Nineteen Ninety Never

I have no idea what to think about Die Antwoord - they’ve got samurai swords and ninjas (I mean, the front man’s name is Ninja!), breathy female vocals and amazing electro beats. But there’s something about them that just doesn’t seem right, and I think that’s part of the appeal - you just don’t know what is really going on. Even their website makes it hard to find out more.

Ninja reminds me of a skinny white guy I used to work construction with who had tattooed the words “Thug Life” and a dragon ripping through his flesh on his chest all by himself. The style was exactly like Ninja’s - a little shaky, and you’re glad he didn’t go for anything more complicated.

But listening to the Die Antwoord’s music and watching their videos, you should be glad he did go for Yo-Landi Vi$$er. Wikipedia says they’re married, but Wikipedia could say anything and who cares as long as she keeps balancing Ninja’s hard raps.

Rounding out the trio is DJ HI-Tek, his hat is awesome.

I don’t really know what role Leon Botha plays in the band beyond artistic support, but he’s one of the elements of Die Antwoord that you leave you with more questions than answers, and affirms the fact that their style is “UFO.”

Die Antwoord - Enter The Ninja (via Cause=Time)

Ryan from Pitchfork Tweeted that “DieAntwoord.com just made 2010 official. I think BoingBoing called it a memesplosion and I think you’ll be hearing a lot of them over the next few weeks. After that? Who knows.

I think that Aliens: Salvation has one of the best comic book covers of all time. At first glimpse, it looks like it might be a traditional piece of Japanese art: a samurai kneels with his sword in front of him while behind him a dragon dances. Take a closer look and you’ll see that the sword is actual a huge cannon, the dragon behind him an Alien. Yeah, I capitlized Alien there because its probably one of the most famous aliens: the chest-bursting, acid-blood aliens from the the movies with Sigourney Weaver (Alien: Ressurection was my favorite).

Since pretty much every encounter with these perfect monsters results in death, I thought I’d accompany this image with some tracks that Trash Yourself threw at me a couple of weeks ago:

Trash Yourself and Toxic Avenger - Die (GTRONIC DubDub Remix)

Trash Yourself and Toxic Avenger - Die (LazyAnts Remix)

Trash Yourself and Toxic Avenger - Die (The Bulgarian Death By Remix)

They’re Trash Yourself on Myspace.

Do you remember when the Sci-Fi channel used to show anime every Friday night? I do…and I especially remember being super-creeped out by the movie Akira.

I mean, all the posters make it look like it’ll be classic cyberpunk: bad-ass bikes, tough Tokyo gang kids, that sort of thing. Then bizarro anime hell breaks loose and the movie just gets weird.

Anyways, Dane Jah ras is a  Canadian poet/freestylist and he has put together a concept album based on Akira. From Dane’s blog:

“Each track features at least one sample from the film. Samples used include Japanese dialogue, the re-done English dialogue and segments from “The Akira Suite” (The film’s score). The mixtape was produced and recorded by myself. The concept, mix and master are from KnowSomething’s DJ D-Mass.”

Dane Jah Ras - A God Appears

You can listen to the rest of the album and read more about it on Dane Jah Ras’ blog.

Courtesy of Suckadelic comes this wonderful piece of religious iconography.

I used to love Star Wars, and Boba Fett in particular. In fact, my 11-year-old self even had a letter published in Star Wars Insider magazine letting the world know how cool Fett was. He had at all: cool helmet, jet-pack, wrist-gun, mystery. He might not have gotten a lot of chicks, but that thought didn’t really cross my mind back then.

In the face of today’s Master Chiefs, Dark Knights and assorted other Iron Men, he seems a bit outgunned and kinda lame. But back in the day, he was the MAN.

If you like Star Wars, be sure and hook it up with Band of The Lost Star Wars mixtape. You haven’t really gotten down with the Dark Side until you’ve heard Vader beatboxing through his respirator.

Band of The Lost - Sampler

More Suckadelic music

Buy the Band of the Lost Episode 7.8.9 Mix-tape

And check out more Dark Side action (in French!) on 199X.

Two things that I definitely think are awesome are ninjas and hot blondes - and that’s why this picture of a hot blonde showing that ninja some love is so awesome.

This rework of the Robin S. house track “Show Me Love” is also pretty awesome. Its by the good half of NONEWYORK, a fella that goes by the name of Something Wrong. They’ve got also got an EP out on beat port

Robin S. - Show Me Love (Something Wrong Mad Love Remix)

More awesome pictures like the one above can be found at Blonde Zombies.

We’ve blogged NONEWYORK before here and here.

The Metal Gear wiki has the full story, but basically the combination of  a cybernetic suit of armor and a High Frequency blade makes for one wicked ninja.

This week my friend also reminded me of the genius that is the GZA (aka the Genius). If RZA’s futuristic personality is some sort of crime-fighting pimp, then the GZA will definitely be reincarnated as a cyborg ninja in the future.

GZA - Liquid Swords

Gza - Swordsman

I’m not really clear if RZA’s alter-ego Bobby Digital is supposed to be some sort of futuristic ghetto protector or if he’s just a cyborg pimp. Either way, he’s pretty awesome. I mean, just look at the album cover: huge circuit-board gun, Mad Max shoulder pads, sniper honey, Kung-Fu, van driving out of explosion. It really has everything.

I also think it is pretty awesome that members of the Wu-Tang make numerous references to the fact that if their group was Voltron, RZA would be the head. Equally awesome is that in almost every single account of the rise of the Wu-Tang clan that you’ll read, there is mention that RZA asked the other members to give him full control of the group for the length of one “dynastic cycle,” after which time he’d relinquish control and basically hand them an empire.

RZA - My Lovin’ Is Digi (from Bobby Digital)

RZA - Love is Digi Part II (from Digi Snacks)

Wu-Tang Clan - Shame On A Nigga (includes a line about Voltron)

Fun fact: Apparentally the RZA wasn’t the first Bobby Digital in the music business.

William Gibson’s Neuromancer has always been one of my favorite books

Near the middle, the main characters, Case and Molly, end up on an orbital colony that had been populated by a group of reggae-loving welders. Case is a hacker, Molly his cyborg captor/guardian angel.

The two surviving Founders of Zion were old men, old with
the accelerated aging that overtakes men who spend too many
years outside the embrace of gravity. Their brown legs, brittle
with calcium loss, looked fragile in the harsh glare of reflected
sunlight. They floated in the center of a painted jungle of
rainbow foliage, a lurid communal mural that completely cov-
ered the hull of the spherical chamber. The air was thick with
resinous smoke.
`Steppin’~ Razor,’ one said, as Molly drifted into the cham-
ber. `Like unto a whippin’~ stick.’
`That is a story we have, sister,’ said the other, `a religion
story. We are glad you’ve come with Maelcum.’
`How come you don’t talk the patois?’ Molly asked.
`I came from Los Angeles,’ the old man said. His dread-
locks were like a matted tree with branches the color of steel
wool. `Long time ago, up the gravity well and out of Babylon.
To lead the Tribes home. Now my brother likens you to Step-
pin’~ Razor.’
Molly extended her right hand and the blades flashed in the
smoky air.
The other Founder laughed, his head thrown back. `Soon
come, the Final Days… Voices. Voices cryin’~ inna wilder-
ness, prophesyin’~ ruin unto Babylon…’
`Voices.’ The Founder from Los Angeles was staring at
Case. `We monitor many frequencies. We listen always. Came
a voice, out of the babel of tongues, speaking to us. It played
us a mighty dub.’

Death In Vegas - Twist and Crawl

Thievery Corporation - Assault on Babylon

Peter Tosh - Steppin’ Razor

I know more about cyberpunk than anything dub- or reggae-related, so I could be totally off on what I think space dub would sound like. The Persian Prince says that dub is “an off-shoot of reggae that involves remixing or revising existing songs into instrumental or mostly instrumental versions by increasing the low-end and removing all or most of the vocals.”

Either way, I’ve been playing a lot of Halo 3 with Claudio lately and my next life goal is to get the Steppin’ Razor achievement.  Suitably named, it involves getting a triple-kill with the energy sword in a ranked multiplayer match.

I used that picture of Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost In The Shell because if anyone is Cybernetic Steppin’ Razor, it’s Motoko. File this post under Ninjas as well, because you just know Steppin’ Razor is just rasta slang for ninja.

You can read the full text of Neuromancer here or buy it from Amazon here.

Then check out Thievery Corporation and Death in Vegas

I added that picture of BJ Penn turning Joe Stevenson into a murder scene because The Persian Prince sent me a couple of tracks and wrote me an email about MMA last week:

“Remember when we used to spend an inordinate amount of time watching big knockouts? Perhaps the most satisfying of which was watching over-rated Kimbo Slice getting his ass handed to him in 14 seconds from a washed up ex-UFC fighter. Not sure whether he loves big knockouts as much as us, but Praverb references the aforementioned KO in this new track, “Blessed with the Gift”, produced by Teddy Roxpin.

I don’t much care for Kanye the rapper (let alone Kanye the robo-voice singer)….but Kanye the producer?  Pretty much never misses.  Case in point: the new Jay-Z track with the fantastic Santogold sample.”

Praverb - Blessed with the Gift

Jay-Z - Brooklyn Go Hard

I love Penn because he’s from HI, and I’m stoked to see him and GSP go at it in January.

I don’t really know if Mirror’s Edge is actually a French game, but since it is based on that parkour stuff it has a certain “je ne sais quois” of coolness about it. More props to it for rocking a cyberpunk storyline.

Pop The Glock is the first Uffie song that I ever heard, and the video below from Mirror’s Edge reminded of it.

Uffie - Pop The Glock

(Merci a Play Five pour le vid!)