In December of '06, Shady Records released our official mixtape Eminem Presents: The Re-Up. In celebration of its release, we collaborated with Vans to create the above sneaker. I think we ordered them via Interscope something like AUGUST of '06. Anyway, they came out great. but verrrry verrry late... They contain logos for Shady Records, Em, 50, Obie Trice, Cashis, Stat Quo, D12 and Bobby Creekwater in a mutated bandanna print with some microphones and skulls and stuff. More pics below. Shout out to Josh Fisher.
Check out the new video from Geffen Records recording artists Blestenation. This video was directed by awesome photographer Clay Patrick McBride and the inimitable Fafu. Rapper Werdplay is the one with the Taxi Driver styling and Various is the one with the full hair head.
Blestnenation's debut album Welcome to MmmBugout City due Spring '08.
Donald Gibb The Revenge of the Nerds marathon was on Cinemax this long Thanksgiving weekend. So of course I took the opportunity to catch pieces of a few of this '80s spawned masterpiece of college film sequels. (There was also a television pilot for Revenge of the Nerds in 1991 that was never aired, sadly enough). Donald Gibb played a character named Fred "The Ogre" Palowalski in the first original flick as well as Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise, and Revenge of the Nerds IV: Nerds in Love. Ogre was conspicuously absent from Revenge of the Nerds III: The Next Generation. One can only assume that the film budget for the 3rd installment was not large enough to afford such a high caliber of classic character actor. The character of Ogre was basically a massive beer swilling, dim-witted bully from the rival Alpha Beta fraternity. Anyone who has seen the film will remember him well from visual memory as the frizzy maned viking that slapped nerds silly. After the Nerds films, Gibb was seen on the underrated HBO comedy series 1st and Ten from 1985-1989 as Dr. Death. Also of note, Gibb played Ray Jackson in the Van Damme vehicle Bloodsport (1988). Aside from that, Donald had many television bit appearances in series ranging Cheers in 1992 to The Facts of Life in 1987. Recently, Gibb played a character called Worm on The Young and the Restless in '03. Since then, his appearances have been few and far between. How does one go from such esteem to playing bit-parts on daytime television? Such is the cruel world of Hollywood and the life of an actor. There is simply no justice in the world sometimes. Sadly enough, it seems that Donald is now apparently in the twilight of his thespian career at a ripe 53 years of age. Bonus fact: it was revealed in 1994's 4th installment that Dudley "Booger" Dawson is from Detroit. Makes sense, I guess... Bonus material: video footage of the Lambda Lambda Lambda rap song from the original classic film below.
Our friend, world renowned modern artist/designer and NY graff legend Stash has a great retail spot on Lafayette and Bleecker in the Village of NYC called Nort/Recon. It is a high-end Nike only seller and also offers a variety of upper-crust streetwear, including Stash's own brand Recon. The store also has accessories for your head and numerous stuff way too cool to just be spoken of. It must be witnessed, just like the store itself. Wait, you don't live in NY? Ok, then. The online shop is supposed to go live real soon. Like today soon! Here is a link to the live and up-to-date news site. There you will find updates on products, Stash's travels and work related life, and everything related to it. Now the real plug: Oh, I forgot to mention.. I am partners with Stash and Co. on the Nort/Recon retail effort. Go get yourself some kicks on this big shopping weekend at a deep discount!
Let's face it. Men watch football on Thanksgiving Day. We snack on whatever our mothers, wives, girlfriends, in-laws, sisters or brothers have placed around the house to deter us from early turkey gorfing, and we drink egg nog and beer. We nurse hangovers from "the biggest bar night of the year" (more on that in a different post sometime)... And we watch football. For those who don't know me at all and/or haven't read this blog, I am a huge football fan. Further to that, I am a Detroit Lions fan. Ever since ever.
The above is a picture of the late, legendary Marvin Rosenberg a year and a half before we lost him. I took him to see a Lions game at Ford Field on 2003 T-Day in his first, last and only game there. Although Grandpa was a Lions fan as well, he wasn't happy about it. In most of his years (and mine), the Lions had losing records. In fact, in the last 10 years, they are 4-6 on Turkey day alone. In 2003 though, Grandpa Rosenberg got to see his team win, in person- against The Packers. I know that a lot of you will be watching the Lions take on the 9-1 Packers with an all-of-a-sudden more awesome than ever Brett Favre. I also know that most of you think that the Pack will prevail. I hope you naysayers are wrong, I really do. It would be nice for The Roar to take one on Thanksgiving in front of a live national audience. Marvin Rosenberg would be proud to see the Lions beat The Packers again, too.
My friend Jon McDonald owns the fantastic Lure Fish Bar in Soho, NY, where I went for lunch today. Their chef Josh is awesome and he invited me to the kitchen to see the beast pictured above. Apparently, this bastard was caught in Alaska by extreme nutso death wish fisherman. It weighs 7 or 8 pounds, and goes for around $250 wholesale. This is a huge Alaskan King Crab. It tasted really good too. Stop it, I didn't eat the whole thing...
Ersatz politician and country singer Kinky Friedman has released his own line of cigars. This one pictured in my hand is called The Texas Jewboy. I find that very funny. On Saturday, the tobacconist at OK! Cigars on West Broadway in Soho told me that Oliva Cigars makes them, so they probably aren't half bad. Oliva also makes the acclaimed "Master Blend" series, which I highly recommend. Oliva cigars are made mostly from Honduran tobacco. I haven't smoked it yet. Here is a link to Kinky's cigar site. See, for those that don't know, Kinky is a rare breed. He has a band called Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys. He is a very outspoken and funny guy, if not a bit campy and eccentric. In 2006, Kinky ran for Governor of Texas. A few people even started to take him seriously, even as he went on the campaign trail doing interviews while chomping a stogie and making jewish jokes that he can make. You know, because he's Jewish... "I'm going to be the first Jewish Governor of Texas, and when elected I'm going to reduce the speed limit to $54.95". I will have my own cigars one day too, Kinky.
My man DJ Houseshoes hipped me to this site about old school Detroit radio. It has great relics and artifacts from local radio stations back in the days. I've always been into graphic design, so the bumper sticker section is particularly cool to me (WABX anyone?). The above sticker is from WRIF, Detroit's classic and hard rock station, and is in honor of Arthur Penhallow's signature bellow. WRIF used to make stickers in the identical oval shape to the above with all sorts of bands. In high school, my brother and I collected them. So did everyone else. We had a leg-up though, our next door neighbor was the printer. We had boxes of them. In honor of the MSU Spartans defeat over Penn State yesterday (a bowl bid for the first time since '03!), here's another one.
Here is a very clever visual analysis of classic and current rap songs and diction. The above chart, obviously, is based on the Dr. Dre & Eminem classic "Forgot About Dre". If you aren't a pretty serious fan of the music, don't bother linking to this. Many more like the above... good stuff.
A friend put me on to this YouTube clip of these very young DJs scratching like grown folks. Or better than grown folks. Rumor has it that these two kids are legendary turntablist DJ Q-Bert's own. Makes sense to me. This is remarkable if you have any knowledge of DJ'ing or if you have ever attempted to scratch. If you haven't, check it out anyway because they are serious.
I know its been a minute since my last post. But, the computer problems are almost fixed and there is s a ton on "deck" so to speak.
This isn't as much a lazy post as it is a result of not having total access to my main computer because Dell doesn't like you to upgrade hard drive memory, they would rather make it so difficult to clone your system onto a new, faster, cheaper, smaller, more memory internal drive that makes you so insane that you have to buy a new Dell with upgraded memory. Well, dude, I'm not getting a Dell. I bought a nice new small external drive (because who doesn't need over 100G of music?)... Anyway, this guy is pretty interesting. He pulled a stunt at the first ex-US regular season NFL game played in London a couple of weeks ago. I mean, obviously its tough to get onto the field of a professional sports game if you aren't supposed to be there. "Butt", to have the "ball" to wear a crotchless referee's uniform and a g-string like this and run around doing some sort of mutated moon-walk with an illegible mess scrawled on your back on an international NFL broadcast is really somethin'.
What were the players on the field supposed to do? I'm sure they want to tackle his ass, but then they probably worried about lawsuits and whatnot and remembered they were in a different country. But, they seemed sort of oddly transfixed on this dumb mutant...
I was sent this by my friend Greenpeace from across the pond (UK for those that need help) after he read my "Butler" post. This is a perfect companion to the World Rosenblog Exclusive video I posted below. Normally I don't like posting without pics because text by itself is boring, but this one is worth it, BABY BOY! (Insert bomb explosion sound here).
Shady Records A&R (and the man who brings the world Dick Shitman's 'Hood Newz') Riggs Morales and his long time girlfriend Melissa were wed on Sunday in Miami. It was a fantastic wedding complete with a Candy Shop and Big Pun ("I'm Not a Player" was the theme song for the garter toss). Interestingly enough, Goliath Artists' own Neil Maman's girlfriend Jen caught the bouquet! Uh oh...
Sometime in 2003, on a trip to London, I stayed at the Lanesborough Hotel in Jolly London. This hotel is incredible, super fancy, comfortable, quaint, luxurious, and expensive... Along with your room, you get a BUTLER. This Butler handles things, like getting your suit pressed, and whatever else butlers do (I have no clue, I grew up in Detroit). Anyway, for some reason one night while visiting Tim Westwood at Radio One, we got on the subject of butlers and where I was staying. Hence, a new catchphrase was somehow created...
This went on for some time. It repeated itself at several meetings and radio interviews. Long live Westwood. Long live the butlers!
The Errol Flynn, also known in slang as Earl Flynn, is a Detroit-bred dance that is awesome. Based on a dance developed by a heroin trafficking street gang bred on Detroit's east side in the 1970's, this dance involves elaborate and flamboyant hand moves. It is elegant, pompous and super hood. Here is a video of a young man who has perfected the moves, down to a slow-motion Matrix-style pirouette.
More about the Errol Flynn gang and their demise can be found in this Wikipedia article. Interestingly, as the article points out, Judge Mathis was a member of the Errol Flynns. Also, if you go back to my "2-0 Swagger" post below and peep the "Another One Bites The Dust" Detroit Lions song, Jimmy "Spiderman" Allen shouts the dance out when he suggest that the team might "Errol Flynn in the end-zone". Swifty McVay of D12 is also a world-renowned Errol Flynn expert. This is very special.
