Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} City Kid A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success by Nelson George Cookie Consent and Choices. NPR’s sites use cookies, similar tracking and storage technologies, and information about the device you use to access our sites (together, “cookies”) to enhance your viewing, listening and user experience, personalize content, personalize messages from NPR’s sponsors, provide social media features, and analyze NPR’s traffic. This information is shared with social media, sponsorship, analytics, and other vendors or service providers. See details. You may click on “ Your Choices ” below to learn about and use cookie management tools to limit use of cookies when you visit NPR’s sites. You can adjust your cookie choices in those tools at any time. If you click “ Agree and Continue ” below, you acknowledge that your cookie choices in those tools will be respected and that you otherwise agree to the use of cookies on NPR’s sites. Nelson George & Opinions on Eminem and Passion Pit. Author and critic Nelson George talks with Jim and Greg about his new book City Kid: A Writer’s Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success . Later Jim and Greg review Eminem ’s new album Relapse . Music News. After much debate, France has passed its three strikes law against filesharers. That means that if you are caught illegally downloading three times your internet could be shut down. It also signals an alliance between the French government and the record industry, and according to the EU , a limiting of personal freedom. Speaking of limited personal freedom, the Chinese government continues to hinder access to popular music. Eager to curb potential protests, China ’s Ministry of Culture has cancelled major Oasis shows and moved the major MIDI festival from centrally located Beijing . Jim is not usually a fan of censorship, but actually favors an Oasis crackdown. While we in this country have been busy with American Idol , Europe ans were anxiously anticipating the winner of the biggest song contest in the world. This year’s Eurovision winner is Alexander Rybeck of Norway . More than 100 million people watched his song Fairytale take the crown. Of course, Jim and Greg don’t take this contest too seriously, but it’s nice to know that the love of schlock pop is universal. Nelson George. Music critic, author and screenwriter Nelson George joins Jim and Greg on the show this week. His many books have become cornerstones on American thinking about hip hop , soul and pop music. Now he has a new book out called City Kid: A Writer’s Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post- Soul Success . After years of exploring the lives of others, including Chris Rock , James Brown and Russell Simmons , Nelson took himself on as a subject. He relays his experience growing up in Brownsville . Music and art gave him a way to experience the outside world and later became his ticket to success. He even made his way to Hollywood , writing and producing the hip hop parody film CB4 . Relapse Eminem. One of hip hop’s most successful artists is Eminem . After a five-year wait, he’s back with a new album called Relapse . The Detroit rapper has again sought help from producer Dr. Dre , and is again relying on violence and misogyny to shock and entertain listeners. The problem-it’s not so shocking anymore. Both Jim and Greg were bored by this record, and Greg hears boredom in Eminem’s own voice. Perhaps Em should try a little good taste for a change. He gets a double Trash It . Manners Passion Pit. The next album up for review is Manners , the debut from Boston -based Passion Pit . The electro-pop quintet is helmed by Michael Angelakos . It’s his falsetto that dominates the album, in addition to the lush, swirling synths. In fact, the music is a little too lush and sugary for Mr. Kot, who wishes there were a few more moments of calm. He gives Manners a Try It rating. Jim was certain Greg would be all over this record. He hears the music as a successful, indie take on ‘80s disco and gives the album a Buy It . Jim and Greg’s choices for the Desert Island Jukebox are often influenced by current events or discussion in an episode. But this week, Jim just wanted to hear some Buzzcocks . Their album Singles Going Steady is one of the great compilation albums of all time. But the one great single that didn’t make it on is the band’s 1979 song I Believe . Is it a manifesto? Or just a joke? Jim doesn’t know, but he’ll be happy listening over and over again. Featured Songs. Serge Gainsbourg, Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde, Fontana, 1968 Run DMC, It’s Like That, Run-DMC, Arista, 1984 Martha & the Vandellas, Heat Wave, Heat Wave, Gordy, 1963 Jay-Z, Heart of the City, The Blueprint, Roc-A-Fella, 2001 Kurtis Blow, The Breaks, Kurtis Blow, Mercury, 1980 Teddy Pendergrass, Turn Off The Lights, Teddy, Legacy, 1979 Grandmaster Flash, The Message, The Message, Sugar Hill, 1982 NWA, Straight Outta Compton, Straight Outta Compton, Ruthless, 1988 Whitney Houston, Saving All My Love For You, Whitney Houston, Arista, 1985 Michael Jackson, Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough, Off the Wall, Epic,1979 Dr. Dre, Nuthin’ But a G Thang, The Chronic, Priority, 1992 Badia, Danger, Donne l’alerte, Le Son’Art, 2009 J*Davey, Hi Sun, The Beauty in Distortion, Interdependent Media, 2008 Skull Gang, I am the Club, Skull Gang, eOne Music, 2009 Eminem, Crack a Bottle, Relapse, Aftermath Entertainment, 2009 Eminem, My Mom, Relapse, Aftermath Entertainment, 2009 Passion Pit, Sleepyhead, Manners, Frenchkiss, 2009 Passion Pit, The Reeling, Manners, Frenchkiss, 2009 Passion Pit, Swimming in the Flood, Manners, Frenchkiss, 2009 The Buzzcocks, I Believe, A Different Kind of Tension, United Artists, 1979 Johnny Thunders & the Heartbreakers, Get off the Phone, Single, Beggars Banquet, 1979 Willie Nelson, A Song for You, Willie and Family Live, Columbia, 1978 Green Day, Last Night On Earth, 21st Century Breakdown, Reprise, 2009 John Lennon, Isolation, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, Apple, 1970. Footnotes. France passes law against filesharers Chinese authorities cancel Oasis performance Alexander Rybak Nelson George Eminem Dr. Dre Passion Pit Buzzcocks. Dear Listeners, For more than 15 years, Sound Opinions was a production of WBEZ, Chicago's public radio station. Now that the show is independent, we're inviting you to join the band and lend a hand! We need your support more than ever because now we have to do all the behind-the-scenes work that WBEZ handled before (like buying insurance and paying for podcast hosting, ugh). Plus, we have some exciting ideas we'd like to try now that there's no one to tell us no! Please consider becoming a Sound Opinions member by giving whatever you can via Patreon or with a one-time donation through PayPal. Thanks for listening, and thanks for your support! Cookie Consent and Choices. NPR’s sites use cookies, similar tracking and storage technologies, and information about the device you use to access our sites (together, “cookies”) to enhance your viewing, listening and user experience, personalize content, personalize messages from NPR’s sponsors, provide social media features, and analyze NPR’s traffic. This information is shared with social media, sponsorship, analytics, and other vendors or service providers. See details. You may click on “ Your Choices ” below to learn about and use cookie management tools to limit use of cookies when you visit NPR’s sites. You can adjust your cookie choices in those tools at any time. If you click “ Agree and Continue ” below, you acknowledge that your cookie choices in those tools will be respected and that you otherwise agree to the use of cookies on NPR’s sites. City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success. Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Brisk slight read that really comes down to demographics. Are the 70s and 80s in New York fascinating to you? The birth of hip-hop and the mid 90s Back Arts movement. For me, yes yes and more yes. So I loved City Kid. You may not care. This is a book with a choir it preaches to. I am in that choir. But there are moments--about families, maturity and growing up-- that are transcendant, that remind me of Colson Whitehead's "Sag Harbor" which I loved even though I'm not black and from New York. And that's why I'd recommend it, even if you're standing outside this church, wondering about the shouts of joy inside. ( ) Brooklyn Boheme Chronicles Fort Greene's Artistic Peak. Filmmaker Nelson George gives insight into the neighborhood that brought you Spike Lee and Wesley Snipes, among others. From Spike Lee to Erykah Badu, Fort Greene has been responsible for producing some of the most successful Black artists in pop culture, and a soon to be released documentary chronicles the window in the neighborhood's history where these success stories lived within blocks of each other. Local filmmaker Nelson George is in the post-production stages of his latest documentary, Brooklyn Boheme, with the film set to be released by the end of the year. The movie is an expansion of sections from his 2009 book, City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success," that also touched on the emerging world of artists in Fort Greene from the mid-80s to late-90s. "When I started doing the events to promote the book, people were most interested in that period," said George. "I thought it was important to fully document that era." Find out what's happening in Fort Greene-Clinton Hill with free, real-time updates from Patch. A Fort Greene resident for the last 26 years, George moved here in 1985 while working as a music editor for Billboard. Shortly after arriving, he became friends with then-burgeoning filmmaker Spike Lee, who lived two blocks away from George on Adelphi St. and Myrtle Ave. "I actually loaned him a few hundred bucks at one time, because we were all scrambling and I was the only one who had a real job," said George. "Spike had a meeting with me because he wanted to get involved in music videos, but he wasn't ever able to crack through in that field." Find out what's happening in Fort Greene-Clinton Hill with free, real-time updates from Patch. Shortly after, Lee gained national acclaim with his debut film, She's Gotta Have It. Several of the dream sequences from the movie were even filmed in George's first apartment in the neighborhood on Willoughby St. and Carlton Ave. George said that Lee's national praise as a "Black Woody Allen" was the catalyst for Fort Greene's arts community to take off. "This was a place where you didn't feel limited," said George. "People began to think that if he can shoot a movie, then I can compose a song, or I can write a book." Over the next two decades, actor Wesley Snipes, comedian Chris Rock, and hip-hop artists Mos Def and Common, among others, emerged as stars while living in the neighborhood. Several of them stuck around for several years afterwards. George cited the cheap rent at the time and close proximity to Manhattan as two of the primary reasons why such a successful arts community in Fort Greene was possible. "The punks on the Lower East Side in the 1980s were living in these hovels for just under $1,000, but I was able to live in a duplex with wood floors and a garden for the same price," said George. In addition to a higher quality of life, George also said the type of art coming out of Fort Greene was radically different than what was being produced in lower Manhattan. "A lot of the punk and new wave that was coming out of Manhattan when I was first moved here was pretty angry," said George. "We had critiques of politics and race, but it wasn't angry. It was about people dealing with complexities of race and identity and sex." By the late 90s, the arts community in Fort Greene was still visible, but had quieted down somewhat. Citing privacy issues, Lee and Rock moved out of the neighborhood, and several of the other celebrities that emerged from Fort Greene followed. George said that while he doesn't rule out Fort Greene having another arts renaissance, there are other areas of Brooklyn experiencing a similar boom to Fort Greene's two-decade run. "When I think of young Black artists these days, I think that Bed-Stuy is becoming for Black artists what Williamsburg has become for emerging white artists," said George. "That being said, there's definitely still a Black presence in Fort Greene, so of course it's possible that this sort of hugely successful arts community could happen again."