The Most Insightful (and accurate) Nicki Minaj Album Review Of All Time

Hi there. So, I sat down at my computer today just looking for something interesting to read to pass the time on this lazy Sunday afternoon so I started reading music sites. I have a fairly adventurous musical appetite (LIE) so when I came across a review of Nicki Minaj's album 'Pink Friday' over at The Number of the Blog (a favorite of mine) I said to myself "I should read this because maybe there will be something unexpectedly awesome about the album that will convince me to give it a listen"...I like to at least pretend to have an open mind, ya know?

So I read the review and it makes the album sound like everything that I had anticipated it would be: abominable. No hate towards Nicki Minaj, she does her thing in the lane she's chosen and she does that better than a lot of her male counterparts (Spotlight directed onto Drake, Big Sean, et al.) It's just that, in terms of the quality of her music, I'm not the kind of person who is inclined to listen to a pile of crap just because it happens to smell less shitty than the other piles of crap. Any motherfarkin way, just read the review. It's funny, it's an interesting read, and it's pretty damn accurate as far as I'm concerned.

NFL Lockout: People Who Should STFU

The NFL lockout is something I never want to hear about again. I'm an avid football fan, but if there is no NFL this fall I will somehow manage to survive and not give a shit. BUT since so many people have their crotchless panties in a bunch over the whole ordeal, I've decided to make a quick list of people whom the NFL lockout makes me want to tar, feather, and grill over an open flame.

THE FANS


Has there ever been a group more worthy of kicking in the throat than NFL fans? No matter what city you're from, your fans are annoying, sloppy drunk, mouth-breathing shit sacks. I didn't think I could hate NFL fans more...until the lockout. Now every article about the lockout has to be accompanied by 761 comments from slobbering sloths all across the country. Never mind that most of these inbreds have never played an actual down of football in their entire lives or know much about football besides their "My team is awesome....Your team blows" philosophy. Everyone has an opinion despite not knowing much about labor negotiations, law, long division, or proper hygiene.

I also love the not-so-thinly veiled racism, homophobia, and general ass-hattery that an NFL fan will proudly share with you at any moment. It's no wonder that the country as a whole is falling apart faster than JLo's marriage (Fuckin' right I did it!) when we have these beacons of the American school system as some of our nation's most vocal citizens.

THE OWNERS


As a football fan, I can honestly say that I despise the owners. Every time an NFL owner opens his mouth he does something to ruin football. Like "Hey guys I don't think any of us are nearly as rich as we need to be, let's squeeze some extra cash out of the guys who make us richer every week". Great idea. How 'bout next week we shut down the sun? Granted, most NFL owners came to own a team by first using their business skills to amass a huge fortune and acquire an asset that is the picture next to the textbook definition of cash cow, but that doesn't make them good people.

How many billionaire businessmen do you think have any humility? *Crickets* How many billionaire businessmen can you say actually care about the common man's plight? *Crickets on fire* This is the same group of lying fartholes who wanted rule changes for "the safety of the players" and not a week later wanted to extend the season to put players in harm's way more often. They'd make wonderful politicians. Now they want me to believe that they are losing revenue, but they can't open up their books because that is private information. I think NFL owner's are actually behind the Nigerian email scams.

THE PLAYERS


In the loving words of my mother "The fuck is you crying 'bout?!". We don't need to go into the myriad reasons as to how great life is as a pro football player. We also don't need to go into the danger's of playing pro football. The reason that we don't need to go into these things is that (some) fans "get it". How 'bout we help NFL players get it: maybe just maybe if you didn't spend every cent you earned in the NFL on houses, cars, designer sun glasses, and child support you'd be able to afford to pay for health care after football. I'm not talking about the guys who played in the 50s through 70s era NFL...those guys got a raw deal in terms of pay and health. But if you've played more than 5 seasons in the modern-day NFL, you can probably afford to put some money away, make smarter business decisions, and stop banging every woman who lifts her skirt up so that you can get that knee replacement surgery after your pro days are behind you.

I've played organized football in my life, but I'll never play in the NFL which is every 10 year old football player's dream. You've made it to Wonderland and you can't stop bitching about the decor.

THE MEDIA


Less is more. As in the more you talk about the NFL lockout, the less I want to listen to you. Call me when it's over and you have something of value to say, but we don't need round the clock coverage of the NFL lockout anymore than we need round the clock coverage of my toilet. I don't care that DeMaurice Smith called his mom about the lockout or that an intern for the Rams left the meetings with problems related to diarrhea.

If the lockout hasn't ended then you have nothing to report. So, why don't you pump up another sporting event no one cares about (I'm looking at you Women's World Cup) and sit the hell down.

Black, White, and Lame All Over

Let's talk politics. I don't mean let's talk about the moronic concepts of left-wing vs right-wing or liberal vs conservative or jackass vs fat ass; I'm talking about the actual game of politics. I'm talking about the bullshit that gets shoveled around ever couple of years that has Americans foaming at the mouth to vote for new prom kings and queens every time a "sexier" candidate enters the forum. I'm talking about the fantastic shell game that has been going on in this country since 1776. I'm talking about the art of selling people a can of Budweiser and telling them it's champagne.

As a black man, I'm very proud of Barack Obama for achieving a feat that I never thought I'd see in my lifetime: a (sort of) black president. Now let me say something that is going to piss a lot of people off: I've never been a Barack Obama fan. I like Obama as a person. I'd love to have a beer and catch a game with the brotha. I'd like to hear him describe how it felt to reach a height that we as black people never thought we'd reach. Then I'd like to ask him what his long range economic recovery plan looks like. I'd like to know why he hasn't taken a hard line on pretty much anything since he took office. I'd ask him why poor people are still getting locked up for smoking pot and most of Wall Street gets to go home and sleep in complete comfort every night. You know...questions about his job.

This is not an Obama bashing excursion. I just want to know why he sold Budweiser as champagne. Speaking of Budweiser (bad pun in 3...2..1...)I know some of you are thinking "Hell, he's better than Bush!". Which is true, but that's setting the bar pretty low isn't it? I mean Steve-O could probably do a comparable job to what George Bush did. Why bring up Bush? What can you possibly use to compare Obama and Bush? Where are they equal to each other? They are both politicians.

pol·i·ti·cian   /ˌpɒlɪˈtɪʃən/
[pol-i-tish-uhn]
–noun
1. a person who is active in party politics.
2. a seeker or holder of public office, who is more concerned about winning favor or retaining power than about maintaining principles.

How do politicians win favor and retain power? By selling Budweiser as champagne. Every election cycle we get a new crop of wolves in sheep's clothing making the same promises. You'd think that by now Americans would be living in a Utopia that was the envy of every nation on the planet. My driver's license just says Illinois, but maybe that is some sort of codename (HA!) Yet you see Americans from Tukwila to Bangor in red-faced fury over which candidate is the secular messiah sent by forces unknown to right all the evils of the last 235 years. Then four years later we're all bitching and complaining about how Senator X or House Speaker Y is the reason for all of our ills, but as soon as Representative A gets into office the sky is going to pour strippers and lollipops. Right, and Lil' Wayne is gonna win best new artist at the Country Music Awards (#sarcasm).

"If you have selfish, ignorant citizens you're going to get selfish, ignorant leaders" ©George Carlin

I don't get mad at the likes of Palin, Boehner, and Gingrich when I see them on television bad-mouthing our current president. They are just trying to win one for their team just like Obama, Clinton, and Biden were in 2008. A politician is a politician is a politician. And a politician by definition (see above)is just a pimp with better education. The sooner the majority of Americans come to this realization, the sooner we get closer to actual change in this country.

I Hate Your Phone

Do you remember where you were when the cell phone became the most important device on the face of the planet? I must've slept through it. At some point in the past 10-12 years, the cell phone made a power move to own our lives and everyone knelt down and said "Your wish is my command" in unison. Really what invention can stand up to the awe created by a shiny, new cell phone being waved in your face at a deeply discounted price? Don't worry I'll wait...© Kat Williams.

Of course, I'm just being an ass. I hate your cell phone. I hate my cell phone. I hate the cell phones of people I've never even seen. Have you ever been talking to someone about a matter that you find to be fairly important and wanted to punch them directly in the fronal lobe as they reply to a text mid sentence? Have you ever witnessed some biological mistake completely disregard your life to answer a call about how awesome last night's episode of 'The Bachelor' was? Then you feel my pain. If you are one of the people who routinely commits one of these atrocities then happily go DIAF.

I love standing in line at Restaurant X and noticing how every person in the line has to stop at some point and look at their cell. You couldn't have possibley missed a call or text or video or email since you last checked your phone 10 miliseconds ago. If you did get a phone call, we'd all know about it because your portable iriation device will spew some rythmic abortion into the air to ear-rape us all. How nice of you! You know what would be even more super awesome of you? If, when you do get a call, you can scream every single word of it at so that I can hear exatly how big of an asshole Mike is or how much you hate Audrey because "she's such a batch!". That would really make my day.

Everyday people walk down the street gazing into their cell phones with little to no regard for all of the people they are rudely staggering into. People drive home from work picking up their phone whenever it buzzes, hums, or sings because they just can't wait to hear what their single-cell brained companion on the other end has to say. Meanwhile all of us regular folk have to swerve around John and Jane Q. Fuckstick as they make your drive home into vehicular dodgeball.

The point? Put the God dammned phone down and unplug long enough to realize that your phone is worthless. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shopping for a new cell phone. Don't judge...I gotta get something nice with my upgrade

The Stand-Up Comedian: America's Unlikely Last Hope

I have a friend who is a comedian. We grew up together in a tight-assed, Christian, Republican, get-me-the-hell-outta-here town in southern Mississippi where neither of us felt like we belonged to any of the rigidly defined social groups that we were supposed to file neatly into. That was one of the reasons we stuck together so tightly once we became friends. Another huge factor was the way our senses of humor seemed to exist on the same twisted plane. We shared an adoration of the outrageous that no one else we knew even came close to having and we made it a point to throw our brand of humor directly into the red faces of every person we could possibly piss off. Our teen years were essentially a living shrine to our favorite comedians: George Carlin and Chris Rock.

I remember seeing both Chris Rock's 'Bring the Pain' and George Carlin's 'Back in Town' on HBO for the first time in 1996. Beyond the extraordinarily amusing comedy of both comedians, the thing that made me such a fan and repeat viewer of specials was this very uncomfortable feeling that the performers left with me during and after the shows. They didn't push boundaries...they ran right through them. They spoke about politics, religion, sex, and the state of humanity in ways that absolutely blew me away because it was so raw, so frank, so real. That uncomfortability with the words I was hearing sparked me to do more investigating into the world around me and reevaluate all of the nice(and mostly untrue) bullshit that I'd been fed my entire life. I loved the way both Rock and Carlin packaged intelligence with painfully hilarious insight to create this very intriguing social commentary disguised as clear buffoonery.

As the years have passed, I've found myself continuously searching for another source where valid, intriguing commentary has been paired with a no BS approach to little avail. Watching politicians speak on almost any topic is simply a task of wading through Berlin wall thick layers of double-speak and partisan posturing to find a thimble of anything worth listening to. A lot of people I know worship at the altar of certain authors, but I feel a lot of the work that gets praised as being so visceral and awe-inspiring seems rather half-hearted. Journalists(with some exceptions) are now personalities who are more interested in promoting their personal brand than they are saying anything that really challenges the conventional wisdom and making people think. Time and time again, I find more value in the words of Louis CK than anything Anderson Cooper has to say.

Whether it is relationship advice from Chris Rock ("You can't just love the white bread part. You got to love the crust of a mothafucka"), George Carlin on politics ("If you have selfish, ignorant citizens you're going to get selfish, ignorant leaders"), Louis CK on child rearing ("If you hit a dog you go to jail, but you can hit a child and it's perfectly ok") I'm constantly hearing well thought out, challenging, and constructive commentary from the supposed clowns of our society.

Let's keep things in perspective while I'm on this topic. There are thousands of worthless hacks out there with nothing more interesting to say than you'd hear in a Limp Bizkit or Wacka Flocka song. I've seen so many comedians attempt to get by on fart jokes and screaming obscenities into the microphone that I can literally tell whether I'm going to like a comedian before he/she is three jokes in. Most of the time you've heard the joke before done better by someone who took the time to craft a bit into something that is worth listening to and memorable. For every Richard Pryor or Bernie Mac there are 10 Carlos Mencia's.

Go ahead, sit down and watch Dave Chapelle's pre flip-out comedy and attempt to miss the genius of everything happening on stage. Of course, the jokes are delivered with amazing timing and wit that he appears to deliver naturally...that's why you're laughing so hard. But listen closer and you'll see layer upon layer of commentary on politics, drugs, racism, sexism, and economic disparity dressed up and presented as just a joke. That is what makes the comedy of great comedians stand head and shoulders over the Dane Cook's of the world. That is also what makes the stand-up comedian America's unlikely last hope for open and honest discourse.

Did I do it? Fuckin' right I did it!

There is this commercial for Sam Adams Boston Lager where Jim Koch, owner of the Boston Beer Company which brews Sam Adams, where Mr. Koch says "I had a good job, but I thought to myself 'I don't wanna do this for the rest of my life. I don't want to do this tomorrow'. Those words play in my head every morning when I walk out of my apartment on my way to work. No one wants to work for "the man" for their entire lives, so it's not like this is some unique thought native to Mr. Koch and myself. For me, the difference is that I know that I can't do this for the rest of my life.

I don't want to be your boss. I don't dream of business meetings in downtown Chicago sky scrapers or getting the big promotion or having hordes of fearful peons cowering and kissing my ass when I walk into a a room or...you get the point. I try my best to understand the people who live their entire lives trying to chase the dream, but I always find myself looking down my nose at them and coming off as a colossal douche. I can't help it. I'm sure they look at me as some sort of head-in-the-clouds slacker/loser who can't get a grip on reality. I'm fine with that because I know we will have to agree to disagree on this one as our approaches to happiness are on opposite ends of the spectrum: theirs is to collect the most toys while mine is to do something I love.

I hate corporate life. I hate the plastic, ass-kissing, saving-up-for-a-Volvo, cookie cutter, lifeless people I have to pretend to like on a daily basis. I hate the pointless work that the empty suits seem to think is the most important thing since opposable thumbs. I hate it all and they day that I can leave it all in my life's rear-view mirror I'll probably explode.

This is my salute to Jim Koch and every other person who has given up being a drone to the job. A shout out to all those people who decided that their soul was worth more than a killer dinette set (word to 'Old School'). The idea of giving up everything you have to do something that you were born to do is the scarier than most empty suits can ever understand, but it is something I have to do...

All Roads Lead Me to Self-Destruct

You ever wake up in the morning, look in the mirror, and think to yourself "We're at this point now"? Or maybe yours goes something like "Yep, this is it". Maybe "Jesus-fuck-Christ, what am I doing with anything?". If not, fuck off. I have that morning like it's a 'Groundhog's Day' TBS marathon and I'm strapped in a medieval torture device. Sometimes I have that day smack dab in the middle of having that day. I guess if you put this together for enough days you might as well label it as your life and move on with the misery. I figured that out when I was about 7.

More and more I realize this 9 to 5 "Yessuh Massah" dick-dance isn't worth the dead slave owners the corporate machine trades for my rotting integrity for each week. I need a remedy. I'm paid to figure stuff out and make things work where conventional wisdom broken down. I get to stare at numbers, figure out patterns in the data and report my findings to the praise and piss-shower superlatives of the ruling class all while pretending like I give a pig's scrotum about any of it. I need a remedy. Truth is, I'd rather be doing this. I'd rather be sitting at my computer making my fingers click out the shit from the cesspool between my ears...too bad nightmares don't earn enough money to pay for dreams.