Weed

Having just hit 420 views, I feel this is appropriate. From 2006, when Super Deluxe still existed.

Bitch I'm MC Hammer

'Ye is a True Gentleman | GlobalGrind

Damn Yeezy! I really try to stay away from talking about this couple, because I believe that Will McAvoy is correct, and that reality telivision/news is fueling the downfall of society. But seriously, dude is wearing leather Hammer pants, with a motherfucking tank top, to a Broadway show. 

I have no doubt this outfit was expensive, because Ye is only validated by items of expense and exclusivity, but expensive don't mean classy, and vice versa. High fashion has long been a home of 'King's New Clothes' mentality (if you don't understand fashion, it's because you can't afford it), and weirdness for the sake of weirdness. Hell, the entire hipster aesthetic seems to be based on intentional ugliness, but this is just too much. 

Maybe I'm asking for too much. I guess a picture of Kim next to this outfit is still much less repulsive than a picture of her next to Ray J's junk. (No Marques Houston.)

Lemme See Ya Grill

via HipHopWired

Ryan Lochte, the swimmer who could finally make people shut up about Michael Phelps, was told he would not receive his medal if he took the podium while wearing the sweet grill pictured above. What a great way to show the world what kind of class Americans have. It's like the spirit of Tommie Smith and John Carlos if they were all about fake shit. Is this guy any relation to Riff Raff? You be the judge:

Straight Outta Cash

As you may have heard, Young Buck, (formerly?) a member of G-Unit, currently owes the IRS close to $200K in taxes. Well, maybe more like $147K now, since the feds apparently auctioned off all of his property of any worth, netting close to $53 stacks in the process.

Some sources stated that the name "Young Buck" was sold as well, but that turned out to be false. (Who the fuck would buy that?) The majority of the items were electronics and jewelry, including a custom "615" chain and medallion. This is different from the spinning "YB" chain, which is different from the spinning G-Unit chains that 50 gave to the crew. (Although, I believe that as a rule you had to get robbed for those chains, unless you were Tony Yayo.) The real bidding war was for hard drives, which normally wouldn't be worth much, but the bidders believed that the drives contained music that they would be able to sell. (If it was that easy, Young Buck would actually sell music.) Unfortunately for these bidders, (but fortunately for anyone with ears) the drives had all been wiped clean already.

Somehow, most of these items were purchased and returned to Buck. His manager purchased the chain and several other items back for him, but I have a feeling that these purchases are all being charged to Buck, with interest. So if you missed out on this auction, you'll probably have another chance before long.

Here's some news coverage of the event. The most hilarious part is probably the white guy who's a "hardcore Young Buck fan." (Pause).

Maybe This Album Will Come Out

Jay Electronica Shares Album Tracklist | Pitchfork

The tracklist for Jay Electronica's album has been posted, what that means, who knows exactly? It's always odd to me that these are even released. Ostensibly, this is to pique interest in the album, although it seems like it only makes it easier to search for the individual tracks and download them. I assume these releases are aimed at critics/bloggers as much, if not more so, than the fans. In this case it seems like The Illuminati's Favorite Rapper is letting everyone know that: a) He's going to have some marketable tracks with Kanye and Puff, and b) He's letting him do some "weird" shit too, with Erykah Badu and the like.

Oddly, there's a feature with Ronald Reagan, which would lead me to believe that they used a sample of his voice and thought it would be clever to list it this way. Kanye did the same thing with "Otis" last year, although with all the sampling he does, that seemed odd too. I couldn't find any proof that was due to a legal issue with the Redding estate, but Ye never made a statement about this being out of respect or his "genius shared vision" or such. Considering he sampled three different James Brown songs on "Gotta Have It", but didn't list JB as a feature, you would think something's up. Although that might be because, as noted fingerbanging expert Too $hort once quipped about the Godfather of Soul, "they used it all up and didn't pay the man." But I digress.

Although "Dear Moleskine" is missing, the "official" release of that track has a huge gap where another guest verse would likely go, and I suspect that could be one of those "iTunes exclusives". (Maybe somebody else was the guest verse, and legal wrangling or other industry nonsense got in the way.) Although, who cares anymore if an album is missing a track, if you can just download the song anyway? (I'm sure Just Blaze just wants that track to be on somebody's album, considering his financial difficulties, as well as his video game addiction as evidenced in the "Fade to Black" documentary.) Fair enough. Hopefully the album sees the light of day, or at least the internet.

Here's one possible route they could go, with a lifted Kendirck Lamar verse, and a "feature" from Malcolm X:

Hey Y'all!

Hey everyone. I've been away doing my actual job, or at least acting like it. What's been happening? It's hot as fuck out there, pretty much wherever you live, except for Seattle or Canada apparently. It's hot enough that I can't finish a large slurpie before it turns into half a cup of super-concentrated chemical juice (white people problems, I know), but I'm certainly not complaining because I have air conditioning. I've worked many a job in this weather, and I'm going to do everything I can to make sure I never have to do that again. I grew up with parents who grew up without air, plus that shit was expensive, so they were pretty selective about turning it on. As the oldest I used my position to secure a spot in front of a box fan. For my first few years on my own, I was poor enough to have to run the air only when necessary, but had good enough credit (or bad enough, it was Discover) to get an air conditioner. That apartment was hot, but my heart goes out to you if you're living without AC or you're homeless. (I don't pray because I'm an atheist, and it's not like it would matter anyway. I do see several  homeless people asking for money pretty regularly, and I give two bucks and change to them in this weather, which is the only charity I completely trust. At least with that they can go into McDonald's and buy a big drink, and hang out indoors, since they're now customers. Or maybe just go buy Mad Dog. Either way, they feel a tiny bit better, at least temporarily Obviously, I'm not saving the world here.) So anyway, what else is going on? Time for a lightning round!

• Adidas let a douchebag design a shoe with a handcuff, then cancelled them when people pointed out the obvious racist nature of such a product. This one really bugged me because I am a bit of a sneakerhead, but not one who's standing in any lines for shoes, or tracking down numbered editions. That shit is dumb Adidas should've known that these shoes would be fucking stupid, because the other Jeremy Scott shoes were also fucking stupid. They include the ones with ridiculous tongues, the ones with wings. The most concise comment on the topic had to be Byron Crawford, who pointed out how anyone who pays the $325 that these cost would actually be a slave. The first one here is the notorious shackle, the rest are other examples of Mr. Scott and Adidas' collaborative douchebaggery.

   

• Bath salts are fucking everywhere! (Really, they've been everywhere for a minute, but the news and the police know about it now, and everyone's ready to go full retard on this issue.) The most publicized story was probably the guy yelling about Biggie and Pac in Georgia, but just look at how many different instances show up in a google search for the past week. So anyway, this is going to be a thing for at least the rest of the summer, and who knows how much longer.
• And how could I not talk about the Affordable Care Act? (You know, Romneycare.) I'm writing something longer on this right now, so I don't want to go too deep on this one, but I'll give you the broad strokes. (Ha, broad strokes.) Anyway, I have a preexisting condition, so this is a game changer for me. The larger impact is interesting here for several reasons. This is a plan that requires you to have insurance (the mandate), and if you don't, you either have to pay a penalty if you can afford insurance, or you go on medicare. (There's more to it, but that's basically it.) Republicans are pissed because this has been their plan for 20 years, and they can't really do anything about it this fall because Romney enacted the same plan in Massachusetts and it's basically worked. So overall, watch out for some seriously incorrect descriptions of this bill, because the primary mission of the current republican party is to oppose everything Barry does.
• Chris Rock got attacked on Twitter for telling the truth on the 4th of July. He pointed out that slaves were still slaves on the original Independence Day, and was promptly shouted at by numerous butthurt white people. He continued to not give a fuck.

Well, that's enough for now. Watch for more coming soon, because it looks like my job is on cruise control most of this summer. With this heat, you already know some dumb shit is gonna pop off. Ride out to Danny Brown's Grown Up.