July 8, 2011
Dr. Octagon was a fictional character created by American rapper Keith Thornton, better known as Kool Keith. First appearing on Thornton’s 1996 debut solo album, ‘Dr. Octagonecologyst,’ Dr. Octagon is an extraterrestrial time traveling gynecologist and surgeon from the planet Jupiter. Thornton performed and released three albums under the alias. The character was murdered by another of his characters, Dr. Dooom on Thornton’s 1999 album ‘First Come, First Served,’ and was briefly revived before once again being killed on Thornton’s 2008 album ‘Dr. Dooom 2,’ in response to the release of ‘The Return of Dr. Octagon,’ an album largely produced without Thornton’s involvement.
In Dr. Octagonecologyst, Dr. Octagon is described as having yellow eyes, green skin, and a pink-and-white Afro. Further tracks detail a list of services offered by Octagon, who claims to treat chimpanzee acne and moosebumps, and relocate saliva glands. Octagon is described as being incompetent, as many of his surgery patients die as he conducts his rounds. He often engages in sexual intercourse with female patients and nurses. Octagon’s uncle, Mr. Gerbik, is described as being half shark, having the skin of an alligator, and is 208 years old.
read more »
Posted in Art, Humor |
1 Comment »
July 5, 2011
Christopher Mercer (b. 1985), more commonly known as Rusko, is an English dubstep record producer and DJ. He made his production debut in 2006 on Dub Police with the song ‘SNES Dub.’
Steering away from the darker side of Dubstep, Rusko brought an upbeat sound to the scene that appealed to many outside the community. Rusko’s extremely successful hit ‘Cockney Thug’ has appeared on various DJ sets and mixes.
Posted in Art, Technology, World |
2 Comments »
June 30, 2011
Yellow Magic Orchestra (YMO) is a Japanese electronic music band consisting of principal members Haruomi Hosono (bass and keyboards), Yukihiro Takahashi (drums and lead vocals) and Ryuichi Sakamoto (keyboards and vocals). The group began under the name ‘Yellow Magic Band’ in 1977, and then renamed itself as ‘Yellow Magic Orchestra’ in 1978.
The band’s former ‘fourth member’ was music programmer Hideki Matsutake. They are regarded as influential innovators of popular electronic music. They helped pioneer synthpop and ambient house, ushered in electronica, anticipated the beats and sounds of electro music, laid the foundations for J-pop, and influenced the house, techno, and hip-hop movements.
read more »
Posted in Art, Technology, World |
Leave a Comment »
June 29, 2011
Sun Ra (1914 – 1993), born Herman Poole Blount, was a prolific jazz artist and philosopher known for his ‘cosmic’ music and philosophies. His eclectic music and unorthodox lifestyle made him controversial. Claiming that he was of the ‘Angel Race’ and not from Earth, but from Saturn, Sun Ra developed a complex persona using ‘cosmic’ philosophies and lyrical poetry that made him a pioneer of afrofuturism. He preached awareness and peace above all.
He abandoned his birth name and took on the name and persona of Sun Ra (Ra being the Egyptian God of the Sun), and used several other names throughout his career, including Le Sonra and Sonny Lee. Sun Ra denied any connection with his birth name, saying ‘That’s an imaginary person, never existed … Any name that I use other than Ra is a pseudonym.’
read more »
Posted in Art, Humor, Philosophy |
Leave a Comment »
June 27, 2011
Zombie Nation is a German techno and electro project of the Munich based DJ and producer Florian Senfter (also known as John Starlight). The first Zombie Nation five track EP was released in the spring of 1999 on DJ Hell’s label, International DeeJay Gigolo Records.
A remix of the song ‘Kernkraft 400’ on this debut release landed in high chart-positions all over the world, including number 2 in the U.K. ‘Kernkraft 400’ was a 1:1 melody copy from the Commodore C64 computer game ‘Lazy Jones.’
read more »
Posted in Art, Money, Technology |
Leave a Comment »
June 7, 2011
Santi White (b. 1976), better known by her stage name Santigold, is an American songwriter, producer, and singer. Her debut album Santogold was released in 2008. The artist got her pseudonym in the 1990s from a friend’s nickname for her. Santigold was the singer of the Philadelphia-based punk rock band Stiffed, whose 2003 album, ‘Sex Sells,’ and 2005 album, ‘Burned Again,’ were produced by Bad Brains bassist Darryl Jenifer. In February 2009, Santogold changed her stage name to Santigold, as a result of infomercial jeweller Santo Gold threatening legal action.
White’s style has been compared often to that of M.I.A. White said of the M.I.A. comparison that they are both ‘women who have similar influences and have worked with some of the same people,’ but that her music is different, adding ‘I can’t think of anybody who would be a better fit of somebody who I’m like… I think what’s accurate about that comparison is that she’s an artist who has loads of different influences… and is putting things together in a way that’s unexpected and genreless.’ Santigold and her friend Amanda Blank have been described as being part of ‘a new crop of young, multicultural, female acts in the wake of M.I.A.’ White also stated her liking for New Wave, stating that ‘My Superman’ is an interpolation of a Siouxsie and the Banshees’ song, ‘Red Light.’
Posted in Art |
Leave a Comment »
June 7, 2011
Sylvester James (1947 – 1988), better known as Sylvester, was an American disco and soul singer, and a gay drag performer.
Sylvester was sometimes known as the ‘Queen of Disco,’ although this moniker has also been bestowed on some of the women of the disco era (i.e. Gloria Gaynor, Donna Summer). His most significant works are the songs ‘You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real) in 1978 and ‘Do You Wanna Funk’ in 1982.
read more »
Posted in Art, Sex |
Leave a Comment »
June 6, 2011
Andre Romelle Young (b. 1965), primarily known by his stage name Dr. Dre, is an American record producer, rapper, and record executive. He is the founder and current CEO of Aftermath Entertainment and a former co-owner and artist of Death Row Records, also having produced albums for and overseeing the careers of many rappers signed to those record labels, such as Snoop Dogg, Eminem and 50 Cent. As a producer he is credited as a key figure in the popularization of West Coast G-funk, a style of rap music characterized as synthesizer-based with slow, heavy beats.
Dr. Dre began his career in music as a member of the World Class Wreckin’ Cru and he later found fame with the influential gangsta rap group N.W.A with Eazy-E, Ice Cube, Mc Ren, and DJ Yella which popularized the use of explicit lyrics in rap to detail the violence of street life. His 1992 solo debut, ‘The Chronic,’ released under Death Row Records, led him to become one of the best-selling American performing artists of 1993. In 1996, he left Death Row to establish his own label, Aftermath Entertainment. Under that label he produced and released a solo album titled ‘2001’ in 1999.
read more »
Posted in Art, Money |
Leave a Comment »
June 1, 2011
The Ethiopians is a ska, rocksteady, and reggae vocal group, founded by Leonard Dillon, Stephen Taylor and Aston Morris. The group started out recording for Clement ‘Coxsone’ Dodd in 1966. Dillon had previously released some mento songs under the name Jack Sparrow. Around late 1966, Morris left the Ethiopians.
Having left Dodd, the Ethiopians started recording at Dynamic Studios for the W.I.R.L. label, releasing the rocksteady classic ‘Train to Skaville,’ which was their first success. In 1968 they recorded the song ‘Everything Crash,’ their first big hit. The song criticised the political situation in Jamaica at the time, such as water rationing and power cuts that led to unrest; such as an incident in which 31 people were shot by police.
Posted in Art, Politics, World |
Leave a Comment »
June 1, 2011
Toots and the Maytals are a Jamaican ska and reggae vocal group. The Maytals were key figures in reggae music. Formed in the early 1960s when ska was hot, the Maytals had a reputation for having strong, well-blended voices and a seldom-rivaled passion for their music. Frederick ‘Toots’ Hibbert (b. 1945) is the group’s frontman.
He met Henry ‘Raleigh’ Gordon and Nathaniel ‘Jerry’ Mathias, forming in 1961 a group whose early recordings were incorrectly attributed to ‘The Flames’ and ‘The Vikings’ in the UK by Island Records. The Maytals first had chart success recording for producer Clement ‘Coxsone’ Dodd at Studio One. With musical backing from Dodd’s house band, The Skatalites, the Maytals’ close-harmony gospel singing overshadowed Dodd’s other up-and-coming vocal group, The Wailers.
read more »
Posted in Art, World |
Leave a Comment »
May 20, 2011
Gregg Michael Gillis (b. 1981), better known by his stage name Girl Talk, is an American musician specializing in mashups and digital sampling. Gillis has released five LPs on the record label Illegal Art. He ended his career in biomedical engineering in 2007 to focus solely on music. He uses often a dozen or more unauthorized samples from different songs to create a new song. He cites fair use as a legal backbone for his sampling practices. After the success of his album Feed the Animals, for which listeners were asked to pay a price of their choosing, Gillis made all of his other albums similarly available via the Illegal Art website.
Regarding his stage name, Gillis has said, ‘the name Girl Talk is a reference to many things, products, magazines, books. It’s a pop culture phrase. The whole point of choosing the name early on was basically to just stir things up a little within the small scene I was operating from. I came from a more experimental background and there were some very overly serious, borderline academic type electronic musicians. I wanted to pick a name that they would be embarrassed to play with. You know Girl Talk sounded exactly the opposite of a man playing a laptop, so that’s what I chose.’
Posted in Art, Money, Politics |
Leave a Comment »
May 17, 2011
Iggy Pop (b. 1947), born James Newell Osterberg, is an American musician. He is considered an influential innovator of punk rock music. He began calling himself ‘Iggy’ after his first band in high school (for which he was drummer), The Iguanas. He was lead singer/songwriter of influential protopunk band The Stooges and became known for his outrageous and unpredictable stage antics. Inspired by the antagonism of Jim Morrison, Pop was the first performer to do a stage-dive, which he started at a concert in Detroit. Other exploits of Pop include rolling around in broken glass, exposing himself to the crowd and vomiting on stage.
Osterberg was raised in a trailer park in Ypsilanti, Michigan. He began his music career as a drummer in different high school bands in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He later moved to Chicago where he played drums in blues clubs, helped by Sam Lay (formerly of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band). In 1968, he and his new band, ‘The Stooges,’ signed with Elektra Records, again following in the footsteps of The Doors, who were Elektra’s biggest act at the time. Reportedly, Pop called Moe Howard to see if it was alright to call his band ‘The Stooges,’ to which Howard responded by merely saying ‘I don’t care what they call themselves, as long as they’re not the Three Stooges!’ and hung up the phone).
Posted in Art |
Leave a Comment »
The Daily Omnivore 