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Old 12-31-2012, 01:08 PM   #132 (permalink)
Mrd00d
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I'm taken aback by your opinions, Manky. I respect you and your opinions but damn that was a hell of a tirade. I don't want to break that apart but basically I can relate to Aesop but I can see how one might not be able to. Aesop Rock is someone I feel almost kinship with. I feel we've gone through similar things and after listening to his work for nearly a decade I have found so much in common with him. He's uplifted me and inspired me, made me cry for a variety of reasons, taught me things, and made me think critically. And I don't say that as if it's a bad thing obviously, but Manky, it sounds like you don't want to think critically when listening to Aesop Rock. That's fine, but you might not understand or find anything to relate to. I love English language so deciphering all the metaphors and such is the fun part. The imagery is fascinating.

Quote:
I take my seat atop the Brooklyn Bridge
With a Coke and a bag of chips
To watch a thousand lemmings plummet
Just because the first one slipped.
Why carry on listening to him? It's up to you, but it took me a couple years (2-3) of listening to his albums regularly for me to be familiar with or even really hear 50% of what goes on. So rewarding it is to hear a song for the 20th time and hear something new and then the 50th time and something else pops up. I find that rewarding. I'll be listening to him for years to come so as to hopefully catch more new stuff, especially from the new records. And here's to more albums, because I can always use more Aesop.

It's funny that the thread "Deciphering Aesop Rock" that you linked... if you scroll down, I was actively up in there trying to motivate people to decipher songs with me.

Here's one I came up with:

Spoiler for Check it::
Verse 1:

Flash that buttery gold, jittery zeitgeist
Wither by the watering hole, what a patrol
What are we, to heart huckabee, art ****ery suddenly?
Not enough young in his lung for the water wing
Colorfully vulgar poacher out of mulch like
'Imma pull the pulse out a soldier and bolt.' (Fine)
Sign of the time we elapsed
When a primate climb up the spine and attach
Eye for an eye, by the bog's life swamps and vines
They get a rise out of frogs and flies
So when a dog fights hog-tied prize sorta costs a life
The mouths water on a fork and knife
And the allure isn't right
No score on a war-torn beach
Where the cash cows actually beef
Blood turns wine when I leak for police
Like 'That's not a riot, it's a feast, let's eat.'


Go ahead and flash your chains and flaunt your cash, but it's hard to hold onto isn't it? Nowadays, nowhere is safe, feeling skittish, (Zeitgeist= "Noun: The defining spirit or mood of a particular period of history as shown by the ideas and beliefs of the time: "'The story captured the zeitgeist of the late 1960s'.")
Grow old shooting the **** about what you did, usually talking out your ass, instead of doing. What a life!

[This following section could use feedback, I can tell]
(Huckabees is a fictional store, a chain of "big-box" department stores akin to Wal-Mart or Target, in the 2004 "I Heart Huckabees", an existential indie comedy)
What are we, to shop big box, screw the small business people, and who are we to defile art such as is done in the mainstream so often lately?
Too old for the floaties; not young enough for waterwings. Time to learn to float.

[Vulgar: ignorant, bad taste; or ordinary, common
Colorful: bright; stands out

Either way, those are contradictory. Bright, ignorant; or, ordinary but stands out
Take what you can from the contradiction and this next segment is also up in the air but I'm taking a stab at it]

The military goes in without a right to and takes what isn't theirs under false pretenses, but when our troops start dying and the reserves are getting taken out as well, and they're all out of human fodder to throw at the situation, they hightail it out with whatever they managed to get/get done and call the fallen soldiers heroes, mission accomplished. Thank you Pvt. Mulch!

It's a sign of the times, when we've got more worries and problems than ever.
("Monkeys/Primates on the back" are worries, regrets, anger and guilt that never keep quiet and refuse to sit still...By "having a monkey on your back," a negative situation has taken on a life of its own and is willfully imposing itself on you.)

[Best guess:]
They made a system of poor vs. poor, poor vs. middle class, where we're fighting amongst each other, revenge lifestyle, capitalism, quietly, the richest get more rich. They get a kick out of watching us folks still stuck in the swamp while they're swinging on vines. Also, they are watching as the frogs eat the flies. The middle class eating the poor to try to stay alive.

Someone else suggested something to do with the rich enjoy purchasing cheap real estate such as swampland and turning into a cash cow, like what Disney did in Florida.

Our greed and desire for material goods ruins other lives, but we just want ours. We care not, mostly, about the child in the sweatshop in China or the cartel wars in Mexico from American drug consumption, etc.

The wars aren't worth fighting for. Too many losers on a battlefield for either side to really call victory, And the prize is never worth the cost in valuable human lives.

Killing people is only acceptable for the military/police, and the thrill is too strong.

[Hook] And I will remember your name and face
On the day you are judged by "The Funhouse" cast
And I will rejoice in your fall from grace
With a cane to the sky like, "None shall pass."


(The Funhouse was a 1981 horror film about 4 teens who spend the night in a funhouse and, after witnessing a murder, are killed one by one. Three teens die, as well as the two murderous carnies. The cast: Kevin Conway, William Finley, Southern Mississippi University football star Cooper Huckabee, and two-time Academy Award-nominee Sylvia Miles. There's another Huckabee instance. If we say the characters, most ended up dead by the end of the movie; but the cast seems to be alive... hmm... we'll go with this for now but correct me if you think of something else

I will remember you when you are dead, and being judged for heaven or hell. And I will be glad to find that you were deemed unworthy of heaven, and sent to hell. Seemingly, none are worthy any more.

Wasn't sure if I needed to mention this, but Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings stood on a bridge and faced a giant demon so that the rest of the fellowship could escape. He stood strong with his staff and declared "You shall not pass" and drove his staff into the bridge, and .... the demon didn't pass, and then Gandalf falls off the bridge with the demon.

[Verse II/III]
Now if you never had a day a snow cone couldn't fix
You wouldn't relate to the rogue vocoder blitz
How he spoke through a NoDoz motor on the fritz
Cause he wouldn't play rollover fetch like a bitch
And express no regrets, though he isn't worth a homeowner's piss
To the jokers who pose by the glitz

(Fine...)
Sign of the swine in the swarm
When a king is a whore who comply and conform
Miles outside of the eye of the storm
With a siphon to lure out a prize and award
While avoiding the vile and bizarre that is violence and war
True blue triumph is more!
Like, "Wait, let him snake up out of the centerfold."
"Let it break the walls of Jericho."
"Ready? Go!"
Sat where the old, cardboard city folk
Swap tales with heads like every other penny throw


If your biggest problems can be fixed by taking your mind off of it, going to get a ice cream treat, or something, you're not going to relate to the dishonest autotune aural assaults we had on our radio airwaves [tongue in cheek]; basically listen to music you can relate to or that you enjoy for your own reasons. Not for status or for friends, but for yourself. Don't go being a thug if you're an honor student and live with your mother. Don't try to relate to the dishonest messages on the radio, that's for sure.

One who runs on energy supplements, NoDoz, caffeine, who is completely out of energy, just striving to make ends meet. Paycheck to paycheck warrior, but he refuses to play by their rules. He also doesn't want to let money run his life, he just wants enough to get by without worry. But even that is a challenge. But it's a challenge accepted; to hell with the fact that he's poor. He's rich in spirit. He didn't bend, breakdown, and sell his self for a bigger paycheck. While that doesn't mean much to those ladies and gents out there that judge others by their status symbols such as fashion, vehicle make and model, etc., it matters to him that he stays true and not be sucked into that world of excess.

Sign of the pigs in the crowd. Materialistic, greedy, pigs. And there's many of them. The materialistic outnumber the simple men of the earth by far too many.
When the ruler isn't governing, but playing to his own interests. He does what he's told by HIS superiors.
Far from the scene of war and turmoil, the government can send in little military pawns to do their bloody work and when it's finished, they remotely inherit their prize. Never had to leave the comfort of the office/home. Meanwhile, thousands have died and for what? [Insert precious resource here][Oil?] That's what they call victory!

Like, let's let it fester in this soldier instead. Let's let it break down his impenetrable walls of emotion.

(Someone said when you flip a penny, what the face of the coin does is rapidly switch between heads and tails)

When you're down with the homeless folks, the homeless 'heads' will tell tales about how things were (similarly ****ed up back then as they are now, just slightly worse now) with each other and any passerby that might spare some change.

Okay, woke to a grocery list
Goes like this: Duty and death
Anyone object, come stand in the way
You could be my little Snake River Canyon today
And I ran with a chain of commands
And a jet pack strapped where the backstab lands if it can (Fine...)

Sign of the vibe in the crowd
When I cut a belly open to find what climb out
That's quite a bit of gusto he muster up
To make a dark horse rush like, "Enough's enough!"
It must've... struck a nerve so they huff and puff
Till all the king's men fluster and cluster****
And it's a beautiful thing
To my people who keep an impressive wingspan even when the cubicle shrink
You got to pull up the intruder by the root of the weed
NY chew through the machine


Only thing on the forecast is what is required of me, and then death.
Anyone going to get in the way of what's required of me, and there will just be a work around. It still will be done.
(Snake River Canyon is a large canyon formed by the Snake River in the Magic Valley region of southern Idaho. It is well known as the site of an unsuccessful 1974 attempt by Evel Knievel to jump it in the Skycycle X-2. Basically Evel wanted to jump the Grand Canyon on his motorcycle, but since Dept. of Agriculture was like "No" he bought his own land near Snake River Canyon, Id., "bought his own damn canyon" and went to jump it but **** didn't go well. But he walked away from a 600 foot fall with only minor injuries...)

And he has his orders, and he's got the tools he needs. And he's watching his back.

(Dark horse is a term used to describe a little-known person or thing that emerges to prominence, especially in a competition of some sort. Started in horseracing, like with a new horse, the betters wouldn't be sure of its level of skill.)

Seeing what the people are made of. Despite the vibe, or the way things appear, when you really get to the heart of it, are things really good? That's a bit of courage he's gathered, to challenge things as they stand and be new, different, unique.
All the 'betters' are like WTF is this guy good or bad or what? and they still have no idea. Now they know they don't like Aesop, because he confuses them. They couldn't market this if they tried.

Even when life is tightening down on you, keep your mind and soul open. Embrace friend and foe, alike, in your wingspan. You're better than that, and them. But when somebody stomps in unwanted, you gotta remove it from the source. Don't dick around, really finish it off for good and for final. New York is fighting back against the man, the machine, etc.
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Last edited by Mrd00d; 12-31-2012 at 01:15 PM.
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