Pimpin' Is Actually Rather Difficult

Thanks "A Milli" to our main men in HK, DJ Enso and Kid Fresh, for having the Bananas Soundsystem (sans Mr. Stokes, who's a geographer now, and doesn't have time for this dj tomfoolery anymore) and Dre Skull out for round #5 of Pimpin' Ain't Easy. Wow, that's a lot of links there, but all worth checking out. Anyways, the night was off the proverbial hook and we can all pat eachother on the back for being so cool and having great taste in music and talent at playing it. If you find youself in Hong Kong, definitely check for this monthly, as the PAE guys are really pushing the envelope for music/nightlife in HK. Anyways, here's a few of my pics from the trip down, many more soon to come from Kit, the standout PAE resident photographer (and my new photography Jedi master). Holler!

Dead ass ducks


Individually wrapped sushi's from one Hong Kong's bajillion 7-11's. Of course, why didn't I think of that? I always have the craving for just one piece of sushi, but don't know how to deal with the dilemma... Psyche!



Mad mad mad props to Joey, HK's #1 most awesome tattoo artist and DJ Enso's special lady friend, for letting me crash on the floor of her studio space for three nights in a row and making me feel like a super bad ass for being able to tell people that "yeah, I was just couch surfing it at this Hong Kong tattoo parlour, waking up to the sound of electric needles imbedding ink into human flesh... no biggie."

DJ Enso let the needle drop...

...and the crowd went ape shit!

Kanye Came to Shanghai

So Kanye West came to Shanghai last Monday and put on a pretty underwhelming show. I was surprised that the world's "premier pop star" wasn't able to sell out the Shanghai Grand Theatre, and was also a bit disappointed by how one-dimensional his show was (completely focused on him, and his kind of bad singing and sort of ok rapping)... I was under the impression that Kanye's live show production value was off the charts. To his credit he brought out a full band, but then proceeded to completely ignore showcasing that band's talents (including dj Craze on the decks, wtf!...). But, the show wasn't without it's moments, and unfortunately for Mr. College Dropout, my favorite moment was when he left the stage and just let this song play out for the crowd.

Journey - Don't Stop Believing

Oh Kanye... Love your production, not feeling your live show. Also, what was Glow in the Dark about it?... I'm just sayin'

A Day Late and a Dollar Short

Halloween was yesterday, I know this. I was 2-pac this year, and though I don't think anyone got it (a skeleton with "Thug Life" tattoed on it's chest) it was a fun costume and people were nice to me. All good, aside from the white face makeup now stuck on my headphones. Anyways, I didn't get around to posting this before, but it's probably my favorite halloween related song.

Kid Koala - Tricks and Treats

The Game Done Changed

If you're a dj dork like me who gets off on improved bug fixes with new versions of serato and stuff like that, then you may already know about these guys hooking up. I've seen the future, and it's a brave new world where all dj's look like they're just checking email. Technologically mindblowing, visually mad boring.

Ableton/Serato Partnership

Internet sucks in China

Jeez... Today has been one of those days where I feel like I'm watching the precious hours of my life pass by while I wait for web pages to load up. What the deal China?!... Can't we all just get down with some real deal high speed internet? This song sums up my feelings in a nutshell.

Fugazi - Waiting Room

Joe Strummer

If you haven't seen the documentary about Joe Strummer, "The Future is Unwritten" it's recommendable according to me. I can't say I've ever been hugely into the Clash aside from some of their radio hits, but this was just a great documentary with an awesome soundtrack of music played both by the Clash and on Joe Strummer's radio program that he used to broadcast internationally out of the U.K. Big up to Leo and Katrina from Free the Wax for hosting the "24 Frames Per Second" documentary nights on their rooftop and exposing me to new media and cool stuff and being generally great people.

The Clash - The Magnificent Seven

Test one two...

Ok, seems that blogger.com has been unblocked in China. Meanwhile, free-bananas.com has been sadly lost by the Bananas Soundsystem (guess we didn't pay our annual dues) and is now a website about fruit, not fruity music and parties, etc... Anyways, I've never blogged before with blogger, so I'm just testing things out. Hopefully I won't be lazy about this and will actually keep this one up and moving.
Let's start it off with a classic hip hop joint that I just recently heard and remembered "Oh, yeah, this song is amazing."

Outkast - Spottieottiedopaliscious