I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: RUN THE JEWELS-Tiny Desk Concert #597 (February 6, 2017).

When Killer Mike and El-P walk out to the Desk, El-P drinks from a formerly unopened liquor bottle (E&J), which Bob says has been aging for 8 years.

Then as the music from DJ Trackstar begins, EL-P says “I insist that you clap your hands like this, lets see if NPR has rhythm”–and after a few claps everyone is way off, to much laughter.

The blurb says

Like any good pair of twins, Run the Jewels have a freaky sort of unspoken fraternity. When El-P (née El-Producto, née Jaime Meline) — rapper, producer, and all-around godfather of the backpacker scene of the late-90’s — and Killer Mike strode in with their usual uniforms — Mike in a gold chain as thick as a garter snake, El in a fitted Yankees cap and pair of blue-mirrored sunglasses — the two didn’t have to do as much as nod to one another before upending three tracks from their latest LP, RTJ3, in strange and perfect symbiosis.

On “Talk to Me,” I feel like Killer Mike’s flow is a little better than El-Ps at least in the beginning.  El-P also says fuck a lot, which I noticed when I first downloaded their album, as well–lots of fucks, which is kind of lazy, I think.  Or maybe I just like Mike’s lyrics better.  Like this:

Born Black, that’s dead on arrival
My job is to fight for survival
In spite of these #AllLivesMatter-ass white folk

After he says this line, they stand back to back, middle fingers raised.  El-P says “this is the pose we do in this song.”

Before “Legend Has It” El-P grabs a banana like a microphone and says it feels more natural that way (Mike then signed the banana for Bob and he had it laminated).  As the song begins, Mike says, “y’all can dance to it your boss ain’t looking.  It’s a little slower and El-P has his flow on and has some great lines:

I am the living swipe right on the mic, I’m a slut
I don’t know how to not spit like a lout
I’ll spill a pound of my kids on your couch

and

I don’t play chicken, you prick, I’m a fox
You wanna kick it, I’ll give you the rocks
You kiss the wood chipper blade if you balk
I’m fuckin’ magic, in fact I’m a warlock of talk
I got a unicorn horn for a (stop)

But the crowd is on it this time when they chant and the crowd goes “RTJ!”

As the song ends, El-P says “You know why they do these things because for that least one week you cannot complain about your jobs.”

The final song is “A Report To The Shareholders.”  Before it begins, El-P says.  “It’s oddly awesome to be here.”  Then he takes one more swig.  Mike shouts, who got the weed?

It is much slower, almost spoken. Each guy gets a verse, between them, there s little instrumental and El-P says ” we haven’t figured out to so in this part.”  My favorite line of the show comes in this song:

“ooh, Mike said ‘uterus'”
They acting like Mike said, “You a bitch”
To every writer who wrote it, misquoted it
Mike says, “You a bitch, you a bitch, you a bitch”
Add a “nigga” for the black writer that started that sewer shit

The two do indeed play off each other perfectly–echoing the last lines of each other’s words.  And despite how angry they sound i the words, they are a surprisingly genial bunch.

[READ: December 8, 2016] Demon Vol. 1

I’ve really enjoyed pretty much everything that Jason Shiga has created.  I love the style of his characters–seemingly very simple yet very expressive.  And I love that his stories are bizarre, complex and mind-blowing.

I’m delighted that this series is being distributed by First Second since I like just about everything they do.  Although I am a little surprised that the published it, given how icky it gets.

Shiga has drawn some books that were kid friendly, but this book IS NOT!  It is about suicide and murder and bad language and all manner of adult things.  Indeed in the forward Shiga notes, “It’s been a dream come true working on this project, pushing past the limits of common decency–of good taste–with every new page.

So Jimmy Yee has had a rough time of late.  His beloved family was killed in a car crash (which he survived).  As an act of desperation, he robbed a bank.  But one of the tellers was killed in the exchange and he feels terrible about it.  He feels that he has nothing to live for so, he writes a note and sets out to kill himself.  Indeed, on the first page we see Jimmy hang himself in a hotel room.

But he soon wakes up back in bed.  He is miffed.  He is still in the hotel room but his rope is gone.  So he fishes around and finds a razor blade.  He commits suicide in the tub.  But then wakes up again in the room.  This time there is a gun in the rawer (alright!) which he uses.  But the same thing happens.  So he tries the sleeping pills that are in the room.  But again he wakes up.  This time however, he notices his headless body in the bathroom. What the heck?

He doesn’t really care so he runs out and jumps in front of a truck

This time he wakes up in the hospital  A girl comes in and hugs him and says she’s happy that he’s okay, daddy.  What?  It’s not his daughter (she is dead, remember).  Nevertheless, she brings him “home” (to her house not his).  He wonders if it’s a parallel universe or something, but when he gets to the house and looks in the phone book–his name is in there.  She rushes to his house and it is definitely his house–just as he left it–but he has to break in because he doesn’t have keys.

Soon the cops come and ask him for I.D. and that’s when he notices that his ID says he’s not Jimmy but some other guy.  What?

The police bring him into the station and wonder what he was doing at Jimmy Yee’s house.  Because Jimmy Yee and four other people were found dead in a motel.  And that’s when he figures it out.  It’s obvious!

He is actually a demon and when he dies he jumps into the next closest body.  Duh!

But now the police are after him and even the feds have gotten in on the case.  So he is going to have to keep switching bodies in order to escape  But that means killing more and more people.

This is a sick and twisted story and it’s disgusting and gruesome.  And very very funny (the last line in particular is hilarious).  It’s also clever and I wonder what Shiga has in store for us in the upcoming volumes.  I can’t wait to find out.