Everything named Watts is wonderful and a thing of quality.

Life is wonderful, fly living rooms, brass brooms
Catch me in the city of Watts, dusted out with Doc Doom

- Ghostface, “Belt Holders”




Essentialism is ridiculous, I learned in Lit 101. Identities are always in flux, changing with the times. Nobody is bound by their socially-constructed religious or gender or skin-tone tribe; that's ridiculous! Just pulling this random example out of thin air: you can be a woman feminist with a master's degree who is also a part-time studio apartment swimsuit model; these are not opposing things. The notion of “false universalisms,” that there are attributes that all members of a particular group share, is dead. Canadian white women aged 18-24 are like this, and Black men who wear suits are like that; ridiculous. Really. All of that aside, the truest thing in apt. 15 today is that if a subject has Watts in its name, it is a wonderful, high-quality thing. Everything with Watts in its name is amazing! Everything.

(The exceptions, because of course there have to be some since blog posts never go as smoothly as you'd like, is former Republican Congressman J.C. Watts, and the Watts uprising of 1965. Neither of those things is wonderful, and neither did any good for anybody.)







Alan Watts, philosopher, radio host, friend of John Cage and Gary Snyder and other sensitive white men of whom my parents are fond. Known for his radio show, for making Buddhist tenets easily digestible by white kids In Search of Meaning (my parents, ca. 1974), and for such snippets of genius as “No work or love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart,” and “Saints need sinners,” and, regarding the use of psychedelics, “When you get the message, hang up the phone.” Oh. Word.

Hating ass individuals come in droves with this guy, like they always do with popular people; Watts was often criticized by fellow Buddhists for not interpreting Buddhist texts accurately. Russell Simmons relieving himself in his solid gold toilet before he goes to yoga knows a little something about that. But how can you fault somebody for wanting to spread some kindness and free us all from the rotten cycle of samsara? Get a grip, people. Watts saw a basic human alienation among Westerners that he felt the need to soothe, and his radio broadcasts are quite pleasant to listen to. I think Watts did more good than harm, and his place on this list is well-earned.








Charles Wright & the Watts 103rd St. Rhythm Band. They're the reason this whole idea sprouted in my brain, and the first Watts-related thing I wrote on the list. Charles Wright got his start playing in clubs where ladies took their clothes off, which is so funny because, years later, this lady enjoys taking her clothes off to Charles Wright! I'm sad to say Express Yourself is the only record from Watts 103rd in my collection; the reissues aren't hard to find at Amoeba, so there hasn't been that panic I usually feel when I'm missing an endorphin-swirling funk classic among my records. I could go get In the Jungle, Babe tomorrow if I wanted to, and if I had any money left over, You're So Beautiful (with the superfine “What Can You Bring Me?”* that punks jumped up and got beat down to in '93). Express Yourself was released in 1970, but even in 2010 it hasn't lost its sweaty power. You put it on and Charles and his boys are still bumpin & grindin like a slow jam, and Cali is still where they put they mack down; gimme love.


The Echo Park Eagles are currently 0 and 1. Opening week (last Sunday) I dressed in a cozy sweater, loungey underpants, and socks to watch various football games you can see on basic cable, and waited for someone, my pretend boyfriend like Pharaohe Monch, to join me. Nobody came. Evidently you people hate a skinny girl who can make good baked chicken and who has 10,000 records and a backyard weed farm. So I hugged Charles Wright (in 12" form) and documented my ridiculous pouty face to show the Internet, my actual boyfriend. Nobody gets me like he does.



“I'm Aware.”

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Michael Watts, producer, label owner, deuce chunk-er, Screwston work put-er in-er. Texans from his neighborhood swear he invented the “chopped and screwed” term; since I have no reason to dispute that, I'm posting it here like it's the truth. Back in '05, I thought I was real cute and funny when I wrote in my “Music” section on my MySpace page, “anything as long as it's chopped and screwed.” 5 years down the road, ain't shit changed; I still represent Swishahouse* (*2005-2006). Michael gets a place here mostly because of all the one-liners in “Still Tippin'” -

Boss Hog on candy.
It takes grindin to be a king.
I got the Internet goin nuts.

Another thing I like about him is that instead of “5000 Watts,” his nickname could be “5 Kilowatts.”






Reggie Watts, 21st Century Schizoid Man. Included here because he's post-comedy, post-weird, has a nice thick head of hair, and is probably deeply depressed—everything I need in a man. He's the smartest guy in the room and I always tag along behind the smartest guy in the room, hoping he notices me. And everything in his act sounds like something out of a Doom song.











Wattstax, 1972 concert. Just...oh god, it's the most amazing thing, I can't believe I even have to describe it here. Go watch the movie, motherfucker. Rufus, Isaac, Carla, the Staple Singers, the Bar-Kays, and numerous others lift ev'ry voice and sing at the mighty Coliseum. And it only cost $1 to get in!

Sweat plus bass plus absorbing the crowd's collective high from Jesse Jackson's call-and-response means I surely would've gotten pregnant at this event. “In Watts, we have shifted from 'Burn, baby burn' to 'Learn, baby learn',” Jesse says, without a trace of corniness. Later, Rufus Thomas comes on stage to do “The Breakdown”; “Ain't I'm clean?” he rhetorically asks, 30 years ahead of Kanye's whole Dear audience, please tell me how great I am and how fucking fresh my Junya Watanabe dunks are act. WATCH IT, I said.















The Watts Towers, tall, spindly, metal/glass/mosaic/mesh/mortar/porcelain creatures rising from south Los Angeles concrete, built by immigrant hands. Simon Rodia was a construction worker from Italy who built the thing over the course of 33 years and called it Nuestro Pueblo--“our town.”

“(Rodia) constructed a dream-like complex of openwork towers . . . and encrusted them with a sparkling mosaic, composed mainly of what had once been refuse,” said Calvin Trillin in The New Yorker, in 1965. Like the architectural, tangible version of the Dust Brothers and Paul's Boutique, kids! Soon there'll be a skatepark there, too.








“Watts Riot,” Kam feat. Ice Cube. Fightin the police with my peers/With head & shoulders, and no more tears. Shampoo raps! Love some shampoo raps. DJ Pooh produced this in '93, and the place and time from which it came is clear when you hear that beat, so crowded and filled with sirens. Kam had that serious voice like a university professor, making everything sound important. Cornel West in a clean white tee and Chucks.

Do people in Brooklyn actually say “What it look like”? I've heard that in song but I just don't know. I can tell you that when Roger Troutman sings “In the cityyyy of good ol’ Watts,” like that’s something that locals say, he's just repeating what Ronnie Hudson sang in “West Coast Poplock.” Ronnie himself made that up. Good ol’ Watts. Nobody actually says that in LA. I mean, nobody used to say that; now they do. It's been added to our lexicon because it was stated over a catchy melody, like “Inglewood always up to no good.” I've heard people say these things. Such is the power of song.










Naomi Watts. Straight men, you've seen Mulholland Drive, right? That's what I thought! Hi, straight men! She's on the list because everyone, everyone loves a blonde fake lesbian. Additionally, she makes good film choices, and her man is Liev Schreiber, San Fran-raised offspring of superleftists and foxy tall artistic strong-facial-featured man of Judaic extraction. She and Liev do it in sweaty and intense fashion every night, I'm certain. For the revolution.




Honorable mention: the Watts Prophets. Semi-honorable mention: Charlie Watts (meh), drummer for the Rolling Stones. He's so very meh (I'm not really a Stones girl), although the first 10 seconds of “Paint It Black” succeeds in its goal of making me feel like I'm surfing in the great blue ocean while also pointing a rifle out of a helicopter above the jungles of Saigon.




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Odds are my Fantasy team will render all others broken and battered and winless this season.

It's early September so here comes the NFL. In the springtime, Ronald Artest has the power to make me forget that football even exists--but when fall begins and Chris Berman starts bellowing on the TV and all the stores start carrying boots and trenchcoats even though it's too hot in LA for any of that, I realize how much I've missed it.

I love and participate in Fantasy Football. I go at with my signature no-holds-barred style, I take no prisoners, I leave it all out on the field and I give it slightly more than 100% on any given Sunday. The fact that I always make fun of fake things should be disregarded. I hate fake rappers and fake nerds, fake NYC accents, fake rappers, fake producers, fake producers. The only good fake things are Biggie's Twitter and fake football, and so I'm jumping into this season's fakery with a full heart and a clear head. I just got my Fantasy roster, assigned to me by the robotic, soulless machine that is Yahoo! Fantasy Football automated system (I tried drafting my own guys last year, and it turns out I'm no good at it). I care about each of the randomly-assigned men below so much, but only to the degree that they remind me of a musical figure with a similar name or back story.




E-40's still rapping, Funk Flex still hasn't learned voice modulation. I'm still underdressed on the Internet. Rae's still rapping. Scarface, Ghostface, Metal Face: still rapping. People do what they're used to. The familiar is easy, comfortable, like they say on commercials for Wrangler jeans. Brett Favre, with his familiar face and his arthritic joints, is suiting up again this year, because Brett Favre still plays football. He retired a couple years ago. I remember, because Jay-Z was on his farewell tour at the time. But, you know. People just do things they're used to. It's hard to walk away.

Upon seeing my Fantasy roster, I started a spirited text conversation with my mom (also in my Fantasy league). "I got Bretty for QB!" I wrote on my tiny keyboard. "OMG, did you know he is old?" she sent back. Then I stopped playing. It started out as such a fun thing, and then somebody had to go and hurt my feelings. Fuck off, Mom. (sorry, Mom!) The concept of a (nearly) 41-year-old QB is the kind of thing everyone laughs at until everyone sees that it's just crazy enough to work. I have a strong feeling that Brett Favre, sometime subject in Weezy* and Jeezy** songs, shall lead my squad to victory.

Brett Favre's middle name is, like every good ol' boy from Mississippi, Lorenzo. Odd and fascinating, that's what that is. I'd like the story behind it, please. Brett Lorenzo has a 73-year-old body. He wears Wranglers, drives a truck, can't handle his booze--a real live walking stereotype, except lovable. He continues to be worn and creaky, but still very very clutch—the E-40 of the NFL, rather than the grouchy, bloated old KRS, thank the lord.

(KRS has no current NFL equivalent...if it were the '70s, maybe sad, elderly Namath when he played for the Rams? I don't know; let me work out the analogy some more in my head).



* And I never miss a game, no Shaq O'Neal/More like Brett Favre, just like Brett Favre
(“Get High, Screw the World”).

** Watch for goonies when you got it, n---as wanna rob/And pull a staff and quarterback 'em like Brett Favre (“Trap or Die”).



Santana Moss. In terms of music, who does his name evoke? Well, Carlos Santana of course, and that hideous creature who calls himself Juelz. But there's also Now for 10 years, we've been on our own/And moss grows fat on a rollin’ stone (“American Pie,” Don McLean). Don really enunciates that F--ffffffat. It's unnecessary and wonderfully stylish. Anyway, a rolling stone gathers no something something; Santana, roll it back to '05 and let's have a thousand-plus-receiving-yards season, buddy.


Brandon Marshall. NO, not Marshall Mathers. The Marshall Tucker Band! The beautiful “Can't You See” was on the Blow soundtrack, but I was already familiar with it due to childhood time spent frolicking in my parents' record collection. It was released by Capricorn (of course) in '73 and it therefore sounds like weed, Jim Beam, big belt buckles, and getting hugged by my dad. And it's got a flute solo!


Ronnie Brown. Ronnie from New Edition, sure, but since I am a California girl dipped in honey and bronzed by the sunshine, I instantly think Ronnie Hudson and his “West Coast Poplock.” Worldwide, let 'em recognize from Long Beach to Rosecrans.





Owen Daniels. Owen Pallett, that weirdo who's obsessed with Final Fantasy. Charlie Daniels, that guy who used to be SO hip hop on account of his storytelling technique but then started showing up on Fox News to weigh in on foreign wars and the reasons Obama is leading us all down the big global toilet. On a side “everything's connected” note, however, Charlie Daniels did a lot of collaborating with the Marshall Tucker Band in the '70s. Let's hope that Owen Daniels does some collaborating with Brandon Marshall when the EP Eagles take the field--mostly I just want Owen to let Brandon get all the touches, since tight ends are worthless in Fantasy Football but the system forces you to play one anyway.




Devin Aromashodu. First of all: Who? Second: based on his name, I believe that he is of Nigerian descent. And third: NIGERIA!, now and forever. I don't understand how such a small county is so fertile in terms of epic humans, but I've worked out the analogy in my head that Nigeria is to countries what Georgia is to American states--unfairly, disproportionately rich in musical geniuses (Fela, Sade, + a hundred more from Nigeria; Ray Charles + a thousand more from Georgia), writers (Achebe, Wole Solinka; Alice Walker, Carson McCullers), and physically stunning people (Oluchi; T.I.). I've never heard of this Aromashodu fellow but the signs tell me that he will surely kill it every week.


Austin Collie. Barrington Levy, “Collie Weed.” Horace Andy, “Collie Herb.”


Jabar Gaffney. It's painful to admit, but the little elves that run around inside my brain piecing together music trivia and rap lyric ephemera came up with nothing when I saw his name. It evokes nothing music-related. Luckily, all's not lost because Jabar Gaffney is just a great-sounding name for a man. It's got an adequate amount of syllables, and the stresses fall in all the right places. Quentin Jammer is the current holder of the best name in the NFL (Earthwind Moreland had the honor until '05), and Black Milk is the current champ in terms of names on rappers' birth certificates that now only the DMV and their grandmas call them by (Curtis Cross). But Jabar. That's a nice goddamn name. Solid, with all those consonants. It makes me think of Kareem, and that's nice. And if I'm to believe what some man on the Internet whom I've never met says, Mr. Gaffney is likely to be a sleeper Fantasy point-getter this season. Denver's offense needs to make up for Brandon Marshall being gone (a real workhorse, Marshall now splits his time between the Dolphins and the Echo Park Eagles) and maybe Gaffney will get something thrown to him now and then. He's got seniority among the team's receivers and he's supposed to do things, big things, this year.


Cedric Benson. Also a great name. It's cinematic and comic-book-hero-sounding. Makes me think of George Benson. And Cedric Brooks, I think, was a Jamaican musician (?).


New Orleans' defense. Everything about New Orleans reminds me of music, I love the Saints, and their defensive squad is ranked around #8 or 9 at the moment, so I'm happy I got 'em. “Football is violence and cold weather and sex and college rye,” said the great sports writer Roger Kahn. Football is also, let's hope, teams from battered and beaten-down cities rising triumphantly in consecutive seasons.







No need to impede The High and Mighty mystique/That shit would be as ignorant as Jimmy the Greek. Soundbombing II hardly ever shows up on those stupid best-of album lists that clog up the Internet every 10 years. I think everyone's still mad at Rawkus and we're being babies by not giving it accolades. But we should. It's a great compilation and I wore the CD out that summer ('99). It's ranked in my personal stupid best-of album list that I carry around in my head. What/What, what, whaaaat.













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Plaid: variations on a theme

Now I’m in the limelight due to the fact that I rhyme tight, and also because of my vast knee-high/thigh-high sock collection. These pics are from that one day when Biggie informed my outfit choices, and I strutted around in my red-and-black lumberjack and my pixellated-Biggie-face slouchy tank top, and nobody dared fuck with me. WE DID IT, BROOKLYN.




The only things I know about fashion are

Bathing suits are nice,
it took me a long time to figure out that boys like skinny legs and go crazy when they are paired with short garments + heels; I wish I’d known sooner because I would’ve really capitalized on the shit instead of being awkward and self-conscious about my own terribly skinny legs,
Zac Posen has a mean case of bitchface,
florals will be huge this spring,
I would like a bag from the House of Wang with those DOPE GROMMETS on the bottom!,
and
there was this one time when K. West and crew went to Paris fashion week and just did not give a collective fuck about how they would be perceived by all the dudes in their old neighborhoods. Other than that, plaid is in for fall, and as someone who is partially made of hardy Scottish stock and who likes songs about red-and-black lumberjacks, I endorse this.




In other plaid news:

I miss this individual and his solid technique of verbal intercourse. And yes, my wistful memories and corresponding photograph are appropriate in this post because houndstooth is a form of plaid. Fall back, pattern police.

“Livin’ Astro.” When rap's Sun Ra tones the weirdness down, he has a Chris Wallace sort of lyrical bent. This could be a Biggie verse, no?

I got my shades, big rock star compared to Elvis
Signin autographs for rappers, while girls move they pelvis
Write songs quickly, for Elton John or Lionel Richie
Call up my butler, get clothes washed by the maid
Ivory soap, this is clean, feel like Cascade
I count the bills, roll to Detroit in Sedan DeVilles
I throw my skully on, big robe like Marvin Gaye
Step in the front row, primetime I move your way
Budweiser Fest soundcheck, demanding more respect
I come correct through the Metro, and turn y'all petrol
I'm up here early bitin donuts sippin on espresso.

Isaac Hayes displays how stunting is, in fact, a habit.
That is all.

Just found out they fucking play Pavement at Urban Outfitters. Not counting the fun I had singing along in my head when I walked around, this was a bad experience. My stress level really suffers because of these kinds of daily intersections of commerce and musical purity. Who cares if the 15-year-old next to me is hearing Pavement on account of shopping in a store headed by a conservative capitalist entrepreneur? She's 15, and it's Pavement, and this means that the music will seep into her and inform all of her choices in life. She might not hear it otherwise, until years later when Natalie the roommate plays it for her during freshman year at UCSB. My mom says it's bad for me, all this mental anguish. But she also says that my sassy mouth is the reason I'm unmarried, so what does she know. Look at Steve there, though. That's a pretty nice haircut (har!). I love the purple v-neck, too. Fashion, baby.

This.
That is all.

If you can rap like this, and we all know you can rap like this, how come you don't rap like this all the time? There's the crushing grind of the rap game, the pressure of feeling pressured. I know the work won't always be sublime. I have a tiny bit of sympathy. But overall, I'm tired of the games and the distracting sidework, Nasir.


I’d rather die in a box than live safe in witness protection
Gotti was a racist, but he still get praises
We don’t give a fuck—gangster is gangster.






Abbey Lee Kershaw has that gap-toothed, tiny-facial-featured beauty that I will just never be able to master. It's frustrating. Fashion loves skinny and white, and I'm both of those, but sadly, fashion does not care for hips and that's why my modeling career peaked when I was 12, then plummeted and landed with a resounding thud. I have confidence that I could pull off something like the look in this photo, though, because I can master nakedness under a plaid button-up, I can master having an adorable bellybutton, and I sure as hell can master a bored expression in front of the camera. This picture is oddly sexy and I can't understand why, although it's that criterion that generally applies to anything sexy. My point is, just please, someone: manipulate an electronic image of me, and give me cartoon antlers.







The Great Typo Hunt has been all over NPR, and the concept is kind of cute--these 2 guys who get little to no ass embarked on a journey to fix all egregious misuses of grammar in signs, ads, and articles. They then wrote a book about their, uh, adventures. I’m kind of like these guys, except with sloppy rap songwriting and production. I see it and I have to call it out; I'm on a mission from God. Maybe one day I’ll write a book about it, and then you’ll all be sorry you ever made fun of me.

Oh look, here's our first example. That awful Game and his buddies Swizzy and Jay Elec (whose presence here confuses and upsets me) have made a song called “Higher,” which is bad and which flips and bounces Bob Marley's “Iron Lion Zion” incorrectly. “I'm gonna be higher,” they believe the chorus goes--except somebody didn't pay attention to the fact that the song is called “Iron Lion Zion,” and there is no mention of the word “higher” in there. It sounds like “higher” because Swizz, I guess, cannot understand Jamaican patois, but all he had to do was consult the title of the song he chopped up and looped. This is just lazy songwriting, and more proof that the best thing Swizz Beats ever did was play hypeman to DMX on Chappelle's Show. That's where he excelled.

Ciccone Youth!

Mike Watt is never not lumberjackin', sartorially speaking. Always with the flannel button-ups, that one. But you know, you're in San Pedro, you got the onshore flow, it's overcast. Dress in layers. They did a piece about him in the LA Times over the weekend that was entertaining and delightful. His feelings about Iggy Pop and, more importantly, BASS, are summed up below. Watt will always be the same, even with creaky bones and gray hair, just like Adam Yauch.

“Iggy's a great cat, as a music person, but he actually knows a lot about culture. He's very intelligent. I've learned so much about being a better bass player from that guy. There's these guys that don't operate machines, they have different perspectives of the sound; they're more like conductors, almost like a bridge to the people. So they can help you, especially with bass, because it's kind of mysterious how bass works. It's not just a guitar. It's a weird thing, kinda like grout between the tiles.”

OHSHIT SONNNN. Gallo's a disgusting Republican jerkoff but he keeps good company. VMAs, '94. Snoop must've magically risen from that wheelchair.







First of all, this is just an excellent photograph. It's full of joy and movement. Who knew Jehovah's Witnesses could swagger so convincingly.


Second, it's MJ's birthday. That's why “Human Nature” was all over popular radio today, even though they should've been playing “The Way You Make Me Feel” (late-'80s MJ), “Say, Say, Say” (early-'80s-underrated-pop-duet-banger MJ), “You Haven't Done Nothing”* (mid-'70s-backing-Stevie-Wonder-with-his-brothers MJ), or “I Wanna Be Where You Are,” from the heartbreakingly-innocent-face era of MJ. OH, or “It's Great to be Here.”


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