By Bea
I don’t know what it is with Hip Hop music that fascinates Asians. I, for one, am Asian and definitely fascinated with the culture and etiquette that Hip Hop brings. I feel the pull towards the music, the dance and the love for the craft. Even though in origin it’s not from our people, I feel possessive enough to take it seriously. No wonder it took me awhile choosing my top 100 rap songs.
First things first, the bar for the hip hop music industry seems to be set higher and higher every day. With new samples, beats and lyrical word play, its obvious why my choice for the best hundred rap beats have become organized into separate categories.
The first category has to be influence. I know people consider rap as a novelty and in some cases they are right. But there are those times when a certain rap song just cuts through its commercial appeal and ends up serving a higher purpose for the general public. Songs that I put under this classification would be revolutionary; they make people think and aim to achieve a greater purpose in life. Songs like Common Sense’s “I Used to love H.E.R.,” KRS- 1′s “You Must Learn” and Nas’ “Illmatic” are just some of the jams I file under this category. Complete with lyrical depth and timeless samples, they teach the younger generation to understand knowledge as they lead by example by practicing what they preach.
On a less serious note, I also have a list of rap songs for chill out music. These jams are the ones I listen to while hanging out with my friends trying to have a good time. “People Everyday” by Arrested Development, “Summertime” by Will Smith and Souls of Mischief’s ’93 “Till Infinity” are just some from my extensive list.
The third category is more for club music. These rap songs are the party anthems that usually get the joint hyped up. Granted they might not be as meaningful or as chill as the others but hey, they make you want to get on the good foot! The vibe these songs give off are crazy. Afrikaa Bambataa’s “Planet Rock,” 50 Cent’s “In da Club” and T.I’s “Whatever You Like” are all included in my top 100 rap songs.
It might seem that I’m pretty old school when it comes to my rap beats but honestly, I prefer rap like they did it back in the day. I do have some other categories that involve newer rap music but these 3 are pretty much the main liners of my list. At the moment, with new rap songs coming out right and left, what they get from me is an open mind and a selective ear because I know what I like and I stick to it, ’cause that’s how Asians do it!
ABOUT BEA: You can read more of Bea’s work at HardKnockRadio.com, your source on the history of rap music and hip hop. Check out her latest on the top 100 rap songs.
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Art in Storefronts continues to garner national attention with its colorful murals and provocative installations that enliven Chinatown streets. Join the artists and property owners to learn about the Lion’s Den and the heyday of Wentworth Alley captured in Robert Minervini’s mural. Hear about the hungry visitors who try to enter Niana Liu’s faux-restaurant installation and how local merchants have embraced her. And find out how Leland Wong photographed 100 children in less than one month. These stories and more will be shared at a bi-lingual community discussion for Art in Storefronts.
An artist-led tour of the storefronts and murals follows the discussion.
Shopping With GASP!
The Moth, a not-for-profit storytelling organization sponsored a talk by Master Lee in 2008, newly available now as a podcast, titled Chink. I personally believe that title, Chink, remains as offensive today as it did to me in the early 1970s when I first heard that word used against me by school bullies. Master Lee is a powerful storyteller, explaining when he was first called Chink, and describing his experiences as a Chinese child in West Hartford, CT in the early seventies.
While most will laugh at his self-deprecating stories of being called names, being the only Asian in his school, and the anger he felt at the school bullies, to me the true telling moment and the one I related most was the end of of the story, where he says it took him “25 more years to become Master Lee.” Growing up on the East coast, in my case, Eastern Long Island, I experienced similar taunts, name calling, and the inevitable status as the only Asian in the school.
I too avoided some of the name calling and threats after the introduction of Bruce Lee and received the inevitable “Do you know kung fu?” questions. I can also say I had my doubts about being Chinese or even affiliated with being Chinese when I was younger. But now, firmly in forties, I can easily say I too am master of who I am, fully confident in my identity. I just can’t believe it took me this long to get here. Thanks Master Lee for a look back at where I’ve been and a chance to reflect on how far I’ve come.
h/t: Koji
Thank God! I was wondering when we were going to see another Fast and the Furious movie! The world really needs these movies in order to function properly. If we don’t have one every three years, it disrupts the space-time continuum.
Once again, Justin Lin gets behind the wheel in the franchise’s fifth installment titled Fast Five which comes out in 2011. As you can see in the picture of the cast the usual suspects are back to have some fun: Vin Diesel (where has he been?), K-town reality show puppeteer Tyrese Gibson, the Keanu Reeves-esque brilliance of Paul Walker and token Asian Sung Kang.
Doesn’t this picture look like it belongs in a Facebook album titled “San Quentin 4th of July BBQ Reunion in San Jose”?
If you happened to watch the Asian Community Fund (APCF) PSA posted last week, you’ll notice a fresh new face in that video. Connie Lim is one of LA’s best kept secrets, but hopefully not for long. Influenced by artists like Imogen Heap, Zero7, Feist, Morcheeba, Portishead, Natalie Merchant, Nina Simone and Bill Withers, Lim has created a different musical genre of what she calls “retrotronica”: a blend of old school songwriting and electronic sentiment.
Her highly anticipated EP, The Hunted, is a heart-felt anthem for the so-called underdogs and outcasts. As a treat to her adoring fans and followers, Connie has dropped her 7-track album exclusively available for digital download on CD Baby just a few days before the official release of her album. The Hunted CD release party is set to go down Saturday, July 17 at the Hotel Cafe in Hollywood, so if you’re in the Los Angeles area and want to check some great local acts, visit her Facebook event page and RSVP.
The video posted above will take you through some of her thoughts and processes behind the making of her second album. Connie’s segment also is accompanied with a spiritual and upbeat live performance of her title track with her house band, The Forrest Philosophy.
DIRECTOR’S NOTE: When we were in high school, I always had this feeling that Connie was going to pursue some sort of career in music. Just to give you a feel for how naturally gifted she was, Connie had won several composition awards throughout high school and then she went on to join a very popular A cappella group at UC Berkeley called the Golden Overtones. Since the release of her very first EP titled Shifting, Connie has continued to dedicate most of her time into improving the quality and sound of her latest album. I had an interesting discussion with her a while back, so if you want a more in-depth background, you can check it out here.
For more information about Connie and her upcoming tour schedule, please visit her official website and her Facebook page.
So, remember about three months ago, when the plans for “the Asian Jersey Shore” filmed in LA’s Koreantown were announced and the application was leaked? The first series of the cast photos have been released to the Internet, and early results show that the cast will either be hot, a mess, or a complete hot mess, depending on who you are and whether you’re, say, sitting around getting stoned talking shit to your friends or, uhm, writing a weblog about Asian American issues.
You’ve got all sorts of obvious comparisons to Jersey Shore: guys with tight black shirts, dude with fauxhawk, girl with hella blonde hair that makes it look like she has a spray tan and — oh shit — even a Korean Snooki, cuz she’s shorter than everyone else and probably gets into DUIs. But what’s this? A former meth addict, who’s a girl? A bisexual adult model, who’s a dude?! What is this, topsy-turvy world?
Needless to say, early response from weblogs have people mortified — “this is going to be an embarrassment to us Asians!” To which I say: it’ll be an embarrassment, sure, but not to us. This will be an embarrassment to cast members of a reality show who auditioned for a K-Town reality series, knowing full well that they were being filmed for a show that involves drinking and fighting. Asian Americans in the media — this blog included — are a fickle bunch. We freak out when Asians are portrayed in the media as nerds and geeks, we freak out when no Asian males have been cast in The Real World in its 15-year run, presumably because we’re desexualized. So, what are we, the suburban Asian family constantly portrayed in Target commercials? We could be, but if there were a reality show about how Michael and Jenny Chau of Mountain View, California dropped off their kids at swim practice, I would be blogging about how it was the most boring reality show that has ever existed and wished how — just for one episode — Jenny could fly to Vegas with her crew and snort coke off a stripper’s ass.
But that’s just me. What do you think: will we ever see a non-offensive portrayal of Asian Americans on television? And if or when we do, will it really be worth watching?
(c) Wesley Choy. Used by Permission
Wesley Choy, restauranteur, certified public account, and former collegiate football player, was “flabberghasted” by a USA Today story. The story told of women in their 60s who rode from Georgia to Canada, bicycling along the path that their ancestors took on the Underground Railroad. It made Choy think about how he had avoided learning Chinese and Chinese culture. He also thought about his recently deceased father. When he went through his late father’s papers, he read copies of letters his father had sent to a friend in China. His father regretted that he learned too late the importance of experiencing what he valued the most – a “bucket list” if you will. Inspired by the underground railroad story and his father’s regrets, Choy sold his restaurant and embarked on a bicycle trip across the United States that would raise money for a number of causes and let him visit Chinese-American historical sites. He called his trip the “Tour du Culture” and created a web site that tracked his travels.
Fascinated by his story, I asked him a number of questions:
You played football at the intercollegiate level. Were you recruited or were you a walk-on?
I played at the NCAA Division III level and I was recruited.You mention that you were traveling in search of Chinese-American historical sites. What were some of the sites you visited?
I visited many of the Chinatowns along the East Coast and West Coast of the United States. They all were quite similar, but within each I found some unique historical markers and buildings (i.e. A building where the first Chinese owned businesses were thought to have been that sprung entire Chinatowns or buildings where Chinese had to seek refuge during the turbulent times around the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882).Although I did ride thru Wyoming, I unfortunately did not get to visit Rock Springs, WY (which was on my list, but I’ll have to return via automobile one day) because this was the scene of the most violent (that was reported on anyway) incidents resulting from the Anti-Chinese sentiiment of the time: The Rock Springs Massacre of 1885. 28 Chinese were killed just for being Chinese.
A very unique place I visited was in Butte, Montana. After the copper boom there coinciding with the completion of the transcontinental railroad, many Chinese migrated to this small town and set up restaurants, doctors offices and various other businesses to support all the miners. A museum is actually located there preserving much of this history.
When I rode thru Ohio, I made it a point to go see these historical markers after reading this article about Chinese Soldiers in the American Civil war: www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=26933. In San Luis Obispo, CA, I saw a monument dedicated to the Chinese who worked and gave their lives in helping Western Expansion. In this town there are still mass graves where Chinese Laborers are buried after being killed during the dangerous work of laying railroads along the mountains of the western coast.
I highly enjoyed seeing the Chinese American Soldiers Memorials in New York City and in Seattle because my grandfather fought for the United States in WWII.
Now that you are finished with your tour, what are your plans?
I plan on translating my adventures into a book. I also plan on continuing my culinary career.What are some lessons that you learned from your fathers letters and your trip that you would like people to know?
The main lesson that I learned that I would like to pass on is that Life is too short to not try and truly live it. Many people I know are comfortable going thru the motions or content with “just getting by” in life. I wouldn’t suggest the extreme that I did for everyone, but for me this trip was what I wanted to do. This was a way for me to live life out of my comfort zone; To experience life in a way that I could never fathom that I would ever do in one life-time.
It’s inevitable when you’re gay and Asian. It’s almost guaranteed you’ll disappoint your parents when they find out you’re queer. The question for most gay Asian children is how to lessen the blow. This problem is universal, whether you’re gay and Asian in the U.S., Canada, Asia, or elsewhere in the world. To get around this problem you could always try the “fake marriage” solution that The Wedding Banquet used, but it’s less than ideal and fraught with problems as the movie showed. On the other hand if you decide to come out to your parents, it’s likely they will ignore your pronouncement and insist you still need to get married and have children.
If you happen to be Chinese and gay, you’re likely to be in the same predicament as Yu Xiaofei and Jiang Yifei, a lesbian couple, still living at home, looking for a way to be together, and yet not disappoint their parents. Their plan though might not be right for everyone. They plan on finding a gay couple in the same predicament and each marry one of the pair, and never actually tell their parents that they are gay. It seems in this case, The Wedding Banquet is more real life than fiction.
With all the pressure to marry and produce an heir in Chinese culture, Wei Wei, a sociology professor at Shanghai’s East China Normal University, estimates that about 90 percent of Chinese gays eventually will marry someone of the opposite sex. It’s a sad statistic, but a sign of the prevalent social stance towards gays in China.
Even growing up in the U.S., as I learned when I got older, the pressure to get married only increases the closer you get to the age of 30. By the time I was 30, my parents actually sat me down and asked if there was something wrong with me. I had no choice but to come out to them (and besides they asked me in my home that I shared with my partner!). But even with my declaration, my parents hounded me through my thirties with admonitions to get married and have kids.
During a recent 8Asians writers dinner, Ernie and I happened to be discussing the predicament of coming out to Asian parents and he asked me if they ever stop bugging you to get married. I told him yes, the only time they actually stop, is when you have a kid of your own. Not an adopted child, a true bona fide genetic offspring of your very own. I always knew I wanted to be a parent, and I learned about surrogacy early in my twenties, but it wasn’t until my late thirties that I had the financial means and the right partner to go about executing my dream of becoming a parent.
Among the many things that surprised me about becoming a parent was that my parents stopped bothering me about getting married and having kids. What probably surprised me more, was that they continued to bother my sister who with her partner had two kids of her own. The difference? My sister adopted the two children that her partner had carried, and as such wasn’t actually biologically related to her kids.
After my daughter was born, I really didn’t expect a change in the way my parents treated me. It was an unexpected benefit. I planned to have a child for all the right reasons, and it was the life changing event I thought it would be. I got lucky with my own mom and dad because of parenthood, but I don’t recommend you become a parent unless you’re sure you want to be one. If you’re Asian and gay and were able to convince your parents not to pressure you to get married and have kids, how did you do it?
- In Japan, Acne is considered cute.
- A video series of Life as a Professional Gamer in Seoul, Korea
- A Chinese American Female Conductor will work the podium at Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
- The Taiwanese interpret 4chan’s latest efforts to send Justin Bieber to North Korea.
- This year’s production of “Paris by Night” unites the Vietnamese community in Westminster.
- “16.2% of Chinese Americans 18 to 25 reported serious psychological distress in the past year; 11.2% of Asian American young adults with serious psychological distress” are receiving care.
- Book proceeds from Reversal, the true-life story of a Filipino-American therapist turned cancer survivor go to Mass Kickers, a young adult Cancer non-profit.
I saw this Target commercial the other day, making this the *third* commercial the discount retailer has done that very tastefully highlights Asian Americans in every day normal settings. Personally, I like the first commercial the best since it was unexpected, includes the tune Brand New Day and highlighted a whole family (mom, dad, kids and grandparents). The second commercial with the over-protective mom was pretty funny as well. This commercial was a bit too short and quiet.
Fifteen years ago in El Monte, California, law enforcement officials discovered 72 Thai nationals confined in an apartment complex ringed with barbed wire, lured to this country with promises of achieving the American dream. Under conditions of forced labor and slavery, some of the victims had been confined for as long as seven years. A seven-member Thai family led by a ringleader known as the notorious “Aunt Suni” was apprehended at the scene. The story made national and international headlines as the first case of modern-day slavery since the abolishment of slavery in the United States.
Written by Los Angeles playwright, Henry Ong, “Fabric” is the only known dramatization of the 1995 Thai garment workers’ slavery case. Company of Angels, Los Angeles’ oldest professional non-profit theater company, in association with the Thai Community Development Center (CDC), opened “Fabric” to sold-out audiences and standing ovations this past weekend.
Fabric is presented by Company of Angels, inside the Black Box at The Alexandria, 501 S. Spring Street, Downtown Los Angeles, and will run through August 8. Performances are on Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., and Sundays at 4:30 p.m. Tickets at $20 can be purchased at www.companyofangels.org.
Founded in 1959 as an artists’ cooperative, Company of Angels recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, making it the oldest non-profit professional theater in Los Angeles. The theater produces works that reflect the diversity of Los Angeles and the issues the City faces.
Thai CDC was founded in 1994, one year before the El Monte slavery case, with a mission to advance the social and economic well being of low and moderate income Thais and other ethnic communities in the Greater Los Angeles. The issues of human trafficking and slavery are an integral part of Thai CDC’s work as a majority of trafficking cases involve Thai nationals.
FABRIC
by Henry OngCo-Directors: Marlene Forte and Tchia Casselle
Produced by Kila Kitu, Joyce Liu, Henry Ong & Deborah Geer
Assoc. Produced by Gregory Gately
Starring: *Jennifer Chang, *Feodor Chin, Jolene Kim, *Dian Kobayashi, Jully Lee, Rudy Marquez, *P.J. Marshall, Eddie Mui, *Diana Toshiko, Ben Wang, *Jeff Watson, *Andy Hamrick
*Member of Actors Equity AssociationJULY 8 – AUGUST 8, 2010
Friday, Saturday, 8pm; Sunday, 4:30pm
$20 General
$12 Students & Seniors
Box Office: (213) 489-3703 / [email protected]Lighting Design: Christopher Singleton
Sound Designer: Dennis Yen
Stage Manager: Amelia Worfolk
Set Design: Luis DelgadoLocation:
Company of Angels
inside The Black Box at The Alexandria
501 S. Spring Street
Los Angeles, CA 90013
Want to check it out, L.A. folks?
What you could win from Company of Angels and 8Asians:
A free pair of tickets for any show in the run (except for sold-out shows) in LA!How do you enter?
All you have to do is to leave a comment saying why you want to see this production and ONE lucky winner will be selected to go!Hurry, the deadline to enter is: Thursday, July 15 at 11:59pm (Pacific Time)
ONE lucky winner will be selected and notified directly.Rules for entering:
1) Please be serious about using the tickets– unused free tix suck!
2) Contributors to 8Asians and their immediate family members are not eligible to win.Prize courtesy of: Company of Angels and 8Asians.
Special thanks to producer Joyce F. Liu
I decided to watch the 2010 NBA Draft this year hoping to see Jeremy Lin getting drafted, especially by the L.A. Lakers. When the #43 and #58 had passed and Lin’s name wasn’t announced, I still had hope because I knew Lin still could still play in the NBA Las Vegas Summer League (and he got invited to play for the Mavs).
After game 1, Jeremy Lin finished his first game with 12 points, 2 assists, 1 steal, and 1 block shot. I thought Jeremy had a good game and showed what I expected, which was fearlessly attacking the basket when he had the chance and trying to find the open teammate. He’s quicker than most people expect and plays aggressive defense. I do think he needs to show that he has a consistent jumpshot, but that can always be developed and improved upon. Jeremy’s performance even got some recognition on ESPN.
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Feb 9: (Los Angeles, CA) OR (Orphan Relief): China Care Bruin’s 4th Annual Awareness Night
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