I Plan To Have A Whole Army By The Time That I'm Through

IMAGE: Erykah Badu LYRIC/TITLE: Saul Williams

Music:

The Rookie is back with some pretty dope mp3s by Insomniac and Spex. Even if you've never heard of either of them, trust that they're both worth checking out if you're a fan of independent hip-hop. Insomniac once had an infamous battle with Murs which some of you may recall: http://www.soothsayrecords.com/rookie/.

Checkerboard Chimes is offering a track with Rakim and Talib Kweli---"Getting Up Anthem": http://checkerboardchimes.blogspot.com/.

At Silence Is A Rhythm Too, you can pick up two incredible tracks from Bill Withers' debut album---"Harlem" and "Better Off Dead": http://siart.blogspot.com/.

Spine Magazine has a remix of Saul Williams' song "Black Stacey" w/NAS. They are also offering the track "Shotta" by Juelz Santana: http://www.spinemagazine.com/index.php?task=.

Speaking of Juelz, you can also download his track "Clorkwork", courtesy of Notes From A Different Kitchen. Link to your right.

The Smoking Section continues to be an excellent resource for downloading miscellaneous tracks, mixtapes and complete albums. Right now, one of my personal favorite things that they're featuring is "Tell Me Why Our Love Has Turned So Cold" by Willie Hutch. This song has recently become familiar to many, as it was sampled in Three 6 Mafia's "Stay Fly": http://smokingsection.blogspot.com.

Breath of Life has another great selection of tracks this week---an Opolopo remix of Erykah Badu's "Southern Girl", "Queen in My Empire" by Rhythm and Sound w/ Jennifer Lara, and a joint by crazy-ass Fishbone:http://www.kalamu.com/bol/.

Two tracks from Biggie's Duets album are available for download at Lemon-Red---"Spit Your Game" w/ Twista and Krayzie Bone + "Old Habits" ft. T.I. and Slim Thug: http://www.lemon-red.org/blog/.

ART:

I tend to take this site for granted because I've been a frequent visitor for quite some time, but Stencil Revolution has quite possibly the best stencil graffiti galleries available online. They feature both street and studio art, and every day there are an abundance of new images that have been posted. If you've never had the pleasure, make it a priority to visit soon: http://www.stencilrevolution.com/photopost/.

POLITICS:

As many intelligent individuals have already surmised, the George Bush administration has been heavily promoting their own brand of weird science---replacing years of knowledge, testing, and study with whatever voodoo bullshit suits their needs and motivations at the time. This video is a humorous take on their treatment/denial of global warming and other issues affecting the environment: http://www.climatemash.org/.

If you find this interesting (and/or it angers you), a site called Bush Greenwatch is tracking the Dubya administration's "environmental misdeeds": http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/. Much more on this topic can be learned by visiting their site.

LIFE:

As I've mentioned several times before, I'm a vinyl junkie, and part of what I love about record albums is (undoubtedly) the covers. Somehow, I've never been able to feel the same way about CD insert bullshit. Some of the covers in my collection are outstanding works of art---and then of course, I've got some really bizarre stuff that isn't all that appealing to the eye. I haven't developed an actual list of the worst album covers I've ever seen, but someone has---and well--they're pretty fuckin' atrocious. That should be all I need to say in the way of an introduction: http://porktornado.diaryland.com/albumcover.html.

I leave you with just one thought...

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened" ---Dr. Suess