this is a test

my wife doesn't read this blog. even though her name precedes mine in the title. let's see how long it takes for her to see this.

new star wars... sorta

my friend chris would appreciate this....

Star Wars: Uncut Trailer from Casey Pugh on Vimeo.

now if there was only a following like this to give the beastmaster a remake....

not no more...

brothers don't dance like this no more... note how they style out towards the end.



who knew that the kid n' play kick step was just a version of the charleston.

the hotness

my wife loves some jon hamm. he plays don draper on mad men, if you don't know. he's pretty sharp, so much so it inspired a line from brooks brothers. i've heard hamm on the doug benson podcast before (recommended) and thought his bit on SNL was hilarious (sergio!!!!). he's a funny dude. here is an 'interview' with zach g.

Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis: Jon Hamm from Between Two Ferns

deydey post script

wow. i talk about hip-hop culture progressing. this is an example. again. wow.



props to deydey

the hotness

so this is delphine nguyen, aka deydey. last year she took the UK popping championships and has gathered up an impressive list of wins. these clips are wonderful on so many levels, but its the last clip that really gets me. mommy i want one!



rocking more traditional


this is art!

fresh moves

a friend told me to check this out and i thought i'd share it...



out west they call that hella fresh!

now waaay out west... they get down like this.



an excerpt form the Floor the Love battle in singapore. yes. singapore. and yes, that was a papoose verse you heard. rep. hard.

yes please

i've never cosplayed. i'd like to, but the number of black male characters in sci-fi/fantasy/comic/game world is limited. with my hair, the possibilities dwindle. thus far i've come up with: shephard from firefly; bishop from x-men; maybe a guy from the crackdown game; a predator; t'challa (aka the black panther)... then there is my own concoction, rasta vince neil.

anyway. gamescom was this weekend. gamescom makes the new york comic con look like a yard sale. the biggest and baddest of them all. needless to say, the cosplayers were out in force. check it.

and. link cosplay is mega-hot!!!


totally unrelated but banging. .watching that nike vid got me hype on these kids here's a clip from the nike am vid feat. shane and theotis... theotis. got to be the coolest name in skateboarding...

nike getting it in!

Go Girl!

Pokemon world champions crowned

pop files

there is an objective measure of pop, the height of an ollie. luis tolentino either tied or broke that record a couple of years back. i don't really follow 'records' because it makes skating more jockish. counting stairs is the most jock-boy i will get about skating. regardless, dude is little with very deceptive pop.

dude has got some kareem campbell pop, all of a sudden there over it.



crazy right. with pop like that, almost anything is possible..

better than hollywood

so games. i play them, there the future of entertainment and have the most earning potential for any form of IP outside of pharmaceuticals. in short, they rule. when i got my xbox 360 (june 2010) the first game, i mean the absolute first game i played on it was bioshock. arguably, the greatest game created, it was an experience. more engaging than a movie, more interactive than a theme park. i highly recommend if you haven't played. i have the sequel, but haven't gotten into it yet. back to the point. here is the trailer for bioshock infinite. if your into steampunk, then you should probably sit because this is emmin-effin awesome..



see what a creative community can create without constant interference from marketing teams and financial backers. take that hollywood...

Pop Files

pop. an intangible quantity when it comes to skating. at a minimum, pop is the height you get on ollies or whenever you pop your board. but pop doesn't necessarily mean how high you can get, it can also translate to distance, that up and out that gets you over a fire hydrant or across a hip. there is also the 'floaty' quality of pop, where the board seems to be glued to shoes and keeps rising.

i like pop. a consistent floaty ollie is all i want (that a nollie heels and/or some type of variel flip). these posts will be dedicated to pop. i'm not some grom concerned with how many stairs, how high or how long. i'm looking for that gorilla snap. case in point, check out my man, stevie. tricks on flat are the best determinate of pop. the switch heels is INSANE (2nd trick). that is what we call gorilla snap...



gangsta!

since we started with stevie, i think it is only reasonable to put in a word about his DGK teammate darren harper. dude is from dc and has some inhuman pop. when i went to dc, i went to this block. kind of like going to love park, just to see the gap, it was a spot i'd seen in plenty vids and wanted to see if it was the fisheye or if it was really diesal. i can saw.... spots legit. the block is alot wider than it appears and is a little over shin high. the difficulty is the drop off. the front is about 2 feet but the back is like 4 feet, so you got to float over, level out to land. it'd take me three weeks just to clear it with an ollie, much less the destruction mr. harper puts down. so, let's get to it. pop files presents.... darren harper. crazy snap on them shuvs....

WIWW - Walt is all Grown

LOST spoilers.....

ok. so the Lost boxset comes out August 24th. although the commentary will likely be the 'meat' fans have been seeking, its the 12 minute epilogue that has the interweb a buzz. i've seen it and..... WTF!. i won't go into too many details, but there's a warehouse, ben with a file, hurley in the back of a van and walt. its old garage-nose walt. he talks with ben and ben eludes that walt may become the new caretaker for the island. not the resolution i wanted but... at least dude got some screen time. (spoiler)



personally, i don't think it is something to lust after. frankly, if that epilogue was the motivating factor behind purchasing a $200 boxset day-of, i would shoot jj abrams. i would crouch down, put my knee on his chest, put the gun barrel in his mouth, the end of the gun on the bridge of his jaw, then squeeze until the trigger goes......

Dos Equis by Kaws

now i can get behind this....

fashawn can skate

so fashawn got on my radar last year, with his boy meets world mixtape. i was taught to follow production. instead of dre, just blaze or pow low the don, i follow j. rawls, el-p, marco polo, and... exile. soulful samples and knock. so, when i heard that exile was producing another album, i was curious. exile produced blu and blu is the sh&t (please get the album if you haven't)! back to fashawn. so "boy meets world" was pleasant. i liked the song with planet asia. nothing noteworthy, but it was one of those albums that you want to listen to again but never do.

fast forward to last month. i follow mixtape djs, like i follow production. i like mixtapes and still listen to them. why? well... watch.

Real G's Rock Tapes from richdirection on Vimeo.

currently my dudes are statik selektah, don cannon and green lantern. "the champ is here" was my reintroduction into mixtape shopping. i remember hearing from a car and remembering the green lantern drop. see. growing up, i had a barbershop and older cousins, so getting new mixtapes wasn't a problem. then in college, well you know the hustle. wednesdays in the union at FSU, then fridays on FAM, then there was always phaze one. and if all else fails you could just get your trade on with the someone from the tri-state. leaving school, things got weird. the internet went BOOM and a move to the midwest and killed my tape access. sure, dj drama was in full effect, but if your taste ran closer to NY you were stuck. then came the move to brooklyn, the home of the mixtape. and i moved down the block from where this happened.



nice.

how it works in brooklyn is, just walk down a street. keep walking and you will eventually run into someone selling mixes. 1 for 5 or 5 for 20. simple. most of my lil wayne collection came from empire mixes, so much so that i think dj drops are a part of songs. point being. i'm back in the tape game. saw that fashawn was coming with a new tape dedicated to illmatic. i got it last week and its DOPE!. he re-did all the songs. the genius is that he kept the same cadences and changed the lyrics to update the content and make it more 'cali.' it bangs.



what's more impressive then that is this.....



dude started with a switch back three. tuff!

just cause

i like music. it gets me hype. this gets me hype. cheers.

mind powers

i think i made this happen. with my mind grapes.

My mind grapes sound bite

minorities in space

carl weathers, danny glover and billy dee williams. it's a shame i can't name anymore black actors that have played prominent roles in sci-fi movies (shots to the original-- Duane Jones). sam jackson as mace windu doesn't count because i do not recognize the last 3 star wars movies as part of the star wars canon or science fiction, more cartoony fantasy. then there is blade. vampires always give me trouble, because historically, monsters are science fiction (dr. frakenstein IS science fiction), but this vampire trend is really screwing the monster hierarchy up. the twillight vampires are more magic than myth. any monster worth its claws has an origins story, which dictates whether it is science fiction or fantasy. reanimating dead flesh, classic. just being from a really pale and old family, (don't forget rich).... cheesy fantasy. why are vampires always wealthy. you'd think that bloodlust and no daylight hours would put a damper on your income stream. i know vampires live forever,and one could smartly invest and over time accumulate moo-lah, but it is never shown, never considered, just assumed. lame. and that is why vampires suck (wow, that is a bad pun)

anyways. i'd take a black monster. i saw candyman recently, and was excited because the antagonist was black. wow. worst villain ever. well, in more than a decade since candyman hit the theaters, wesley turned blade into WWF and sam jackson keeps getting roles that make no sense.. (nick fury... really) we haven't had a decent sci-fi film featuring a black actor (unless you count Vin Diesal, then.... Chronicles of Riddick must get a nod!), i have to present this trailer. wish it really happened...

and props to Joss Whedon and The wachowski brothers for doing their thing as well...

generation next

dances in hip-hop go hand in hand. growing up, it was the traditional b-boying. then by the mid to late eighties we were doing the prep, the cabbage patch, the wop, the running man, the roger rabbit, the kid n' play, and a bunch of others. i was so into the movement, that my brother and i even developed a routine to Lean on Me (a la Scoob and Scrap Lover). Needless to say, i've tried to remain atleast aware of new dances (as means to relate and interact with pop culture and hip-hop). on my recent trip to DC, i was exposed to the Dougie. i heard the song prior, but failed to realize it was referencing a dance. i thought it was some type of drug or sex reference. well, what i found out was, like the Reject was a version of the Running Man, the Dougie is just the old Doug E Fresh dance. if you've seen Paid in Full you know exactly what i mean.
i guess it was inevitable, first they take the same hooks and breaks, then they take the fashion and the slang, now its the dances. hopefully, high-tops and processed fades won't make a comeback.....






and just because it's a fly song!!!!