Music

TAOTFH: Heaven’s Boogie 2: Alpha and Omega

Humble thineself…

DVD cases litter the floor around my cot. The Karate Kid sat, opened and beaten from years of wear. Rocky III served as a top for a plastic cup filled to the brim with discarded sunflower seed shells. The Space Jam label has long since slipped out of its plastic sleeve and found its way elsewhere, presumably the trash can of one of my bunkmates. Three years have passed since my first and second deaths, and the subsequent recollection of my first dance-off in Heaven eats at me nonstop. My mind immediately recalled the dubious nature of my defeat to Jesus, ultimately costing me a space in Heaven. Three years…three long, frustrating, grating, discontent years have done nothing to make me any more consolable; I grew more apoplectic as each day slogged along. I ejected Stomp the Yard from my laptop, and ran my thumb across the trackpad until I pulled up a date saved and marked urgent in my calendar: January 20, 2018. My right eyebrow twitched slightly; it was the only demonstrative representation of what echoed in the annals of my mind. Jesus will be on the receiving end of the most merciless and vengeful beatdown He has-and will have-ever experienced. I never broke my gaze from that calendar as I reached for The Dark Knight Rises.

This committee, comprised of the 12 Apostles of Nazareth, was not able to come to a unanimous decision regarding your acceptance or denial into The Kingdom of The Lord…

Jesus was a sucker for that, man. And also, how the hell was it fair for Him to be judged by His dusty group of sycophant, cowardly moochers? I’d like to think that if you gave your Boy up to the Feds after He spent the past 10-plus years feeding you bums, the least you could do is act like His Twist is innovative and fresh. You think The Outlawz ever told Tupac he rhymed ‘Hennessy’ with ‘enemies’ too often? No, they shut up and let Pac pay their Pacific Bell bills. I saw John’s face during that battle; it was the hollow enthusiasm of a man grateful for the free meals but tired of them all being unleavened bread. He seemed the most likely to be swayed. At one point, he placed a clenched fist over his mouth, stifling laughs as I pretended to spin Jesus’ head on the floor while doing a Bob and Weave like a St. Lunatic. I figured if I could get any type of stalemate, there would be strong consideration for letting me past those gates. John was my best hope.

How many special people change?

How many lives are living strange?

Where were you while we were getting hiiiigh?

Was it my youth and its expected ignorance? Was it the social awkwardness that was misconstrued as antisocial and discriminatory? Was I just an asshole? How did I wind up here? Did I not respond to my texts quickly enough? I know who Stacie Lane is…does God have a problem with Stacie Lane? I feel like that’s His problem, not mine. I own my shame, God (if that’s even Your real name); perhaps You should do the same. You sat there and saw Your Son appropriate my culture and beat me based on a group of His peers emboldening said appropriation; I saw You bend Your arm, looking to nestle Your pasty face into the fold…

Slowly walking down the hall

Faster than a cannonball

Where were you while we were getting hiiiigh?

For three months, I became Bruce Wayne in that underground prison. I ran around the entirety of the large square compound, envisioning my calf muscles willing my legs to push through the sandy California shores alongside Rocky and Apollo. I did ab crunches upside down from the bunkbeds adjacent from my own cot like a young Curtis Jackson, furiously preparing for either a battle or a brawl. But mostly I sat. I sat on the edge of that cot, glaring at my laptop screen. Rage burned the tip of my earlobes as Jesus’ immaculate portrait stared back at me. A ring of light shown about His entire upper body, and my pupils projected the hellfire that churned about in my stomach. The other tenants in the Purgatory Appeals Program walked about daily, and, without a word, acknowledged what we both knew to be true: win or lose, there was no way I would be returning.

Jesus threw His robe into the overzealous audience and Steve Jobs dropped the beat…

That’s when I realized it was all a demeaning and twisted construction designed to humiliate and shun, not to humble and genuflect. Shattering disappointment sent waves through my lower body, causing me to stagger slightly toward the dancefloor. My focus, once singular, ricocheted throughout the entirety of my psyche and made my shoulders droop heavily at my impending embarrassment and exile. It became abundantly clear: THIS was the purgatory that was described to me upon my arrival into the Appeals Program. However, there would be no proving myself worthy of living forever amongst the blessed; there would only be the opportunity to lose at the hands of Jesus every five years (unless I die immediately upon my return to Earth). I danced my heart out, vacating my thoughts and ignoring the faces and snickers of a crowd in on such a cruel joke. Unfortunately, my impiety never warranted Hell. No, it deserved something much harsher.

Final Round: The Fly Hobo of Uptown D.C. vs. Jesus of Nazareth

Jesus walked slowly to the dance area in a black robe and red and black Converses. Prince and Lil Peep flanked Him as Gordie Howe held an Apple HomePod over his head. “No Problem” by Chance the Rapper filled the air and Howe twirled around like one of those girls at boxing matches with the big ass cards waving about. I knew I didn’t want another battle with this Man, and I now knew I’d never ever get to see those Golden Strippers. I sat on my floating stool and took in the pageantry and theatrics one last time.

I walked slowly toward the center of the dancefloor, shaking slightly. I could make out the faces of so many people I revered during my lifetime, from Alicia Tyler to the old Taylor Swift. I had a scorching desire to walk amongst them, but found composure in the realization that I would never be able to. Jesus and the shimmering aura that followed Him stood three feet in front of me, and I knew what I had to do. As He extended His hand in a hollow and condescending gesture of sportsmanship, I held back tears while my left fist hurdled towards His perfect jawline…

I didn’t stop swinging until He was on the ground. The tears fell freely now, and I reached for a set of brass knuckles I had stashed in the inner pocket of my joggers. The next blow landed clean across Jesus’ nose, sending His holy blood and mucus onto my t-shirt. Another shot caught Him directly in His mouth. The crowd looked on, stunned frozen at my audaciousness. But no one dared intervene. They- much like Jesus- understood exactly what was happening: I had enough of their system. I stood over a bloodied Messiah and through puffy, welling eyes, watched Him mutter in a hushed and forced voice, “you don’t have to do this, My son…”

I blinked back more tears and raised my fist again for one last blow.

“I never had a choice.”

“Wake up the dawn and ask her why

A dreamer dreams she never dies

Wipe that tear away now from your eyyye…”

It had only been about two days since arriving here, but I know I did what was necessary. This home is not ideal, but I broke the vicious cycle that would have been my eternity. The lesser of two evils is evil itself, and not the evil that lurks behind veiled intent and dishonest promises. I’m oddly content at this realization, and it allows me to carry out my days with some sort of purpose as I toil away. No longer present are the daily Sisyphean efforts disguised as penance. What lies all around me is tangible self-actualization, and with that, peace.

And someday you will find me…

Caught beneath the landslide…

In a Champagne Supernova in the skyyy…

Read Part One Here

Jesus knows my heart; He also knows these hands intimately. A.J. Armstrong is the creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities

My Last Post About Women Ever, Part III: Faded Pictures and Old Playlists

Is it weird I still think about them? What about the fact they routinely pop up in my head in the form of wistful nostalgia? How about the fact I still have pictures of them in my phone, even though some of them were two or three cells ago? Would you judge me if I told you I still pull up those pictures from time to time? Or that I stare at them longingly, wishing I could somehow relive some of the moments that continue to play on in my dreams? And the damn songs. Those songs all of them ruined because they send those complex emotions rushing back to me and make me relive the memories so often. Sometimes I sift through those pictures and replay those songs in my mind silently, some more somber than others…

“As she turned through the pages, a tear rolled down her face/I could see her reminiscing…why her life had to be this way…”

I was in love with her at 12. By then, she lived 688 miles away in a city I had just left but loved just as much. I grew up with her and fell for her temper. We fought so damn fiercely, I knew that passion would eventually be channeled into something mature and timeless. I just KNEW it would. The song doesn’t really speak to what I felt and what I wanted her to feel; she just used to sing it off-key on the couch when I visited her. That picture of her smiling at me while an Ebony Magazine sits open in her lap always conjures up the love I have for the summer of ‘99…

This one loved the song “Like You” by Bow Wow and Ciara. I sit and look at my phone, amazed that somebody so pretty then could become more beautiful years after that youthfully ignorant pose that smiles back at me. I remember that song because it blared from her phone and I knew that someone she was more interested in was calling. The bridge is a run-on sentence that ended with what my heart screamed silently at her: IAin’tNeverHadNobodyShowMeAllTheThingsThatYouDoneShowedMeAndTheSpecialWayIFeelWhenYouHoldMeWeGon’AlwaysBeTogetherBabyThat’sWhatYouToldMe- and I believe it- cuz I ain’t never had nobody do me like you….

I still hate the man on the other end of those calls, even though I never formally met him. The fact my feelings were embodied in a song reserved for another dude pissed me off. Despite it (or because of it), that drove me harder to live out those lyrics during our aimless drives in my Ford Explorer…

Love can be either a continuous melody or a painful bookend, which is why Ms. “Like You” will forever be remembered by a Ghostface Killah song, too. Not even a song, actually; the instrumental to said song…I had some SHIT to say. Is love really being up late writing angry lyrics over a Ghostface track? If you’re angry enough…it makes sense to you, trust me. The “Back Like That” beat played in some shitty iPod headphones while I scribbled a message I desperately wanted to shout in her face…

Jay-Z’s “Dear Summer” made me a stalker. The copied-and-pasted Facebook pictures of her posing in her dorm room made me weird to the people that didn’t understand what love really is. If they knew, then they had to know why I wanted to stalk her. With that song playing over and over from an iPhone 3 perched in the bushes situated below her kitchen window. She would never notice my actual presence…but she would absolutely feel a certain discomfort at the amount of weird things happening around her. Simple things like me gluing the hair in her combs to her bathroom mirror in vague messages. Or weird, square-shaped patches missing from her beige pillow covers. Or her Twitter account being followed by @ImUp_IAmAlwaysUP_AndWatching_You. Thank God that’s not a long song, my Dear [Redacted]…

The next image is hard to look at; it’s harder to describe the impact such a passing moment continues to have. She stood in front of a fountain- one I walked by daily to a building that had professors that changed my life and women that made life hard and a department that dared me to be great- and held me like she was in love with it all without her really knowing so. My Little One. The single mother that was both thirsty for knowledge and unaware of her immaturity. When somebody so young is the anchor of her entire family, her saying her ringtone for you is “No Better Love” is special. I couldn’t even come up with a decent quip for it; it’s awesome, period. I hear that song and just imagine she still smiles whenever it gets played. It’s my only bridge to a past that easily could have been my forever. Maybe it’s my ego whispering to me that I will always matter within those three or four minutes. Maybe I just like the damn song and misremember how special it really was to her. Whatever. I don’t miss her. Nope. I’m not trying to convince myself at all…

Man, she stole MY song and made it OURS. That motherfucker. That humble, pretty, stacked motherfucker. I played a song I loved and she loved the song and now we love the song. “Time of Your Life” went from being something that elevated my mood and made me smile at the ridiculous nature of day-to-day life to becoming a burgeoning couples’ mood music. Her pictures are explicit so I won’t describe them (but I damn sure will keep on looking) but what the hell…?

This last picture is always hard because I never know how to feel. She deserved better from both him and I. I never knew what she was telling him when she laid in his apartment and I’m sure he never knew about our conversations. The only picture is one I snuck while she was looking at the video to our song, too drunk to even notice the flash. Did she play our song for him? Did she introduce him to the music video with her head so perfectly nestled under his chin like she did with me on my couch? She was never mine; she was either under me or him and the influence. I wonder what that kind of tugging did to her psyche, but I never asked. I just kind of waited for her to blurt it out in her weaker moments…

“8 doobies to the face…fuck dat/12 bottles in a case…nigga, fuck dat/2 pills and a half-weight…nigga, fuck dat/Got a high tolerance when your age don’t exist…”

My Beautiful Mistake makes those words seem so surreal. Who gives a shit about growing old when living in the now is so much more pleasurable? She had no concern to even know she would forever be suspended in that nonchalant pose. I wonder so many things when I stare at it. It feels ominous and dark; it’s also telling and intimate…

“Got a high tolerance when your age don’t exist…”

Timeless photos…

A.J. Armstrong listens to a lot of Drake late at night and tends to reminisce hard; this post was supposed to come out two days earlier. He is also the creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities

Hip-Hop and the White Critic

If you haven’t yet read Amiri Baraka’s seminal piece on jazz, please read it here.

“Most jazz critics have been white Americans, but most important jazz musicians have not been.”

-Amiri Baraka, 1960

54 years later, our critics are still primarily white, our art is still being viewed through eyes that do not quite resonate, and jazz is dead. This has become a reality in the years since, an acknowledgement that what we create is open to critique by those not able to fully comprehend the context of which it was created. In 1960, it was the conception of jazz being appreciated and yet not quite understood by those white critics. Today, hip-hop has been swiped from our collective bassinets.

“As one Howard University professor said to me…’It’s fantastic how much bad taste the blues contain!’”

It’s all noise now. A garbled collection of expletives set to deep basslines. It’s not spoken truth over hypnotic backdrops- it never was to a certain generation, regardless- it’s just hyperbolic boasts in sync with noise. Or it’s noise that has stolen elements of funk, gospel, rhythm and blues, and, yes, jazz in the name of youthful ignorance. It’s why those middle-class Black Americans locked jazz away in closets of shame, and it’s why hip-hop, of any era, remains undefended during times of attack, ridicule, and outrage. It’s fantastic yet unclaimed by those that “matter”.

“…The major flaw in this approach to Negro music is that it strips the music too ingenuously of its social and cultural intent. It seeks to define jazz as an art (or a folk art) that has come out of no intelligent body of sociocultural philosophy.”

They (read: WE) focus on what you “shouldn’t” say. They (read: WE) don’t investigate. “Fuck Tha Police” is too violent, “Fight the Power” is too militant, and “Brenda’s Got a Baby” is too divisive. It’s always too…something, and therein lies the problem. It can’t ever be a reflection; they (read: WE) have to place these songs as depictions. Depictions of what’s wrong with us and not the system or environment in which they (read: WE) escaped in a different fashion. They (read: WE) hear a message but they (read: WE) don’t quite heed it. It’s just an angry noise that- at this point- only emanates from their (read: OUR) children’s bedrooms.

“Most jazz critics began as hobbyists or boyishly brash members of the American petite bourgeoisie, whose only claim to any understanding about the music was that they knew it was different; or else they had once been brave enough to make a trip into a Negro slum to hear their favorite instrumentalist defame Western musical tradition.”

They (read: THEY) knew Doggystyle was unlike anything they’ve ever heard before. They knew Harlem World had a lot of samples from songs they grew up critiquing. Tha Carter III made them love OUR thing. But they didn’t walk into Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles on East Broadway before then. They didn’t venture to Uptown Manhattan until Clinton quelled their fears. They still haven’t walked the streets of Hollygrove; they just knew Wayne’s 16 songs both eschewed the “norm” and placed them in the midst of his chaos. They can analyze and review, but they can’t be us. However, the sad part of this is: they seem to appreciate it much more than we do.

54 years ago, “Jazz and the White Critic” seemed to hint at a defining piece of Black culture slowly being taken from us. Has that occurred with our newest creation? Not fully, but there are ominous signs. Wu-Tang Clan paraphernalia is a Hot Topic “Hot Topic”, Tupac resurrected at Coachella, and Macklemore just Macklemore’d the Grammys (even he was surprised, apparently). Is there anything wrong with any of this? Of course not; they (read: THEY) are remembering and channeling some of the best we have had to offer and that’s awesome. It’s only slipping from our grasp because we don’t cherish our creation. We can give it to whomever but can’t we still bob our collective heads to it? It’s not enough to paint a masterpiece; every once in a while we should stand back and admire what we created.

Rest in paradise, Amiri Baraka. A.J. Armstrong is the humbled creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities