Chris' Musical Musings

As I get ready to get my sleepy self ready for the final Saturday men's and women's basketball doubleheader this season, I'm listening to a lot of music, and a few new songs (at least new to me) weigh heavily on my mind, so if you don't mind I'm going to share my thoughts, good, bad or indifferent, on what has caught my ear these days.

Crime Mob - Rock yo hips: I'm an underground Crime Mob fan, yes I admit it. Ever since "Knuck if you buck" dropped in the spring of '04, followed by my favorite cut "I'll beat yo' ass," I've always been curious as to if this teenaged crunk-hop supergroup could stay together. Well they've signed with Lil Scrappy's G'd Up records and dropped this club banger which can only be appropriate for the Southern region, due to the full-bodied nature of said Southern women. Yet Diamond and Princess are two petite things, and my favorite line in the entire song is Diamond saying "come and get this, honeybun." Why? I guess I've always been a sucker for pet names and a woman saying "come get it." Horn-dog-itis is a helluva drug.

Musiq - Buddy: As Cnel pointed out in one of his recent entries, this samples Taana Gardner's 1982 hit "Heartbeat," one of the most sampled tracks in music history, and one could argue Musiq's version is Just Friends (Sunny) 2007, but whatever the case, the Philly boy still has the magic of friendly persuasion to get a woman to drop her draws. What? Come on, don't act like he's not asking for a lil' lovin'. He's just being a gentleman about it. That only works on wax I'm certain.

M.I.M.S. - This is why I'm hot: A joint full of swagger from a newcomer that wants the world to know that, well, he's hot. It's not anything we haven't heard before, but still, if you want a reason to pat yourself on the back after an achievement of any sort, this song has a ready-made hook just for you. His acronym is interesting to me; "Music Is My Savior." Would love to hear his explanation as to how he came up with that name.

Juelz Santana - The Second Coming: My theme for spring semester 2007. I'm ready to walk across that stage and yell "I take what I want, I'm a born warrior!" Apparently the demand from the Nike commercial featuring LeBron, Kobe, Steve Nash, Amare Stoudemire and others was so great, that Juelz and Just Blaze recorded a full version and it will be on Santana's upcoming album. That, my friends, is an infectious song.

Lloyd ft. Lil' Wayne - You: Three years ago, this young Muppet-looking cat had a ghetto love duet with Ashanti that somehow became a modern R&B staple, for better or for worse. Now at 20, Lloyd has linked up with the new Busta Rhymes of random cameos, Weezy F. Baby for his comeback single, another one that sounds eerily similar to Wayne's remix collabo with Bobby Valentino on tell me in 2005. Yes, there is a lack of originality on the music scene these days, but we dance, we sing because we hypnotized by some beats and lyrics. Needless to say, there was a lot of comedy as I walked into a class the other day singing this song.

Omarion - Ice Box: This song first came to my attention when Veronica was talking about it in one of our many chats and Mashaun made me fall out of my seat by likening the song to a cold part of a woman's reproductive region. I found out on my own that Omarion is really trying to carve a niche for himself, and you gotta respect his hustle, his dancing ability and his improving vocals. Just don't do anymore movies, kid.

And that's pretty much it for the time being, but I just realized that this entry is my 96th, meaning I'm only four away from 100. It's a shame it's taken me 24 months to even get to this point, but all that means is that my four entries a month are hard hitting and with some substance...I like to think that, anyway. Any suggestions on how I should mark the upcoming occasion?

Let the countdown begin

Valentine's Day was a suck-ass holiday for all the typical reasons. However, I got a bit of wonderful news that Wednesday afternoon as I ventured over to the Records office to check on the status of my senior audit. I asked to speak to Ms. Gede, the woman in charge of all graduation applications purposely before midterms to see where I stood and if there was anymore heartache in the forecast. She didn't have any of that for me. "Chris, you're fine. Just pass your classes this semester, and you'll be graduating." It took everything inside of me not to do cartwheels around that woman's office. You see, after close to six years, $47,000 in student loans, nine different roommates, six different rooms/apartments, four years on newspaper staff, through good times and bad, my undergraduate experience is three months away from ending. And I'm alright with that. More than alright with that.

This is exciting me to no end because I can actually visualize my graduation day, which is something I haven't had the pleasure of experiencing in quite some time. In the spring of 1999, I was jerked out of marching across the stage with my Howard High School of Technology classmates because of a wayward geometry teacher and her raggedy grading scale. That was probably the most humiliated I've ever been in my life. Sitting at home June 11th, which ironically was the same date my mother graduated from Howard some 27 years earlier. Once I enrolled at DSU, I promised myself that I would march across a stage to get my degree, no matter if it took longer than four years. Well, it has, but it's all for the good.

On another historical note, this will be 20 years to the spring of my last graduation, kindergarten at the People's Settlement Association, the community center in my neighborhood. That day will always be remembered as the day I tagged Eddie Jervey because he wouldn't stop plucking my graduation hat, and the lady who was speaking said "I won't take long" and I apparently yelled out "GOOD!" I don't remember it, but my mother loves to tell that story, so I go with it.

But now that I've had time to reflect, I can remember my DSU experience year for year. Some times were good, most were bad, but they all served a purpose. It's up to me to learn from my mistakes and correct them as I go forth into the real world. From a 19 year old kid whose naive, innocent view of the world perished along with 8,000 lives on 9-11 to a 25 year old man not quite ready, but still not afraid to move on with his life. Who knew? So let the countdown begin, kids. 92 days left in undergrad. I can't believe that graduation is actually in my sights. As we sports media types like to say, I control my own destiny with my classes and everything. Maybe I've controlled my destiny all along. Whatever the case, I'm ready for these last three months. Hopefully the last three months are ready for me.

Some things will never change...

It was a bitterly cold Monday night-turned-Tuesday morning a week and a half ago when I was returning from the ESPNU-televised win by the DSU men's basketball team over Norfolk State, a cold that can best be described in two northeastern terms; "Brick" and of course, "the Hawk." Hood on my trusty gray hoodie up, skull cap covering my afro'd head and arms shoved in the pockets, I really had no idea that I would be dealing with some complete and utter nonsense in the unmistakbly freezing late January air. Until I passed a group of -- ugh -- females in front of the William C. Jason library. "Aye sexy," one girl called out. I kept walking. "So you're just gonna ignore me like that? I can't get your number or anything?" I kept walking. Finally after about the fourth "can you stop," I turned halfway and said "what?" She comes up to me and I say "you don't know what's under this hood."

She looks closer and responds "a sexy man. What's your name?"
"Chris."
"I'mma look you up on Facebook, o.k.?"
"Uh-huh, sure."

I've seen that ugly bitch at least four times since then and she's never said a word to me. This is why I have an unbelievably misogynistic view of women in general because they all seem to find a way to piss me off. The reason I kept walking after the first couple of times she spoke was because that has happened to me before; a chick trying to hit on a "not-so-attractive" dude on a dare from their friends. After a while, I got tired of being the butt of some chickenhead joke and just ignored the "aye sexy" foolishness from that point on. Against my better judgement, I responded and even though it took a while to play out, the joke, once again, was on me.

So what am I to do? What can I do to change my luck with women? That's just it; I can't. You figure losing weight would at least get me some measure of respect (39 pounds and counting, if you're scoring at home), but apparently no matter what I do, I'll always be a joke to these women. Just in the last seven days alone, I've been called a GDI (Goddamned Individual) by a Delta (not one from DSU) who looks like her mother had an affair with Dumbo, given goofy stares by more of DSU's finest walrus-looking hoes, and almost let some busted local Dover chick bum a free meal off of me.

Sadly, there's not much I can do to reverse the trend of women playing me to the left (to the left...) without seeming like a bitter, mean, evil, misogynistic so and so, not to mention the usual jabs at my looks that females take when I call them out on their bullshit. So why do I continue to talk about it? Because it clears my sinuses, that's why. No seriously, I just think out loud because it's better than holding it in and it explodes later on. Although, this could be considered an explosion.

I've outlined at least 15 incidents over the 13 months I've had this blog where women have continually made a fool of me in some way shape form or fashion. The words of that classic Bruce Hornsby song comes to mind (to you music amateurs, no Pac didn't come up with it first); "That's just the way it is; some things will never change." Women treating me like crap? The way it is. Will it change? Highly unlikely.

Bruce however, was optimistic in his 1986 hit about racism, saying "oh, but don't you believe that," at the end of the chorus. Sadly, I don't know if I share his hopeful outlook when it comes to the opposite sex.