#when i was a kid they used to tell us about the Mystical African Tribes that STRETCHED THEIR LIPS (scary!!!!)...

[uncanny-tranny]

I love giving advice, apparently, so if you are a newly pierced person or are planning on being pierced, here are some of the things I found helpful, as somebody who isn't a professional piercer but has had six plus piercings on my face and body, and multiple ear piercings (which I don't count, since I DIY'd them):

Normal bath towels are your enemy, proceed with caution after bathing. NEVER wipe moisture away from a fresh piercing, always pat it dry

You will hit a new piercing and it will hurt. This is inevitable, just know that you likely haven't destroyed it. Feel free to cry, though, it hurts like hell.

If your piercer gives you instructions, heed them. If you're on restrictions, please take it as seriously as possible

When you're going in for a piercing, please eat or drink something - at least what constitutes as a snack for your body. It really helps

If you're getting an oral piercing, make sure you size down after the healing period - I hadn't sized down for my last oral piercing when I first had the chance, and it was... so annoying to have too-large of jewelry

Not all jewelry is made equally. Do your research on materials, threading, and sizing. I've found that titanium jewelry is really nice for me, and I like it, but that isn't the only option. Make sure you think about your body and its needs and preferences

Close your eyes while being pierced (I found this really helps me)

Don't over-clean a new piercing, twice per day is usually a good place to start

The completed healing period is a very average suggestion - you may heal slower or faster. Try to adhere to that suggestion, though, especially if you do not feel you're healed enough

Personally, I have found that I am completely healed when my piercing feels like just another part of my body, even when it is touched. When my piercings start to feel as though they are foreign when they never do before, I know I likely need to clean them

While I have DIY'd piercings, I personally do not recommend it, especially if you are either not using sterilized equipment, or are piercing a very dangerous place (like the tongue). If you are absolutely positive about committing to the DIY mindset, please try to do due diligence in research at least

Tip your piercer. Body mods are a luxury service, and it takes years to even become a piercer, much less to be proficient at it. Tip your piercer, ESPECIALLY if their prices feel too good to be true - they likely are. Unless you are directed otherwise by your piercer, just assume that you will be tipping them for their services and budget accordingly

Make sure you understand how your piercer wants you to take care of your piercing, and ask questions. There is no question too "dumb"

If you are getting a body part pierced you are insecure about, realize your piercer has most likely seen HUNDREDS of different body parts of various sizes, shapes, and oddities. Your body is not uniquely bad, nor would a good piercer make you feel unwelcome or uncomfortable with your body. If they do, however, DO NOT go through with the piercing. You should feel safe being pierced by somebody, and, indeed, that is the bare minimum.

If you use saline wash to clean piercings, you can DIY it. You will go through NeilMed like no other, and with it being $5USD a bottle, that price can rack up quickly. Make sure you use distilled water and non-iodized salt, though

If your piercing is infected, please don't be too ashamed to seek help. It's in your best interest to make sure you don't get ill or your site gets nasty ("nasty" as in painful)

These are just some of the things I've learned being a pierced person! My piercings are something I absolutely needed, and I do not for a minute regret having them. I want that same happiness to befall you, and that happens when you are able to understand a bit more what goes into piercings. You are, essentially, getting a new body part installed by a pro, and so I don't want you to not be ready for that.

Again, I am not a professional piercer, but am rather a body piercing enthusiast with many different types of piercings. I don't have every piercing, though, so please look at this critically for the piercing(s) that you want or have. At least, treat this like a soft suggestion or ways to help you brainstorm what you will find helpful.

More tips are obviously welcomed, especially if you yourself have more insight or expertise. Good luck to every pierced person or future pierced person reading this💛

[mfmagazine]

Vera Black

Article by Victoria Laurey

Photo by Denson Baker

The late 60's belonged to the sounds of Jimi Hendrix's guitar and the prodigious voice of Janis Joplin, that would soon bring these two forces together. The place...Max Yasgur's dairy farm near the hamlet of White Lake in the town of Bethel, New York where a 3-day concert took place. During the sometimes rainy weekend, thirty-two acts performed outdoors in front of 500,000 concert-goers. It is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most pivotal moments in popular music history and was listed among Rolling Stone's 50 Moments That Changed the History of Rock and Roll. That pivotal moment was no other than Woodstock.

Now, here comes New Zealand born singer/songwriter, Vera Black, who has a unique heart-felt style of Folk/Soul/Rock, as she instills in her own "Modern Woodstock", to produce real music with real meaning. This unique beauty (formally known as Amanda Baker) now graces us with her gut-wrenching and mesmerizing tone in the musical scriptures that she delivers. After touring the world with her 6-piece band, it's no wonder that this Australian beauty takes us on a journey through the life of "peace, love, music, and feathers." I can honestly say when I heard this girl wale, her essence had taken me back to Wayne's World, where that 1992 audience fallen in love with "Cassandra". Black will make you go "Schwing!" soon as that first note hits waves onto your speakers. With her hit "The Fool", we would a fool not to keep our ears peeled to this Queen of feathers and life.

You are compared to two of my favorite artist such as Annie Lennox and Janis Joplin. What about these eccentric artist that inspired your particular sound?

The music I have listened to over my entire lifetime has inspired the sound I have today, I love so many different types of music, I love great singers. In regards to Lennox and Joplin, they are two passionate women and the message is clear, they have unbelievable voices and they are prepared to use them, to tell a story and tell it with maturity and conviction. This is how I hope to communicate with my music.

"The Fool" is such a beautiful and powerful song that defines so many relationships. How does this song reflect to your own experiences?

Well, I did write this song for a dear friend of mine who was going through a bad break up, I wrote it and sang it to her, to say “hey I know how you feel, and if you could put it in a song, it would sound a little something like this.” I would be lying if I said the experience didn’t come from me first. I’ve had my fair share of shitty relationships, I tend to talk very little about it, but write about it, it make’s for great venting and allows you to get on with your life.

"The Waiting City" was a film you had the chance of writing the song "The Beauty of Life" - that was performed by Isabel Lucas and Joel Edgerton- who play musicians in the film. Can you remember your initial reaction to watching that particular scene?

It’s always strange seeing someone else’s interpretation of your work, I remember thinking, you write a whole song and 15 seconds end up in the film! But it was a great experience, just having to work to a ‘brief’ and a set of guidelines makes for an interesting change in the way I normally write. This film was written and directed by my sister-in-law, Claire McCarthy and shot by my brother, cinematographer, Denson Baker ACS. I felt so proud to be apart of an Australian feature with the involvement of my brother and sister.

After performing in the Led Zepplin tribute tour around NSW with some of Australia's best musicians and vocalists, was it a challenge to sing the songs to their perfection, due in part to the people’s songs you were performing? Which songs were your favorite to take on?

It was a challenge I really enjoyed. Led Zeppelin is one of my all time favorites. I did my own take on the songs rather than trying to match up to the great Robert Plant. I opened the show with Rock & Roll, it was cool, 'coz I think the audience is always expecting some guy to come running out looking and sounding just like Plant, but surprise….. it’s me! I loved doing ‘All of my Love’, nothing beats singing with a full string section. ‘Battle of Evermore’ is such a great song, I sang the female part once sung by Najma Akhtar.

What are your top 5 songs you cannot live without? Why?

That is a very hard question….‘The End’ by The Doors would be up there…it’s the feeling I get when I listen to it…when I hear it, it’s mystical and spiritual, the tone of Jim’s voice hits that spot for me. ‘Push it’ by Salt & Pepper, I can’t imagine what life would be like without ‘Push it’. 'Lifeline' by Ben Harper, it’s simple, beautiful, it makes me think and more importantly, it makes me feel something, reminds you that your human. ‘Big Love’ by Lindsay Buckingham. He is one of my favorite songwriters, along with Stevie. The guitar alone is awesome. I once gave this to a new guitarist I was working with and told him we were going to play this song and he had to learn it. I was just kidding, but the next week he came back and he had learnt it and he was playing it perfectly, so we had to add it to our set. ‘The River Song’ by Dennis Wilson. I remember the first time I heard this song, My heart started beating really fast and my palms were sweaty, I thought….. I want to write music like that. I’m such a sucker for a Gospel Choir, which is where I started singing, in a choir.

Favorite poem or quote that you live by?

“I’m not here to be a princess, I’m here to be the Queen” Quote by Vera Black

The one instrument you wish you knew how to play?

I can play a little bit of a few instruments, enough to write songs, but I wish I was freakishly talented at piano. I would also love to be able to shred an epic guitar solo.

Did you grow up in an artistic household?

My Dad is a great story-teller and writer, almost every night we would sit around the table, eating dinner and listen to my Dad tell stories, some funny, some scary, it really encouraged our imagination. He also had great taste in music, he would often turn on ACDC’s ‘Thunderstruck’, in the morning, as loud as our little stereo could handle and head off out the door to work, it was his way of getting us up and ready for school. My mum was a ballet dancer. When I was young I would go to my Mum’s ballet class and watch, I didn’t like listening to that at daggy piano recitals they would dance to, so I would take along my cassette walkman and listen to Maxi Priest or Madonna. My brother, being a cinematographer, he has always had a camera in his hand and I was most of the time, more than willing to get in front of it. He was always making some kind of movie, or commercial about some made up product. He would often experiment with filters and gels even in his early teens, he had such patience for getting the perfect shot, he still does. My brother and I both did theatre. I performed quite a bit in musicals and I was also a dancer and dance teacher for some time.

Have you ever considered yourself as a girly girl or tomboy when it comes to your sense of style?

Definitely a tomboy, from when I was very young, I would wear a baseball cap and dressed very boyish. I always preferred hanging out with boys and being competitive, I always wanted to ‘one up’ them. I was also in the Scouts with my brother for a while, the only girl in the group. Even now you will barely see me in a dress, I love my jeans, leather pants, shirt’s with flared sleeves and waistcoats. I love wearing clothes that make me feel like a strong, sexy woman, clothes I can confidently move and dance around in and not be self conscious that my butt crack will show or boob will fall out. I love the art of dressing sexy but only revealing a little and leaving the rest up to the imagination, sometimes that can be much more of a turn on. I’m a big fan of the styles worn by Jim Morrison, Hendrix, Zeppelin, Johnny Depp, then I just add a bit of soft rock feathers, I love a look that’s timeless.

Are there any negative messages in music today you wish would change?

There are, but people need to make their own choices for what they listen to and buy. I bring a message of Peace, Love, Music and Feathers, it’s so much easier to love than it is to hate place.

Now. my family heritage is African American and Cherokee and I see that you make your own featured head-piece. Can you describe the process on how you created your own?

I come from a Maori Heritage, native to New Zealand and they too wore feathers. I just love feathers. All the different tribes and everyday people that wear them and their reasons for wearing them, and what it means to wear certain feathers. I am so fascinated with how feathers are formed and the amazing colors that are magically created. I kind of stumbled upon it, I had always worn feathers and my last trip through the States I saw some amazing feather work, it was so inspiring I started making more of my own feather pieces that represented me and my style. I wanted to make feather pieces that didn’t just look beautiful being worn around your head or down your hair, but could be worn as a necklace, attached to a waistcoat, belt or even just hanging on your bedroom door knob, it oozes great energy where ever it’s worn or hanging. I loved the whole idea of feather hair clips and I was often wearing a braided leather headband, so I combined the two. Whilst you can still take off the leather band and wear it as a hair clip, it can be looped onto a leather band and be worn numerous ways.

Tell me your inspiration behind your feather designs.

I am a big fan of the ‘Woodstock Era’. I’m sure I was there in another lifetime. I loved the style and what they believed in, I love the music and how it made everyone feel. The braided leather band represents that for me, freedom, love, peace, music…then all you need is feathers, to me feathers also represents this. I think what the Native American’s have done with feathers, is the most amazing feather work I have ever seen. I think anyone else who works with feathers will say they are inspired or influenced by the Native American style, I love it. I was very inspired after visiting Santa Fe, and the designs I saw, I started making dream-catchers when I got back to Sydney. I would really love to visit one of the tribes there, if they will have me, and teach me how to make a Native American head-dress. Through trial and error of figuring out how the feathers would best sit and fall I finally came up with some set designs that worked really well. Each piece to have it’s own personality, I would wake up in the morning and imagine what feather colors I was going to mix together, what twine and beading would match, and who it would look cool wearing it.

Who do you see wearing your designs?

I made quite a few pieces for Angus and Julia Stone for a music video shoot. They really suit feathers and wear them so well. I also made some for actress Isabel Lucas, I met Isabel from doing ‘The Waiting City’. She saw what I had made some for Angus and Julia and asked if I would design some especially for her. I really enjoyed making those for her, Isabel is the perfect example of who looks great wearing feathers. She wear’s them really well and looks absolutely gorgeous. I would love to see Nicole Ritchie wear my feathers, she suits this look really well. I would love to design special pieces for Stevie Nicks, Steven Tyler and Keith Richards. It’s the down to Earth girls and guys, that are conscious of the world around them that best suit feathers, they are not for the material girls, it would look too much like your trying to be fashionable. If you’re going to wear them you have to mean it.

Do you have a name for each of head-pieces you have made?

Funny you should ask, I did start out naming them, I had one feather head-piece that I attached little silver spoons to, I called it “Reese Featherspoon”. I started getting faster at making them and had to make a lot to have enough to sell each week, I could barely keep up with demands. I did get attached to them, so naming would have just made the attachment worse.

[itsfinancethings]

October 25, 2019 at 10:25PM

Many people say that hip-hop was birthed by DJ Kool Herc on a 1973 summer evening in the Bronx. Others point to the release of the 1979 Sugarhill Gang song “Rapper’s Delight” as the moment when the genre was catapulted into the national consciousness.

But several years before either of those moments, Rudy Ray Moore was rhyming over a beat. On his 1970 album Eat Out More Often, the comedian, propelled by a backing band, spit profane and slang-laced poems about America’s mystical underbelly of prostitutes, hustlers and thieves — including one character named Dolemite, a slick-talking, karate-chopping pimp who exposed corrupt officials and defeated seedy rivals.

This quasi-musical performance of Moore’s recording is dramatized in Dolemite Is My Name, a new film that arrived on Netflix on Friday and stars Eddie Murphy as Moore, who died in 2008. The film traces Moore’s reinvention from struggling comedian and record shop employee to movie star in his own film, Dolemite, which would become a beloved cult favorite in 1975.

But while the movie faithfully depicts Moore’s rise, it ends before it can explore the primary way he remains influential in modern culture: through hip-hop. At every step of hip-hop’s four-decade history, artists have imitated not only Moore’s rhyming style, but nearly every facet of his act. “All these things that hip-hop became — the image, the swag, the independence, the sh-t-talking — he was it before it was called hip-hop,” the West Coast hip-hop pioneer Too $hort tells TIME.

While Moore’s act would be considered decidedly misogynistic today, he put forth an alluring alternative model of success for black men, and his do-it-yourself spirit paved the way for generations of musicians and entrepreneurs. Below, several prominent hip-hop artists from across the decades — Too $hort, Big Daddy Kane, Del the Funky Homosapien and Luther “Uncle Luke” Campbell — talk about Moore’s impact on their own art.

“He was the first really to be rapping”

Moore’s rapping on Eat Out More Often was a far cry from what hip-hop would become: his words weren’t rhythmically aligned to the music, and the beats were jazzy as opposed to funk-based. But his unique, bombastic delivery on that record — filled with black vernacular, growling catchphrases, and eye-popping profanity — set many precedents. His theme song to Dolemite’s 1976 sequel, The Human Tornado, got even closer to rap before it was rap: over a funky breakbeat, Moore crooned a few lines before spitting a rapid-fire, multi-syllabic bar: “I don’t want no dilapidated seep-sapping pigeon-toed, cross-eyed, bow-legged son-of-a-gun messing with me,” he snarls.

When Del the Funky Homosapien was a teenager starting his rap career in the early ’90s in Oakland, he was introduced to Dolemite at a friend’s recording studio and was bowled over by Moore’s verbal prowess. “I was like, ‘This is wild,’” he told TIME. Intrigued, Del went back through Moore’s discography and realized it contained the blueprint for rap. “I would be studying his monologues — how to really rap,” he says. “He was the first really to be rapping damn near like that… Having people captivated just by how you’re talking. I wanted to see how he was doing it.”

Del would go on to achieve critical acclaim throughout the ’90s for his tongue-twisting and off-kilter bravado. Meanwhile, another rapper had ascended out of the same city wielding a profane boisterousness: Too $hort. Of all the rapper’s colorful obscenities, he became known for a particular curse word — ”b-tch” — that he delivered in a way not dissimilar to Rudy Ray Moore. Too $hort says this is no accident, given that he saw The Human Tornado “probably a hundred times.”

“There’s no way on earth I could ever fix my mouth to say I’m not influenced by him,” he says. “Part of the makeover of Too $hort comes from listening to Rudy Ray Moore’s rhythmic cadence, his attitude, the way he curses.”

Moore’s influence on rapping was not just stylistic but structural. On his records, he weaved long-winded and uproarious narratives about society’s underworld, full of sexcapades and brawls. Curtis Sherrod, the executive director of the Hip Hop Culture Center in Harlem, says that Moore provided a direct link between griots — West African historians and storytellers — and more recent hip-hop narratives. “He didn’t know he was a griot, but it was in his DNA,” Sherrod says. “He was able to tell stories and captivate audiences who were experiencing oppression and needed to have an hour window into this fable mystery fantastic life he gave you.”

In the years to come, comedic storytelling that often involved sex and violence, from Slick Rick’s “La Di Da Di” to Biz Markie’s “The Vapors” to Snoop Dogg’s “Murder Was the Case,” would become an integral part of hip-hop’s DNA.

“We don’t have to ask for it”

When Kanye West rapped “we never had nothing handed, took nothing for granted” on the opening song to his debut record The College Dropout, he could have been talking about Rudy Ray Moore. Dolemite Is My Name depicts Moore’s struggle to be taken seriously when trying to break into the film industry: he was repeatedly told by executives that his lewd and black-oriented sensibilities were unsuitable for mass consumption. But Moore wouldn’t take no for an answer: he spearheaded Dolemite by fronting the money himself, creating his own distribution networks and learning how to make a movie on the job.

His dogged self-belief and independence would become a model for future rappers to create their own lanes as opposed to ceding creative control. Early in Too $hort’s career, for example, he sold cassette tapes out of the trunk of his car, formed his own label and forged an alter ego built on unshakeable confidence. He would eventually become a leader of the West Coast sound and a massive seller in the 1990s and 2000s. “He passed on that entrepreneurial spirit where we don’t have to ask for it, we just do it ourselves,” Too $hort says of Moore. “In my early days, he was definitely as influential as any rapper.”

Around the same time, the Miami DJ Luther “Uncle Luke” Campbell was hoping to ascend in a city that had little hip-hop legacy. Rather than sign to a label, Campbell was inspired by Moore to go it himself and start Luke Records, one of the very first hip-hop labels in the South. “You watched a Rudy Ray Moore movie and saw he produced it, directed it, marketed his music and did everything else,” Campbell tells TIME. “He always inspired me to say, “Okay, if Rudy Ray Moore can do it, I can do it.”

As the leader of 2 Live Crew, Campbell furthered Moore’s legacy through his unhinged bawdiness. 2 Live Crew’s records contained graphic depictions of sex — and many samples of Moore’s voice —and found a massive audience for a level of obscenity that record labels would have thought unthinkable. 2 Live Crew also proved startlingly important to the future of hip-hop through their involvement in two legal cases related to free speech. In 1990, Luke and other group members were arrested for obscenity charges, but they were eventually acquitted and the charges were overturned on the grounds of free speech. The same year, the group was sued for its interpolation of Roy Orbison’s “Oh, Pretty Woman,” with the case going all the way to the Supreme Court. In 1994, the court ruled in favor of 2 Live Crew and set the standard for protecting works of parody.

“If it weren’t for Rudy Ray Moore, we would have never done those songs,” Campbell says. “He has just as much credit for our career and our success as us doing the music.”

“The Pimp Persona”

While Moore played many characters, none had an impact as monumental as Dolemite. From The Mack to Superfly to Willie Dynamite, Dolemite arrived amidst a ’70s renaissance of fictional black pimps who would set a template for countless hip-hop stars. “I loved the pimp persona,” Too $hort says. “He would kick your ass, and he was about the money. Then he would stop on the street and start rapping to the homies. It’s like, this guy is the ultimate guy.”

In an era directly following the Watts riots, the Vietnam War and widespread urban rot, the pimp became a mythological figure; a larger-than-life, self-made renegade trying to claim autonomy in an unjust world. “If the leader of this country is stealing and getting away clean, what the hell are we supposed to do?” one character says in Dolemite, referring to Richard Nixon. Embracing pimp narratives wasn’t just about escapism, but a rebellion against traditional modes of American success.

So many rappers — from Snoop Dogg to Ice-T to Big Boi — adopted the persona, wearing colorful, flashy clothing and wide-brimmed hats. Their demeanor dripped with laidback aplomb. “I studied The Mack and Rudy Ray Moore / They were my idols when I was a kid,” Big Boi rapped on Outkast’s 1994 debut album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. There was Jay-Z’s “Big Pimpin’,” 50 Cent’s “P.I.M.P”, and even this year, Megan Thee Stallion’s “Pimpin’,” which flips gender dynamics on their head in its celebration of sex and power.

And Dolemite, the archetype for many of these boasts, would be name-dropped over and over throughout the years by countless stars, both an inside joke and an homage. Snoop Dogg, the Wu-Tang Clan, Eazy-E, the Beastie Boys, Lupe Fiasco and A$AP Rocky have all slipped his name in verses, while Moore’s crackling voice has been sampled by Big Sean, Dr. Dre and A Tribe Called Quest.

Several rappers even went one step further and brought Moore into the studio with them, using him as a torchbearer and literalizing the lineage between them. On the intro to Busta Rhymes’ 2001 album Genesis, Moore implores Busta to “continue to give it to ‘em raw.” On Method Man’s Tical, Moore asserts he “taught the boy everything he know.” Moore also appears as Dolemite in Eric B and Rakim’s 1990 music video for “In the Ghetto.”

That same year, Big Daddy Kane — one of the biggest rappers at the time — staged a rap battle between him and a 63-year-old Moore on record. On “Big Daddy vs. Dolemite,” the two engaged in a vulgar game of one-upmanship before Kane conceded defeat. “He was doing the body shaking and everything,” Kane remembers about that day. “He went straight into character.”

Kane has a long history of engaging with Moore’s work: after watching The Human Tornado on repeat on his tour bus, he sampled a beat for his 1989 song “Children R The Future” by hooking up the VHS tape straight into his recording equipment. And one of Moore’s quips, “Put your weight on it!,” became the basis of Kane’s 1990 song with the same name. “He was that raw comedian that stayed raw,” Kane said. “He was someone I respected and looked at as an icon.”

Kane stayed in touch with Moore through the last decade of his life and says that despite all of the respect Moore received from the hip-hop community, he “died bitter.” “He died feeling like, ‘Y’all gives props to Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, Redd Foxx, and they all used to come see me,’” Kane explains.

“To have someone make a movie about him — especially a comedic genius like Eddie Murphy — I know he would be real happy.”

[newstechreviews]

Many people say that hip-hop was birthed by DJ Kool Herc on a 1973 summer evening in the Bronx. Others point to the release of the 1979 Sugarhill Gang song “Rapper’s Delight” as the moment when the genre was catapulted into the national consciousness.

But several years before either of those moments, Rudy Ray Moore was rhyming over a beat. On his 1970 album Eat Out More Often, the comedian, propelled by a backing band, spit profane and slang-laced poems about America’s mystical underbelly of prostitutes, hustlers and thieves — including one character named Dolemite, a slick-talking, karate-chopping pimp who exposed corrupt officials and defeated seedy rivals.

This quasi-musical performance of Moore’s recording is dramatized in Dolemite Is My Name, a new film that arrived on Netflix on Friday and stars Eddie Murphy as Moore, who died in 2008. The film traces Moore’s reinvention from struggling comedian and record shop employee to movie star in his own film, Dolemite, which would become a beloved cult favorite in 1975.

But while the movie faithfully depicts Moore’s rise, it ends before it can explore the primary way he remains influential in modern culture: through hip-hop. At every step of hip-hop’s four-decade history, artists have imitated not only Moore’s rhyming style, but nearly every facet of his act. “All these things that hip-hop became — the image, the swag, the independence, the sh-t-talking — he was it before it was called hip-hop,” the West Coast hip-hop pioneer Too $hort tells TIME.

While Moore’s act would be considered decidedly misogynistic today, he put forth an alluring alternative model of success for black men, and his do-it-yourself spirit paved the way for generations of musicians and entrepreneurs. Below, several prominent hip-hop artists from across the decades — Too $hort, Big Daddy Kane, Del the Funky Homosapien and Luther “Uncle Luke” Campbell — talk about Moore’s impact on their own art.

“He was the first really to be rapping”

Moore’s rapping on Eat Out More Often was a far cry from what hip-hop would become: his words weren’t rhythmically aligned to the music, and the beats were jazzy as opposed to funk-based. But his unique, bombastic delivery on that record — filled with black vernacular, growling catchphrases, and eye-popping profanity — set many precedents. His theme song to Dolemite’s 1976 sequel, The Human Tornado, got even closer to rap before it was rap: over a funky breakbeat, Moore crooned a few lines before spitting a rapid-fire, multi-syllabic bar: “I don’t want no dilapidated seep-sapping pigeon-toed, cross-eyed, bow-legged son-of-a-gun messing with me,” he snarls.

When Del the Funky Homosapien was a teenager starting his rap career in the early ’90s in Oakland, he was introduced to Dolemite at a friend’s recording studio and was bowled over by Moore’s verbal prowess. “I was like, ‘This is wild,’” he told TIME. Intrigued, Del went back through Moore’s discography and realized it contained the blueprint for rap. “I would be studying his monologues — how to really rap,” he says. “He was the first really to be rapping damn near like that… Having people captivated just by how you’re talking. I wanted to see how he was doing it.”

Del would go on to achieve critical acclaim throughout the ’90s for his tongue-twisting and off-kilter bravado. Meanwhile, another rapper had ascended out of the same city wielding a profane boisterousness: Too $hort. Of all the rapper’s colorful obscenities, he became known for a particular curse word — ”b-tch” — that he delivered in a way not dissimilar to Rudy Ray Moore. Too $hort says this is no accident, given that he saw The Human Tornado “probably a hundred times.”

“There’s no way on earth I could ever fix my mouth to say I’m not influenced by him,” he says. “Part of the makeover of Too $hort comes from listening to Rudy Ray Moore’s rhythmic cadence, his attitude, the way he curses.”

Moore’s influence on rapping was not just stylistic but structural. On his records, he weaved long-winded and uproarious narratives about society’s underworld, full of sexcapades and brawls. Curtis Sherrod, the executive director of the Hip Hop Culture Center in Harlem, says that Moore provided a direct link between griots — West African historians and storytellers — and more recent hip-hop narratives. “He didn’t know he was a griot, but it was in his DNA,” Sherrod says. “He was able to tell stories and captivate audiences who were experiencing oppression and needed to have an hour window into this fable mystery fantastic life he gave you.”

In the years to come, comedic storytelling that often involved sex and violence, from Slick Rick’s “La Di Da Di” to Biz Markie’s “The Vapors” to Snoop Dogg’s “Murder Was the Case,” would become an integral part of hip-hop’s DNA.

“We don’t have to ask for it”

When Kanye West rapped “we never had nothing handed, took nothing for granted” on the opening song to his debut record The College Dropout, he could have been talking about Rudy Ray Moore. Dolemite Is My Name depicts Moore’s struggle to be taken seriously when trying to break into the film industry: he was repeatedly told by executives that his lewd and black-oriented sensibilities were unsuitable for mass consumption. But Moore wouldn’t take no for an answer: he spearheaded Dolemite by fronting the money himself, creating his own distribution networks and learning how to make a movie on the job.

His dogged self-belief and independence would become a model for future rappers to create their own lanes as opposed to ceding creative control. Early in Too $hort’s career, for example, he sold cassette tapes out of the trunk of his car, formed his own label and forged an alter ego built on unshakeable confidence. He would eventually become a leader of the West Coast sound and a massive seller in the 1990s and 2000s. “He passed on that entrepreneurial spirit where we don’t have to ask for it, we just do it ourselves,” Too $hort says of Moore. “In my early days, he was definitely as influential as any rapper.”

Around the same time, the Miami DJ Luther “Uncle Luke” Campbell was hoping to ascend in a city that had little hip-hop legacy. Rather than sign to a label, Campbell was inspired by Moore to go it himself and start Luke Records, one of the very first hip-hop labels in the South. “You watched a Rudy Ray Moore movie and saw he produced it, directed it, marketed his music and did everything else,” Campbell tells TIME. “He always inspired me to say, “Okay, if Rudy Ray Moore can do it, I can do it.”

As the leader of 2 Live Crew, Campbell furthered Moore’s legacy through his unhinged bawdiness. 2 Live Crew’s records contained graphic depictions of sex — and many samples of Moore’s voice —and found a massive audience for a level of obscenity that record labels would have thought unthinkable. 2 Live Crew also proved startlingly important to the future of hip-hop through their involvement in two legal cases related to free speech. In 1990, Luke and other group members were arrested for obscenity charges, but they were eventually acquitted and the charges were overturned on the grounds of free speech. The same year, the group was sued for its interpolation of Roy Orbison’s “Oh, Pretty Woman,” with the case going all the way to the Supreme Court. In 1994, the court ruled in favor of 2 Live Crew and set the standard for protecting works of parody.

“If it weren’t for Rudy Ray Moore, we would have never done those songs,” Campbell says. “He has just as much credit for our career and our success as us doing the music.”

“The Pimp Persona”

While Moore played many characters, none had an impact as monumental as Dolemite. From The Mack to Superfly to Willie Dynamite, Dolemite arrived amidst a ’70s renaissance of fictional black pimps who would set a template for countless hip-hop stars. “I loved the pimp persona,” Too $hort says. “He would kick your ass, and he was about the money. Then he would stop on the street and start rapping to the homies. It’s like, this guy is the ultimate guy.”

In an era directly following the Watts riots, the Vietnam War and widespread urban rot, the pimp became a mythological figure; a larger-than-life, self-made renegade trying to claim autonomy in an unjust world. “If the leader of this country is stealing and getting away clean, what the hell are we supposed to do?” one character says in Dolemite, referring to Richard Nixon. Embracing pimp narratives wasn’t just about escapism, but a rebellion against traditional modes of American success.

So many rappers — from Snoop Dogg to Ice-T to Big Boi — adopted the persona, wearing colorful, flashy clothing and wide-brimmed hats. Their demeanor dripped with laidback aplomb. “I studied The Mack and Rudy Ray Moore / They were my idols when I was a kid,” Big Boi rapped on Outkast’s 1994 debut album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. There was Jay-Z’s “Big Pimpin’,” 50 Cent’s “P.I.M.P”, and even this year, Megan Thee Stallion’s “Pimpin’,” which flips gender dynamics on their head in its celebration of sex and power.

And Dolemite, the archetype for many of these boasts, would be name-dropped over and over throughout the years by countless stars, both an inside joke and an homage. Snoop Dogg, the Wu-Tang Clan, Eazy-E, the Beastie Boys, Lupe Fiasco and A$AP Rocky have all slipped his name in verses, while Moore’s crackling voice has been sampled by Big Sean, Dr. Dre and A Tribe Called Quest.

Several rappers even went one step further and brought Moore into the studio with them, using him as a torchbearer and literalizing the lineage between them. On the intro to Busta Rhymes’ 2001 album Genesis, Moore implores Busta to “continue to give it to ‘em raw.” On Method Man’s Tical, Moore asserts he “taught the boy everything he know.” Moore also appears as Dolemite in Eric B and Rakim’s 1990 music video for “In the Ghetto.”

That same year, Big Daddy Kane — one of the biggest rappers at the time — staged a rap battle between him and a 63-year-old Moore on record. On “Big Daddy vs. Dolemite,” the two engaged in a vulgar game of one-upmanship before Kane conceded defeat. “He was doing the body shaking and everything,” Kane remembers about that day. “He went straight into character.”

Kane has a long history of engaging with Moore’s work: after watching The Human Tornado on repeat on his tour bus, he sampled a beat for his 1989 song “Children R The Future” by hooking up the VHS tape straight into his recording equipment. And one of Moore’s quips, “Put your weight on it!,” became the basis of Kane’s 1990 song with the same name. “He was that raw comedian that stayed raw,” Kane said. “He was someone I respected and looked at as an icon.”

Kane stayed in touch with Moore through the last decade of his life and says that despite all of the respect Moore received from the hip-hop community, he “died bitter.” “He died feeling like, ‘Y’all gives props to Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, Redd Foxx, and they all used to come see me,’” Kane explains.

“To have someone make a movie about him — especially a comedic genius like Eddie Murphy — I know he would be real happy.”

[netmaddy-blog]

Spreading the Not-So-Good News

New Post has been published on https://netmaddy.com/spreading-the-not-so-good-news/

Spreading the Not-So-Good News

The influence of the occult upon our everyday lives is staggering. An African missionary from the Mandinka tribe of West Africa, once asked a congregation a question similar to that asked by the Apostle Paul of the Galatians. His 11-minute message, spoken in the mid-90’s, I can still recall, as he shouted the question: “You foolish Americans… who has bewitched you?!”

The basis of his message was that, right here in the good ole’ U.S. of A., everywhere he looked, he could detect an occult influence. Whether it was through the media, commercials, from the “alternative religions,” even from the pulpits of well-meaning Christian ministers, what this man was detecting was something OTHER than the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Crystals, guided imagery, healing meditation, Christian Science, Kabbalah, Mormonism…why has “Christian America” so eagerly accepted these ideas that, at their root, are so contrary to that which would be considered orthodox? Why are so many things OTHER than biblical concepts being sought out to meet the needs of those who claim to be Christians?

In 2 Corinthians, 11th chapter, the Apostle warned that some would come preaching “another Jesus” and “a different gospel.” He wrote, “…as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.” There are three types of doctrine spoken of within the New Testament: the doctrine of man, the doctrine of devils and the doctrine of Christ (and of God). Personally, I contend that Bible illiteracy is the basis for this continual weakening of Orthodox Christianity. One example of this can be found in the number of Southern Baptists who are joining the Mormon Church. According to the Arizona Latter-day Sentinel, April 2, 1988, “…an average of 282 members of their church join the LDS church each week. Coincidentally, the (sic) average Southern Baptist congregation has 283 members, which means the Baptists lose 52 congregations each year to the Mormons.

Though a group may mention the name ‘Jesus’ and season their conversation with spiritual-sounding, familiar Christianese, not all that glitters is gold. For example, those who worship The Sacred Mushroom (No, I’m NOT kidding) refer to a mushroom as ‘Jesus’ so, based upon Romans 10:9-10 (…if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.) they consider themselves to be “saved.” Some actually believe this and have placed their faith in a fungus.

We must ask ourselves just WHO this Jesus is whenever that Name is spoken. Is he Lucifer’s brother? The archangel Michael? An Ascended master? A mere prophet? A fungus? Or is the ‘Jesus’ to whom they refer the Lord of all Creation that He claimed to be? You see Jesus of Nazareth was either a liar, a lunatic, or truly Lord of all… the way WE must see Him as well.

PART 2: The FARCE is with us!

After the first Star Wars movie, Christian bumper stickers came out stating that the “Force” was with us. Thinking the Star Wars movie was a Christian allegory, many assumed this “Force” being referred to in the film was the Holy Spirit. Of course, as we all know, the Holy Spirit is NOT a force, but the third Person of the triune God that we worship.

Right?

Not according to a 2001 survey by the Barna Group which stated that 61% of Americans believed the Holy Spirit to be a mere symbol of God’s presence rather than a living entity. Scripture clearly reveals that the Holy Spirit has a purpose – to empower those who trust in Christ for the advancing of His Kingdom – as well as personal character traits. Yet, I marvel at how many Christians, ministers included, refer to Him merely as “it” – IF they acknowledge Him at all. Just as amazing, 60% of adults believe Satan is merely a symbol of evil. Yet, 81% of us believe angels exist and influence people’s lives.

What is most startling about the Star Wars phenomenon is not the advent of yet another movie, but the real ways in which people around the world appear to be forming a religion out of the thing. The Anglican Digest reported that the first school to teach Jedi – named for the Jedi Knights from the series – was recently opened in Romania. Courses at the Star Wars Academy include the correct use of light saber swords, and lessons on how to speak Wookiee.

The BBC reported (2002) that at least 70,000 people in Australia wrote-in “Jedi” as their response under the category of religion on the last census form. Hard-core fans of the films have been trying to have Jedi declared an official religion around the English-speaking world for years now.

The same situation occurred in New Zealand in their census of 2001. Similarly, more than 390,000 people in England declared themselves Jedi in their census of the same year – a shocking number when you consider that only 260,000 people in England declared themselves to be Jewish! There are various Internet campaigns going on now that encourage voters in the U.S. to petition for Jedi as an official religion on the next U.S. census form.

Star Wars creator, George Lucas, once said: “I put the Force into the movie in order to try to awaken a certain kind of spirituality in young people — more a belief in God than a belief in any particular religious system. I wanted to make it so that young people would begin to ask questions about the mystery.”

Well, it backfired, George. In a Time magazine interview, Lucas downplayed any religious implications about his series, but then went on to admit to using “the Force” as a representation of God and the Dark Side warrior, Darth Vader, as a metaphor for the evil that exists inside us all. How different is that from saying all humans are born in sin and need the help of “God” to save them? Sounds pretty religious, does it not?

Sadly, very few proponents of this Jedi faith have noticed that their new “religion” is very elitist and only a very few of the Star Wars characters are permitted to attain any benefit from the Force, that being only those referred to in the series as Jedi Knights. Far from being literally a ‘life-force’ that can be harnessed by the underclasses and oppressed, it can only be used by a chosen few High Priests.

The Holy Spirit is so-entitled for one very specific, obvious reason: to distinguish Him from EVIL spirits, deceiving devils that are constantly at work in our midst, killing, stealing and destroying even those who call themselves ‘Christian.’ The Holy Spirit empowers us. He convicts us of sin AND of our righteousness. He comforts, exhorts, edifies and confirms. He is a constant Teacher and reminds us of all that Jesus taught (so read what Jesus taught). He’s the exact SAME Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead and He desires to take up residence in anyone who believes that Jesus is who He said He is.

Jesus sent Him. So, He’s obviously all well ever need! He’s no mere force, but where Satan and his minions are concerned, He will make YOU a force to be reckoned with.

PART 3: The Kabbalah Kraze

The latest trendy religion is the Kabbalah. Pop singer Madonna has reportedly donated tens of millions to the cause. Other famous followers include comedian Roseann Barr, actress Demi Moore and many others. In today’s occult revolution where every dimension of the occult is being explored, there has been a revived interest in Kabbalah among both Jew and Gentile.

Although its Jewish origin makes it unique, Kabbalah is still essentially an occultic practice, and is thus incompatible with the Judeo-Christian faiths. Its Pantheistic theology teaches that all reality springs directly from God’s own essence. Even if one believes that these “emanations” from God’s essence have “gone through a descent of ten spheres on four different levels” – whatever THAT means – the conclusion is inescapable that even he who is on the lowest level is still of one essence with God; and thus, ultimately, that individual IS God. This is a concept that is incompatible with the Biblical concept God, who created the world out of nothing, NOT out of Himself. In Genesis 1:1, the Hebrew word for “create” is “bara,” referring to something coming out of nothing. This verse debunks Pantheism, the belief that God is IN the creation and IS the creation. God is not the tree, the rock, the building or the air. Yet, Pantheism holds that God permeates everything, and, therefore, IS all.

Pantheism is not unique to the practitioners of Kabbalah. I once debated a believer in Pantheism and asked him if God was in those bird droppings on the rock wall before us. I believe I heard his mental wheels come to a screeching halt for a moment. “Come now,” I said, urging him not to check his brain at the door, “your beliefs are either absolutely true in all instances or they aren’t true at all.” Incidentally, he was a member of a local mainline Christian denomination. Pantheism is being embraced by many Christians. The concept is, basically, that only the spiritual dimension exists. Some Pantheistic religions include Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism. Pantheism also forms the basis for Transcendental Meditation and some aspects of New Age mysticism.

This should not be confused with the concept of God’s omnipresence. God IS omnipresent. He’s everywhere at once. David said, “…if I ascend up into heaven, thou (God) art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there,” (Psalm 139:8). But God is NOT the created world. In fact, He is completely EXTERNAL to the created world. Worship belongs to the Creator, not His creation. Paul tells us in Romans 1:25 that there will be those “Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator….”

God is related to the world as a sculptor is related to his sculpture, or I am related to this message on my computer screen right now. The sculptor is not the sculpture. The writer is not the writing. The sculpture and the writing are productions. They are produced by the one that creates, and what one creates, can be created again. Perhaps it will be different or it may be better.

God created everything just by speaking it into existence. It was not difficult. He’s God, you know. “Let there be light and there was light” (Genesis 1:3). Poof! “Let the waters bring forth and they brought forth, Let the earth bring forth and it brought forth” (Genesis 1:20,24). Poof! God was not put to a test to make the universe. Some say, “Mankind was a more difficult product!” God formed Adam out of the dust of the ground; we must not have been TOO tough. Like a mud pie maybe. Poof! He took a rib from Adam’s side, spoke a word, and turned it into a woman. Poof! That was not hard for God. This whole creation was not such a magnificent production where God was concerned. To us, it is absolutely unfathomable. With just a little word, it all came to be, or at least, got started. It was really easy for the Creator. Genesis1:31declares that in six days – even if a day is as a thousand years in God’s economy – it all came to be, simply through His spoken words.

Imagine having that kind of an all-powerful Creator God handling our measly, temporal problems! He WANTS to handle our lives in this same way, but we must GIVE them to Him.

PART 4: If it’s broken, let’s fix it

North America is the only continent on earth where the Church is not growing, despite a 2002 Barna survey revealing that 85% of us self-identify as Christians. The exodus from American churches has reached biblical proportions. People are leaving organized churches at a rate of 53,000 a week in Europe and North America combined (the U.S. lost 57,500 in the entire Vietnam War, to put that number in perspective). As a whole, Christians lose 7,600 a day to other religions or irreligion. According to the North American Mission Board (NAMB), the need for new churches is greater than it’s ever been as evidenced by the church-to-population ratios over the last century. For example, in 1900, there were 27 churches, of multiple denominations, per 10,000 people. Today there are 12 churches per 10,000 people. Meanwhile eight churches close their doors permanently every day; nearly 3,000 annually.

The mind boggles regarding the latest in American Church statistics. For example, the number of ministers who no longer believe in the infallibility of Scripture is startling: 85% of the Presbyterian USA pastors said NO; 85% of the Methodist pastors said NO; 85% of the Episcopal pastors said NO; 55% of the Baptist pastors said NO; 45% of the Catholic priests said NO. (Source: Warner A. Bonner, LeadershipJournal.net)

A whopping 42% of Americans believe Jesus committed sins. Whereas Jesus directed us to “go and make disciples,” only16% of American Christians are involved in a discipleship process of regularly meeting with a group or individual for spiritual growth. The Internet is the only mass medium whose audience share has grown during the past decade (I can attest as this ministry’s e-Mail outreach grows annually). The proportion of the population using the Internet as a spiritual resource has increased by two-thirds since 1998. According to the Barna Group, “Our studies continue to show that people are using the Christian media to provide elements of ministry that are not adequately provided to them by their local church.” He explained, “For some people, these media complement their church experience. For others, a combination of these media forms a significant portion of their faith experience….”

Church leaders should start strategizing right about now! Yes, the times they are a-changing’. The Church must wisely adapt and reach the masses where they are, but we must cautiously filter everything we read and hear through the teachings of Jesus Christ. Remember the wise counsel of Paul: “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ,” Colossians 2:8. Sadly, much of this modern-day spiritual smorgasbord, including the New Millenium’s hybrid faiths – though they may well be signs of the apostasy of the end times – are really anything less than the unpaid invoices of the Church at large.