Why do women wear high heels ?

One of Life's little mysteries...


Like.. Why did the kamikaze pilots wear helmets?


Beats me.

Back To Niceness 21/02/2009

Yo!

Besides seducing your girlfriends, I also host a radioshow called Back To Niceness with ODB (Old Dirty Brusseleir) DJ Kwak. You can download all the latest episodes on backtoniceness.podomatic.com.

This week, we had DJ Lefto and DJ Simbad in the studio doing a little guest mix before they burned down the house at Tavernier (Brussels) Wonderful Party on Saturday. I think maybe for contractual reasons (FM Brussel <> Studio Brussel) I'm not supposed to put Lefto's name on here, but what the heck Shreck. As you can hear this time DJ Kwakkermans grabbed the mic for co-hosting duties. As you can hear he never shaves his throat.

Nice !

PS: Also I'm reading a good book on Cinema called Cassavetes Directs.
Do you care?

Blogfully Yours,

Don Beda

Diva's and Roommates

Day #2, how are you? Doing nothing being cool, so true, listening to old skool on Youtube, Amanda Diva in the cube.. Preparing the big trip to Venezuela, thinking of a master plan, but man.. Listen. This is not your normal blog. It's just me talking straight from the Soul, ice cold.

What have I learned today? Well, I'm living with people who have all passed the age of 30, and it feels like I'm back in College. Auch! Actually, when reading these Rules for College Roommates I realized .. this is pretty much My Homey Life right now:

Rules for Living With Thirty-Plus-Year-Old Geezers :

3. Don't buy anything for the apartment, use and abuse other roommates items until they are destroyed and wait for them to buy a new one.

4. Feel free to leave any and all dirty dishes wherever you please, certainly one of your roommates has taken classes in house-cleaning 101 and will clean up after you. Just because you are big enough to make a mess shouldn't obligate you to be big enough to clean it up.

6. Leave all electrical appliances, especially the lights on at all times--we are paying for the apartment, and there is no need to conserve energy--let other less important people do that.

9. Never, ever, ever, ever empty the trash--if your roommate won't do it, just let the apartment stink. You were not born a garbage man, so why lower yourself to that level especially when you are a princess?

11. Make sure that you leave as much hair as possible on the bathroom sinks and in the shower. Don't clean out your brush over the trash can, of course your roommates want to look at pieces of your broken hair each and everytime they go to the bathroom.

13. Feel free to eat any food that is located in the kitchen. Whether it be in your cabinet or not, it is free for the taking. Even if its not open, your roommates shop for the entire apartment, not themselves. Oh, and if your roommate questions you about missing food, pretend you know nothing about it--you can always blame it on the cookie monster.

I'm just kidding of course, the reality is much worse. I have dreams of people attacking me with axes because I didn't say "hello" in the morning! And I'll admit I do indulge in Rules 3, 4, 6, 9, 11 and 13.. No, apart from the roommates' occasional shouting, nervous breakdowns, paranoid headtrips and door-slamming, I guess it's pretty much a Normal Household. Plus the good thing about living with weed-heads is: 1) free dope 2) they get paranoid so you can fuck with their heads like that. Change the furniture around a bit, look at 'em sideways, don't talk.. they go nuts!. It fucks with their routine and self-esteem, apparently.

Hey, Life is a joke ;)

Cruelly Yours,

Don Beda

Weekends

My girl Yam said I should blog more. In fact, it's true.. I do have things to say.
Consider this diary entry number #1.

Quite a weekend.. Started off on Thursday at Botanique (brussels) for Day Two of Boutik Rock. This is a contest for Belgian bands, mostly from the french-speaking part of our little hunky-ass country. As if it's not bad enough to divide a tiny country into two pieces, this music fest, much like the Rockrally (same idea but on the Flemish part) promises to let us discover new and exciting Belgian bands. Really? Where was Family Jammin'? The Elements? Well.. the problem is, since ages both these contests (there is equality in backwardness) are mostly rock-oriented, overlooking the fact that it's now 2009 in a globalized world where a whole lot of funky, soulful, groovy, heavy genres have surpassed the shoegazing stage these "new" alt.rock, folk.pussy, anti.emo bands of white middle-class music nerds are still in.

But hey, Boutik Rock promises us "25% urban music", what a treat. I can be fairly short about Day Two: missed the first band waiting for a woman. Next, a very basic live performance by Veence Hanao, quite eery as a "poète maudit" spoken word recital.. but we was expecting a music concert, Inspector Clouseau. Some art.rock wanking by a band called Thot (change the name to Bhof, maybe?), nujazzhiphop by Ntoumos, showcasing (the feisty trumpet not withstanding) a lot of things I despise about Belgian bands trying to imitate the Black nusouljazzhiphop thing (no competition, you ain't been born singing gospel in church dude) : middle-of-the-road musical ambition and (wow) let's invite a DJ on the set but still give the guitarplayer enough room for a boring solo. Oh and Joshua's kinda hip now, so let's have a black guy rappin' who also sings in a more rock-like voice. Do I sound harsh? I can't feel the vibe if it ain't there. Same with some heavy metal band who's name I forget. An exhaustive music journalist I am not. Let's just say all in all most bands lacked Originality and Guts.

Daaamn. Can't wait for next tuesday, get my dose of real hip hop at Check The Rhyme.

Well, it seems like this country is made up of no-taste having music critics (keeping the day job, of course) half-assed bands and promotors, a few exceptions not withstanding. Back to Boutik Rock. The only band that operated on a European level, had the whole crowd shaking and asking for MORE, who delivered an ace concert with ska-showstoppers: the Moon Invaders. Nuff said. And nuff respect for a good show. I'm guessing they won't even be in the Top 3.

I'm not gonna front: I'm no objective observer. I only witnessed one day of this music contest and I hope that the other days had more interesting bands on offer. Yep, I'm prejudiced. And I can, and will, highly recommend and support Le Baron5 (who played Boutik Rock on Day One) because my ex-drummer plays in the group. Easy! This is, after all, my blog.

Oh. I ain't done yet. Friday was spent dreaming of Venezuela, not going to a benefit happening to save a low-quality neo-liberal flemish paper and sleeping next to a coughing girl. Saturday was all emotion and being jacked by fools who play the game sideways. Or is it me? It's all good. Players.. Actually, we don't participate. The Wonderful party was just that, after a couple of beers and seeing talking people smile, knowing we'll be friends forever. Sunday ended in an overdose of pancakes, kisses and listening to women talk about men like me, but not me..

Feels good, being me.

Gracefully Yours, Don Beda.

Music of the past, music of the phuture..

72 Soul - Still Waters was released about a year ago on 72movements and thewab.com. It was largely overlooked and misunderstood by critics in the world of commercial and underground music. At the time I was just.. putting it out there, without much conviction or promotion. It was just my little headtrip, my off-centre baby. The album, then, is a lazy downtempo expression of the soul of a soft-spoken man with a preference for nouvelle vague films (Pierrot Le Fou) and falling in love with young girls. A concept album? Let's just say critics still need to develop a new vocabulary to decribe my style..

Download the digital version with new artwork HERE.

72 Soul – Still Waters (2008)
Available on i-tunes, amazon and cd-baby
http://cdbaby.com/cd/72soul
http://www.annorax.be/home
http://www.amazon.com/Still-Waters/dp/B001BOZT0K/ref=sr_f3_1?ie=UTF8&s=dmusic&qid=1233920011&sr=103-1

Contact 72soul@gmail.com if you wanna support me
and buy this CD.


Transcending Project was as a collaboration between 72 Soul and
Akello Uchenna. At the time I just got my new computer and internet connection, I got hooked to Myspace and through some strange herbal space vibe I connected with this wonderfully mushroom'd beat-making brother from North Carolina. I never even knew what he looked like 'till after the "Change" album was released in 2006. Akello Uchenna released his Green Mint album shortly after on innercurrent.com.
Transcending Project – Change (2006)
Available on i-tunes and amazon
http://www.amazon.com/Change/dp/B000R0196M

Enjoy the vibe,

Don Beda

Bon vieux temps

Bon Vieux Temps - French Connection Mix by 72Soul (early 2008)

Needs another loop so we added a flute

You gotta study the scriptures, to get the full picture. Here's a little sonic break-down of the sample used by Diamond D on one of his songs of the classic "Stunts, blunts and hip hop" album. An album I finally copped at the Ghent Mac Fly store, be sure to drop in that store when in Ghent! Do the knowledge.

New York Shit - Bus-a-bus


I Went For Mine - Diamond D

I Went For Mine - Diamond D