impact it had, the connection it created with the millions of people who’ve been through the same thing that I’ve been through, or who can relate to my ambitions or emotions . . . You don’t have to be from Marcy projects to relate to the idea of, I’m not gonna lose. I’m gonna fight, and I’m gonna make something out of nothing. You know, that’s pretty much the American dream as it stands now. So, for me, the realization that I could speak to people like that came first on a small scale. Then it just started happening—I started having this vibration.

MITCHELL: You’ve always had a really good ear for things like that in your music, but one of your real gifts is that you can hear those sorts of things in other people’s music, too—like The Notorious B.I.G. or the Neptunes or Kanye West. That’s part of what makes you a great collaborator.

JAY-Z: I just really love the music. Everyone who makes music is a good collaborator at their foundation because in order to make music, you have to connect to it in a way that other people can’t. Other things can get in the way, whether it’s the boxes that people put themselves in, or the feelings they might have towards a person. But those things don’t get in the way for me. To me, there shouldn’t be any lines. All these ways we classify things as R&B and hip-hop and rock . . . It’s bullshit. It’s all music. If you put yourself in that box, then you won’t be able to hear that it’s all music at its soul. When people say stuff like, “Oh, that’s soft rock. I don’t listen to that,” I find that elitist. It’s music-racist. [laughs]

MITCHELL: That was one of the big parts of rap for a while. Not only were you not supposed to listen to other kinds of music, you weren’t supposed to listen to other MCs either.

JAY-Z: Yeah, but that was all bravado. That was all about, “I’m the best! No one else exists!” I pretty much forget all that in terms of collaborating. I really just like breaking down those barriers, whether it means doing an album with Linkin Park, an album with R. Kelly [The Best of Both Worlds, 2002], or playing at the Brandenburg Gate with Bono.

MITCHELL: Or doing a song like “Empire State of Mind” with Alicia Keys?

JAY-Z: Exactly.

MITCHELL: If you think about all the guys in hip-hop that you came up with, you’re one of the only ones who is still here—and part of the reason is that a lot of those guys didn’t break out of that box you’re talking about. In fact, most of them are still in it.

JAY-Z: I think a big part of that is insecurity. You know, successful people have a bigger fear of failure than people who’ve never done anything because if you haven’t been successful, then you don’t know how it feels to lose it all. You don’t have that fear. So why do you think people get stuck in those boxes? It’s that fear of going back down. “I had success. I had a number one record. I had a number one album. I have to make this kind of record again or else I’m going to lose it all.” So that’s how you end up making the same song over and over. People find their zone, a place that’s comfortable, and they say, “I’m not gonna try that other thing. What if I fail? Then I’ll have to go back! What if I can’t get in the club anymore?” [both laugh] It’s difficult for me as well. The Blueprint 3 was the most difficult album that I’ve ever made.

MITCHELL: Why is that?

JAY-Z: Well, what I was trying to do with this album—which is the same thing I was trying to do on Kingdom Come [2006]—is go somewhere that hadn’t been gone before, to try to chart a new territory in rap. The reason I’ve been grounded, though, and able to make albums, is because I’ve allowed my friends to come with me and voice an opinion. That’s who keeps you grounded—the people who have known you longest. People who don’t know you, you don’t know their motives. They smile at you all day, “Oh, that’s great. You’ve done it again! You’re the greatest!” And that’s not good for an artist. You’ve gotta keep the people that have been around you, who saw you when you didn’t have anything, so they have the confidence to say, “Get out of here. That shit is bullshit!” I welcome that.

MITCHELL: Just calling it The Blueprint 3 really throws down a challenge to yourself, doesn’t it?

JAY-Z: Right, of course. But I thought it was needed. I think this Blueprint is even bigger than the first one [The Blueprint, 2001] in terms of rap music in general. It shows that a guy who isn’t 16 years old can make relevant music. That’s a big thing in rap because it used to be that when guys got to be 30 years old, that was it because they had to try to rap like they were 18, and then the 18-year-olds were like, “We don’t even use that slang! That’s so last week! What are you talking about? You don’t even know what’s going on out here! You’re done!”

MITCHELL: That’s when you go do a sitcom.

JAY-Z: [laughs] Yeah, exactly. Because you’re so disconnected. But if you’re a guy who loves to make rap music, then you have to do it, and those 18-year-olds are where the white-hot spot is, right? That’s what everyone says. That’s the demographic that you have to go for. But you don’t get to those kids by not being honest with yourself, because a separation develops between you and your music, and those kids don’t believe what you’re rapping about, so they don’t buy into it. That’s not something that’s honest to them. For me, the challenge is just making great albums, because talent—and writing in general—is not tangible. There’s no expiration date on it. At the same time, you might wake up tomorrow and be unable to write music. There’ve been genius artists who’ve been great for two years and then it’s gone. You just never know. So for me to put out my 11th studio album and have it connect the way it has still . . . I know it’s not Reasonable Doubt [1996]. It ain’t The Black Album [2003], either. It’s The Blueprint 3. It’s its own album, and it has connected with a lot of people.

MITCHELL: These albums are sort of like epics to you. Each song is like a scene, but there’s a context for each of them.

JAY-Z: Yeah. I mean, Blueprint 3 is made up of songs, but it’s also a commentary on the idea that in order for rap to survive, we have to stretch out the drama. We have to stretch out the audience. It can’t be this narrow—we have to stretch out the point of view. Because, as people grow, their points of view change as well, and so you start to lose people as they get older, just by nature of the fact that they don’t relate anymore to what you’re doing. Rap is fairly young, but it’s hitting this wall right now. It’s not this new thing anymore. Everyone’s heard it all before. So it’s like, “Okay, what are we going to talk about now? Where are you going to go with this?” It can’t just be about shock anymore. Before, it was all shock—“Motherfucker! Get it?” It was all this rebellious energy. Now, that’s not shocking anymore. We see the punch coming. So we’ve got to come up with something new. We gotta get on our game.

MITCHELL: Part of it, too, is that, in hip-hop, the audience generally moves from one person to the next, which is why it’s so amazing that you’ve been in the game for such a long time.

JAY-Z: Well, in rap years, I’m like The Rolling Stones or U2.

MITCHELL: The Grateful Dead.

JAY-Z: [laughs] The Grateful Dead, exactly!

MITCHELL: Were you conscious of bringing the audience along with you?

JAY-Z: Yeah, but I also never wanted to just make the same album that I made before. I am who I am as a person—I can’t change who I am.

MITCHELL: You probably don’t remember this, but we met four years ago at the Spotted Pig [the restaurant in New York City’s West Village of which Jay-Z is a co-owner]. It was the night that Bill Clinton was there. You and I were sitting outside having a cigar, actually, and you said, “Man, the world has changed. The president is talking to me about my music!” Do you remember that night?

JAY-Z: Yeah, man.

MITCHELL: I thought about that when Obama did the “dirt off my shoulder” moment. What’s it like for you to have basically two presidents who know how to deal with you?

JAY-Z: It’s unbelievable because it’s so far away from where I come from. We were the kids who were ignored by every politician. We didn’t have the numbers, the vote, to put anybody in office, because no matter who was in the office, we didn’t think that it would affect change where we lived. So nobody went out and voted. For me, being with Obama or having dinner with Bill Clinton . . . It’s crazy. It’s mind-blowing, because where I come from is just another world. We were just ignored by politicians—by America in general.

MITCHELL: But then you went from being ignored to being targeted. I mean, politicians actually went after rappers.

JAY-Z: Yeah. From being ignored, to being targeted, to being accepted.

MITCHELL: And you, as a rapper, have lived through all those eras. How has the game changed for you? You’ve changed as a person but, in a lot of ways, as you’ve grown, rap has become more of a marketing thing, and much more cynical.

For the rest of the interview, go to Interview

NIGHTSHADOW'S MAIDEN VOYAGE

We have seen Jaguar Concept Motorcycle images before, today we will see a video of Jaguar Motorcycle in action. Cool!
Leaping Jaguar and Charging Bull motorcycles by Massow Concept Cycles. The Jaguar powered by an air-cooled Buell S3's 1200cc V-twin engine, body made from high-grade stainless steel. It price at £320,000 (about $567,000). Via likecool

SADE - SOLDIER OF LOVE

Gotta get her new album for my pops!

DRUYORKTV: EPISODE 7: PREDICTION FOR THE NEXT DECADE

Hit up druyork.com and get your vote on.

SNOOP DOGG FT JAY-Z - I WANNA ROCK (KINGS G MIX) RADIO RIP

FIRE. Download HERE

BIRTH OF AN AVATAR

Birth of an AVATAR from Peter Ammentorp Lund on Vimeo.

Copenhagen decided to make his own Avatar after watching James Cameron’s epic film.
"After watching James Cameron's AVATAR, I really wanted to have an avatar of my own. :o) Here is the result, after fooling around in photoshop for a couple of hours."

ALYSSA MONKS' PAINTINGS

Alyssa’s paintings are of a representational narrative genre. She portrays a specific place and time with simultaneous empathy and detachment. Monks is part of the Continuing Education Faculty at the New York Academy of Art, where she teaches Flesh Painting. She currently is also an instructor at the Montclair State University.

She earned her BA from Boston College and an MFA in painting from the New York Academy of Art, Graduate School of Figurative Art. At the New York Academy of Art, Alyssa studied with Vincent Desiderio, Jenny Saville, Wade Schuman, Brenda Zlamany, John Jacobsmeyer, Harvey Citron, Deane Keller, Edward Schmidt, Steven Assael, and Lisa Bartolozzi. She additionally studied at Montclair State College, the New School, and Lorenzo de’Medici in Florence. She completed an artist in residency at Fullerton College.

Alyssa has been awarded the Grant for Painting from the Elizabeth Greensheilds Foundation three times and has had recent solo shows in New York and Anaheim, California. Alyssa is currently represented by Sarah Bain Gallery in Anaheim and DFN Gallery in New York. Her work is available at David Klein Gallery in Michigan and Hespe Gallery in San Fransisco.

Via Alyssamonks

MOS DEF CREATING THE ECSTATIC

Pure dopeness martians!!

LIGHT TOUCH

Light Touch($TBA) is an interactive projector that instantly transforms any flat surface into a touch screen. Its Holographic Laser Projection(HLP) technology inside which creates a bright, high-quality video images in WVGA resolution - 10.1″ virtual touch screen, so the user can use projected image as a touchscreen with virtual keyboards and touching the image. Cool tech!

GO LONG (2009 SKATEBOARDING)

A lotta people don't know but I'm a fan of skateboarding and this video is truly the dopest. Enjoy!

VIDEOS FOR MY MARTIANS

JAY-Z FT SWIZZ BEATZ - ON TO THE NEXT ONE

THE COOL KIDS FT BOLDY JAMES - TIRES

STACK BUNDLES FT THE RIOT SQUAD - PEEP GAME

MOS DEF FT TALIB KWELI - HISTORY

TREY SONGZ FT FABOLOUS - SAY AAH

THE COOL KIDS - FREE THROWS

JAY-Z FT MR HUDSON - YOUNG FOREVER


ENJOY!!