The rise of "The Heist

Ever since I heard Macklemore's new album "The Heist" 4 days ago, I have been listening to it non stop.  While I like the song "Thrift Store" and am in awe of his three hundred million and eight hundred thousand hits on You Tube (That's insane)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK8mJJJvaes, I love the album as whole.  It has been a long time since I have listened to an album from start to finish old school Columbia House style (remember that, those hustlers!). Let alone, just out and bought an album after hearing it.

It is so refreshing to hear a rapper/hip hop artist singing about things other than guns, drugs, money, and women. The lyrics are superb, the beat is poppin' and its got me droppn some dough.  Uhh.

Pretty amazing in that the album became number one on i tunes within hours of its release with no mainstream promotion or support.  It made Hot 100 chart history by having their first two singles both become a #1 single, and the first to do so without being signed to a major record company in almost 20 years.  http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/1560817/macklemore-ryan-lewis-cant-hold-us-tops-hot-100

With today's rampant technology, it is possible to listen artists for free.  Spotify, Pandora, You Tube are amazing tools that have revolutionized consumer access to music.  For many independent artists it is a way to get on the airwaves fast.  However, the artists get paid very little when we use these tools compared to when we purchase songs and albums.  This has put tremendous pressure on artists to make their living off live performances.   More live performances is problematic as they end up having more vocal cord injuries and other repetitive use injuries in guitarists and drummers.  Not to mention being on the road is exhausting.  Please support independent artists by buying their albums and songs directly.

My favorite songs are "Awake", "Ten Thousand Hours" and "Starting Over".


Check it out.

Wrecking the Body of the World.

Last night I finished reading Eve Ensler's "In the Body of the World" 

If you don't know who Eve Ensler is you should.  Go ahead and google her.  She has done much on her short time on Earth.  Puts the rest of us to shame.  Her shame led her to do amazing things.  Most of us who have been shamed by sexual abuse sometimes respond by over caring and overworking.  As if our existence on the planet can only be justified by doing amazing things to correct the ills of the planet.  I really resonated with this.  Her book was hard to read.  Raw and horrifying.  As someone who works with cancer patients, I could really feel her anguish about what was happening to her body.  Equally intriguing is her linking her getting uterine cancer to working with women who have been sexually assaulted aka Raped.  Was it linked to her rape by her father?

Equally harrowing, she links the rape of women to the rape of the planet.  I too believe that they are no different and are born of the same consciousness.  When we destroy the planet we destroy our future.  When we rape a woman, we destroy her capacity to bring forth the future generations.  We are cancer.  You and me.  The resources required for us to live our entitled lives requires the destruction of the Earth.  We are the Cancer.  We are Rapists.  We create the conditions for cancer to arise when we live in this way.

Indigenous cultures have always held that the Earth is our "mother".  After all it is her "body" that gives rise to the material substance of our bodies.  Ashes to Ashes, dust to dust.  We are born of and return to the Earth.

We need healthy women to have healthy children to have a better future.  We also need a healthy Earth for that reality to occur.  Life is short in the grand scheme of things.  You can spend your life doing something small like accumulating resources to maintain the illusion of a comfortable life.  Or we can build something bigger than ourselves.  Something lasting, something for everyone. Lets build it together the time is now.