Despite attempts by the Hell's guardian, Ashanti (and his goons) to keep me down via stomach virus, I survived the week. Clap clap bravo. Here's a recap of my work this week:

Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings' 'Game' Never 'Gets Old'









And today, I posted a look back at how I accumulated my book collection over at The Page Turners, my venture with Suga and Alise.



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 Dear John Legend,

Hey girl.

I know you've fashioned yourself to be some sort of genre-wandering soul singer, fooling women with rusty gaydars from Philly to Barcelona. That's fantastic. I applaud your ambition. Really, I do. That you offer a testosterone-lite alternative to the lesbianic wailings of Adultress Keys does not go unnoticed. Your love for sparse, piano-backed production certainly provides you a lane in which you are free to roam without the worries of choreography, sex appeal, and vocal training. Cheers to you, little man.

Whether you are aware or not, society generally appreciates your offerings to the musical landscape. One piano-humping songstress is enough, so thanks for knowing your limits.

Your latest release, Wake Up: John Legend and the Roots, your joint venture with Questo and Co. should have been a fool-proof affair. Eliminating songwriting from the equation to revisit soul classics should have been a hip-switching walk in the park, right? In theory, yes. Execution is an entirely different situation. (Original song fail: "Shine", performed on Leno, HERE)

I'll just come out and say it: You, little man, have gotten beside yourself. Somewhere along the way, one of your breasted arm accessories has gassed up the space beneath your mini-fro and lead you to believe you were a formidable, real vocalist. If you want to beat on keys and bless crowds with your throaty, oldmanconstipationvoice and churn out self-written tunes for the ladies, go for it. Skip to your motherfucking loo, darling, and knock yourself out.

Hell, continue down the path left by Alexander Adultress Keys' manfeet and give us white-woman-world-pop if it makes your ovaries tingle.

What you should never attempt, little man, is to even liken yourself to legends like, oh, say...Mr. Donny Edward Hathway.

After his pear-clutching rendition of "Earth Song", one thing is clear: you and Usher have been getting lifted in the powder room. Again.

We know the Roots can generally do no wrong. Any band that can support Jill Scott's king-sized voice and ego must be talented. But you don't have that problem. Your issue: someone has it out for you.

Someone wants you to fail. Obviously. To suggest that you can do more than cast your Maybelline-rimmed eyes upon a Hathaway record--inside its sleeve--is an insult to the music community, me, and gayfaced entertainers worldwide.

That nobody hit you with a flying leg drop while you recorded "Little Ghetto Boy" is further proof of a conspiracy. Hearing it today, I was tempted to consult Google for a direct line to Homeland Security. Fuck Osama, Obama needs to be on the lookout for shit like this.

The Original:


The Offense:


Heaux. Please.

The spirit of Wyclef's epic slave cry lives on through you.

Donny Hathaway: legend.

you: second-rate diva who can't sustain

Please realize that your range can fit inside your favorite tube of L'Oreal.

You've got some nerve, little man. My suggestions:

1. Cut the hormone dosage in half.
2. Treat yourself to a Brazillian wax.
3. Sit the fuck down.

I need a zebra cake to calm my damn nerves. If I had Nene "Nethaniel" Leakes' beeper number, I would call him up to come stomp on your head.
 
Judgmentally Yours,

-chrisAlexander


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Well, day three of my work for SOULBOUNCE is done. I am so thankful for this opportunity, as I have learned many things about myself, my dedication, my abilities, and my strengths and areas for improvement in just three days. I look forward to major growth with the Soulbounce Team, and must give a special hi-five to ill Mami and Butta. I hope that my unique (male) perspective blends well with the groove they have going there. Here is a recap of my posts this week:

Eric Lau Hits Another 'Home Run' 






 




 Will 2011 See Amy Winehouse's Comeback?
















 Cee-lo's 'Old Fashioned' Gives Us Something New to Love













Back to the grind on Monday. Thanks for all the support, kids.



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As a result of my post on The Real Housesitters of Dekalb, I was offered a writing position over at Soulbounce, a dope music blog that aims to "expand the conversation of urban music beyond the over-exposed and the obvious." In other words, SIT DOWN RIHANNA.

I often comment that many of my favorite artists couldn't buy their way into the Top 40, and I'm totally fine with that. Popularity and talent are not related whatsoever, so I jump at the chance to give some shine to brilliant minds that don't have to hump on camera and plump up their asses for camera time.

My first two posts went live today.

*insert Chopped N Screwed negro spiritual*

Cee-lo's "Old-Fashioned" Gives Us Something New To Love


John Legend Get's a Chance To "Shine" On Leno

Check them out, comment, and browse the site. You just might stumble across something new.

All praise due to the Prophetess La Toya Yvonne Jackson, knower of all things, Queen of nose upgrades.

~chrisAlexander

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Good morning persons,

Today is an exciting day here at coloredboy.net HQ. The staff (Me, My'Self, and i) is abuzz because our glorious leader, i, has launched a book-lover's blog with the help of the lovely Nakia aka SugaHoney. Enter The Page Turners. We felt we should have a place to formally discuss our literary likes, dislikes, and obsessions, and have input from a wide variety of intelligent minds on what's hot in the streets bookstores. My focus shall be mostly memoirs, but my first review is not quite in that lane. You'll see, hoe. We aim to launch by next week, so check back every day this week to meet the rest of the Page Turner crew, Malca, Shydel, and Alise. Now do a split, hoe!

So, if you are a book-lover, a supporter of nerdery, a coloredboy.net-lover, or have some time to kill, please check us out at:
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Where do I begin?

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Two weeks ago, the de-lotioned deity known as Ashy Jack (meet him here and here) shared the beginning of his memoir with the writing class. I was all prepared to make a grand spectacle out of sharing his memoir with you, my lovely readers. However, as the circus began and he started reading, it all became less and less funny. What started out as my wishes to strike back at a man that took digs at my skinny jeans, sexuality, and hair became my pity for a geriatric bag man who silently protests deodorant and toothpaste, and reads at a fifth grade level.

It's hard to decide what to write about, especially when my parents is both so equally yoped in my life.

 Its title:  

All of that.
 
It's a harrowing tale of growing up in a loving, big family here in Los Angeles. He details his life among his siblings, and the wonders of his beautiful family home:

we had large backyard with many different s kinds of fruit trees such as plum tree, pear tree, lemon tree,orangetree,avocado tree,preach tree.

Yes, folks. Ashy Jack's family cultivated a new tree species: the preach tree, kids. You think raising a shit ton of kids and surviving poverty is enough? That's all your family did? Did YOUR mom and dad discover a new species of plant life? Didn't think so.

my parents bought their home in the nineteen fifty four.

I'm sure some of you may have been born in 1954  or have parents born in 1954. And that ol' regular ass 1954 wasn't special enough for this clan. Jack's family started THEIR life together in

I working class middle class area their property was manicure lawn. The enviroment was a positive place to live. My mom...was five feet ten inches tall with long black hair. She look taller when she put high heel on she look as tall as my dad. My dad was six feet four and the short in his family. my dad wear his hair in a afro hair style in those days.Hewas a muscle built man that work sometime in our garage with the weight.

So, kneeggur? I was the YOUNG in my family! Yeen special, Ashy Jack's Dad! So you think you're some special muscle built drug dealer or something, moving weight and such? YEEN SPECIAL.

She would bake many different kinds of desert likecholate cake, carrot cake lemon cake, whitecake,banana pudding,sweet potato pie.she also cook many different kinds of impeacher cobbler, apple cabbler,black berry cabbler.

Mr. Jack just shat on your entire life. Can your mom bake a desert? My mama baked brownies and cookies, but Ashy Jack's mama baked THE FUCKING SAHARA. Suck.on.that. She invented something called cholate cake, too! BOO to your sad ass mama. And can YOUR mama bake impeacher cobbler?? I don't EVEN know what the fuck impeacher cobbler IS. So, that family is on some NEXT level culinary shit.

and CABBLER????


nothing.

Accept it. Ashy Jack is superior to you in every way. He rocks the party WITHOUT lotion and is too cool for subject-verb agreement. He is an expert on what the rest of us in the class should have done differently in life, and feels very strongly about my skinny jeans. King of put-downs, he is! Shut me RIGHT the fuck up.

BAOW.

Anywho, that week also saw the disappearance of his sidekick, Lady Create-A-Waist:



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There are times...when we look above and beyond....oh, wrong intro. Um. *shuffles papers* There are times in our lives when a seemingly minor event alters the course of history. This past week I gave into my appreciation for certain forms of televised coonery (as long as it's not airing on BET--an important clarification), and caught up on the latest episode of Bravo's The Real Housesitters of Dekalb.

I know, I know. I'm supposed to be above this, being general in Saint Damita Jo's Holy Army and all. I know. But, let me plead my case. First off, I still haven't converted to the darkside and eaten a pussy got cable. I was raised on cable. Living with my ex in 2006 in New York, we never set it up, so I just got used to not having it. Besides, I'd rather read a book or watch my weight fluctuate. Second, while I own a TV (Mama insisted), I get most of my TV from Hulu, once a week. I usually catch up on TV Thursday nights after class, after a long week of procrastination. I deserve a break, you know.

The show is a break from reality. With all the goat asshair wigs, silly putty noses, rented cheeks, strained girdles, and hidden children, there's little that is real about this show. There's something charming about watching a group of women of questionable gender bicker, stunt, and posture for the cameras.

So, this past week, viewers were witness to an emotional exchange between the star of the show, who is coincidentally the first African American transgender mother on television, Nethaniel (Nene) Leakes and her failure-filled bisonly child, Bryson the Dinosaur.

 I tell you, my life was forever changed. I received life anew from the way Nethaniel verbally thrashed Bryson the Dinosaur when he requested to return to the rented household after being given the size 15 boot.



I present here in it's entirety, the monologue by he-who-will-portray-my-uncle-in-my-biopic, Nene. I can, upon request, for the right price, now recite this entire monologue, soon to be featured in the stage production of Tyler Perry's: For Dick-Nosed Colored Girls Who Mass Produce Backfat and Blur Gender Lines When Drag Bingo Aint Enuf.

The scene: Nethaniel and his son Bryson the Dinosaur, referred to as BisonlyBryson going forward,  are sitting at the dinner table in a rented house. Nethaniel's wearing Nose #2 and girdle number 12. (Yes, his penis is tucked.) BisonlyBryson is giving you "I just spent a week breaking rocks by forehead with Fred and Barney" in the face. The overall effect: Precious' Diabeetusly Dejected Shame, personified.

Backstory: Bryson, the picture of failure and the embodiment of all that's ever been wrong with Coloured America, goes to visit a fellow goon in the slammer. Whilst getting patted down, it's discovered that he had mary jane on his bulky body. Arrested. Grows another stomach. Gets kicked out of Nethaniel's house. Now, returns home to ask forgiveness, and to move back in. Nethaniel pours his heart out, lamenting the fatherly pain felt when you witness your "chahl" clearly going in the wrong direction. Tears were shed, English was slaughtered, feelings were hurt. Here's my favorite part of the exchange.





I mean, I kinda feel like you're a luh too strict or hard or whatever. Like...




 


 Yeah...I kinda feel like you trynna put a...curfew on me....That's one of the things I don't like....









 



*looks around* Naw....












 .......................







 You got clothes laying in your floor. And I'm being tough on you. You NEVA load de dish washa. You cook food and leave stuff EVREWHEAH. You don't even take the trash out to the STREET. You have a little brother, who is 11 years old. You don't spend NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO time wit' HEEYUM. You leave here and DON'T return. And I'm being tough on you?





 


*lays egg*







 

 Yet and still (my favorite colored-people line EVER) I pay da bills to be here. I buy all the food you're cooking. I pay for the maid service. Ya unnastand? I make sho the lights are on and the do'bell can ring. I DO THAT.....ME. And I'm being tough on you?





 *dramatic pause*












And with that, Nethaniel stomped off into the kitchen to shave his stubble, tighten that girdle and re-tuck his dick, leaving BisonlyBryson sitting there in his heart-clogging stupor: sweaty, unclean, and confused.


 It was a magical sight. The way Nethaniel laid the slovenly BisonlyBryson out took me back to my colorful teenage years, when scenes like this were often followed by a swift backhand from Mama. She'd say,

"Come here. Stand still and don't you flinch at me."

then: SLAP!

*shudders*

 ....I just found how to grab the video from Hulu. So BEHOLD King Nene in action:











Well then. Your life has been sufficiently enriched for the day. Go out and adopt a Coloured Compton Child, please, in the name of dick-tucking transgendered mothers everywhere. It's the right thing to do.

*curtain falls*

~colored boy

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The third release from the soul duo The Foreign Exchange, Authenticity has arrived. I thought their previous album, Leave It All Behind was damn near perfect. This.is.even.better. Yet another solid, straight listen. I can enjoy this CD from open to close, with the dense, cynical "Last Fall" to the standout closing track, This City Aint The Same Without You featuring the DC native Yahzarah (who I've mentioned here). Also featured are Jesse Boykins III and he-who-sounds-better-featured-on-records-than-on-solo-tracks, Darien Brockington.

A short film, Thank You For Listening, about the creation of this project:



Listen to the album and past releases from The  Foreign Exchange here.

 Enjoy.

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It's 6:39 PM. Students of the memoir writing class are gathered outside the door awaiting the teacher's arrival. Out of habit, and because I know Ashy Jack and/or Lady Create-A-Waist will be soon be joining us in the hallway, I have my camera out, muted, with the flash off, waiting for the magic to happen.

I'm tired. I'm drinking raspberry tea, making notes on a chapter submission to be read later in class. Ashy Jack, a native of a region of Compton where lotion is outlawed, shows up. The gentleman on the right compliments me on my necklace.

That's a cross, right? Oooh. Lemme see. (examines) I like that. Very cool.

Then Ashy Jack:

"Is them..um...skuhhs? Them is skuhhs? Like...dead heads? Oh! That's a....uum...an... ALUMINUMATI symbol? I don't know about that....

...and he launches into a convo with the other gentleman about heathens and "wuss wrong wit de whirl today."

Class begins. A girl is reading a chapter about her brother's death. She worked in a call center where phones had to be stored under your desk. In the course of two hours, she missed 25 calls from her mother, sisters, and other relatives notifying her about her brother. She is grief-stricken, thinks she should have been more attentive. She is emotional, and we offer our support before critiquing her work.

After an awkward silence, Ashy Jack waves his hand to bless her with his wisdom:

Well...you mentioned the phone...and missing the calls. I think maybe you should have answered the phone. Do you regret that?

 Yes. He is not to be bothered with the task at hand, offering feedback on the WRITING and things to improve upon within the storytelling. Oh no.  Ashy Jack, like last week, feels inclined to tell us what he thinks we should have done differently in LIFE.

I think...you know...if you would have answered the phone....maybe...it wouldn't have ended up as it did. Good storeh doe.

I cringed and huffed and made a big to-do about disrupting him. The next chapter came from a girl who wrote about her journey into motherhood: deciding to have a baby, a cross-country road trip with her husband, the joys of inescapable credit card debt, and so on. It was a light, uplifting, cute story. I was, however, distracted by the woman beside me. Victoria.

Picture: Sub-Saharan hairline. Silky smooth, hand-me-down Lil Miss EBT Pageant Ponytail. Over-sized suede jacket.




oh. and these:


THAT wasn't the distraction. After our break, she'd returned with Fritos. Yuck, but "to each is zone" (shoutout to Dirty Dez for that gem). What distracted me was that she would crush them in her hand and shake it up as you do before rolling dice, then inserted the little pieces slowly, feeding them through her front teeth. WEIRD. Then: licking her palms and wiping it on the suede jacket. Not sure why it distracted a classmate and I, but she was LOUD, and was gonna enjoy her Fritos (yuck) regardless of what I thought. I couldn't take my eyes off of her.

I thought class would end with no additional gems from Ashy Jack. Then, while telling a story, he goes off into some tangent about how kids today shouldn't be wearing skinny jeans and how that's why teenage girls get knocked up so young, and how locs (he called them dreads) are.........UNBECOMING, and that he missed the old days when men were men and women stayed home and cooked.

*sigh*

That gave me a hearty laugh, even moreso when my classmate Sarah, who cringes when I cringe and is annoyed when I'm annoyed, looked at me with widened eyes, as if waiting for my response. Good times.

I'll give that one to Ashy Jack. He even glanced at me when mentioning skinny jeans. You go, Ashy Jack. You go boy.

He's clearly declared war. He plans to present his chapter next week. I will have a camera crew on hand. And next time he says some slick shit, I'm calling A&E on his ass for hoarding teeth.

~coloredBoy

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