Sunday, January 07, 2007

This Blog Is My Public Storage Cabinet

Sasha Frere-Jones is interviewed by Gawker. Never does Sasha fail to bring me exactly to where I didn't know I wanted to be.
"I like high intensity, bouillon-style forms: pop songs, essays, poems, photos. Blogs can link to songs and poems and photos. Right? So if the bits all line up correctly, blogs create an extra high-density poetics. Blogs are flexible and fast; with no editor, you don't have to wait for yes or brace for no. The blogger can do parodies without consulting the Legal Department; drum up instant audience participation; or shift into mayhem."
Sasha writes about pop music for The New Yorker and maintains his own blog. I read both avidly. Before I read the interview, I had no idea no idea how much I liked London-based MC/rapper Dizzee Rascal. I pay attention to Sasha's likes and sometimes add to my own collection of likes.

Sasha on swag:
My new boss doesn't want us to accept gifts, so I must give wise men the Heisman. The old days were another matter. I was like a Senator playing PACs off each other. One day I'd get an XXL Jeru tha Damaja shirt, for no money. The next day, I'd receive a powder blue XXXL Nas shirt that made me look fat and harmless. (As my lifelong dream is to become fat and dangerous, this was a complicated feeling.) One day-this was such a day-I got an XXL t-shirt bearing the name of an MC I had never heard of. I lived well.
Instructions from Sasha, the guru:
Walk slowly and calmly out of your apartment building. When you reach street level, stop. Sit on the curb. Watch the passing traffic. Smell the smells. Hear the voices of laughing children and the lovers who speak to each other. Do not, at any point, become weak. Do not give away your keys to a pedestrian. When you have achieved satori, please call me. I will hang up on you.
Yes, master.

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