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"slug": "bay-area-hip-hop-1980s",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927363\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-800x450.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927363\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-800x450.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-1020x574.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-160x90.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-768x432.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-1536x864.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_.png 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In the mid-1980s, after years of street dance, DJing and graffiti sharing equal space, rapping took center stage. The Bay Area’s bass-heavy sound would arrive at the end of the decade. (Clockwise from top left: Too Short, MC Hammer, Dominique DiPrima, Club Nouveau, and Motorcycle Mike.) \u003ccite>(Steve Ringman/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images; Al Pereira/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images; SFSU Television Archives; Raymond Boyd/Getty Images; Hodisk Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Editor’s note\u003c/strong>: This story is part of \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop\">That’s My Word\u003c/a>\u003cem>, KQED’s year-long exploration of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop\">Bay Area hip-hop\u003c/a> history, with new content dropping all throughout 2023.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 4.6875em;float: left;line-height: 0.733em;padding: 0.05em 0.1em 0 0;font-family: times, serif, georgia\">I\u003c/span>t’s a wintry January evening when Bas-1 brings me to Del the Funky Homosapien’s house in the East Bay. For much of the afternoon, Bas — the \u003ca href=\"https://eastbayexpress.com/old-school-fool-1/\">Oakland native\u003c/a> who’s worked with Digital Underground and released \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=bas-1+full+album+mentally+astute\">his own solo records\u003c/a> — has schooled me on the origins of the Bay Area hip-hop sound.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bas lists numerous rappers from the ’80s, and not just Todd “Too Short” Shaw, the East Oakland rapper who famously hustled homemade cassette tapes. I’ve never heard most of the names Bas mentions: MC Chocolate Milk, Windell Baby Doll, Davy Def, Buddy Bean, Reggie Reg Rock Ski.ter, M.C. Tracy, Rock Master Fresh, Nic Nack, Kimmie Fresh, and the Acorn Crew with Grandmaster Fresh (a rapper later known as “DJ Daryl” Anderson, famed for producing tracks like 415’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuZ6CAwZmys\">Side Show\u003c/a>” and 2Pac’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAJfDP3b5_U\">Keep Ya Head Up\u003c/a>”).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID='arts_13924126']Many of these early Bay Area rappers never put out a commercially available record. Instead, their work is mostly confined to locally distributed cassette tapes — collectors call them “gray tapes” — that are now nearly impossible to find. They publicly broadcasted these tapes throughout neighborhoods, utilizing boomboxes and car stereos as well as stereos at house parties. “None of them sound like Too Short,” says Bas. “Some of these people didn’t put out recordings, but they were known.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the 1980s, Bay Area hip-hop was an artistic movement struggling for a distinct identity. The first half of the decade was defined by street dance and aerosol art as much as rap and DJing. But as local youth began to absorb the sounds emanating from national hotspots like New York, they created a distinctive style all their own — one that would make a global impact in the years to come.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Del’s house, Bas queues up an extraordinary live video clip of \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5u3eiG9BtdE\">Mac Mill, Emperor E, and DJ Anthony “K-os” Bryant\u003c/a> performing at \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11690787/when-oakland-was-a-chocolate-city-a-brief-history-of-festival-at-the-lake\">Festival at the Lake\u003c/a>, a now-defunct annual event held at Lake Merritt, in 1988. (Alex “Naru” Reece, who organized the showcase where Mac Mill performed, clarified in a follow-up conversation that it didn’t happen during Festival at the Lake. He also says the showcase was filmed in 1986 for a 1988 video compilation.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mac Mill and Emperor E go back and forth, trading sound effects and dense Oakland slang as K-os cuts and scratches copies of Long Island band Original Concept’s deathless bass classic, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai4VC0NUxl4\">Knowledge Me\u003c/a>.” Bas praises Mac Mill’s unusual “Arabian” style, which the latter deployed nearly a decade later with the 1995 single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_f0TB3Igro\">Arabian Hump\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5u3eiG9BtdE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, Bas-1 calls Chris “CJ Flash” Jourdan, an OG who worked with Timex Social Club, the Berkeley teen band whose 1986 electro-funk classic, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVce2IeYcTg\">Rumors\u003c/a>,” represented the first national breakthrough for Bay Area hip-hop culture. As Bas broadcasts CJ Flash’s voice from his phone through Del’s stereo equipment, CJ Flash spends the next hour or so describing a fledging scene where poppers and boogaloo dancers, not rappers or DJs, were the prime attractions. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These ensembles drew from a street-dance tradition that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13891300/reclaiming-the-legacy-of-oaklands-boogaloo-dance-culture\">dates back decades\u003c/a>. Their kinetic performances ignited crowds at high schools, house parties, and public spaces like Justin Herman Plaza and Union Square in San Francisco and UC Berkeley’s Sproul Plaza. Battles even took place on the street, with crews traveling to different neighborhoods around the region to seek out rivals. “You could meet with people on their turf and get down, and hopefully not get thumped in the process,” says CJ Flash. Many Bay Area hip-hop pioneers got their start in dance crews, including Club Nouveau’s Jay King (who pop-locked with The Unknowns), DJ King Tech (who was known as Wizard, and danced with Master City Breakers), and Flash himself (who \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub1TtnI4dh8\">performed with UFO\u003c/a>).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub1TtnI4dh8\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By contrast, rapping was a relatively new and undeveloped skill, the lowest element on the hip-hop totem pole. “Anybody could rap. Anybody could say a bunch of basic rhyme words with no style and flavor,” says Bas, noting as an aside that “most folks couldn’t understand the lyrics anyway.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How is a discussion about street dancers connected to an exploration of the Bay Area hip-hop sound? It’s important to understand the conditions under which the genre emerged locally.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Turntables, Casios and Homemade Tapes\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As KQED’s Eric Arnold explains in “\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13924126/the-bay-area-was-hip-hop-before-there-was-hip-hop\">The Bay Area Was Hip-Hop Before There Was Hip-Hop\u003c/a>,” foundational elements such as spoken word, funk, and rhythm & blues existed locally well before New Jersey trio Sugarhill Gang arrived with “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKTUAESacQM\">Rapper’s Delight\u003c/a>” in the fall of 1979.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID='arts_13923978']At the same time, the Bay Area was not the Bronx, where breakbeat culture catalyzed and fermented. Bronx DJs, MCs and B-boys like Kool Herc, Grandmaster Flash, Afrika Bambaataa, Grandmaster Caz, the Rock Steady Crew and many others gained renown among mid-’70s New York youth long before “Rapper’s Delight.” By contrast, as CJ Flash explains, it took much of the 1980s for Bay Area youth to develop the cadences and rhythms we now associate with modern rap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Back then, enterprising musicians couldn’t purchase studio software and distribute their own music on an internet platform like Soundcloud. Recording equipment was expensive. An unsigned artist needed the financial and business expertise to manufacture vinyl and cassettes with artwork, much less convince record stores like Leopold’s Records in Berkeley to carry them. (Recordable CD-Rs weren’t widely used until the 1990s.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This helps explain why so many rappers utilized turntables and Casio keyboards, and then recorded their songs using the microphone input on relatively cheap stereo equipment. Captured on recordable cassettes like Maxell and TDK, some of these “gray tapes” simply had stickers with handwritten titles. More often, they weren’t labeled at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927410\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927410\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-768x576.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A box of handmade Bay Area rap tapes, part of Naru’s home archives. \u003ccite>(Mosi Reeves)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In those days, Too Short was an outlier, a Fremont High School student who canvassed East Oakland spots like Arroyo Park, \u003ca href=\"https://medium.com/@bayareahiphoparchive/in-conversation-with-56fae687e9c\">selling copies of “Game Raps”\u003c/a> at a few dollars a pop. Since Short was originally from Los Angeles, he relied on rap partner Tony “Freddy B” Adams to show him around the Town. The duo \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#too-short-and-freddy-b-start-making-handmade-tapes\">made customized tapes for local drug dealers and players\u003c/a> in the city’s nightlife — now known as “special request” tapes — shouting out the customers’ names in their raps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Short was a hustler,” says CJ Flash. “He had a style of telling stories that was so outlandish and so funny that word got around.” Short and Freddy B developed the trademark “Biiiiitch!” catchphrase, and Short has often said that he and Freddy B intended to get famous together. Unfortunately, Freddy B was in prison when Short released his landmark “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwVJTvOO4yY\">Freaky Tales\u003c/a>” tape in 1987. (Adams is \u003ca href=\"https://www.dailyrepublic.com/all-dr-news/solano-news/local-features/from-too-hort-colleague-to-christian-missionary/\">now a minister\u003c/a> at Mount Calvary Baptist Church in Fairfield.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927341\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 676px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TooShort.SFExaminer.1984.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"676\" height=\"455\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927341\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TooShort.SFExaminer.1984.jpg 676w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TooShort.SFExaminer.1984-160x108.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 676px) 100vw, 676px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Too Short in 1984, at the age of 18. \u003ccite>(Katy Raddatz/San Francisco Examiner/Bancroft Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Others like Sir Quick Draw, Mac Mill, and Chief Naked Head (later known as Premo; he passed away in January of 2023) simply gave away their tapes or let friends copy or “dub” the originals. As Richmond rapper \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13925761/magic-mike-richmond-calvin-t-rap-hip-hop\">Magic Mike explained in a recent interview with Dregs One\u003c/a>, dubs of his tracks circulated as widely as Germany. “It was more or less trying to make a name for yourself…you had to make a tape,” adds CJ Flash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most importantly, Bay Area hip-hop in the ’80s was a primordial soup of youngsters figuring out what the local sound would be. The answers wouldn’t arrive until near the end of the decade. “The Bay Area was behind,” says CJ Flash, comparing it to more advanced regions like Los Angeles, South Florida, and New York. “We never thought about radio.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘A Pivotal Moment’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Alex “Naru Kwina” Hence remembers the first time he heard the Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight” as a 14-year-old preparing to attend Oakland High School. “When the song went off, everybody ran outside, like, ‘Did you hear that song?!” he laughs, calling it one of the best moments of his life. “It was a pivotal moment, bro. We literally started rapping the song and trying to remember it.” \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Naru called himself Sir Quick Draw, an alias inspired by Hanna-Barbera cartoon \u003cem>Quick Draw McGraw\u003c/em> as well as the fact that, as a runner, “I was hella fast.” He took inspiration from Kurtis Blow, the Harlem rapper who scored major hits like 1980’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzl-2g5HhaI\">The Breaks\u003c/a>.” And Naru almost immediately began recording his voice on tape. His first original song was “The Caveman Rap,” which was inspired by Brooklyn rapper Jimmy Spicer’s 1980 single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkGLco0tGqc\">Adventures of Super Rhyme\u003c/a>.” Naru can still recite those verses from memory: \u003cem>Now people come and take a trip in time with me / Back to that sweet year one million B.C.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I still got that old-school flavor, man,” he admits. “Hip-hop was more fun for me back then.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927368\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.Boxes_.1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"840\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927368\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.Boxes_.1.jpg 600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.Boxes_.1-160x224.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Naru Kwina, who recorded under the names Sir Quick Draw and Em Cee Quick, poses with his home archives. \u003ccite>(Mosi Reeves)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But rap in the Bay Area didn’t take off right away. “Most people would rap other people’s songs. They’d just repeat what they heard on the radio,” says Naru. Aspiring MCs honed their craft by congregating at Eastmont Mall, “trying to impress the girls, and getting our names on our derby jackets.” And when Tom Tom Club’s 1981 hit “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECiMhe4E0pI\">Genius of Love\u003c/a>” dropped? “Everybody rapped over that joint, man. Too many people.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s worth remembering that hip-hop was a phenomenon developed essentially by Black and Brown children. Rapping, pop-locking, spray-painting aerosol art on neighborhood walls, even DJing: These were youthful forms of play and creative expression.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bas, who grew up in North Oakland, remembers \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#at-fishermans-wharf-a-street-dance-destination-emerges\">popping and “roboting” at Pier 39 on Fisherman’s Wharf\u003c/a> in the late ’70s as a child. “You have people like Ben [James] from Live Incorporated doing pantomime and roboting,” he says, noting one of the better-known dance crews. Dancers competed for attention and tips that they could spend on Snickers bars and arcade games. “Battle-wise, you had to have skill and talent to a certain caliber in order to truly be out on the Wharf or on Market [and Powell] in front of the cable cars,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927321\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-800x547.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"547\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927321\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-800x547.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-1020x697.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-160x109.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-768x525.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A street dance crew called The Vita Family perform at Pier 39 in 1986. \u003ccite>(Liz Hafalia/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Local newspaper stories focused on the emergence of hip-hop as a youth obsession. Enterprising teachers incorporated it into their lesson plans. On high-school campuses, fledgling DJs like Joseph Thomas “G.I. Joe” Simms Jr. at El Cerrito High School and groups like the Devastating Four proliferated. At house parties, mobile DJ crews spun the latest electro, boogie-funk, and rap hits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gatherings at schools, churches, and community centers typically reserved a few minutes for fledgling local rap and dance crews to perform. This was also the era of \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#nancy-reagan-visits-oakland-and-coins-the-phrase-just-say-no\">the Reagan Administration’s “Just Say No” campaign\u003c/a>, and kids were often asked to help spread an anti-drug message through raps. “Inspired by rapping groups such as Sugar Hill, Run DMC, Jeckyl and Hyde and Mell (sic) and the Furious Five, teen-agers create their own raps mostly for fun and to bring attention to themselves,” read a June 29, 1985, story in the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em>. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID='arts_13925415']In the first half of the decade, street dance remained a focal point. \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/12/04/1140504217/double-dutch-fantastic-four-holiday-classic\">Double Dutch jump-rope competitions\u003c/a> sponsored by McDonald’s drew thousands to Lincoln Square Center in Oakland. The San Francisco Street Breakers held a fundraising benefit, “Super Break Sunday,” at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts in 1985. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ironically, street dance “got played out” after the success of Hollywood movies like \u003cem>Beat Street\u003c/em> and \u003cem>Breakin’\u003c/em>, and rap music moved to the center of hip-hop culture. Quickening the process were concerts by Black music stars like the \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#the-fresh-fest-comes-to-oakland\">Fresh Festival\u003c/a>, the first national hip-hop tour, with headliners Run-DMC at the Oakland Coliseum. Local radio tentatively began to experiment with rap, notably KMEL-FM and its mix DJs such as Michael Erickson and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13828163/watch-cameron-paul-give-a-masterclass-in-early-djing\">the late Cameron Paul\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927323\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-1020x1517.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"952\" class=\"size-large wp-image-13927323\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-1020x1517.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-800x1190.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-160x238.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-768x1142.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-1033x1536.jpg 1033w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_.jpg 1345w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A flyer for the Fresh Festival, which arrived in Oakland in 1984.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“By 1985, there was this incredible scene in the South Bay,” says Adisa “The Bishop” Banjoko. As a teen DJ in San Bruno “who looked like Urkel,” he remembers traveling far and wide to buy records, from Creative Music Emporium in San Francisco to T’s Wauzi in Oakland. Meanwhile, nightclubs like Mothers and Studio 47 brought a fusion of hip-hop, freestyle and techno. “San Jose had underage hip-hop teenage clubs, and no other city had those,” he says. (Banjoko later became a rapper, a journalist, and now promotes jiu-jitsu, meditation and chess with his company \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/real64blocks/?hl=en\">64 Blocks\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Back in Oakland, Naru continued making tapes. “I come from a musical family. My cousin’s the Maestro” — a.k.a. producer Keenan Foster, who has worked with Too Short, Dru Down, and Askari X — “and a lot of my family sings. I got a drum machine, a little Yamaha keyboard. I would play my bass lines. We had double-cassette decks.” He collaborated with Taj “Turntable T” Tilghman, “who was dope on the turntables.” Turntable T eventually bought a Roland TR-808 drum machine, the instrument du jour for def beat MCs. “When that 808 came, that was it. Everyone loved that deck. \u003cem>Boom!\u003c/em>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Gray tapes” that circulated weren’t the EP and album-length releases we’re familiar with today. Some tapes only had one song per side; or maybe just one song on one side, period. Artists were judged not only by their ability to rap engagingly for several minutes, but also to chop up a familiar beat like Whodini’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5r0i2ZAbCc\">Friends\u003c/a>,” transforming it into something fresh and original; or even make rudimentary 808 beats. For example, Too Short drew attention for “rapping the longest,” as Bas explains, leading to songs that lasted eight or nine minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927334\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-800x682.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"682\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-800x682.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-1020x870.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-160x136.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-768x655.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Adisa Banjoko in the 1980s. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Adisa Banjoko)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Those tapes were everywhere. Everyone was trying to see what was possible,” says Banjoko. In 1987, he began making raps under the name MC Most Ill. His first song was “Rhyme Junkie.” “The truth was, some of it was really cool but a lot of it actually also sucked, because [the art form] was brand new. … The quality control was not there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On August 18, 1984, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> published an article called “Rapping with Too-Short,” the first story on the 18-year-old prodigy. Pacific News Service journalist Anthony Adams called Short’s songs “preacher-like yarns over pre-recorded music,” and noted that one of them was about automaker John DeLorean, whose conviction for cocaine trafficking made national news. Short claimed he and his partner Freddy B sold over 2,000 tapes. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003cem>Chronicle-Examiner\u003c/em> also frequently interviewed \u003ca href=\"https://www.dominiquediprima.com/\">Dominique “Lady D” DiPrima\u003c/a>, a New York transplant and San Francisco State University student who rapped, sung, and organized events. DiPrima possessed a rich family pedigree — her father was the jazz writer Amiri Baraka, her mother the beat poet Diane DiPrima. In late 1984, \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#home-turf-premieres-on-kron-tv\">KRON-TV recruited her to host \u003cem>Home Turf\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, a Saturday-afternoon program that became appointment viewing for local teens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everyone had a crush on Dominique,” says Naru, giggling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927320\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-800x541.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927320\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-800x541.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-1020x690.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-160x108.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-768x520.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-1536x1039.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_.png 1540w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dominique DiPrima, pictured here hosting a 1987 episode of ‘Home Turf’ on KRON-4. \u003ccite>(SFSU Television Archive)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>The First Bay Area Rap Record Opens the Floodgates\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>One of the under-acknowledged aspects of early hip-hop is the way elder Black musicians shepherded young artists into the recording industry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The late Sylvia Robinson, who was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2022, initially emerged in the mid-’50s as one-half of Mickey & Sylvia, who scored a national hit with “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SwMB9v1pQ4\">Love Is Strange\u003c/a>.” As a ’70s solo artist and producer, Robinson made slinky, Eartha Kitt-like erotic disco capers such as “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NA2X1040_gY\">Pillow Talk\u003c/a>” and “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPScEJ66_m4\">Sweet Stuff\u003c/a>.” After discovering hip-hop when she heard DJ Lovebug Starski at a party, Robinson formed Sugar Hill Records, and turned three rapping teens she found in New Jersey into its first act, the Sugarhill Gang.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This process of soul veterans working with young people resulted in independent 12” singles that mirrored — if not yet accurately capturing — the nascent rap sound at a time when big companies virtually ignored it. With his Mercury Records contract, Kurtis Blow was the only act with a major album deal. A handful of other pioneers like DJ Hollywood scored one-off 12” deals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A similar process played out in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R_h9BCuvBE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first Bay Area rap record is widely considered to be Phil “Motorcycle Mike” Lewis and the Rat Trap Band’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4Odk2Vu70s\">Super Rat\u003c/a>,” a 1981 boogie-funk single notoriously released by East Oakland heroin kingpin Milton “Mickey Mo” Moore’s Hodisk Records. The name “Hodisk” was a cheeky reference to his onetime side business as a pimp. (Moore has since reformed and is now a pastor in West Oakland.) In fact, Mickey Mo boasts in his 1996 autobiography \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qy6RNV6f5w\">The Man: The Life Story of a Drug Kingpin\u003c/a>\u003c/em>, “Hodisk Records became the first record company on the West Coast to release a rap record.” (The first L.A. rap record, Disco Daddy and Captain Rapp’s “The Gigolo Rapp,” was also released in 1981.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mickey Mo has another claim to rap lore: In 1980, he \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#the-first-rap-performance-on-a-major-stage\">helped finance an Oakland Coliseum concert\u003c/a> headlined by L.A. funk band War, with the Sugarhill Gang as a supporting act. Journalist Lee Hildebrand’s pre-concert interview with the Gang in the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> was the first mention of rap music in the local press. A second funk-rap novelty, Steve Walker’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vB9jCLUWwBY\">Tally Ho!\u003c/a>,” also appeared in 1981. In 1983, San Francisco’s Debo & Brian released the electro-funk EP \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgv_AfTbEng\">This Is It\u003c/a>\u003c/em>. The momentum had started.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had made this vow that I would never ever do anything having to do with rap,” laughs Claytoven Richardson. During his long career, the Berkeley-born, Oakland-raised Richardson worked with Aretha Franklin, Kenny G, Whitney Houston, Elton John, and Celine Dion. But in the early ’80s, he was best known as a singer, producer, and arranger with hot dancefloor jazz-funk bands like Bill Summers & Summers’ Heat. His anti-rap stance reflected the music industry at large in the 1980s. “Nobody had the foresight to see that it would morph and change and do the things that it’s done,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927369\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 625px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/ClaytovenRichardson.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"625\" height=\"352\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927369\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/ClaytovenRichardson.jpg 625w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/ClaytovenRichardson-160x90.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 625px) 100vw, 625px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Claytoven Richardson pictured in March 2023 in Los Angeles, California. \u003ccite>(Steven Simione/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Still, Richardson couldn’t avoid the increasingly popular genre when he scored a production deal at Fantasy Records, the onetime Berkeley jazz label also known for innovative acts like Sylvester and Cybotron, as well as one-off singles generated by a “throw it against the wall and see if it sticks” philosophy. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the records Richardson produced in that anything-goes environment was Mighty Mouth’s satirical complaint, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VU1hAFnrtU8\">I’m All Rapped Out\u003c/a>.” (He wasn’t the only one annoyed over rap; perhaps out of wishful thinking, a 1985 \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em> article referred to the “fast-fading hip-hop scene.”) A vocalist named Lawrence Pittman didn’t show up for the session, so Richardson performed the lyrics himself. However, Pittman showed up to rap on Mighty Mouth’s second single, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqfQcLbemE4\">The Roaches\u003c/a>,” which parodied Whodini’s electro hit, “Freaks Come Out at Night.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other scattered local raps appeared between 1985 and 1986. Former boogaloo dancer Jay King, just home from a stint in the Air Force and splitting time between Sacramento and Vallejo, formed a group called Frost and released “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hObIekxeoSg\">Battle Beat\u003c/a>.” His friends Denzil Foster & Thomas McElroy produced it, as well as another electro-rap track, Sorcerey’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ap6uw-kX8o\">Woo Baby\u003c/a>.” Pittsburg rapper James “Red Beat” Briggs issued “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7dUlMEZUSc\">Freak City\u003c/a>,” which was later remixed by N.W.A. co-founder Arabian Prince. And there was Rodney “Disco Alamo” Brown, from Richmond, whose 12” “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6K-pXg1DY98\">The Task Force\u003c/a>” is \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#richmonds-task-force-memorialized-on-wax\">an early example\u003c/a> of Bay Area rap chronicling street life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927313\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-800x484.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"484\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927313\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-800x484.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-1020x618.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-160x97.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-768x465.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Too Short, pictured at his manager’s house in Oakland on September 21, 1987. \u003ccite>(Steve Ringman/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Most importantly, Too Short’s rising buzz led to a deal with deep East Oakland entrepreneur Dean Hodges’ 75 Girls label. Released in 1985, the resulting \u003cem>Don’t Stop Rappin’\u003c/em> was the first official album by a local rapper. While fans of a certain age still treasure protean electro-funk tracks like “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2ywke376NQ\">Girl\u003c/a>” — which E-40 referenced on his 1998 hit, “Earl, That’s Yo Life” — the album couldn’t compare to his raunchy and wickedly hilarious “special request” tapes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was during this period that Naru finally got his chance in the studio. Since 1984, UC Berkeley station \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#college-radio-makes-its-mark\">KALX-FM\u003c/a> served as home to “Music for the People,” a Sunday-morning community affairs and music show hosted by the late Charles “Natty Prep” Douglass, as well as DJs like Billy “Jam” Kiernan (who also broadcast on San Francisco State University station KUSF-FM), David “Davey D” Cook, and funkster Rickey “The Uhuru Maggot” Vincent. When Naru won \u003ca href=\"https://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/107287\">a 1986 rap contest hosted by Billy Jam on KALX\u003c/a>, he earned a deal with Bay Wave Records, a local imprint distributed by Hollywood-based Macola Records. Richardson was hired to produce the session.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLlNn1Zh1ww\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“[Quick Draw] was a great rapper. He had a lot of great lyrics and ideas,” says Richardson. On “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLlNn1Zh1ww\">Rapaholic\u003c/a>,” Richardson and session engineer Michael Denten (who later worked with Spice 1 and E-40) accompanied Quick Draw’s dexterous and energetic raps with sharp-angled percussive edits and sound effects reminiscent of The Art of Noise and Mantronix.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Respect to Claytoven,” says Naru, who not only continues to make music but also owns a company, \u003ca href=\"http://hiplearning.org/\">Hip Learning\u003c/a>, that promotes childhood education with rap. He wasn’t entirely satisfied with the “Rapaholic” experience: “They made the record sound hella more polished. It was [supposed to be] a little more underground than that.” However, he adds, “[Claytoven] taught us a lot in the studio about the mics they use and how to mix. It was a good experience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927411\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/SirQuickdrawFlyer.72dpi.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"889\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927411\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/SirQuickdrawFlyer.72dpi.jpg 600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/SirQuickdrawFlyer.72dpi-160x237.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A photocopied flyer advertising Sir Quick Draw’s single ‘Rapaholic.’ \u003ccite>(Mosi Reeves)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>A Radio Breakthrough — And a Kid Named Hammer\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As the trajectory of Bay Area hip-hop waxed and waned, three catalyzing moments brought the scene into focus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first was an R&B track. Timex Social Club’s “Rumors” captured the pulse of Bay Area youth culture, from Marcus Thompson and Alex Hill’s skittering electro-funk bass and drums to singer Michael Marshall’s distinctly regional accent and coy recitation of schoolyard gossip (“Did you hear the one about Michael? Some say he must be gay…”) Produced by Jay King and Denzil Foster and released on King’s Jay Records in February 1986, it mushroomed into a top ten \u003cem>Billboard\u003c/em> pop hit and dominated radio all year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVce2IeYcTg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But by the summer, Timex Social Club was falling apart and trading accusations with King over money and credit. The group’s only album \u003cem>Vicious Rumors\u003c/em> — by that point it was just Michael Marshall — featured drum programming from CJ Flash and a shout-out to KALX’s Natty Prep, who helped break “Rumors” on his “Music and Life” show. Marshall retreated from the spotlight before \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#i-got-5-on-it-remix-a-meeting-of-greats-recorded-in-alameda\">re-emerging as the hook man\u003c/a> on the Luniz’ 1995 smash “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERtkpnXLrL4\">I Got 5 on It\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After breaking with Timex Social Club, King formed a group called Jet Set and signed a deal with Warner Bros. Records. The group changed their name to Club Nouveau before debuting with the single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKWhkjXV5uM\">Jealousy\u003c/a>.” A follow-up, the Bill Withers cover “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbyjaUJWWmk\">Lean on Me\u003c/a>,” went to number-one on the \u003cem>Billboard\u003c/em> Hot 100, while Club Nouveau’s debut album \u003cem>Life, Love & Pain\u003c/em> went platinum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927310\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-800x489.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"489\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927310\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-800x489.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-1020x624.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-160x98.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-768x470.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Singers Samuelle Prater, Jay King and Valerie Watson of Club Nouveau performs at the U.I.C. Pavilion in Chicago, Illinois in August 1987. \u003ccite>(Raymond Boyd/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>King’s growing stardom rippled across the Bay and reached Felton Pilate, the Vallejo keyboardist, singer, and producer best known as a driving force in Bay Area funk stars Con Funk Shun. The two had already worked together on King’s onetime rap group Frost; Pilate engineered that record. Pilate soon added one of King’s projects, Sacramento R&B/rap group New Choice, to a growing slate of projects he produced and engineered at his Felstar Studios.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Felstar Studios was the culmination of work he had begun while not touring and rehearsing with Con Funk Shun. At his home studio on Sandpiper Drive in Vallejo, Pilate helped assemble records for fledgling local artists. “I never thought of myself as just a studio,” he says, where he simply records his clients. “I have a little experience here. I’ve got several gold albums. Here, let me pass on some of this knowledge.” When asked if he considered himself a mentor, he demurs, even though that’s arguably what he was. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Pilate opened Felstar Studios on Sonoma Boulevard, his trusted associate was James Earley, a young engineer whom he credits for adding a more contemporary sensibility to the Studios’ output. Among the locals who came to them were M.V.P., a family trio consisting of Earl Stevens, Danell Stevens, and Brandt Jones. Their 1988 12”, \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfLuAL6DueI\">The Kings Men\u003c/a>\u003c/em>, also included Tanina Stevens and Angela Pressley, who called themselves Sugar ‘N’ Spice. The members of M.V.P. updated their stage names to E-40, D-Shot and B-Legit, added Tanina as Suga T, and \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#the-clicks-down-dirty-ushers-in-mobb-music-era\">evolved into The Click\u003c/a>, arguably becoming the most famous rap group to emerge from Vallejo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927370\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 700px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/MVP.e-40.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"700\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927370\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/MVP.e-40.jpg 700w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/MVP.e-40-160x160.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">M.V.P., a 1988 Vallejo rap group featuring Busy D, E-40 and Legit (L–R). The three would later add E-40’s sister Suga T and become known as The Click. \u003ccite>(Gerry Ericksen / Rushforce Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1986, Pilate and Earley both had solo deals at Berkeley’s Fantasy Records. It was there that Pilate met a former Oakland A’s batboy named Stanley “Holyghost Boy” Burrell through Fantasy Records producer Fred L. Pittman. “Fred would often hire me to do keyboard arrangements for him,” says Pilate. When Pittman asked him to play keys for Holyghost Boy, Pilate responded, “Hey Fred, why don’t you let me take the reins on this?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a classically trained jazz and classical musician, Pilate didn’t think much of rap, even though Con Funk Shun not only included a rap verse on a 1982 single, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQ9GHVTI-EE\">Ain’t Nobody Baby\u003c/a>”; but also made “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmmzvN7raB0\">Electric Lady\u003c/a>,” a 1985 hit produced by Larry Smith of Whodini fame that landed in the top five of \u003cem>Billboard\u003c/em>’s Black Singles chart. “Musically, I wasn’t a fan, but as a producer, I said, ‘I can do this,’” he says. “Like everyone else, Con Funk Shun wanted to be relevant, and rap was all over the radio.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The tracks Burrell brought to Pilate consisted of him rapping over sparse Yamaha RX5 drum-machine parts. Pilate responded by going into “study mode.” He listened to the rap stuff that was getting airplay like Doug E. Fresh & the Get Fresh Crew. As a result, the skittering percussion on Burrell’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVWFiptGNY\">Let’s Get It Started\u003c/a>” is reminiscent of the go-go-inspired arrangements on Doug E. Fresh hits like “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sGw9GSCiYU\">The Show\u003c/a>” and “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UtqnKIF7kE\">All the Way to Heaven\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927325\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-800x565.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"565\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927325\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-800x565.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-1020x720.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-160x113.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-768x542.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">MC Hammer films the music video for ‘Let’s Get It Started’ at Sweet Jimmie’s nightclub in downtown Oakland, March 19, 1988. \u003ccite>(Deanne Fitzmaurice/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“My thing was to make it more music-driven than beat-driven,” says Pilate. In many cases, he simply “listened to what [Burrell] was talking about and wrote a straight R&B song underneath it.” He also gives credit to Earley, who helped refine the drum programming and brought “that younger ear” to the project. They incorporated stock horn stabs from a battery of Juno, Roland, and Yamaha drum machines. Meanwhile, Kent “The Lone Mixer” Wilson and Bryant “D.J. Redeemed” Marable added rhythmic scratches by cutting up Curtis Mayfield and Beastie Boys records.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the demos were finished, Fantasy Records dropped Pilate, Earley and Burrell from their deals. “They weren’t really sure how to market any of us,” says Pilate. Then, he chuckles, “The next time I ran into the Holyghost Boy, he had changed his name to MC Hammer.” After forming Bustin’ Records in Fremont with financial help from Oakland A’s ballplayers like Mike Davis and Dwayne Murphy, Hammer turned the Pilate demos into three 12”s — “Ring ’Em,” “The Thrill Is Gone” and “Let’s Get It Started” — and the 1987 album \u003cem>Feel My Power\u003c/em>. “I was like, man, those were rough mixes! You were supposed to come back and let me fix that!” Pilate laughs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Everyone involved in Bay Area hip-hop has vivid memories of MC Hammer blowing up. Near-mythical stories of his local takeover abound, like attending local concerts surrounded by a massive crew; or tearing up the dance floor at The Silks, a popular nightclub in Emeryville.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927324\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-800x727.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"727\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927324\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-800x727.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-1020x926.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-160x145.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-768x698.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate.jpg 1058w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">MC Hammer and Fenton Pilate in modern times. Pilate engineered and co-produced MC Hammer’s first recordings. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Felton Pilate)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Today, it’s worth revisiting \u003cem>Feel My Power\u003c/em> and 1988’s \u003cem>Let’s Get It Started\u003c/em>. Released after Hammer signed with Capitol Records, \u003cem>Let’s Get It Started\u003c/em> found Hammer and Pilate remixing those original demos while adding vital new tracks like “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sZVcXzSE3M\">Pump It Up\u003c/a>.” The results are bombastic and vibrant dance-floor jams as ecstatic as anything by Kid ‘n’ Play and Salt-n-Pepa. Hammer’s subsequent leap into pop superstardom with 1990’s \u003cem>Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em\u003c/em> and the ubiquity of “U Can’t Touch This” obscure just how great those early tracks are.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Eight Woofers in the Trunk\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>MC Hammer’s major-label arrival in 1988 capped a year of Bay Area hip-hop on the cusp of national exposure. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After Too Short issued \u003cem>Born to Mack\u003c/em> in the fall of 1987 on his Dangerous Music label, Jive Records picked it up. (Dangerous Music also issued \u003cem>Dangerous Crew\u003c/em>, a compilation of vital Bay Area acts like Spice-1, Rappin’ 4-Tay, and the female duo Danger Zone.) Digital Underground’s playful and psychedelic “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zQ1frcgSbI\">Underwater Rimes\u003c/a> / \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpBNB20wVo0\">Your Life’s a Cartoon\u003c/a>” led to a deal with Tommy Boy. Local talent waited in the wings, including rapper/producer Paris (A.T.C.’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHpiPWfOBk4\">Cisco Jam\u003c/a>”), Sway & King Tech (\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBJujmVXiwE\">Flynamic Force\u003c/a>\u003c/em> EP), Dangerous Dame (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9Frj4j09GE\">The Power That’s Packed\u003c/a>”), and MC Twist and the Def Squad (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lZz7qhjfjw\">Just Rock\u003c/a>”). And the late Cameron Paul, known for his “Beats & Pieces” breakbeats, remixed Queens trio Salt-n-Pepa’s 1987 track “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPkdk1oMmtE\">Push It\u003c/a>” into a global phenomenon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13828164\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-800x496.jpg\" alt=\"Cameron Paul reveals his mixing secrets.\" width=\"800\" height=\"496\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13828164\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-160x99.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-768x476.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-240x149.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-375x233.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-520x322.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cameron Paul, who provided the spine of New Orleans bounce music with ‘Brown Beats’ and recorded a smash-hit remix of Salt ‘n’ Pepa’s ‘Push It,’ was also a prominent club and radio megamix DJ in San Francisco. \u003ccite>(YouTube)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Incidentally, the first local group to score a major label deal wasn’t Hammer, but Surf MCs, a Berkeley group that Profile Records promoted as a Beastie Boys-like rap/rock crossover. Their 1987 album \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojCAqdBA7uA\">Surf or Die\u003c/a>\u003c/em> proved a flop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet the third moment that catalyzed Bay Area hip-hop wasn’t a singular record like Timex Social Club’s “Rumors,” or an artist like Hammer and Short. It was the sound of walloping, all-enveloping bass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Made for surgically enhanced car and jeep stereos, the bass colossus is as much a feature of hip-hop in the mid-’80s as the pounding Roland TR-808 machine, from Rick Rubin’s production on LL Cool J’s “Rock the Bells” and T La Rock’s “It’s Yours” to Rodney O and DJ Joe Cooley’s “Everlasting Bass” and Dr. Dre’s work on Eazy-E’s “The Boyz-N-The Hood.” It also mirrors the crack-cocaine epidemic that began to blight and distort communities across the country. As street life turned treacherous, the specter of the hustler, and whether to become one, cast a growing shadow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID='arts_13925761']“Then the new style came, the bass got deeper / You gave up the mike and bought you a beeper / Do you want to rap or sell coke? / Brothers like you ain’t never broke,” Too Short memorably rapped on his 1989 hit, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvfUUOO0xoM\">Life Is…Too Short\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Banjoko recalls how the presence of gangs transformed local shows. “You would see a bunch of people dressed up together [in the same gear], and you might assume they were a rap or dance crew. They were young drug lords,” he says. “You could get trampled, beat up or robbed by any of them. I remember 69 Ville being massively deep at the Fresh Fest and the [Run-DMC] Raising Hell tour. They were terrifying, straight up. You were going to tuck your chain, you were going to take your Kangol off, or they were going to take it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927326\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/HughEMC.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"409\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927326\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/HughEMC.jpg 600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/HughEMC-160x109.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hugh EMC, the San Francisco rapper whose 1988 single ‘It’s the Game’ unflinchingly chronicled street life. \u003ccite>(Soul Sonic Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Rap imagery became more honest and explicit. Some like Richmond rapper Magic Mike, San Francisco’s Hugh EMC (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_p7L0eJfKI\">It’s the Game\u003c/a>”), and Oakland’s Hollywood (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.discogs.com/release/641778-Hollywood-Stay-Heart-And-Soul-Raps-Just-A-Battlefield\">Gangster Rap\u003c/a>”) seemed to embrace the hustler ethos, while cautiously adding verses about the consequences of that lifestyle. Then there was Oakland rapper Morocco Moe, whose “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogNoOCIVPrI\">Task\u003c/a>” criticized how law enforcement brutalized communities in the War on Drugs: “Their intentions are good/But their actions are wrong.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Every Black neighborhood was infested” with crack, says Vallejo producer Khayree Shaheed. “There was an influx of money coming into young Black men, but there was also a lot of death occurring.” The epidemic also marked his entry into the world of rap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a descendant of the Bay Area’s vaunted funk tradition, Khayree spent the ’70s and early ’80s playing bass guitar for bands like Grand Larceny, Body Mind & Spirit and Touch of Class (with keyboardist Rosie Gaines, who later joined Prince & the New Power Generation). His travels took him across the U.S. and even to Japan, where Touch of Class lived and performed for several months. (Though his bands made demos, there are no official recordings to date.) When asked about the first time he heard rap, Khayree cites “jazzoetry” ensembles like The Last Poets, not the Sugarhill Gang. And as a youth growing up on Lofas Place in Vallejo, he spent plenty of time following Con Funk Shun, hoping to apprentice with the biggest band in the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927412\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-800x510.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"510\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927412\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-800x510.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-1020x651.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-160x102.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-768x490.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-1536x980.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Vallejo musician Khayree Shaheed, playing bass onstage in 1979. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Khayree Shaheed)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Khayree was in his mid-20s when Rod “I.C.E.” Andrews and Dan “Luvva D” Morrison a.k.a. the Luvva Twins brought Khayree a demo they had made on a Casio keyboard, “Hubba Head.” The song title was slang for a crack addict, and the duo described the “hubba head’s” descent into addiction with charismatic punch. They arranged the music and rapped most of the lyrics, while Khayree dropped a short verse and added guitar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Khayree had already spent time at Pilate’s home studio, honing his writing and production skills. (“I always enjoyed working with him,” says Pilate.) Now, he brought “Hubba Head” to Pilate, and the two prepared it for release. Setting up his own label, Big Bank Records, Khayree distributed two hundred copies of the 12” to DJs and influencers. “The record was super popular in the streets,” says Khayree.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pArkWvlAebg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After “Hubba Head,” Khayree began working with Jay King, a fellow graduate of Vallejo High School. The opportunity to write and produce New Choice’s 1987 single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-VLZQ4X1yA\">Cold Stupid\u003c/a>” and most of the quintet’s 1988 debut, \u003cem>At Last\u003c/em>, gave him important experience on a major project and financial stability. By fusing bass, funky R&B and hip-hop breakbeats, New Choice reflected a parallel R&B movement that both influenced and was inspired by the hip-hop scene. Similar Bay Area acts included Oakland’s Tony! Toni! Toné!, who parlayed backing sessions for Sheila E. and Tramaine Hawkins into a major-label deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flush from his experience with New Choice, Khayree was ready to start his own company. “I’m listening to EPMD’s \u003cem>Strictly Business\u003c/em>,” he says, inspiring the name of his second label, Strictly Business Records. He knew that Mike “The Mac” Robinson, who also grew up on Lofas Place, was a rapper. Robinson hailed from a musical family: his uncle Steve “Silver” Scales was a well-traveled Vallejo funk percussionist who played with Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club, and the B-52s. (Though it would be a delicious coincidence, Scales didn’t perform on “Genius of Love.”) Khayree encouraged Robinson to take music more seriously. Meanwhile, Robinson’s mother drew the memorable Strictly Business logo: an open briefcase, ready for business.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1988, Khayree released The Mac’s three-song EP, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.discogs.com/release/805531-The-Mac-Im-Ah-Big-Mac\">I’m Ah Big Mac\u003c/a>.” Heard now, what immediately stands out is the unique \u003cem>tone\u003c/em> of the bass. “We used synthesizers that had dumb-fat bass lines,” explains Khayree in reference to himself and Too Short as well as future Bay Area colleagues like Ant Banks. By comparison, he says, other regional scenes relied on a “natural” bass guitar or samples from records. “You feel it through your whole body. … You can get it with a bass guitar, depending on how you EQ the bass and what you run your guitar through. But you’re \u003cem>never\u003c/em> going to touch the subs and the depth of a Minimoog, of the Oberheim Ovx, or the Roland Juno 106.” The EP’s highlight is its B-side “The Game Is Thick,” which centers on a sample of Prince’s “D.M.S.R.” \u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927371\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-800x498.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"498\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927371\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-800x498.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-1020x635.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-160x100.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-768x478.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick.jpg 1537w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Khayree and The Mac (L–R), pictured on the cover of The Mac’s ‘The Game is Thick.’ \u003ccite>(Phil Bray / Strictly Business Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1989, Khayree remixed and re-released “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCxGl7Ok1YI\">The Game Is Thick\u003c/a>” as a standalone 12” with a memorable cover photo: Khayree looking super-clean in a grey suit, clasping a briefcase, with The Mac in a red-and-black bomber jacket. Khayree calls the style “pimping.” “We didn’t mean pimping so much as getting prostitutes to work,” he explains. “It’s an attitude, and it’s a musical style.” The “game” is a metaphor for life in the Black community. Street slang illustrated complex situations, whether it was dealing with the repercussions of a raging crack epidemic, or simply navigating the tensions of everyday living. Meanwhile, The Mac’s “cool, silky, pimpish” flow and Khayree’s synthesized bass production proved a clear predecessor to the ’90s mob-music sound that took over Bay Area rap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID='arts_13924167']Upon release, “The Game Is Thick” didn’t make a major impact, and most copies went to local DJ pools. “We promoted records out of the trunk,” says Khayree. “We went from Bobby G’s Soul Disco in San Francisco to [Rico Casanova’s record pool] The Pros in Oakland.” Still, “The Game Is Thick” remix received a mention in Davey “D” Cook’s April 7, 1989 “Beats & Breaks” column for \u003cem>BAM\u003c/em> Magazine. “Let me tell you, it’s hyped to the max,” Davey D wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With Khayree’s encouragement, the Mac taught himself how to produce music with synth keyboards. He also introduced Khayree to another Vallejo artist, Andre “Mac Dre” Hicks, who became Strictly Business’ second act. By the time The Mac was shot and killed on July 23, 1991 in what Khayree calls “a case of mistaken identity,” the two had recorded dozens of tracks and released a third and final 12” protesting police violence, 1990’s “Enuff of Tis Sh-t!” One of The Mac’s beats posthumously appeared on Mac Dre’s 1993 track, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slA_s7tSjMU\">The M.A.C. & Mac D.R.E.\u003c/a>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927413\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-800x523.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"523\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927413\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-800x523.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-1020x666.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-160x105.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-768x502.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-1536x1003.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Khayree with Kool Moe Dee at the 1988 BRE Conference in Los Angeles. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Khayree Shaheed)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Mike had a big, big loving heart,” remembers Khayree, sounding wistful. He emphasizes how The Mac left behind a daughter, “Mac” Reina Robinson, and a pregnant girlfriend who gave birth to his son, Mike. At one point, Khayree plays a voicemail of The Mac passionately singing a funky, swinging hook, as if to counteract the stereotype that rappers aren’t musicians. He talks about how The Mac’s way of playing simple, evocative keyboard notes for maximum effect echoes in the work of his famed protégé, Mac Dre. “I miss him,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Area rap broke wide at the end of the decade, leading to a 1989 story in the \u003cem>New York Times\u003c/em>, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/1989/09/10/arts/rap-by-the-bay-oakland-emerges-as-a-force-in-pop.html\">Rap by the Bay: Oakland Emerges as a Force in Pop\u003c/a>.” Not every local pioneer who laid the groundwork would enjoy the fruits of that success. But their stories are essential to understanding how local hip-hop came of age, and everything that came after.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927363\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-800x450.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927363\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-800x450.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-1020x574.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-160x90.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-768x432.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_-1536x864.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/that_s_my_word_____featured_image__3_.png 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In the mid-1980s, after years of street dance, DJing and graffiti sharing equal space, rapping took center stage. The Bay Area’s bass-heavy sound would arrive at the end of the decade. (Clockwise from top left: Too Short, MC Hammer, Dominique DiPrima, Club Nouveau, and Motorcycle Mike.) \u003ccite>(Steve Ringman/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images; Al Pereira/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images; SFSU Television Archives; Raymond Boyd/Getty Images; Hodisk Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Editor’s note\u003c/strong>: This story is part of \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop\">That’s My Word\u003c/a>\u003cem>, KQED’s year-long exploration of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop\">Bay Area hip-hop\u003c/a> history, with new content dropping all throughout 2023.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-size: 4.6875em;float: left;line-height: 0.733em;padding: 0.05em 0.1em 0 0;font-family: times, serif, georgia\">I\u003c/span>t’s a wintry January evening when Bas-1 brings me to Del the Funky Homosapien’s house in the East Bay. For much of the afternoon, Bas — the \u003ca href=\"https://eastbayexpress.com/old-school-fool-1/\">Oakland native\u003c/a> who’s worked with Digital Underground and released \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=bas-1+full+album+mentally+astute\">his own solo records\u003c/a> — has schooled me on the origins of the Bay Area hip-hop sound.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bas lists numerous rappers from the ’80s, and not just Todd “Too Short” Shaw, the East Oakland rapper who famously hustled homemade cassette tapes. I’ve never heard most of the names Bas mentions: MC Chocolate Milk, Windell Baby Doll, Davy Def, Buddy Bean, Reggie Reg Rock Ski.ter, M.C. Tracy, Rock Master Fresh, Nic Nack, Kimmie Fresh, and the Acorn Crew with Grandmaster Fresh (a rapper later known as “DJ Daryl” Anderson, famed for producing tracks like 415’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuZ6CAwZmys\">Side Show\u003c/a>” and 2Pac’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAJfDP3b5_U\">Keep Ya Head Up\u003c/a>”).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Many of these early Bay Area rappers never put out a commercially available record. Instead, their work is mostly confined to locally distributed cassette tapes — collectors call them “gray tapes” — that are now nearly impossible to find. They publicly broadcasted these tapes throughout neighborhoods, utilizing boomboxes and car stereos as well as stereos at house parties. “None of them sound like Too Short,” says Bas. “Some of these people didn’t put out recordings, but they were known.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Throughout the 1980s, Bay Area hip-hop was an artistic movement struggling for a distinct identity. The first half of the decade was defined by street dance and aerosol art as much as rap and DJing. But as local youth began to absorb the sounds emanating from national hotspots like New York, they created a distinctive style all their own — one that would make a global impact in the years to come.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Del’s house, Bas queues up an extraordinary live video clip of \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5u3eiG9BtdE\">Mac Mill, Emperor E, and DJ Anthony “K-os” Bryant\u003c/a> performing at \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11690787/when-oakland-was-a-chocolate-city-a-brief-history-of-festival-at-the-lake\">Festival at the Lake\u003c/a>, a now-defunct annual event held at Lake Merritt, in 1988. (Alex “Naru” Reece, who organized the showcase where Mac Mill performed, clarified in a follow-up conversation that it didn’t happen during Festival at the Lake. He also says the showcase was filmed in 1986 for a 1988 video compilation.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mac Mill and Emperor E go back and forth, trading sound effects and dense Oakland slang as K-os cuts and scratches copies of Long Island band Original Concept’s deathless bass classic, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai4VC0NUxl4\">Knowledge Me\u003c/a>.” Bas praises Mac Mill’s unusual “Arabian” style, which the latter deployed nearly a decade later with the 1995 single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_f0TB3Igro\">Arabian Hump\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/5u3eiG9BtdE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/5u3eiG9BtdE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Then, Bas-1 calls Chris “CJ Flash” Jourdan, an OG who worked with Timex Social Club, the Berkeley teen band whose 1986 electro-funk classic, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVce2IeYcTg\">Rumors\u003c/a>,” represented the first national breakthrough for Bay Area hip-hop culture. As Bas broadcasts CJ Flash’s voice from his phone through Del’s stereo equipment, CJ Flash spends the next hour or so describing a fledging scene where poppers and boogaloo dancers, not rappers or DJs, were the prime attractions. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These ensembles drew from a street-dance tradition that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13891300/reclaiming-the-legacy-of-oaklands-boogaloo-dance-culture\">dates back decades\u003c/a>. Their kinetic performances ignited crowds at high schools, house parties, and public spaces like Justin Herman Plaza and Union Square in San Francisco and UC Berkeley’s Sproul Plaza. Battles even took place on the street, with crews traveling to different neighborhoods around the region to seek out rivals. “You could meet with people on their turf and get down, and hopefully not get thumped in the process,” says CJ Flash. Many Bay Area hip-hop pioneers got their start in dance crews, including Club Nouveau’s Jay King (who pop-locked with The Unknowns), DJ King Tech (who was known as Wizard, and danced with Master City Breakers), and Flash himself (who \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub1TtnI4dh8\">performed with UFO\u003c/a>).\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/ub1TtnI4dh8'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/ub1TtnI4dh8'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>By contrast, rapping was a relatively new and undeveloped skill, the lowest element on the hip-hop totem pole. “Anybody could rap. Anybody could say a bunch of basic rhyme words with no style and flavor,” says Bas, noting as an aside that “most folks couldn’t understand the lyrics anyway.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How is a discussion about street dancers connected to an exploration of the Bay Area hip-hop sound? It’s important to understand the conditions under which the genre emerged locally.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Turntables, Casios and Homemade Tapes\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As KQED’s Eric Arnold explains in “\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13924126/the-bay-area-was-hip-hop-before-there-was-hip-hop\">The Bay Area Was Hip-Hop Before There Was Hip-Hop\u003c/a>,” foundational elements such as spoken word, funk, and rhythm & blues existed locally well before New Jersey trio Sugarhill Gang arrived with “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKTUAESacQM\">Rapper’s Delight\u003c/a>” in the fall of 1979.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>At the same time, the Bay Area was not the Bronx, where breakbeat culture catalyzed and fermented. Bronx DJs, MCs and B-boys like Kool Herc, Grandmaster Flash, Afrika Bambaataa, Grandmaster Caz, the Rock Steady Crew and many others gained renown among mid-’70s New York youth long before “Rapper’s Delight.” By contrast, as CJ Flash explains, it took much of the 1980s for Bay Area youth to develop the cadences and rhythms we now associate with modern rap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Back then, enterprising musicians couldn’t purchase studio software and distribute their own music on an internet platform like Soundcloud. Recording equipment was expensive. An unsigned artist needed the financial and business expertise to manufacture vinyl and cassettes with artwork, much less convince record stores like Leopold’s Records in Berkeley to carry them. (Recordable CD-Rs weren’t widely used until the 1990s.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This helps explain why so many rappers utilized turntables and Casio keyboards, and then recorded their songs using the microphone input on relatively cheap stereo equipment. Captured on recordable cassettes like Maxell and TDK, some of these “gray tapes” simply had stickers with handwritten titles. More often, they weren’t labeled at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927410\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927410\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-768x576.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.BoxofTapes.CloseUp.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A box of handmade Bay Area rap tapes, part of Naru’s home archives. \u003ccite>(Mosi Reeves)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In those days, Too Short was an outlier, a Fremont High School student who canvassed East Oakland spots like Arroyo Park, \u003ca href=\"https://medium.com/@bayareahiphoparchive/in-conversation-with-56fae687e9c\">selling copies of “Game Raps”\u003c/a> at a few dollars a pop. Since Short was originally from Los Angeles, he relied on rap partner Tony “Freddy B” Adams to show him around the Town. The duo \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#too-short-and-freddy-b-start-making-handmade-tapes\">made customized tapes for local drug dealers and players\u003c/a> in the city’s nightlife — now known as “special request” tapes — shouting out the customers’ names in their raps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Short was a hustler,” says CJ Flash. “He had a style of telling stories that was so outlandish and so funny that word got around.” Short and Freddy B developed the trademark “Biiiiitch!” catchphrase, and Short has often said that he and Freddy B intended to get famous together. Unfortunately, Freddy B was in prison when Short released his landmark “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwVJTvOO4yY\">Freaky Tales\u003c/a>” tape in 1987. (Adams is \u003ca href=\"https://www.dailyrepublic.com/all-dr-news/solano-news/local-features/from-too-hort-colleague-to-christian-missionary/\">now a minister\u003c/a> at Mount Calvary Baptist Church in Fairfield.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927341\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 676px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TooShort.SFExaminer.1984.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"676\" height=\"455\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927341\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TooShort.SFExaminer.1984.jpg 676w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TooShort.SFExaminer.1984-160x108.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 676px) 100vw, 676px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Too Short in 1984, at the age of 18. \u003ccite>(Katy Raddatz/San Francisco Examiner/Bancroft Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Others like Sir Quick Draw, Mac Mill, and Chief Naked Head (later known as Premo; he passed away in January of 2023) simply gave away their tapes or let friends copy or “dub” the originals. As Richmond rapper \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13925761/magic-mike-richmond-calvin-t-rap-hip-hop\">Magic Mike explained in a recent interview with Dregs One\u003c/a>, dubs of his tracks circulated as widely as Germany. “It was more or less trying to make a name for yourself…you had to make a tape,” adds CJ Flash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most importantly, Bay Area hip-hop in the ’80s was a primordial soup of youngsters figuring out what the local sound would be. The answers wouldn’t arrive until near the end of the decade. “The Bay Area was behind,” says CJ Flash, comparing it to more advanced regions like Los Angeles, South Florida, and New York. “We never thought about radio.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘A Pivotal Moment’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Alex “Naru Kwina” Hence remembers the first time he heard the Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight” as a 14-year-old preparing to attend Oakland High School. “When the song went off, everybody ran outside, like, ‘Did you hear that song?!” he laughs, calling it one of the best moments of his life. “It was a pivotal moment, bro. We literally started rapping the song and trying to remember it.” \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Naru called himself Sir Quick Draw, an alias inspired by Hanna-Barbera cartoon \u003cem>Quick Draw McGraw\u003c/em> as well as the fact that, as a runner, “I was hella fast.” He took inspiration from Kurtis Blow, the Harlem rapper who scored major hits like 1980’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzl-2g5HhaI\">The Breaks\u003c/a>.” And Naru almost immediately began recording his voice on tape. His first original song was “The Caveman Rap,” which was inspired by Brooklyn rapper Jimmy Spicer’s 1980 single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkGLco0tGqc\">Adventures of Super Rhyme\u003c/a>.” Naru can still recite those verses from memory: \u003cem>Now people come and take a trip in time with me / Back to that sweet year one million B.C.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I still got that old-school flavor, man,” he admits. “Hip-hop was more fun for me back then.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927368\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.Boxes_.1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"840\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927368\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.Boxes_.1.jpg 600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Naru.Boxes_.1-160x224.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Naru Kwina, who recorded under the names Sir Quick Draw and Em Cee Quick, poses with his home archives. \u003ccite>(Mosi Reeves)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But rap in the Bay Area didn’t take off right away. “Most people would rap other people’s songs. They’d just repeat what they heard on the radio,” says Naru. Aspiring MCs honed their craft by congregating at Eastmont Mall, “trying to impress the girls, and getting our names on our derby jackets.” And when Tom Tom Club’s 1981 hit “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECiMhe4E0pI\">Genius of Love\u003c/a>” dropped? “Everybody rapped over that joint, man. Too many people.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s worth remembering that hip-hop was a phenomenon developed essentially by Black and Brown children. Rapping, pop-locking, spray-painting aerosol art on neighborhood walls, even DJing: These were youthful forms of play and creative expression.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bas, who grew up in North Oakland, remembers \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#at-fishermans-wharf-a-street-dance-destination-emerges\">popping and “roboting” at Pier 39 on Fisherman’s Wharf\u003c/a> in the late ’70s as a child. “You have people like Ben [James] from Live Incorporated doing pantomime and roboting,” he says, noting one of the better-known dance crews. Dancers competed for attention and tips that they could spend on Snickers bars and arcade games. “Battle-wise, you had to have skill and talent to a certain caliber in order to truly be out on the Wharf or on Market [and Powell] in front of the cable cars,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927321\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-800x547.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"547\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927321\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-800x547.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-1020x697.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-160x109.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791-768x525.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1298788791.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A street dance crew called The Vita Family perform at Pier 39 in 1986. \u003ccite>(Liz Hafalia/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Local newspaper stories focused on the emergence of hip-hop as a youth obsession. Enterprising teachers incorporated it into their lesson plans. On high-school campuses, fledgling DJs like Joseph Thomas “G.I. Joe” Simms Jr. at El Cerrito High School and groups like the Devastating Four proliferated. At house parties, mobile DJ crews spun the latest electro, boogie-funk, and rap hits.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gatherings at schools, churches, and community centers typically reserved a few minutes for fledgling local rap and dance crews to perform. This was also the era of \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#nancy-reagan-visits-oakland-and-coins-the-phrase-just-say-no\">the Reagan Administration’s “Just Say No” campaign\u003c/a>, and kids were often asked to help spread an anti-drug message through raps. “Inspired by rapping groups such as Sugar Hill, Run DMC, Jeckyl and Hyde and Mell (sic) and the Furious Five, teen-agers create their own raps mostly for fun and to bring attention to themselves,” read a June 29, 1985, story in the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em>. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In the first half of the decade, street dance remained a focal point. \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/12/04/1140504217/double-dutch-fantastic-four-holiday-classic\">Double Dutch jump-rope competitions\u003c/a> sponsored by McDonald’s drew thousands to Lincoln Square Center in Oakland. The San Francisco Street Breakers held a fundraising benefit, “Super Break Sunday,” at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts in 1985. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ironically, street dance “got played out” after the success of Hollywood movies like \u003cem>Beat Street\u003c/em> and \u003cem>Breakin’\u003c/em>, and rap music moved to the center of hip-hop culture. Quickening the process were concerts by Black music stars like the \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#the-fresh-fest-comes-to-oakland\">Fresh Festival\u003c/a>, the first national hip-hop tour, with headliners Run-DMC at the Oakland Coliseum. Local radio tentatively began to experiment with rap, notably KMEL-FM and its mix DJs such as Michael Erickson and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/arts/13828163/watch-cameron-paul-give-a-masterclass-in-early-djing\">the late Cameron Paul\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927323\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 640px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-1020x1517.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"952\" class=\"size-large wp-image-13927323\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-1020x1517.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-800x1190.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-160x238.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-768x1142.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_-1033x1536.jpg 1033w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/FreshFest.Flyer_.jpg 1345w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A flyer for the Fresh Festival, which arrived in Oakland in 1984.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“By 1985, there was this incredible scene in the South Bay,” says Adisa “The Bishop” Banjoko. As a teen DJ in San Bruno “who looked like Urkel,” he remembers traveling far and wide to buy records, from Creative Music Emporium in San Francisco to T’s Wauzi in Oakland. Meanwhile, nightclubs like Mothers and Studio 47 brought a fusion of hip-hop, freestyle and techno. “San Jose had underage hip-hop teenage clubs, and no other city had those,” he says. (Banjoko later became a rapper, a journalist, and now promotes jiu-jitsu, meditation and chess with his company \u003ca href=\"https://www.instagram.com/real64blocks/?hl=en\">64 Blocks\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Back in Oakland, Naru continued making tapes. “I come from a musical family. My cousin’s the Maestro” — a.k.a. producer Keenan Foster, who has worked with Too Short, Dru Down, and Askari X — “and a lot of my family sings. I got a drum machine, a little Yamaha keyboard. I would play my bass lines. We had double-cassette decks.” He collaborated with Taj “Turntable T” Tilghman, “who was dope on the turntables.” Turntable T eventually bought a Roland TR-808 drum machine, the instrument du jour for def beat MCs. “When that 808 came, that was it. Everyone loved that deck. \u003cem>Boom!\u003c/em>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Gray tapes” that circulated weren’t the EP and album-length releases we’re familiar with today. Some tapes only had one song per side; or maybe just one song on one side, period. Artists were judged not only by their ability to rap engagingly for several minutes, but also to chop up a familiar beat like Whodini’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5r0i2ZAbCc\">Friends\u003c/a>,” transforming it into something fresh and original; or even make rudimentary 808 beats. For example, Too Short drew attention for “rapping the longest,” as Bas explains, leading to songs that lasted eight or nine minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927334\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-800x682.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"682\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-800x682.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-1020x870.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-160x136.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait-768x655.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Adisa.portrait.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Adisa Banjoko in the 1980s. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Adisa Banjoko)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Those tapes were everywhere. Everyone was trying to see what was possible,” says Banjoko. In 1987, he began making raps under the name MC Most Ill. His first song was “Rhyme Junkie.” “The truth was, some of it was really cool but a lot of it actually also sucked, because [the art form] was brand new. … The quality control was not there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On August 18, 1984, the \u003cem>San Francisco Examiner\u003c/em> published an article called “Rapping with Too-Short,” the first story on the 18-year-old prodigy. Pacific News Service journalist Anthony Adams called Short’s songs “preacher-like yarns over pre-recorded music,” and noted that one of them was about automaker John DeLorean, whose conviction for cocaine trafficking made national news. Short claimed he and his partner Freddy B sold over 2,000 tapes. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003cem>Chronicle-Examiner\u003c/em> also frequently interviewed \u003ca href=\"https://www.dominiquediprima.com/\">Dominique “Lady D” DiPrima\u003c/a>, a New York transplant and San Francisco State University student who rapped, sung, and organized events. DiPrima possessed a rich family pedigree — her father was the jazz writer Amiri Baraka, her mother the beat poet Diane DiPrima. In late 1984, \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#home-turf-premieres-on-kron-tv\">KRON-TV recruited her to host \u003cem>Home Turf\u003c/em>\u003c/a>, a Saturday-afternoon program that became appointment viewing for local teens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everyone had a crush on Dominique,” says Naru, giggling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927320\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-800x541.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"541\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927320\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-800x541.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-1020x690.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-160x108.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-768x520.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_-1536x1039.png 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/DominiqueDiprima.HomeTurf.SFSU_.png 1540w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dominique DiPrima, pictured here hosting a 1987 episode of ‘Home Turf’ on KRON-4. \u003ccite>(SFSU Television Archive)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>The First Bay Area Rap Record Opens the Floodgates\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>One of the under-acknowledged aspects of early hip-hop is the way elder Black musicians shepherded young artists into the recording industry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The late Sylvia Robinson, who was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2022, initially emerged in the mid-’50s as one-half of Mickey & Sylvia, who scored a national hit with “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SwMB9v1pQ4\">Love Is Strange\u003c/a>.” As a ’70s solo artist and producer, Robinson made slinky, Eartha Kitt-like erotic disco capers such as “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NA2X1040_gY\">Pillow Talk\u003c/a>” and “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPScEJ66_m4\">Sweet Stuff\u003c/a>.” After discovering hip-hop when she heard DJ Lovebug Starski at a party, Robinson formed Sugar Hill Records, and turned three rapping teens she found in New Jersey into its first act, the Sugarhill Gang.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This process of soul veterans working with young people resulted in independent 12” singles that mirrored — if not yet accurately capturing — the nascent rap sound at a time when big companies virtually ignored it. With his Mercury Records contract, Kurtis Blow was the only act with a major album deal. A handful of other pioneers like DJ Hollywood scored one-off 12” deals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A similar process played out in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/2R_h9BCuvBE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/2R_h9BCuvBE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The first Bay Area rap record is widely considered to be Phil “Motorcycle Mike” Lewis and the Rat Trap Band’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4Odk2Vu70s\">Super Rat\u003c/a>,” a 1981 boogie-funk single notoriously released by East Oakland heroin kingpin Milton “Mickey Mo” Moore’s Hodisk Records. The name “Hodisk” was a cheeky reference to his onetime side business as a pimp. (Moore has since reformed and is now a pastor in West Oakland.) In fact, Mickey Mo boasts in his 1996 autobiography \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qy6RNV6f5w\">The Man: The Life Story of a Drug Kingpin\u003c/a>\u003c/em>, “Hodisk Records became the first record company on the West Coast to release a rap record.” (The first L.A. rap record, Disco Daddy and Captain Rapp’s “The Gigolo Rapp,” was also released in 1981.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mickey Mo has another claim to rap lore: In 1980, he \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#the-first-rap-performance-on-a-major-stage\">helped finance an Oakland Coliseum concert\u003c/a> headlined by L.A. funk band War, with the Sugarhill Gang as a supporting act. Journalist Lee Hildebrand’s pre-concert interview with the Gang in the \u003cem>Oakland Tribune\u003c/em> was the first mention of rap music in the local press. A second funk-rap novelty, Steve Walker’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vB9jCLUWwBY\">Tally Ho!\u003c/a>,” also appeared in 1981. In 1983, San Francisco’s Debo & Brian released the electro-funk EP \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgv_AfTbEng\">This Is It\u003c/a>\u003c/em>. The momentum had started.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I had made this vow that I would never ever do anything having to do with rap,” laughs Claytoven Richardson. During his long career, the Berkeley-born, Oakland-raised Richardson worked with Aretha Franklin, Kenny G, Whitney Houston, Elton John, and Celine Dion. But in the early ’80s, he was best known as a singer, producer, and arranger with hot dancefloor jazz-funk bands like Bill Summers & Summers’ Heat. His anti-rap stance reflected the music industry at large in the 1980s. “Nobody had the foresight to see that it would morph and change and do the things that it’s done,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927369\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 625px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/ClaytovenRichardson.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"625\" height=\"352\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927369\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/ClaytovenRichardson.jpg 625w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/ClaytovenRichardson-160x90.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 625px) 100vw, 625px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Claytoven Richardson pictured in March 2023 in Los Angeles, California. \u003ccite>(Steven Simione/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Still, Richardson couldn’t avoid the increasingly popular genre when he scored a production deal at Fantasy Records, the onetime Berkeley jazz label also known for innovative acts like Sylvester and Cybotron, as well as one-off singles generated by a “throw it against the wall and see if it sticks” philosophy. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the records Richardson produced in that anything-goes environment was Mighty Mouth’s satirical complaint, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VU1hAFnrtU8\">I’m All Rapped Out\u003c/a>.” (He wasn’t the only one annoyed over rap; perhaps out of wishful thinking, a 1985 \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em> article referred to the “fast-fading hip-hop scene.”) A vocalist named Lawrence Pittman didn’t show up for the session, so Richardson performed the lyrics himself. However, Pittman showed up to rap on Mighty Mouth’s second single, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqfQcLbemE4\">The Roaches\u003c/a>,” which parodied Whodini’s electro hit, “Freaks Come Out at Night.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other scattered local raps appeared between 1985 and 1986. Former boogaloo dancer Jay King, just home from a stint in the Air Force and splitting time between Sacramento and Vallejo, formed a group called Frost and released “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hObIekxeoSg\">Battle Beat\u003c/a>.” His friends Denzil Foster & Thomas McElroy produced it, as well as another electro-rap track, Sorcerey’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ap6uw-kX8o\">Woo Baby\u003c/a>.” Pittsburg rapper James “Red Beat” Briggs issued “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7dUlMEZUSc\">Freak City\u003c/a>,” which was later remixed by N.W.A. co-founder Arabian Prince. And there was Rodney “Disco Alamo” Brown, from Richmond, whose 12” “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6K-pXg1DY98\">The Task Force\u003c/a>” is \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#richmonds-task-force-memorialized-on-wax\">an early example\u003c/a> of Bay Area rap chronicling street life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927313\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-800x484.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"484\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927313\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-800x484.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-1020x618.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-160x97.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164-768x465.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1206295164.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Too Short, pictured at his manager’s house in Oakland on September 21, 1987. \u003ccite>(Steve Ringman/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Most importantly, Too Short’s rising buzz led to a deal with deep East Oakland entrepreneur Dean Hodges’ 75 Girls label. Released in 1985, the resulting \u003cem>Don’t Stop Rappin’\u003c/em> was the first official album by a local rapper. While fans of a certain age still treasure protean electro-funk tracks like “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2ywke376NQ\">Girl\u003c/a>” — which E-40 referenced on his 1998 hit, “Earl, That’s Yo Life” — the album couldn’t compare to his raunchy and wickedly hilarious “special request” tapes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was during this period that Naru finally got his chance in the studio. Since 1984, UC Berkeley station \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#college-radio-makes-its-mark\">KALX-FM\u003c/a> served as home to “Music for the People,” a Sunday-morning community affairs and music show hosted by the late Charles “Natty Prep” Douglass, as well as DJs like Billy “Jam” Kiernan (who also broadcast on San Francisco State University station KUSF-FM), David “Davey D” Cook, and funkster Rickey “The Uhuru Maggot” Vincent. When Naru won \u003ca href=\"https://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/107287\">a 1986 rap contest hosted by Billy Jam on KALX\u003c/a>, he earned a deal with Bay Wave Records, a local imprint distributed by Hollywood-based Macola Records. Richardson was hired to produce the session.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/dLlNn1Zh1ww'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/dLlNn1Zh1ww'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>“[Quick Draw] was a great rapper. He had a lot of great lyrics and ideas,” says Richardson. On “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLlNn1Zh1ww\">Rapaholic\u003c/a>,” Richardson and session engineer Michael Denten (who later worked with Spice 1 and E-40) accompanied Quick Draw’s dexterous and energetic raps with sharp-angled percussive edits and sound effects reminiscent of The Art of Noise and Mantronix.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Respect to Claytoven,” says Naru, who not only continues to make music but also owns a company, \u003ca href=\"http://hiplearning.org/\">Hip Learning\u003c/a>, that promotes childhood education with rap. He wasn’t entirely satisfied with the “Rapaholic” experience: “They made the record sound hella more polished. It was [supposed to be] a little more underground than that.” However, he adds, “[Claytoven] taught us a lot in the studio about the mics they use and how to mix. It was a good experience.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927411\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/SirQuickdrawFlyer.72dpi.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"889\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927411\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/SirQuickdrawFlyer.72dpi.jpg 600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/SirQuickdrawFlyer.72dpi-160x237.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A photocopied flyer advertising Sir Quick Draw’s single ‘Rapaholic.’ \u003ccite>(Mosi Reeves)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>A Radio Breakthrough — And a Kid Named Hammer\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>As the trajectory of Bay Area hip-hop waxed and waned, three catalyzing moments brought the scene into focus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first was an R&B track. Timex Social Club’s “Rumors” captured the pulse of Bay Area youth culture, from Marcus Thompson and Alex Hill’s skittering electro-funk bass and drums to singer Michael Marshall’s distinctly regional accent and coy recitation of schoolyard gossip (“Did you hear the one about Michael? Some say he must be gay…”) Produced by Jay King and Denzil Foster and released on King’s Jay Records in February 1986, it mushroomed into a top ten \u003cem>Billboard\u003c/em> pop hit and dominated radio all year.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/jVce2IeYcTg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/jVce2IeYcTg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>But by the summer, Timex Social Club was falling apart and trading accusations with King over money and credit. The group’s only album \u003cem>Vicious Rumors\u003c/em> — by that point it was just Michael Marshall — featured drum programming from CJ Flash and a shout-out to KALX’s Natty Prep, who helped break “Rumors” on his “Music and Life” show. Marshall retreated from the spotlight before \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#i-got-5-on-it-remix-a-meeting-of-greats-recorded-in-alameda\">re-emerging as the hook man\u003c/a> on the Luniz’ 1995 smash “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERtkpnXLrL4\">I Got 5 on It\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After breaking with Timex Social Club, King formed a group called Jet Set and signed a deal with Warner Bros. Records. The group changed their name to Club Nouveau before debuting with the single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKWhkjXV5uM\">Jealousy\u003c/a>.” A follow-up, the Bill Withers cover “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbyjaUJWWmk\">Lean on Me\u003c/a>,” went to number-one on the \u003cem>Billboard\u003c/em> Hot 100, while Club Nouveau’s debut album \u003cem>Life, Love & Pain\u003c/em> went platinum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927310\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-800x489.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"489\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927310\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-800x489.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-1020x624.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-160x98.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851-768x470.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/GettyImages-1346275851.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Singers Samuelle Prater, Jay King and Valerie Watson of Club Nouveau performs at the U.I.C. Pavilion in Chicago, Illinois in August 1987. \u003ccite>(Raymond Boyd/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>King’s growing stardom rippled across the Bay and reached Felton Pilate, the Vallejo keyboardist, singer, and producer best known as a driving force in Bay Area funk stars Con Funk Shun. The two had already worked together on King’s onetime rap group Frost; Pilate engineered that record. Pilate soon added one of King’s projects, Sacramento R&B/rap group New Choice, to a growing slate of projects he produced and engineered at his Felstar Studios.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Felstar Studios was the culmination of work he had begun while not touring and rehearsing with Con Funk Shun. At his home studio on Sandpiper Drive in Vallejo, Pilate helped assemble records for fledgling local artists. “I never thought of myself as just a studio,” he says, where he simply records his clients. “I have a little experience here. I’ve got several gold albums. Here, let me pass on some of this knowledge.” When asked if he considered himself a mentor, he demurs, even though that’s arguably what he was. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Pilate opened Felstar Studios on Sonoma Boulevard, his trusted associate was James Earley, a young engineer whom he credits for adding a more contemporary sensibility to the Studios’ output. Among the locals who came to them were M.V.P., a family trio consisting of Earl Stevens, Danell Stevens, and Brandt Jones. Their 1988 12”, \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfLuAL6DueI\">The Kings Men\u003c/a>\u003c/em>, also included Tanina Stevens and Angela Pressley, who called themselves Sugar ‘N’ Spice. The members of M.V.P. updated their stage names to E-40, D-Shot and B-Legit, added Tanina as Suga T, and \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/bayareahiphop/timeline#the-clicks-down-dirty-ushers-in-mobb-music-era\">evolved into The Click\u003c/a>, arguably becoming the most famous rap group to emerge from Vallejo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927370\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 700px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/MVP.e-40.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"700\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927370\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/MVP.e-40.jpg 700w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/MVP.e-40-160x160.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">M.V.P., a 1988 Vallejo rap group featuring Busy D, E-40 and Legit (L–R). The three would later add E-40’s sister Suga T and become known as The Click. \u003ccite>(Gerry Ericksen / Rushforce Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1986, Pilate and Earley both had solo deals at Berkeley’s Fantasy Records. It was there that Pilate met a former Oakland A’s batboy named Stanley “Holyghost Boy” Burrell through Fantasy Records producer Fred L. Pittman. “Fred would often hire me to do keyboard arrangements for him,” says Pilate. When Pittman asked him to play keys for Holyghost Boy, Pilate responded, “Hey Fred, why don’t you let me take the reins on this?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a classically trained jazz and classical musician, Pilate didn’t think much of rap, even though Con Funk Shun not only included a rap verse on a 1982 single, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQ9GHVTI-EE\">Ain’t Nobody Baby\u003c/a>”; but also made “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmmzvN7raB0\">Electric Lady\u003c/a>,” a 1985 hit produced by Larry Smith of Whodini fame that landed in the top five of \u003cem>Billboard\u003c/em>’s Black Singles chart. “Musically, I wasn’t a fan, but as a producer, I said, ‘I can do this,’” he says. “Like everyone else, Con Funk Shun wanted to be relevant, and rap was all over the radio.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The tracks Burrell brought to Pilate consisted of him rapping over sparse Yamaha RX5 drum-machine parts. Pilate responded by going into “study mode.” He listened to the rap stuff that was getting airplay like Doug E. Fresh & the Get Fresh Crew. As a result, the skittering percussion on Burrell’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVWFiptGNY\">Let’s Get It Started\u003c/a>” is reminiscent of the go-go-inspired arrangements on Doug E. Fresh hits like “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sGw9GSCiYU\">The Show\u003c/a>” and “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UtqnKIF7kE\">All the Way to Heaven\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927325\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-800x565.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"565\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927325\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-800x565.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-1020x720.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-160x113.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_-768x542.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.VIdeoShoot.NewParish.Getty_.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">MC Hammer films the music video for ‘Let’s Get It Started’ at Sweet Jimmie’s nightclub in downtown Oakland, March 19, 1988. \u003ccite>(Deanne Fitzmaurice/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“My thing was to make it more music-driven than beat-driven,” says Pilate. In many cases, he simply “listened to what [Burrell] was talking about and wrote a straight R&B song underneath it.” He also gives credit to Earley, who helped refine the drum programming and brought “that younger ear” to the project. They incorporated stock horn stabs from a battery of Juno, Roland, and Yamaha drum machines. Meanwhile, Kent “The Lone Mixer” Wilson and Bryant “D.J. Redeemed” Marable added rhythmic scratches by cutting up Curtis Mayfield and Beastie Boys records.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the demos were finished, Fantasy Records dropped Pilate, Earley and Burrell from their deals. “They weren’t really sure how to market any of us,” says Pilate. Then, he chuckles, “The next time I ran into the Holyghost Boy, he had changed his name to MC Hammer.” After forming Bustin’ Records in Fremont with financial help from Oakland A’s ballplayers like Mike Davis and Dwayne Murphy, Hammer turned the Pilate demos into three 12”s — “Ring ’Em,” “The Thrill Is Gone” and “Let’s Get It Started” — and the 1987 album \u003cem>Feel My Power\u003c/em>. “I was like, man, those were rough mixes! You were supposed to come back and let me fix that!” Pilate laughs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Everyone involved in Bay Area hip-hop has vivid memories of MC Hammer blowing up. Near-mythical stories of his local takeover abound, like attending local concerts surrounded by a massive crew; or tearing up the dance floor at The Silks, a popular nightclub in Emeryville.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927324\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-800x727.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"727\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927324\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-800x727.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-1020x926.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-160x145.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate-768x698.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Hammer.Pilate.jpg 1058w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">MC Hammer and Fenton Pilate in modern times. Pilate engineered and co-produced MC Hammer’s first recordings. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Felton Pilate)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Today, it’s worth revisiting \u003cem>Feel My Power\u003c/em> and 1988’s \u003cem>Let’s Get It Started\u003c/em>. Released after Hammer signed with Capitol Records, \u003cem>Let’s Get It Started\u003c/em> found Hammer and Pilate remixing those original demos while adding vital new tracks like “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sZVcXzSE3M\">Pump It Up\u003c/a>.” The results are bombastic and vibrant dance-floor jams as ecstatic as anything by Kid ‘n’ Play and Salt-n-Pepa. Hammer’s subsequent leap into pop superstardom with 1990’s \u003cem>Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em\u003c/em> and the ubiquity of “U Can’t Touch This” obscure just how great those early tracks are.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Eight Woofers in the Trunk\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>MC Hammer’s major-label arrival in 1988 capped a year of Bay Area hip-hop on the cusp of national exposure. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After Too Short issued \u003cem>Born to Mack\u003c/em> in the fall of 1987 on his Dangerous Music label, Jive Records picked it up. (Dangerous Music also issued \u003cem>Dangerous Crew\u003c/em>, a compilation of vital Bay Area acts like Spice-1, Rappin’ 4-Tay, and the female duo Danger Zone.) Digital Underground’s playful and psychedelic “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zQ1frcgSbI\">Underwater Rimes\u003c/a> / \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpBNB20wVo0\">Your Life’s a Cartoon\u003c/a>” led to a deal with Tommy Boy. Local talent waited in the wings, including rapper/producer Paris (A.T.C.’s “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHpiPWfOBk4\">Cisco Jam\u003c/a>”), Sway & King Tech (\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBJujmVXiwE\">Flynamic Force\u003c/a>\u003c/em> EP), Dangerous Dame (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9Frj4j09GE\">The Power That’s Packed\u003c/a>”), and MC Twist and the Def Squad (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lZz7qhjfjw\">Just Rock\u003c/a>”). And the late Cameron Paul, known for his “Beats & Pieces” breakbeats, remixed Queens trio Salt-n-Pepa’s 1987 track “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPkdk1oMmtE\">Push It\u003c/a>” into a global phenomenon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13828164\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-800x496.jpg\" alt=\"Cameron Paul reveals his mixing secrets.\" width=\"800\" height=\"496\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13828164\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-160x99.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-768x476.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-240x149.jpg 240w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-375x233.jpg 375w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2018/03/CameronPaul-520x322.jpg 520w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cameron Paul, who provided the spine of New Orleans bounce music with ‘Brown Beats’ and recorded a smash-hit remix of Salt ‘n’ Pepa’s ‘Push It,’ was also a prominent club and radio megamix DJ in San Francisco. \u003ccite>(YouTube)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Incidentally, the first local group to score a major label deal wasn’t Hammer, but Surf MCs, a Berkeley group that Profile Records promoted as a Beastie Boys-like rap/rock crossover. Their 1987 album \u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojCAqdBA7uA\">Surf or Die\u003c/a>\u003c/em> proved a flop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet the third moment that catalyzed Bay Area hip-hop wasn’t a singular record like Timex Social Club’s “Rumors,” or an artist like Hammer and Short. It was the sound of walloping, all-enveloping bass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Made for surgically enhanced car and jeep stereos, the bass colossus is as much a feature of hip-hop in the mid-’80s as the pounding Roland TR-808 machine, from Rick Rubin’s production on LL Cool J’s “Rock the Bells” and T La Rock’s “It’s Yours” to Rodney O and DJ Joe Cooley’s “Everlasting Bass” and Dr. Dre’s work on Eazy-E’s “The Boyz-N-The Hood.” It also mirrors the crack-cocaine epidemic that began to blight and distort communities across the country. As street life turned treacherous, the specter of the hustler, and whether to become one, cast a growing shadow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Then the new style came, the bass got deeper / You gave up the mike and bought you a beeper / Do you want to rap or sell coke? / Brothers like you ain’t never broke,” Too Short memorably rapped on his 1989 hit, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvfUUOO0xoM\">Life Is…Too Short\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Banjoko recalls how the presence of gangs transformed local shows. “You would see a bunch of people dressed up together [in the same gear], and you might assume they were a rap or dance crew. They were young drug lords,” he says. “You could get trampled, beat up or robbed by any of them. I remember 69 Ville being massively deep at the Fresh Fest and the [Run-DMC] Raising Hell tour. They were terrifying, straight up. You were going to tuck your chain, you were going to take your Kangol off, or they were going to take it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927326\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 600px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/HughEMC.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"409\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13927326\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/HughEMC.jpg 600w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/HughEMC-160x109.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hugh EMC, the San Francisco rapper whose 1988 single ‘It’s the Game’ unflinchingly chronicled street life. \u003ccite>(Soul Sonic Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Rap imagery became more honest and explicit. Some like Richmond rapper Magic Mike, San Francisco’s Hugh EMC (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_p7L0eJfKI\">It’s the Game\u003c/a>”), and Oakland’s Hollywood (“\u003ca href=\"https://www.discogs.com/release/641778-Hollywood-Stay-Heart-And-Soul-Raps-Just-A-Battlefield\">Gangster Rap\u003c/a>”) seemed to embrace the hustler ethos, while cautiously adding verses about the consequences of that lifestyle. Then there was Oakland rapper Morocco Moe, whose “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogNoOCIVPrI\">Task\u003c/a>” criticized how law enforcement brutalized communities in the War on Drugs: “Their intentions are good/But their actions are wrong.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Every Black neighborhood was infested” with crack, says Vallejo producer Khayree Shaheed. “There was an influx of money coming into young Black men, but there was also a lot of death occurring.” The epidemic also marked his entry into the world of rap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a descendant of the Bay Area’s vaunted funk tradition, Khayree spent the ’70s and early ’80s playing bass guitar for bands like Grand Larceny, Body Mind & Spirit and Touch of Class (with keyboardist Rosie Gaines, who later joined Prince & the New Power Generation). His travels took him across the U.S. and even to Japan, where Touch of Class lived and performed for several months. (Though his bands made demos, there are no official recordings to date.) When asked about the first time he heard rap, Khayree cites “jazzoetry” ensembles like The Last Poets, not the Sugarhill Gang. And as a youth growing up on Lofas Place in Vallejo, he spent plenty of time following Con Funk Shun, hoping to apprentice with the biggest band in the city.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927412\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-800x510.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"510\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927412\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-800x510.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-1020x651.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-160x102.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-768x490.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi-1536x980.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.1979.DockoftheBay.72dpi.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Vallejo musician Khayree Shaheed, playing bass onstage in 1979. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Khayree Shaheed)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Khayree was in his mid-20s when Rod “I.C.E.” Andrews and Dan “Luvva D” Morrison a.k.a. the Luvva Twins brought Khayree a demo they had made on a Casio keyboard, “Hubba Head.” The song title was slang for a crack addict, and the duo described the “hubba head’s” descent into addiction with charismatic punch. They arranged the music and rapped most of the lyrics, while Khayree dropped a short verse and added guitar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Khayree had already spent time at Pilate’s home studio, honing his writing and production skills. (“I always enjoyed working with him,” says Pilate.) Now, he brought “Hubba Head” to Pilate, and the two prepared it for release. Setting up his own label, Big Bank Records, Khayree distributed two hundred copies of the 12” to DJs and influencers. “The record was super popular in the streets,” says Khayree.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/pArkWvlAebg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/pArkWvlAebg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>After “Hubba Head,” Khayree began working with Jay King, a fellow graduate of Vallejo High School. The opportunity to write and produce New Choice’s 1987 single “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-VLZQ4X1yA\">Cold Stupid\u003c/a>” and most of the quintet’s 1988 debut, \u003cem>At Last\u003c/em>, gave him important experience on a major project and financial stability. By fusing bass, funky R&B and hip-hop breakbeats, New Choice reflected a parallel R&B movement that both influenced and was inspired by the hip-hop scene. Similar Bay Area acts included Oakland’s Tony! Toni! Toné!, who parlayed backing sessions for Sheila E. and Tramaine Hawkins into a major-label deal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Flush from his experience with New Choice, Khayree was ready to start his own company. “I’m listening to EPMD’s \u003cem>Strictly Business\u003c/em>,” he says, inspiring the name of his second label, Strictly Business Records. He knew that Mike “The Mac” Robinson, who also grew up on Lofas Place, was a rapper. Robinson hailed from a musical family: his uncle Steve “Silver” Scales was a well-traveled Vallejo funk percussionist who played with Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club, and the B-52s. (Though it would be a delicious coincidence, Scales didn’t perform on “Genius of Love.”) Khayree encouraged Robinson to take music more seriously. Meanwhile, Robinson’s mother drew the memorable Strictly Business logo: an open briefcase, ready for business.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1988, Khayree released The Mac’s three-song EP, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.discogs.com/release/805531-The-Mac-Im-Ah-Big-Mac\">I’m Ah Big Mac\u003c/a>.” Heard now, what immediately stands out is the unique \u003cem>tone\u003c/em> of the bass. “We used synthesizers that had dumb-fat bass lines,” explains Khayree in reference to himself and Too Short as well as future Bay Area colleagues like Ant Banks. By comparison, he says, other regional scenes relied on a “natural” bass guitar or samples from records. “You feel it through your whole body. … You can get it with a bass guitar, depending on how you EQ the bass and what you run your guitar through. But you’re \u003cem>never\u003c/em> going to touch the subs and the depth of a Minimoog, of the Oberheim Ovx, or the Roland Juno 106.” The EP’s highlight is its B-side “The Game Is Thick,” which centers on a sample of Prince’s “D.M.S.R.” \u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927371\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-800x498.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"498\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927371\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-800x498.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-1020x635.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-160x100.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick-768x478.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/TheMac.GameisThick.jpg 1537w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Khayree and The Mac (L–R), pictured on the cover of The Mac’s ‘The Game is Thick.’ \u003ccite>(Phil Bray / Strictly Business Records)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1989, Khayree remixed and re-released “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCxGl7Ok1YI\">The Game Is Thick\u003c/a>” as a standalone 12” with a memorable cover photo: Khayree looking super-clean in a grey suit, clasping a briefcase, with The Mac in a red-and-black bomber jacket. Khayree calls the style “pimping.” “We didn’t mean pimping so much as getting prostitutes to work,” he explains. “It’s an attitude, and it’s a musical style.” The “game” is a metaphor for life in the Black community. Street slang illustrated complex situations, whether it was dealing with the repercussions of a raging crack epidemic, or simply navigating the tensions of everyday living. Meanwhile, The Mac’s “cool, silky, pimpish” flow and Khayree’s synthesized bass production proved a clear predecessor to the ’90s mob-music sound that took over Bay Area rap.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Upon release, “The Game Is Thick” didn’t make a major impact, and most copies went to local DJ pools. “We promoted records out of the trunk,” says Khayree. “We went from Bobby G’s Soul Disco in San Francisco to [Rico Casanova’s record pool] The Pros in Oakland.” Still, “The Game Is Thick” remix received a mention in Davey “D” Cook’s April 7, 1989 “Beats & Breaks” column for \u003cem>BAM\u003c/em> Magazine. “Let me tell you, it’s hyped to the max,” Davey D wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With Khayree’s encouragement, the Mac taught himself how to produce music with synth keyboards. He also introduced Khayree to another Vallejo artist, Andre “Mac Dre” Hicks, who became Strictly Business’ second act. By the time The Mac was shot and killed on July 23, 1991 in what Khayree calls “a case of mistaken identity,” the two had recorded dozens of tracks and released a third and final 12” protesting police violence, 1990’s “Enuff of Tis Sh-t!” One of The Mac’s beats posthumously appeared on Mac Dre’s 1993 track, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slA_s7tSjMU\">The M.A.C. & Mac D.R.E.\u003c/a>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13927413\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-800x523.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"523\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13927413\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-800x523.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-1020x666.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-160x105.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-768x502.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi-1536x1003.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/04/Khayree.KoolMoeDee.72dpi.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Khayree with Kool Moe Dee at the 1988 BRE Conference in Los Angeles. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Khayree Shaheed)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Mike had a big, big loving heart,” remembers Khayree, sounding wistful. He emphasizes how The Mac left behind a daughter, “Mac” Reina Robinson, and a pregnant girlfriend who gave birth to his son, Mike. At one point, Khayree plays a voicemail of The Mac passionately singing a funky, swinging hook, as if to counteract the stereotype that rappers aren’t musicians. He talks about how The Mac’s way of playing simple, evocative keyboard notes for maximum effect echoes in the work of his famed protégé, Mac Dre. “I miss him,” he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Area rap broke wide at the end of the decade, leading to a 1989 story in the \u003cem>New York Times\u003c/em>, “\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/1989/09/10/arts/rap-by-the-bay-oakland-emerges-as-a-force-in-pop.html\">Rap by the Bay: Oakland Emerges as a Force in Pop\u003c/a>.” Not every local pioneer who laid the groundwork would enjoy the fruits of that success. But their stories are essential to understanding how local hip-hop came of age, and everything that came after.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "There are Plenty of Doomsday Climate Stories — ‘Extrapolations’ is About the Everyday",
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"content": "\u003cp>In some ways, \u003ca href=\"https://tv.apple.com/us/show/extrapolations/umc.cmc.4uoqxmxlnipm9zsc88bkjyjx4\">\u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em>\u003c/a> is typical eco-thriller fare. The Apple TV+ series depicts a planet on the brink of environmental crisis, where ordinary human beings battle increasingly hostile elements, and a villainous tech tycoon seeks to take over the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet in contrast to apocalyptic climate change dramas, like\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2004/05/28/1915138/questionable-science-behind-the-day-after-tomorrow\"> \u003cem>The Day After Tomorrow\u003c/em> \u003c/a>and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2014/06/29/326154752/in-snowpiercer-a-never-ending-train-ride-and-a-society-badly-off-track\">\u003cem>Snowpiercer\u003c/em>, \u003c/a>\u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> doesn’t dwell on the End of Days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We wanted to focus on what we call the ‘messy middle,’” series creator Scott Burns told NPR in an interview. “Because before we get to the end, there’s a lot of life that we’re all gonna have to go through.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN6oWKPxwx0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the barrage of daily news headlines devoted to climate change, there still aren’t many fictional TV shows and movies that deal with the topic. And those that do tend towards disaster, picturing the end of life on Earth as we know it. But \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> attempts to walk the line between fiction and scientific fact to tell the story of what’s at stake for our planet over the next few decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Dramatizing the ‘messy middle’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>The messy middle dramatized in \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> unfolds over roughly three decades starting about 15 years from now. Burns said he wanted to make climate change feel immediate, especially to young people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you are 15 or 16 right now and you watch our show, you’re gonna be alive in 2070 when our show ends,” Burns said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13879441']Burns said much of the show’s sense of immediacy about the near future stems from digging into — and making predictions based on — science. His team drew on the \u003ca href=\"https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/reports?gclid=Cj0KCQjwt_qgBhDFARIsABcDjOcKowrqXgMothLpqDQdMQBek9Xfo8J0tKQi6Hzu2KrFAZU1oDNC6cQaAmLQEALw_wcB\">U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports\u003c/a> and consulted with climate scientists to come up with storylines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the episode set in the year 2046, for instance, global temperatures have risen to an alarming 1.8 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Sienna Miller plays a conservationist struggling to save species from going extinct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Ocean temp is over 90 most days. Krill is gone. Almost. Food column is collapsing,” Miller’s character, Rebecca Shearer, laments.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Putting data on screen\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Burns is no stranger to putting climate data on screen. \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2016/05/04/476717308/after-10-years-an-inconvenient-truth-is-still-inconvenient\">\u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em>, \u003c/a>the Oscar-winning 2006 documentary he co-produced, is essentially a giant PowerPoint presentation packed with a bunch of statistics about global warming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://theconversation.com/ten-years-on-how-al-gores-an-inconvenient-truth-made-its-mark-59387\">Studies\u003c/a> demonstrate how \u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em> helped bring climate change into the cultural conversation. But after it came out, Burns found himself asking if there were ways he could harness fiction rooted in science to highlight the problem’s urgency in a more visceral way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13924912']“I think that climate change is different when it’s portrayed on a graph than when it is portrayed in a story with characters who look and feel like the audience,” the producer said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When deciding what story to tell about the climate change future we could face, Burns said he wasn’t interested in depicting worst-case scenarios.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We felt that if we did that the show would be very vulnerable to criticism, that we were just sensationalizing,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>A series grounded in scientific facts\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>To experts like University of Colorado Boulder environmental studies professor \u003ca href=\"https://www.colorado.edu/envs/maxwell-boykoff\">Max Boykoff\u003c/a>, the predictions in \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> seem, for the most part, well-grounded in science.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way in which they talked about forest fires and water scarcity and poor air quality and public health challenges are all the kinds of things that we are writing about,” Boykoff told NPR in an interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are some aspects of \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> that do seem a little far-fetched to the scholar, such as the notion that by 2046, humans would be able to talk to animals in English — among them, a humpback whale voiced by Meryl Streep.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925067']Nevertheless, Boykoff said he’s excited to see a mainstream TV show tackle climate change so credibly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Few people pick up and read peer-reviewed literature on a daily basis,” Boykoff said. “And so when it comes to climate change, the way in which entertainment media is engaging with it is critically important to helping a global population understand what we’re facing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s why, Boykoff said, in our era of misinformation, it’s crucial for creators to get the science right.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Any climate story is better than no climate story\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>But other experts say having a firm foundation in science isn’t the most important thing when it comes to telling compelling climate change stories.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m less concerned with writers getting it wrong and that being damaging, than I am with us continuing to ignore [climate change] in the worlds of our stories,” said Anna Jane Joyner, the founder and CEO of \u003ca href=\"https://www.goodenergystories.com/\">Good Energy\u003c/a>, a nonprofit that supports movie and TV production in the climate change space with research and connections to experts. The company did consulting work on \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em>. “Even just talking about climate change in your story is more beneficial than not,” Joyner said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A recent \u003ca href=\"https://www.goodenergystories.com/offerings/research\">Good Energy study\u003c/a> revealed that between 2016 and 2020, fewer than three percent of scripted television shows and films even mentioned climate change, let alone had storylines related to the topic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Joyner said she wants this to shift, because she understands how persuasive the types of entertainments can be.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13907576']Even over-the-top offerings like \u003cem>The Day After Tomorrow\u003c/em> show how impactful pop culture can be on raising public awareness around climate change, as a \u003ca href=\"https://climatecommunication.yale.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/2004_11_Before-and-after-The-Day-After-Tomorrow.pdf\">2004 study in \u003cem>Environment\u003c/em> journal\u003c/a> focusing on audience responses to that movie showed. The study concluded that, “some commentators had predicted that the film would bring more public attention to the issue of global warming than the publication of most scientific articles, reports, or congressional testimonies, and this prediction appears to have been correct.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Joyner said Good Energy is helping to conduct a similar study around audiences responses to \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Audio and digital stories edited by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/people/881642560/ciera-crawford\">\u003cem>Ciera Crawford\u003c/em>\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/people/493126084/ravenna-koenig\">\u003cem>Ravenna Koenig\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>. Web copy edited by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/people/348743704/beth-novey\">\u003cem>Beth Novey\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=There+are+plenty+of+doomsday+climate+stories+%E2%80%94+%27Extrapolations%27+is+about+the+everyday&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In some ways, \u003ca href=\"https://tv.apple.com/us/show/extrapolations/umc.cmc.4uoqxmxlnipm9zsc88bkjyjx4\">\u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em>\u003c/a> is typical eco-thriller fare. The Apple TV+ series depicts a planet on the brink of environmental crisis, where ordinary human beings battle increasingly hostile elements, and a villainous tech tycoon seeks to take over the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet in contrast to apocalyptic climate change dramas, like\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2004/05/28/1915138/questionable-science-behind-the-day-after-tomorrow\"> \u003cem>The Day After Tomorrow\u003c/em> \u003c/a>and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2014/06/29/326154752/in-snowpiercer-a-never-ending-train-ride-and-a-society-badly-off-track\">\u003cem>Snowpiercer\u003c/em>, \u003c/a>\u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> doesn’t dwell on the End of Days.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We wanted to focus on what we call the ‘messy middle,’” series creator Scott Burns told NPR in an interview. “Because before we get to the end, there’s a lot of life that we’re all gonna have to go through.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/TN6oWKPxwx0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/TN6oWKPxwx0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Despite the barrage of daily news headlines devoted to climate change, there still aren’t many fictional TV shows and movies that deal with the topic. And those that do tend towards disaster, picturing the end of life on Earth as we know it. But \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> attempts to walk the line between fiction and scientific fact to tell the story of what’s at stake for our planet over the next few decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Dramatizing the ‘messy middle’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>The messy middle dramatized in \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> unfolds over roughly three decades starting about 15 years from now. Burns said he wanted to make climate change feel immediate, especially to young people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you are 15 or 16 right now and you watch our show, you’re gonna be alive in 2070 when our show ends,” Burns said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Burns said much of the show’s sense of immediacy about the near future stems from digging into — and making predictions based on — science. His team drew on the \u003ca href=\"https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/reports?gclid=Cj0KCQjwt_qgBhDFARIsABcDjOcKowrqXgMothLpqDQdMQBek9Xfo8J0tKQi6Hzu2KrFAZU1oDNC6cQaAmLQEALw_wcB\">U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports\u003c/a> and consulted with climate scientists to come up with storylines.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the episode set in the year 2046, for instance, global temperatures have risen to an alarming 1.8 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Sienna Miller plays a conservationist struggling to save species from going extinct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Ocean temp is over 90 most days. Krill is gone. Almost. Food column is collapsing,” Miller’s character, Rebecca Shearer, laments.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Putting data on screen\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Burns is no stranger to putting climate data on screen. \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2016/05/04/476717308/after-10-years-an-inconvenient-truth-is-still-inconvenient\">\u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em>, \u003c/a>the Oscar-winning 2006 documentary he co-produced, is essentially a giant PowerPoint presentation packed with a bunch of statistics about global warming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://theconversation.com/ten-years-on-how-al-gores-an-inconvenient-truth-made-its-mark-59387\">Studies\u003c/a> demonstrate how \u003cem>An Inconvenient Truth\u003c/em> helped bring climate change into the cultural conversation. But after it came out, Burns found himself asking if there were ways he could harness fiction rooted in science to highlight the problem’s urgency in a more visceral way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“I think that climate change is different when it’s portrayed on a graph than when it is portrayed in a story with characters who look and feel like the audience,” the producer said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When deciding what story to tell about the climate change future we could face, Burns said he wasn’t interested in depicting worst-case scenarios.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We felt that if we did that the show would be very vulnerable to criticism, that we were just sensationalizing,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>A series grounded in scientific facts\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>To experts like University of Colorado Boulder environmental studies professor \u003ca href=\"https://www.colorado.edu/envs/maxwell-boykoff\">Max Boykoff\u003c/a>, the predictions in \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> seem, for the most part, well-grounded in science.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way in which they talked about forest fires and water scarcity and poor air quality and public health challenges are all the kinds of things that we are writing about,” Boykoff told NPR in an interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are some aspects of \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em> that do seem a little far-fetched to the scholar, such as the notion that by 2046, humans would be able to talk to animals in English — among them, a humpback whale voiced by Meryl Streep.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Nevertheless, Boykoff said he’s excited to see a mainstream TV show tackle climate change so credibly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Few people pick up and read peer-reviewed literature on a daily basis,” Boykoff said. “And so when it comes to climate change, the way in which entertainment media is engaging with it is critically important to helping a global population understand what we’re facing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s why, Boykoff said, in our era of misinformation, it’s crucial for creators to get the science right.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Any climate story is better than no climate story\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>But other experts say having a firm foundation in science isn’t the most important thing when it comes to telling compelling climate change stories.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m less concerned with writers getting it wrong and that being damaging, than I am with us continuing to ignore [climate change] in the worlds of our stories,” said Anna Jane Joyner, the founder and CEO of \u003ca href=\"https://www.goodenergystories.com/\">Good Energy\u003c/a>, a nonprofit that supports movie and TV production in the climate change space with research and connections to experts. The company did consulting work on \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em>. “Even just talking about climate change in your story is more beneficial than not,” Joyner said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A recent \u003ca href=\"https://www.goodenergystories.com/offerings/research\">Good Energy study\u003c/a> revealed that between 2016 and 2020, fewer than three percent of scripted television shows and films even mentioned climate change, let alone had storylines related to the topic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Joyner said she wants this to shift, because she understands how persuasive the types of entertainments can be.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Even over-the-top offerings like \u003cem>The Day After Tomorrow\u003c/em> show how impactful pop culture can be on raising public awareness around climate change, as a \u003ca href=\"https://climatecommunication.yale.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/2004_11_Before-and-after-The-Day-After-Tomorrow.pdf\">2004 study in \u003cem>Environment\u003c/em> journal\u003c/a> focusing on audience responses to that movie showed. The study concluded that, “some commentators had predicted that the film would bring more public attention to the issue of global warming than the publication of most scientific articles, reports, or congressional testimonies, and this prediction appears to have been correct.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Joyner said Good Energy is helping to conduct a similar study around audiences responses to \u003cem>Extrapolations\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Audio and digital stories edited by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/people/881642560/ciera-crawford\">\u003cem>Ciera Crawford\u003c/em>\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/people/493126084/ravenna-koenig\">\u003cem>Ravenna Koenig\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>. Web copy edited by \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/people/348743704/beth-novey\">\u003cem>Beth Novey\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=There+are+plenty+of+doomsday+climate+stories+%E2%80%94+%27Extrapolations%27+is+about+the+everyday&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>In these days of rage — from hate-tweeting threads to public confrontations — one thing is pretty clear: “Beef” is on the menu.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Served up by Ali Wong and Steven Yeun, the new television show created by Lee Sung Jin drops Thursday on Netflix. The 10-episode \u003cem>Beef\u003c/em> follows an epic feud between two strangers, played by Yeun (\u003cem>The Walking Dead\u003c/em>, \u003cem>Minari\u003c/em>) and Wong (\u003cem>Always Be My Maybe\u003c/em>), that stems from a wild case of road rage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFPIMHBzGDs\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The plot points may go to the extremes for entertainment but Yeun believes \u003cem>Beef\u003c/em> actually says a lot about society, and he’s “proud” of that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just see a giant mirror up to all of us,” he said in a recent interview. “We’re living in a lot of isolation, building a lot of stories up in our head. Maybe all we really want to do is connect to somebody.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wong agreed, adding that their characters Amy and Danny keep their feud going because each finds it strangely enjoyable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926773']“They’re letting walls down. They’re seeing each other at their ugliest,” Wong said. “There’s a deep acceptance that’s obviously very cathartic and very necessary. I think that’s the most unexpected and beautiful part about our show.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The more Danny and Amy reveal their true selves to one another, the more they hide from their loved ones. Amy grits her teeth and smiles at her husband George, as she secretly resents that she’s the family provider, taking her away from quality time with their young daughter while George stays home and creates bad pottery. George, in the meantime, feels inadequate that his wife is the breadwinner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just wish you’d unload the dishes sometimes,” George complains to Amy in a scene.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I barely have time to eat off those dishes,” she replies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Once any partner has a sort of resentment that they hang on to and suppress, and it’s not communicated, it boils into something else,” said Joseph Lee, who plays George. “Something will explode at some point.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Portraying so much anger actually helped Yeun to choose to take a more Zen-like outlook.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At first it was cathartic to play anger. I was just like, ‘Cool, that’s fun.’ Then after a while, I was like, ‘I’m tired,’” Yeun said. “To be angry for this long is so tiring. Like, what are we doing? Why are we so angry? It was just very clear to me, to like, just chill, so it was illuminating for me.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926515']Wong is quick to point out that despite the rage expressed on screen, offscreen it was very different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There was a lot of joy being had in between takes that we don’t see on camera … like me and Steven laughing,” Wong said. “The friendship I developed with (castmate) Ashley Park and a lot of the other people is like by far the best outcome of the show, no matter how it’s received.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 AP. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/\">visit AP\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Beef’ premieres on Netflix on April 6, 2023. \u003ca href=\"https://www.netflix.com/title/81447461\">Details here\u003c/a>. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In these days of rage — from hate-tweeting threads to public confrontations — one thing is pretty clear: “Beef” is on the menu.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Served up by Ali Wong and Steven Yeun, the new television show created by Lee Sung Jin drops Thursday on Netflix. The 10-episode \u003cem>Beef\u003c/em> follows an epic feud between two strangers, played by Yeun (\u003cem>The Walking Dead\u003c/em>, \u003cem>Minari\u003c/em>) and Wong (\u003cem>Always Be My Maybe\u003c/em>), that stems from a wild case of road rage.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/AFPIMHBzGDs'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/AFPIMHBzGDs'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>The plot points may go to the extremes for entertainment but Yeun believes \u003cem>Beef\u003c/em> actually says a lot about society, and he’s “proud” of that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just see a giant mirror up to all of us,” he said in a recent interview. “We’re living in a lot of isolation, building a lot of stories up in our head. Maybe all we really want to do is connect to somebody.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wong agreed, adding that their characters Amy and Danny keep their feud going because each finds it strangely enjoyable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“They’re letting walls down. They’re seeing each other at their ugliest,” Wong said. “There’s a deep acceptance that’s obviously very cathartic and very necessary. I think that’s the most unexpected and beautiful part about our show.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The more Danny and Amy reveal their true selves to one another, the more they hide from their loved ones. Amy grits her teeth and smiles at her husband George, as she secretly resents that she’s the family provider, taking her away from quality time with their young daughter while George stays home and creates bad pottery. George, in the meantime, feels inadequate that his wife is the breadwinner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just wish you’d unload the dishes sometimes,” George complains to Amy in a scene.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I barely have time to eat off those dishes,” she replies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Once any partner has a sort of resentment that they hang on to and suppress, and it’s not communicated, it boils into something else,” said Joseph Lee, who plays George. “Something will explode at some point.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Portraying so much anger actually helped Yeun to choose to take a more Zen-like outlook.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At first it was cathartic to play anger. I was just like, ‘Cool, that’s fun.’ Then after a while, I was like, ‘I’m tired,’” Yeun said. “To be angry for this long is so tiring. Like, what are we doing? Why are we so angry? It was just very clear to me, to like, just chill, so it was illuminating for me.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Wong is quick to point out that despite the rage expressed on screen, offscreen it was very different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There was a lot of joy being had in between takes that we don’t see on camera … like me and Steven laughing,” Wong said. “The friendship I developed with (castmate) Ashley Park and a lot of the other people is like by far the best outcome of the show, no matter how it’s received.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 AP. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/\">visit AP\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Beef’ premieres on Netflix on April 6, 2023. \u003ca href=\"https://www.netflix.com/title/81447461\">Details here\u003c/a>. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "How a Hand Gesture Dominated a NCAA Title Game and Revealed a Double Standard",
"headTitle": "How a Hand Gesture Dominated a NCAA Title Game and Revealed a Double Standard | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>Louisiana State University beat the University of Iowa in the women’s NCAA tournament final on Sunday in a matchup full of \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/04/02/1167668881/lsu-iowa-ncaa-basketball\">historic firsts\u003c/a> and dramatic moments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the most-talked about moves happened late in the game and involved two star players, John Cena’s wrestling catchphrase and a social media frenzy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what happened: LSU forward Angel Reese celebrated the Tigers’ fourth-quarter lead (and imminent victory) by waving one hand in front of her face — a gesture popularized by the wrestler as “You Can’t See Me” — and tapping her ring finger while looking pointedly at Iowa Hawkeyes guard Caitlin Clark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/espn/status/1642650038886170624\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The moment quickly went viral, with commentators and observers criticizing Reese for what they perceived as unsportsmanlike taunting of Clark. The word “classless” even \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/search?q=classless&src=typed_query\">trended on Twitter\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reese is Black and Clark is white.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both players have been standouts at this year’s March Madness: Reese, 20, was named \u003ca href=\"https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/36048786/content-not-fit-narrative-lsu-reese-last-laugh\">Most Outstanding Player\u003c/a> on Sunday, while 21-year-old Clark — who had already been named 2023 Player of the Year by \u003ca href=\"https://www.kcrg.com/2023/03/31/caitlin-clark-wins-another-national-player-year-award/\">several associations\u003c/a> — \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncaa.com/news/basketball-women/article/2023-04-01/caitlin-clarks-record-breaking-ncaa-tournament-run-numbers\">broke multiple records\u003c/a> at the tournament. She finished with 191 points, the most ever scored by any man or woman in a single NCAA tournament.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And both players have used the same gesture at this year’s March Madness: Clark waved a hand in front of her face two games earlier when Iowa beat Louisville to enter the Final Four.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But she didn’t get criticism for it. In fact, she earned praise, including \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/JohnCena/status/1640774822626992139?s=20\">from Cena himself\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/JohnCena/status/1640774822626992139\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After Reese faced backlash for returning the gesture, many people, including professional athletes, took to Twitter to point out the racist double standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13919506']And this is far from the only time that’s happened, \u003cem>Washington Post\u003c/em> sports columnist and ESPN panelist Kevin Blackistone \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/04/03/1167683199/lsu-is-the-womens-ncaa-basketball-champion-mens-winner-decided-tonight\">told \u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> on Monday\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For example: Jack Johnson, who became the \u003ca href=\"https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jack-Johnson\">first Black heavyweight boxing champion\u003c/a> early in the 20th century, was called cowardly for the same defensive style of boxing that earned white fighters praise for using their guile. Blackistone later \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/ProfBlackistone/status/1642847805080322049/photo/1\">tweeted that\u003c/a> NFL halfback Joe Lilliard was “a standout in the league in the early 1930s and just as cantankerous as many white players back then, but was castigated for being so.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve been conditioned into judging similar, if not the same, behavior by white athletes and Black athletes differently,” Blackistone told \u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em>. “And this was another anecdote to go along with that qualitative evidence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/RGIII/status/1642652287154761728\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Where does the gesture come from?\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Cena has been doing the “You Can’t See Me” move since he brought it to the WWE in \u003ca href=\"https://youtu.be/lHm6mgOMyEE\">the early 2000s\u003c/a>, waving an open hand across his face to suggest he’s too fast for his opponents to see him coming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHm6mgOMyEE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It was also the title of Cena’s 2005 \u003ca href=\"https://www.sbnation.com/wrestling/2014/8/8/5792278/listening-to-john-cenas-rap-album-in-the-year-2014\">debut rap album\u003c/a>, which included “The Time is Now,” his now-iconic \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svjMiqVeiG8\">entrance song\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cena may have popularized the gesture, but he didn’t create it from scratch. He publicly credits rapper and G-Unit member Tony Yayo with doing it first, in his 2005 \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqEncKFd7M8\">“So Seductive” music video\u003c/a> with 50 Cent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqEncKFd7M8&t=91s\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How did it get into Cena’s hands? He’s brought that story to several talk show stages in recent years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He \u003ca href=\"https://youtu.be/__gMSsaGNA0?t=70\">told Jimmy Fallon\u003c/a> last year that when he was working on his 2005 album, his younger brother Sean was “always our litmus test” and never satisfied with any of the songs. But when Sean heard “The Time is Now,” he says, he offered a seal of approval in the form of Tony Yayo’s move — bobbing his head in front of his open hand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cena remembers saying he’d do it on TV — and his brother daring him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So basically, on a dare, by absolute chance, I went out there and I figured this wasn’t visible enough,” he says, demonstrating the head nod versus the hand wave. “So I wanted to do \u003cem>this\u003c/em>, and the term ‘you can’t see me’ is like, ‘Well, you’re not even on my level.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The catchphrase has morphed into an \u003ca href=\"https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/you-cant-see-me\">even bigger meme\u003c/a> in the years since, with people joking now that they literally cannot see Cena. (He correctly predicted on \u003cem>The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon\u003c/em> that those quips would flood the YouTube video’s comment section.)\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What have the players said?\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Both players have already commented publicly on Sunday night’s controversy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13916840']Immediately after the game, Reese \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/SportsCenter/status/1642672182873473027?s=20\">told ESPN\u003c/a> that she had been eager to whip out the move, saying “Caitlin Clark is a hell of a player for sure, but I don’t take disrespect lightly.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reese accused Clark of disrespecting members of her team as well as South Carolina players at \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/DimeUPROXX/status/1641984841460637697\">a previous game\u003c/a>. Her LSU teammate Alexis Morris had \u003ca href=\"https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/36031086/lsu-punish-iowa-disrespectful-defense\">already criticized the Hawkeyes’ defense\u003c/a>, saying she found the way they guarded South Carolina “disrespectful” and vowing to “take it personally” going into the final.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wanted to pick her pocket,” Reese added. “But I had a moment at the end of the game … I was just in my bag, in my moment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reese later doubled down in \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/Reese10Angel/status/1642686677738205184?s=20\">unapologetic tweets\u003c/a> and comments at a postgame press conference, where she said she had faced personal attacks all year for not fitting the narrative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t fit in the box that you all want me to be in. I’m too hood, I’m too ghetto. You told me that all year. But when other people do it, y’all don’t say nothing,” Reese said. “So this is for the girls that look like me, that want to speak up on what they believe in. It’s unapologetically you. It was bigger than me tonight.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She noted that Twitter will always “go in a rage,” but she feels happy for all that she’s done to help grow women’s basketball this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/sportingnews/status/1642671282767507456\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clark \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/nick_rothschild/status/1642664982172295170?s=20\">said at a postgame briefing\u003c/a> that she had “no idea” that Reese was taunting her, adding that she was “just trying to get to the handshake line and shake hands and be grateful that my team was in that position.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was just trying to spend the last few moments on the court with especially the five people that I’ve started 93 games with, and relishing every second of that,” Clark added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder said at that same conference that “we’re all different people and we all have different ways to show our emotions,” adding she could only focus on what she can control.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What are others saying?\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Many \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/EmmanuelAcho/status/1642651280211603456?s=20\">athletes\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/PeterBurnsESPN/status/1642650651439034373?s=20\">commentators\u003c/a> and fans are calling out the people who have criticized Reese, questioning why they didn’t take issue with the gesture when Clark did it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13910698']“If you didn’t say it was classless when Caitlin Clark did it to her opponents then don’t say it about Angel Reese either,” \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/RGIII/status/1642655304180531201?s=20\">tweeted former Baylor quarterback\u003c/a> and Heisman winner Robert Lee Griffin III.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Retired NBA player \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/etanthomas36/status/1642656571061678080?s=20\">Etan Thomas\u003c/a> called people out for finding it “cute” when Clark did it. “So don’t be all outraged and talking about class and sportsmanship when Angel Reese does the same thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others encouraged people who had that reaction to interrogate the bias behind it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you celebrated Clark for doing this but not Angel Reese you gotta take a long, long look in the mirror,” tweeted \u003cem>The Athletic \u003c/em>writer \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/itsmeglinehan/status/1642663520830464008?s=20\">Meg Linehan\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And others still urged people to move away from the conversation and, as one women’s basketball \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/WBBWorldWide/status/1642655683010076672?s=20\">fan account\u003c/a> put it, “let these women trash talk!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sports journalist Holly Rowe \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/sportsiren/status/1642662230708609024?s=20\">called on people\u003c/a> to stop bashing the players, no matter whose side they took.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unapologetically confident young women should be celebrated NOT hated,” she added. “Get used to it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=How+a+hand+gesture+dominated+a+NCAA+title+game+and+revealed+a+double+standard+&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Louisiana State University beat the University of Iowa in the women’s NCAA tournament final on Sunday in a matchup full of \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/04/02/1167668881/lsu-iowa-ncaa-basketball\">historic firsts\u003c/a> and dramatic moments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the most-talked about moves happened late in the game and involved two star players, John Cena’s wrestling catchphrase and a social media frenzy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what happened: LSU forward Angel Reese celebrated the Tigers’ fourth-quarter lead (and imminent victory) by waving one hand in front of her face — a gesture popularized by the wrestler as “You Can’t See Me” — and tapping her ring finger while looking pointedly at Iowa Hawkeyes guard Caitlin Clark.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>The moment quickly went viral, with commentators and observers criticizing Reese for what they perceived as unsportsmanlike taunting of Clark. The word “classless” even \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/search?q=classless&src=typed_query\">trended on Twitter\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reese is Black and Clark is white.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both players have been standouts at this year’s March Madness: Reese, 20, was named \u003ca href=\"https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/36048786/content-not-fit-narrative-lsu-reese-last-laugh\">Most Outstanding Player\u003c/a> on Sunday, while 21-year-old Clark — who had already been named 2023 Player of the Year by \u003ca href=\"https://www.kcrg.com/2023/03/31/caitlin-clark-wins-another-national-player-year-award/\">several associations\u003c/a> — \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncaa.com/news/basketball-women/article/2023-04-01/caitlin-clarks-record-breaking-ncaa-tournament-run-numbers\">broke multiple records\u003c/a> at the tournament. She finished with 191 points, the most ever scored by any man or woman in a single NCAA tournament.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And both players have used the same gesture at this year’s March Madness: Clark waved a hand in front of her face two games earlier when Iowa beat Louisville to enter the Final Four.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But she didn’t get criticism for it. In fact, she earned praise, including \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/JohnCena/status/1640774822626992139?s=20\">from Cena himself\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>After Reese faced backlash for returning the gesture, many people, including professional athletes, took to Twitter to point out the racist double standard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>And this is far from the only time that’s happened, \u003cem>Washington Post\u003c/em> sports columnist and ESPN panelist Kevin Blackistone \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/04/03/1167683199/lsu-is-the-womens-ncaa-basketball-champion-mens-winner-decided-tonight\">told \u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> on Monday\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For example: Jack Johnson, who became the \u003ca href=\"https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jack-Johnson\">first Black heavyweight boxing champion\u003c/a> early in the 20th century, was called cowardly for the same defensive style of boxing that earned white fighters praise for using their guile. Blackistone later \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/ProfBlackistone/status/1642847805080322049/photo/1\">tweeted that\u003c/a> NFL halfback Joe Lilliard was “a standout in the league in the early 1930s and just as cantankerous as many white players back then, but was castigated for being so.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve been conditioned into judging similar, if not the same, behavior by white athletes and Black athletes differently,” Blackistone told \u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em>. “And this was another anecdote to go along with that qualitative evidence.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003ch3>Where does the gesture come from?\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Cena has been doing the “You Can’t See Me” move since he brought it to the WWE in \u003ca href=\"https://youtu.be/lHm6mgOMyEE\">the early 2000s\u003c/a>, waving an open hand across his face to suggest he’s too fast for his opponents to see him coming.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/lHm6mgOMyEE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/lHm6mgOMyEE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>It was also the title of Cena’s 2005 \u003ca href=\"https://www.sbnation.com/wrestling/2014/8/8/5792278/listening-to-john-cenas-rap-album-in-the-year-2014\">debut rap album\u003c/a>, which included “The Time is Now,” his now-iconic \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svjMiqVeiG8\">entrance song\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cena may have popularized the gesture, but he didn’t create it from scratch. He publicly credits rapper and G-Unit member Tony Yayo with doing it first, in his 2005 \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqEncKFd7M8\">“So Seductive” music video\u003c/a> with 50 Cent.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wqEncKFd7M8'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wqEncKFd7M8'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>How did it get into Cena’s hands? He’s brought that story to several talk show stages in recent years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He \u003ca href=\"https://youtu.be/__gMSsaGNA0?t=70\">told Jimmy Fallon\u003c/a> last year that when he was working on his 2005 album, his younger brother Sean was “always our litmus test” and never satisfied with any of the songs. But when Sean heard “The Time is Now,” he says, he offered a seal of approval in the form of Tony Yayo’s move — bobbing his head in front of his open hand.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cena remembers saying he’d do it on TV — and his brother daring him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So basically, on a dare, by absolute chance, I went out there and I figured this wasn’t visible enough,” he says, demonstrating the head nod versus the hand wave. “So I wanted to do \u003cem>this\u003c/em>, and the term ‘you can’t see me’ is like, ‘Well, you’re not even on my level.’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The catchphrase has morphed into an \u003ca href=\"https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/you-cant-see-me\">even bigger meme\u003c/a> in the years since, with people joking now that they literally cannot see Cena. (He correctly predicted on \u003cem>The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon\u003c/em> that those quips would flood the YouTube video’s comment section.)\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What have the players said?\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Both players have already commented publicly on Sunday night’s controversy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Immediately after the game, Reese \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/SportsCenter/status/1642672182873473027?s=20\">told ESPN\u003c/a> that she had been eager to whip out the move, saying “Caitlin Clark is a hell of a player for sure, but I don’t take disrespect lightly.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reese accused Clark of disrespecting members of her team as well as South Carolina players at \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/DimeUPROXX/status/1641984841460637697\">a previous game\u003c/a>. Her LSU teammate Alexis Morris had \u003ca href=\"https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/36031086/lsu-punish-iowa-disrespectful-defense\">already criticized the Hawkeyes’ defense\u003c/a>, saying she found the way they guarded South Carolina “disrespectful” and vowing to “take it personally” going into the final.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I wanted to pick her pocket,” Reese added. “But I had a moment at the end of the game … I was just in my bag, in my moment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reese later doubled down in \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/Reese10Angel/status/1642686677738205184?s=20\">unapologetic tweets\u003c/a> and comments at a postgame press conference, where she said she had faced personal attacks all year for not fitting the narrative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t fit in the box that you all want me to be in. I’m too hood, I’m too ghetto. You told me that all year. But when other people do it, y’all don’t say nothing,” Reese said. “So this is for the girls that look like me, that want to speak up on what they believe in. It’s unapologetically you. It was bigger than me tonight.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She noted that Twitter will always “go in a rage,” but she feels happy for all that she’s done to help grow women’s basketball this year.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>Clark \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/nick_rothschild/status/1642664982172295170?s=20\">said at a postgame briefing\u003c/a> that she had “no idea” that Reese was taunting her, adding that she was “just trying to get to the handshake line and shake hands and be grateful that my team was in that position.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was just trying to spend the last few moments on the court with especially the five people that I’ve started 93 games with, and relishing every second of that,” Clark added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder said at that same conference that “we’re all different people and we all have different ways to show our emotions,” adding she could only focus on what she can control.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What are others saying?\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Many \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/EmmanuelAcho/status/1642651280211603456?s=20\">athletes\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/PeterBurnsESPN/status/1642650651439034373?s=20\">commentators\u003c/a> and fans are calling out the people who have criticized Reese, questioning why they didn’t take issue with the gesture when Clark did it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“If you didn’t say it was classless when Caitlin Clark did it to her opponents then don’t say it about Angel Reese either,” \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/RGIII/status/1642655304180531201?s=20\">tweeted former Baylor quarterback\u003c/a> and Heisman winner Robert Lee Griffin III.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Retired NBA player \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/etanthomas36/status/1642656571061678080?s=20\">Etan Thomas\u003c/a> called people out for finding it “cute” when Clark did it. “So don’t be all outraged and talking about class and sportsmanship when Angel Reese does the same thing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others encouraged people who had that reaction to interrogate the bias behind it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you celebrated Clark for doing this but not Angel Reese you gotta take a long, long look in the mirror,” tweeted \u003cem>The Athletic \u003c/em>writer \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/itsmeglinehan/status/1642663520830464008?s=20\">Meg Linehan\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And others still urged people to move away from the conversation and, as one women’s basketball \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/WBBWorldWide/status/1642655683010076672?s=20\">fan account\u003c/a> put it, “let these women trash talk!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sports journalist Holly Rowe \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/sportsiren/status/1642662230708609024?s=20\">called on people\u003c/a> to stop bashing the players, no matter whose side they took.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unapologetically confident young women should be celebrated NOT hated,” she added. “Get used to it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=How+a+hand+gesture+dominated+a+NCAA+title+game+and+revealed+a+double+standard+&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "‘The Big Door Prize’ Asks: How Would You Live if You Knew Your Life’s Potential?",
"headTitle": "‘The Big Door Prize’ Asks: How Would You Live if You Knew Your Life’s Potential? | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>The premise, at least, comes straight out of \u003cem>The Twilight Zone\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the small town of Deerfield, a mysterious machine appears one day in the general store. Sit inside its booth, which surrounds you with an eerie blue glow, and the apparatus dispenses a card that reveals your life’s potential.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='pop_109055']And if AppleTV+’s \u003cem>The Big Door Prize \u003c/em>was in fact a \u003cem>Twilight Zone\u003c/em> episode, or for that matter a Stephen King novel, you’d know what to expect next: A moralistic tale that posits a vision of humanity as venal, petty and grasping. The machine’s presence would tear the town’s families apart, sunder friendships and stoke seething resentments that would soon bubble over into inevitable violence, because these pathetic townsfolk refused to content themselves with their sad little lots in life. The sinister (possibly infernal?) machine exposed their empty, meaningless lives, and mocked them for daring to imagine an existence other than the one they were stuck with. Stupid hicks. With their \u003cem>dreams\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thankfully \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> isn’t interested in that particular tidy, condescending formula.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Writer/creator David West Read’s previous gig was \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/04/07/828866063/the-schitt-s-creek-finale-gave-david-a-happy-ending\">\u003cem>Schitt’s Creek\u003c/em>,\u003c/a> which gives you a clearer sense of what to expect. On that series, the main characters’ big-city hauteur eventually melted away to an abiding (if often grudging) appreciation for life in a small town. In \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em>, Read has taken \u003ca href=\"https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/563865/the-big-door-prize-by-mo-walsh/\">M.O. Walsh’s 2020 novel \u003c/a>of the same name and washed it in the gentle waters of the \u003cem>Creek\u003c/em>, dialing back the book’s darker themes for a more nuanced and generous take on the people who make Deerfield their home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Said townsfolk are, it will not shock you to learn, quirky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because this is TV, and that’s the law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mu-KfLd-d9U\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Make it quirk\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>But it’s not quite so simple: A series like\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2016/11/25/503157421/gilmore-girls-returns-on-netflix-just-in-time-for-a-holiday-binge\"> \u003cem>Gilmore Girls\u003c/em>\u003c/a> called upon the wacky residents of its impossibly bucolic setting only infrequently, and only then to dutifully manifest their characteristic oddness in a quick scene or two per episode, before sinking back into the whimsical, undifferentiated background. But \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> features a true ensemble cast of characters, many of whom become the focus of individual episodes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This ensemble is led by a magnificent Chris O’Dowd, who stars as Dusty, a preternaturally affable teacher at the local high school. O’Dowd is leaning hard into the character’s hapless-goofy-Dad charm, here, and it proves impossible to resist. He gives Dusty, who at first seems perfectly content with his life, a winsome, searching quality that intensifies over the course of the season; he knows himself, but wonders, wryly, if there’s more to know. As his wife Cass, Gabrielle Dennis strikes similar but complementary notes; she’s also grounded and happy, yet the card she receives from the machine leaves her pondering her future — idly at first, then much, much less so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926947']The couple’s teenage daughter Trina (Djouliet Amara) is still reeling from a recent tragedy, but finds a fraught kind of comfort with Jacob (Sammy Fourlas); both actors invest their characters with intelligence and wit that keep them from coming across as the kind of sulky, underdrawn teens that populate the CW.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Again and again, characters that could have been thinly drawn yet still funny — Izzy, the town’s narcissistic mayor (Crystal Fox), Beau, Jacob’s macho father (Aaron Roman Weiner) and bluff restaurant owner Giorgio (Josh Segarra, great as always) — are given the time and attention to surprise us with layers of emotion and absurdity that make them rounded and real.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At some point early in the season — it was somewhere around the wedding episode, which features a character performing a wildly ill-considered dance number, and the townsfolk reacting to it — I realized I’d gone from laughing at these characters to laughing with them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Beyond the \u003cem>Zone\u003c/em>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Given the cynicism of its premise — small towners get shown their true potential — it’s only natural to expect that \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> would seek to speak to, and reassure, our most cynical selves. And I suppose it could be read as a cautionary tale about what happens when we place too much faith in technology, even if said technology is mysterious and possibly supernatural.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926773']But in showing characters attempting to shake themselves out of their unexamined lives, \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> never contents itself with ridiculing their previous complacency. Instead, it spends its time (and thus, our time) delighting in their newfound curiosity and drive, their willingness, their openness, their sense of purpose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What makes us most human, it seems to say, isn’t our pettiness, our greed, our self-satisfaction, or any other moral failing that Rod Serling would step out from behind some shrubbery to lecture us about at the end of a \u003cem>Twilight Zone\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Big Door Prize \u003c/em>instead suggests that it’s the act of striving for something — not necessarily for something better, or something more. Just … for \u003cem>something\u003c/em>. It makes a strong case that we are at our best, our most human selves, when we allow ourselves, finally, simply, to try.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27The+Big+Door+Prize%27+asks%3A+How+would+you+live+if+you+knew+your+life%27s+potential%3F&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘The Big Door Prize’ premieres on Apple TV+ on March 29, 2023. \u003ca href=\"https://tv.apple.com/us/show/the-big-door-prize/umc.cmc.2rjxcljdjz4h47vjdxnytcn23?mttn3pid=Google%20AdWords&mttnagencyid=a5e&mttncc=US&mttnsiteid=143238&mttnsubad=OUS20191000_1-652823703969-c&mttnsubkw=147103945855__vcrindm5_\">Details here\u003c/a>. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The premise, at least, comes straight out of \u003cem>The Twilight Zone\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the small town of Deerfield, a mysterious machine appears one day in the general store. Sit inside its booth, which surrounds you with an eerie blue glow, and the apparatus dispenses a card that reveals your life’s potential.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>And if AppleTV+’s \u003cem>The Big Door Prize \u003c/em>was in fact a \u003cem>Twilight Zone\u003c/em> episode, or for that matter a Stephen King novel, you’d know what to expect next: A moralistic tale that posits a vision of humanity as venal, petty and grasping. The machine’s presence would tear the town’s families apart, sunder friendships and stoke seething resentments that would soon bubble over into inevitable violence, because these pathetic townsfolk refused to content themselves with their sad little lots in life. The sinister (possibly infernal?) machine exposed their empty, meaningless lives, and mocked them for daring to imagine an existence other than the one they were stuck with. Stupid hicks. With their \u003cem>dreams\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thankfully \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> isn’t interested in that particular tidy, condescending formula.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Writer/creator David West Read’s previous gig was \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/04/07/828866063/the-schitt-s-creek-finale-gave-david-a-happy-ending\">\u003cem>Schitt’s Creek\u003c/em>,\u003c/a> which gives you a clearer sense of what to expect. On that series, the main characters’ big-city hauteur eventually melted away to an abiding (if often grudging) appreciation for life in a small town. In \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em>, Read has taken \u003ca href=\"https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/563865/the-big-door-prize-by-mo-walsh/\">M.O. Walsh’s 2020 novel \u003c/a>of the same name and washed it in the gentle waters of the \u003cem>Creek\u003c/em>, dialing back the book’s darker themes for a more nuanced and generous take on the people who make Deerfield their home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Said townsfolk are, it will not shock you to learn, quirky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Because this is TV, and that’s the law.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/Mu-KfLd-d9U'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/Mu-KfLd-d9U'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003ch3>Make it quirk\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>But it’s not quite so simple: A series like\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2016/11/25/503157421/gilmore-girls-returns-on-netflix-just-in-time-for-a-holiday-binge\"> \u003cem>Gilmore Girls\u003c/em>\u003c/a> called upon the wacky residents of its impossibly bucolic setting only infrequently, and only then to dutifully manifest their characteristic oddness in a quick scene or two per episode, before sinking back into the whimsical, undifferentiated background. But \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> features a true ensemble cast of characters, many of whom become the focus of individual episodes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This ensemble is led by a magnificent Chris O’Dowd, who stars as Dusty, a preternaturally affable teacher at the local high school. O’Dowd is leaning hard into the character’s hapless-goofy-Dad charm, here, and it proves impossible to resist. He gives Dusty, who at first seems perfectly content with his life, a winsome, searching quality that intensifies over the course of the season; he knows himself, but wonders, wryly, if there’s more to know. As his wife Cass, Gabrielle Dennis strikes similar but complementary notes; she’s also grounded and happy, yet the card she receives from the machine leaves her pondering her future — idly at first, then much, much less so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The couple’s teenage daughter Trina (Djouliet Amara) is still reeling from a recent tragedy, but finds a fraught kind of comfort with Jacob (Sammy Fourlas); both actors invest their characters with intelligence and wit that keep them from coming across as the kind of sulky, underdrawn teens that populate the CW.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Again and again, characters that could have been thinly drawn yet still funny — Izzy, the town’s narcissistic mayor (Crystal Fox), Beau, Jacob’s macho father (Aaron Roman Weiner) and bluff restaurant owner Giorgio (Josh Segarra, great as always) — are given the time and attention to surprise us with layers of emotion and absurdity that make them rounded and real.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At some point early in the season — it was somewhere around the wedding episode, which features a character performing a wildly ill-considered dance number, and the townsfolk reacting to it — I realized I’d gone from laughing at these characters to laughing with them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Beyond the \u003cem>Zone\u003c/em>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Given the cynicism of its premise — small towners get shown their true potential — it’s only natural to expect that \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> would seek to speak to, and reassure, our most cynical selves. And I suppose it could be read as a cautionary tale about what happens when we place too much faith in technology, even if said technology is mysterious and possibly supernatural.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But in showing characters attempting to shake themselves out of their unexamined lives, \u003cem>The Big Door Prize\u003c/em> never contents itself with ridiculing their previous complacency. Instead, it spends its time (and thus, our time) delighting in their newfound curiosity and drive, their willingness, their openness, their sense of purpose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What makes us most human, it seems to say, isn’t our pettiness, our greed, our self-satisfaction, or any other moral failing that Rod Serling would step out from behind some shrubbery to lecture us about at the end of a \u003cem>Twilight Zone\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>The Big Door Prize \u003c/em>instead suggests that it’s the act of striving for something — not necessarily for something better, or something more. Just … for \u003cem>something\u003c/em>. It makes a strong case that we are at our best, our most human selves, when we allow ourselves, finally, simply, to try.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27The+Big+Door+Prize%27+asks%3A+How+would+you+live+if+you+knew+your+life%27s+potential%3F&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘The Big Door Prize’ premieres on Apple TV+ on March 29, 2023. \u003ca href=\"https://tv.apple.com/us/show/the-big-door-prize/umc.cmc.2rjxcljdjz4h47vjdxnytcn23?mttn3pid=Google%20AdWords&mttnagencyid=a5e&mttncc=US&mttnsiteid=143238&mttnsubad=OUS20191000_1-652823703969-c&mttnsubkw=147103945855__vcrindm5_\">Details here\u003c/a>. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "A Mother Faces ‘A Thousand and One’ Obstacles in This Unconventional NYC Film",
"headTitle": "A Mother Faces ‘A Thousand and One’ Obstacles in This Unconventional NYC Film | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>A Thousand and One\u003c/em> begins in 1994, shortly before a 22-year-old woman named Inez is released from Rikers Island. We don’t know much about her, but \u003ca href=\"#t\">Teyana Taylor\u003c/a>, the electrifying actor who plays her, tells us plenty just from the brashly confident way Inez strides through her old Brooklyn stomping grounds after a year away.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As she greets old friends and looks for work as a hairdresser, Inez is determined to put the past behind her — though that becomes impossible when she runs into her 6-year-old son, Terry, on the street. Terry was sent to foster care when Inez went to prison, and while he resents her for leaving him, he’d clearly rather be with her again than in his current situation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926757']And so when Terry has an accident at home, Inez impulsively springs him from the hospital and takes him to the Harlem neighborhood where she grew up. They lie low for a while, though it soon becomes sadly clear that nobody’s really looking for Terry, who’s just one of many kids who’ve slipped through the cracks of the foster-care system. Inez grew up in that system herself, and she wants to give Terry the loving home she never had.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Soon she finds them a rundown Harlem apartment — the number on the door, 10-01, is one explanation for the movie’s title. Over the next several years, this apartment will be their home, but it’s a precarious one, where every happy moment feels both fleeting and hard-won.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inez works long hours to provide for herself and Terry, a gifted student whose teachers think he could be Ivy League material. Eventually, Inez marries Lucky, an old boyfriend played by a charismatic William Catlett. While not the most faithful husband, Lucky becomes a genuinely loving father figure to Terry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBM0_6JJw1s&t=4s\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Terry is played at ages 6, 13 and 17 by the actors Aaron Kingsley Adetola, Aven Courtney and Josiah Cross. The use of three actors to play a young Black man at different ages has already earned the movie comparisons to \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2016/10/19/498395257/for-films-creators-moonlight-provided-space-to-explore-a-painful-past\">Barry Jenkins\u003c/a>’ sublime 2016 drama, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2016/10/20/498261200/a-melancholy-youth-finds-himself-under-the-heavenly-glow-of-moonlight\">\u003cem>Moonlight\u003c/em>\u003c/a>. But those similarities aside, \u003cem>A Thousand and One\u003c/em> focuses more specifically on the young man’s mother. Taylor, an R&B performer in her first leading film role, conveys the full weight of Inez’s sacrifices. By the end, the sensual, free-spirited woman we met in the opening scenes has become visibly sadder and wearier, though still possessed of the same devil-may-care defiance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If \u003cem>A Thousand and One \u003c/em>were just a story about a mother and son overcoming the odds, it would be moving enough. But the writer-director A.V. Rockwell, making a strong feature debut after years directing shorts and music videos, gives this intimate drama a sharp sociopolitical context. Even as Inez and Terry grow older, the city around them is changing, too. At the beginning, the Harlem we see pulses with grit and energy, shot in a vibrantly kinetic style and set to a ’90s hip-hop beat. By the end, the neighborhood has been gentrified beyond recognition, as reflected in the movie’s cooler, gloomier palette and its many shots of anonymous-looking office and residential buildings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926404']Rockwell doesn’t shy away from detailing how these shifts have impacted communities of color in general, and Inez and Terry in particular. They’re gradually forced out of their apartment by a new landlord who wants to tear the building down. Terry and his friends face routine police harassment — a development that Rockwell intersperses with real news clips covering Mayor Giuliani’s embrace of \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/02/25/809368292/the-legacy-of-stop-and-frisk-policing-in-michael-bloombergs-new-york\">“stop and frisk” policies\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>None of this comes off as didactic; Rockwell deftly weaves her commentary into a story that turns out to be less conventional and more surprising than it looks. She also reminds us that there’s more to both Inez and Terry than their tough circumstances. We see this in the playful scenes of 17-year-old Terry flirting with a girl behind a restaurant counter, or the poignant moment when Inez — rather than picking a fight with one of Lucky’s girlfriends, as she might have once done — instead treats her with decency and grace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rockwell has such a sure grasp of her characters and their complexities that she’s able to end the story on a boldly unresolved note. I left the movie thinking about what might lie ahead for Inez and Terry, and feeling grateful for the time I’d spent in their company.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 Fresh Air. To see more, visit \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/programs/fresh-air/\">Fresh Air\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=A+mother+faces+%27A+Thousand+and+One%27+obstacles+in+this+unconventional+NYC+film&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>A Thousand and One\u003c/em> begins in 1994, shortly before a 22-year-old woman named Inez is released from Rikers Island. We don’t know much about her, but \u003ca href=\"#t\">Teyana Taylor\u003c/a>, the electrifying actor who plays her, tells us plenty just from the brashly confident way Inez strides through her old Brooklyn stomping grounds after a year away.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As she greets old friends and looks for work as a hairdresser, Inez is determined to put the past behind her — though that becomes impossible when she runs into her 6-year-old son, Terry, on the street. Terry was sent to foster care when Inez went to prison, and while he resents her for leaving him, he’d clearly rather be with her again than in his current situation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>And so when Terry has an accident at home, Inez impulsively springs him from the hospital and takes him to the Harlem neighborhood where she grew up. They lie low for a while, though it soon becomes sadly clear that nobody’s really looking for Terry, who’s just one of many kids who’ve slipped through the cracks of the foster-care system. Inez grew up in that system herself, and she wants to give Terry the loving home she never had.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Soon she finds them a rundown Harlem apartment — the number on the door, 10-01, is one explanation for the movie’s title. Over the next several years, this apartment will be their home, but it’s a precarious one, where every happy moment feels both fleeting and hard-won.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inez works long hours to provide for herself and Terry, a gifted student whose teachers think he could be Ivy League material. Eventually, Inez marries Lucky, an old boyfriend played by a charismatic William Catlett. While not the most faithful husband, Lucky becomes a genuinely loving father figure to Terry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wBM0_6JJw1s'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wBM0_6JJw1s'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Terry is played at ages 6, 13 and 17 by the actors Aaron Kingsley Adetola, Aven Courtney and Josiah Cross. The use of three actors to play a young Black man at different ages has already earned the movie comparisons to \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2016/10/19/498395257/for-films-creators-moonlight-provided-space-to-explore-a-painful-past\">Barry Jenkins\u003c/a>’ sublime 2016 drama, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2016/10/20/498261200/a-melancholy-youth-finds-himself-under-the-heavenly-glow-of-moonlight\">\u003cem>Moonlight\u003c/em>\u003c/a>. But those similarities aside, \u003cem>A Thousand and One\u003c/em> focuses more specifically on the young man’s mother. Taylor, an R&B performer in her first leading film role, conveys the full weight of Inez’s sacrifices. By the end, the sensual, free-spirited woman we met in the opening scenes has become visibly sadder and wearier, though still possessed of the same devil-may-care defiance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If \u003cem>A Thousand and One \u003c/em>were just a story about a mother and son overcoming the odds, it would be moving enough. But the writer-director A.V. Rockwell, making a strong feature debut after years directing shorts and music videos, gives this intimate drama a sharp sociopolitical context. Even as Inez and Terry grow older, the city around them is changing, too. At the beginning, the Harlem we see pulses with grit and energy, shot in a vibrantly kinetic style and set to a ’90s hip-hop beat. By the end, the neighborhood has been gentrified beyond recognition, as reflected in the movie’s cooler, gloomier palette and its many shots of anonymous-looking office and residential buildings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Rockwell doesn’t shy away from detailing how these shifts have impacted communities of color in general, and Inez and Terry in particular. They’re gradually forced out of their apartment by a new landlord who wants to tear the building down. Terry and his friends face routine police harassment — a development that Rockwell intersperses with real news clips covering Mayor Giuliani’s embrace of \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/02/25/809368292/the-legacy-of-stop-and-frisk-policing-in-michael-bloombergs-new-york\">“stop and frisk” policies\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>None of this comes off as didactic; Rockwell deftly weaves her commentary into a story that turns out to be less conventional and more surprising than it looks. She also reminds us that there’s more to both Inez and Terry than their tough circumstances. We see this in the playful scenes of 17-year-old Terry flirting with a girl behind a restaurant counter, or the poignant moment when Inez — rather than picking a fight with one of Lucky’s girlfriends, as she might have once done — instead treats her with decency and grace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rockwell has such a sure grasp of her characters and their complexities that she’s able to end the story on a boldly unresolved note. I left the movie thinking about what might lie ahead for Inez and Terry, and feeling grateful for the time I’d spent in their company.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 Fresh Air. To see more, visit \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/programs/fresh-air/\">Fresh Air\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=A+mother+faces+%27A+Thousand+and+One%27+obstacles+in+this+unconventional+NYC+film&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Video Game ‘MLB The Show’ Breaks Barrier With Negro League Players",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>MLB The Show\u003c/em> has broken a video game barrier: For the first time, the franchise will insert some of the greatest Negro League players — from Satchel Paige to Jackie Robinson — into the 2023 edition of the game as playable characters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Video gamers are now able to venture into a storyline mode involving eight Negro League legends through \u003cem>MLB The Show 23\u003c/em>, which releases Tuesday. The narrative experience will feature short videos about the players along with gameplay focused on the epic moments of their careers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13914585']Along with Robinson and Paige, the game also features other players including Buck O’Neil, Rube Foster, Hilton Smith, John Donaldson, Hank Thompson and Martin Dihigo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This made sense on multiple levels,” said Bob Kendrick, the narrator of storyline experience and president of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, which is located in Kansas City, Missouri. Along with the museum, he partnered with Sony for the historic Black players’ insertion into the game.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way the Negro League players played, it fits perfectly for a video game,” he said. “There were so many gaming fans who have been clamoring for the inclusion of the Negro Leagues. People were popping into my timeline on social media. This has been stirring for several years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I never really dreamt this would become reality. And I didn’t really think it would happen with arguably the biggest baseball video game of them all. This is something we are inherently proud of.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kendrick said the multi-year partnership is a “gigantic step in keeping the legacy alive” for the Negro Leagues. The last time Negro League players were featured in a video game was on EA Sports MVP Baseball 2005 that included Robinson, Paige and Bob Gibson as legendary figures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, this is all about creating relevancy,” he said. “How do I establish a relevant connection with an ever-changing generation of young people? I can’t sit back and wait for them to come to me at the doors of the museum. I have got to them in the mode of which they are getting information. If it’s a video game, then so be it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlRQCkFbqw0\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramone Russell was the first to pitch Sony executives the concept of breathing life into the Negro League players through the franchise’s popular video game. He’s been mulling over the idea for more than a decade as a mainstay for the development and marketing team for the \u003cem>MLB The Show\u003c/em> series.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13911111']“This is a project I’ve always wanted to do,” said Russell, the product development communications and brand strategist for Sony Interactive Entertainment. He played a vital role in working across multiple teams who did a “tremendously smart job” in creating the mode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So many of our fans — even when they hear the word ‘Negro Leagues’ — they have no context of what the Negro League is and what it represents,” Russell continued. “I’ve been asked ‘Hey, when are you going to have the Negro Leagues?’ My answer would be, ‘As soon as we can find the right way to do it.’ As you know, perfection is the enemy of progress. But about two years ago, I felt like now is the time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not a lot of game footage from the Negro Leagues exists, so game creators gathered archive video and photos from the museum and family members of the deceased players to collect as much as they could. That helped nail down the fine animation details for each player, jerseys and the stadiums where games were held.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Russell said the process was a tedious one, but it couldn’t have fully come together without the expertise of Kendrick — who he says knows the real history of the Negro Leagues and players “more than anyone else.” He said Kendrick was the perfect person to narrate the storyline mode, because of his well-rounded knowledge about players’ greatness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even though Jackie Robinson was the first African American player to play in a Major League Baseball game in 1947, Kendrick said during his narration in the mode that Robinson was not the best player from the Negro Leagues. He said the league had such a rich talent pool where players played with in a “bold, brash way” and was “fast and daring.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not to disparage Jackie at all, but this is how great the talent was in the Negro Leagues,” Kendrick said. “I tell people all the time that the talent in the Negro Leagues would not take a backseat to any league. We’re talking about some of the greatest athletes to ever put on a baseball uniform. And unfortunately, the majority of the public, they don’t know these names. But they should, both from a baseball perspective as well as a historical perspective.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925671']Sony’s San Diego Studio will donate $1 to the Negro Leagues Museum for every \u003cem>MLB The Show 23 Collector’s Edition\u003c/em> is sold.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kendrick said having the Negro League storyline in the game will hopefully inspire young Black kids and others of color to learn more about their heritage. He wants the visibility of the video game to help bring more awareness to the museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Through animation and a project like this, you can bring them to life,” he said. “It’s a beautiful way to convey everything the Negro Leagues represents. I was amazed by people who didn’t know night baseball originated from the Negro Leagues. They just didn’t get their just due. It’s not there in the pages of an American history book. … Now, we have a chance to let people know.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘MLB The Show 23’ is out now. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 Associated Press. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/\" rel=\"noopener\">visit AP\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I never really dreamt this would become reality. And I didn’t really think it would happen with arguably the biggest baseball video game of them all. This is something we are inherently proud of.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kendrick said the multi-year partnership is a “gigantic step in keeping the legacy alive” for the Negro Leagues. The last time Negro League players were featured in a video game was on EA Sports MVP Baseball 2005 that included Robinson, Paige and Bob Gibson as legendary figures.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, this is all about creating relevancy,” he said. “How do I establish a relevant connection with an ever-changing generation of young people? I can’t sit back and wait for them to come to me at the doors of the museum. I have got to them in the mode of which they are getting information. If it’s a video game, then so be it.”\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/dlRQCkFbqw0'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/dlRQCkFbqw0'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Ramone Russell was the first to pitch Sony executives the concept of breathing life into the Negro League players through the franchise’s popular video game. He’s been mulling over the idea for more than a decade as a mainstay for the development and marketing team for the \u003cem>MLB The Show\u003c/em> series.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“This is a project I’ve always wanted to do,” said Russell, the product development communications and brand strategist for Sony Interactive Entertainment. He played a vital role in working across multiple teams who did a “tremendously smart job” in creating the mode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So many of our fans — even when they hear the word ‘Negro Leagues’ — they have no context of what the Negro League is and what it represents,” Russell continued. “I’ve been asked ‘Hey, when are you going to have the Negro Leagues?’ My answer would be, ‘As soon as we can find the right way to do it.’ As you know, perfection is the enemy of progress. But about two years ago, I felt like now is the time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not a lot of game footage from the Negro Leagues exists, so game creators gathered archive video and photos from the museum and family members of the deceased players to collect as much as they could. That helped nail down the fine animation details for each player, jerseys and the stadiums where games were held.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Russell said the process was a tedious one, but it couldn’t have fully come together without the expertise of Kendrick — who he says knows the real history of the Negro Leagues and players “more than anyone else.” He said Kendrick was the perfect person to narrate the storyline mode, because of his well-rounded knowledge about players’ greatness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even though Jackie Robinson was the first African American player to play in a Major League Baseball game in 1947, Kendrick said during his narration in the mode that Robinson was not the best player from the Negro Leagues. He said the league had such a rich talent pool where players played with in a “bold, brash way” and was “fast and daring.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not to disparage Jackie at all, but this is how great the talent was in the Negro Leagues,” Kendrick said. “I tell people all the time that the talent in the Negro Leagues would not take a backseat to any league. We’re talking about some of the greatest athletes to ever put on a baseball uniform. And unfortunately, the majority of the public, they don’t know these names. But they should, both from a baseball perspective as well as a historical perspective.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Sony’s San Diego Studio will donate $1 to the Negro Leagues Museum for every \u003cem>MLB The Show 23 Collector’s Edition\u003c/em> is sold.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kendrick said having the Negro League storyline in the game will hopefully inspire young Black kids and others of color to learn more about their heritage. He wants the visibility of the video game to help bring more awareness to the museum.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Through animation and a project like this, you can bring them to life,” he said. “It’s a beautiful way to convey everything the Negro Leagues represents. I was amazed by people who didn’t know night baseball originated from the Negro Leagues. They just didn’t get their just due. It’s not there in the pages of an American history book. … Now, we have a chance to let people know.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘MLB The Show 23’ is out now. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 Associated Press. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/\" rel=\"noopener\">visit AP\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "‘Succession’ Returns for a Fourth and Final Season of Family Back-Stabbing",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Succession \u003c/em>began on Logan Roy’s birthday, with his first medical emergency. It had him nearly dying in his own helicopter, and it raised the question of what might come after Logan. Who would take over Waystar Royco? Who would run things? What would Logan have wanted? Since then, we’ve learned that this was an utter misdirect: \u003cem>Succession\u003c/em> is not about following Logan Roy at all. It is about \u003cem>surviving \u003c/em>Logan Roy. Can he be endured? Can his caustic influence be undone? Can he ever be outwitted, outplayed, or outlasted?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite dialogue so acerbic that it puckers the cast’s mouths like a salt and vinegar chip, and despite the dynamism of performances that harden, soften and harden again, stasis has always stalked the story of the Roys. Kendall, after all, has been vanquished in four separate rebellions against his father, each time ramming his quavering, sad-boy face into a different immovable object.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926515']At the board meeting in Season 1, it was weather and midtown traffic. At Shiv and Tom’s wedding, it was the dual grip of his own addiction and his cowardice in the face of consequences. After the press conference\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2019/10/14/770025859/roy-oh-roy-that-succession-finale-was-a-trip\"> at the end of Season 2,\u003c/a> it was systemic indifference to the wrongdoing of the billionaire class. And at the end of Season 3, when his siblings finally joined him, it was Logan’s legend itself. Tom had seen Kendall lose to his father before, believed he would lose again, and wound up bringing about that result in an effort to end up on the winning team (and spite his wife). Kendall had thought that an orderly approach could work, that the brutal truth could work, or that a united front could work. They didn’t.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Succession\u003c/em> can look like it’s stuck in a loop, but the way this conflict between Logan and his three youngest kids changes in shape but never in result served to establish the show’s central truth: Logan always wins. If that’s the case, though, there’s a story problem with one final season to go. If the kids do finally beat him, you’ve cheated on that truth. If they stop trying to beat him, the conflict is over. If they fail again, the family has just made one last round through the same cycle. And the last thing \u003cem>Succession \u003c/em>could ever end in is any sort of compromise. So what’s a storyteller to do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Critically, though, at\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2021/12/12/1063561827/succession-recap-season-3-finale\"> the end of the third season,\u003c/a> something else changed in a way it never had. It wasn’t the dynamic between Shiv, Roman and Kendall and their father one-on-one, but the dynamics \u003cem>among\u003c/em> the three of them. Logan, even in winning again, had become so galled at their effort to defy him that he took his eye off the ball. He gave up his greatest advantage, the one he’d been using to control them all their lives: playing them against each other. He told them \u003cem>all \u003c/em>that they were fools. He had spent decades trapping them in separate emotional cells and giving them different information and different promises. Now, he had effectively shut them in a room together and walked out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wisely, the fourth season begins a while later, rather than dwelling on the immediate aftermath, which seems to have played out as one would expect. Family relationships? Busted. Shiv’s marriage? A wreck. The sale to GoJo? About to close. What’s more, it’s Logan’s birthday again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3D3ewle7XY\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We find Roman, Shiv and Kendall hanging out at a compound somewhere beautiful, looking at mountains and blue sky through enormous windows that emphasize their opened-up world — particularly compared to the dark-wood family home, where Logan is celebrating another trip around the sun with his usual joyless scowl. The siblings are working on a terrible but brutally plausible idea for a new company, and their fixation is mostly on making fun of proposed logos. They are eyeing each other suspiciously now and then, wondering whether anyone is going to break with the group, but they are together, truly, more than we’ve ever seen. Meanwhile, only two members of the family remain in Logan’s circle: Tom, who proved his loyalty to his father-in-law by shivving Shiv, and Greg, who was won over by Tom’s appeal to the utter irrelevance of the human soul.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13906871']So while his kids are still trying to survive Logan Roy, they are oddly, suddenly, liberated from him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Maybe. Sort of.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first episode of this final season (of the four offered to critics) asks a new question, and hints at the way this story problem will be solved and stasis avoided: Without their father setting them against each other in the way he always has, and without the dynamic they have all known since birth that has prevented them — Shiv, Kendall, Roman and Connor — from developing durable and meaningful relationships with anyone as adults, who \u003cem>are\u003c/em> these people? What will drive them, if not that competitiveness for his approval? And without them as his playthings, will Logan somehow manage to … miss them? Can torturing Greg and being exasperated by Tom ever give Logan anything close to the visceral pleasure he gets from emotionally abusing his children?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first episode also introduces an important choice that comes back over and over in the first few episodes: the comedy and the tension that’s inherent in the unseen. There is a discussion between Logan and Greg that sounds \u003cem>so\u003c/em> funny, the kind of exchange that the writers would dig into and that the actors could devour like a Christmas ham — but we don’t see it, we only hear Greg describe it. There is a series of telephone conversations where we seem to be watching the wrong side, the less important side — the listening side rather than the speaking side. Information arrives first via a telling flicker in the eye of a person who’s receiving it, who only later makes explicit what was said. \u003cem>Succession\u003c/em> has always been a sharply written show, but there is a delicious restraint in this season that feels new.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To do less, to say less, and to leave out scenes that could have been dramatic or comedic or both, requires confidence in both the writers and the cast. Jeremy Strong, Sarah Snook, Kieran Culkin and Alan Ruck have in common a talent for summoning both childlike, love-me expressions and loathsome, snide, ice-cold ones. They can sneer and snivel with only seconds separating the two.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925147']And doing without much in the way of contact between Logan and his children in the early going requires him to be surrounded by people who give his character shape. There’s Tom, and there’s Greg, but critically, this season also sees new opportunities for Logan’s cadre of suit-wearing opportunists played by the genius supporting cast. Gerri (J. Smith-Cameron) (whose relationship with Roman seems to be far less complex to her than it is to him) has managed to stick around even after the Photo That Shall Not Be Named, and she remains a ruthlessly efficient cipher. Karl (David Rasche) and Frank (Peter Friedman) continue to be the dry-witted Weasel-Dee and Weasel-Dum of corporate goobers, and poor Hugo (Fisher Stevens) and Karolina (Dagmara Dominczyk) are over and over forced into the position of translating this family’s disasters for the entire world. They are uniformly divine when called upon in new ways.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is a season the creators are holding close to the vest for obvious reasons. But in the early going, it’s off to exactly the emotionally complicated, darkly funny, backstabbing, bantering, betraying, bewitching, tragicomic punch-packing start that the people who have followed the Roys since Kendall first sang along in the back seat of a limo are craving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Succession%27+returns+for+a+fourth+and+final+season+of+family+back-stabbing&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Season 4 of ‘Succession’ premieres on HBO Max on March 26, 2023. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Succession \u003c/em>began on Logan Roy’s birthday, with his first medical emergency. It had him nearly dying in his own helicopter, and it raised the question of what might come after Logan. Who would take over Waystar Royco? Who would run things? What would Logan have wanted? Since then, we’ve learned that this was an utter misdirect: \u003cem>Succession\u003c/em> is not about following Logan Roy at all. It is about \u003cem>surviving \u003c/em>Logan Roy. Can he be endured? Can his caustic influence be undone? Can he ever be outwitted, outplayed, or outlasted?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite dialogue so acerbic that it puckers the cast’s mouths like a salt and vinegar chip, and despite the dynamism of performances that harden, soften and harden again, stasis has always stalked the story of the Roys. Kendall, after all, has been vanquished in four separate rebellions against his father, each time ramming his quavering, sad-boy face into a different immovable object.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>At the board meeting in Season 1, it was weather and midtown traffic. At Shiv and Tom’s wedding, it was the dual grip of his own addiction and his cowardice in the face of consequences. After the press conference\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2019/10/14/770025859/roy-oh-roy-that-succession-finale-was-a-trip\"> at the end of Season 2,\u003c/a> it was systemic indifference to the wrongdoing of the billionaire class. And at the end of Season 3, when his siblings finally joined him, it was Logan’s legend itself. Tom had seen Kendall lose to his father before, believed he would lose again, and wound up bringing about that result in an effort to end up on the winning team (and spite his wife). Kendall had thought that an orderly approach could work, that the brutal truth could work, or that a united front could work. They didn’t.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Succession\u003c/em> can look like it’s stuck in a loop, but the way this conflict between Logan and his three youngest kids changes in shape but never in result served to establish the show’s central truth: Logan always wins. If that’s the case, though, there’s a story problem with one final season to go. If the kids do finally beat him, you’ve cheated on that truth. If they stop trying to beat him, the conflict is over. If they fail again, the family has just made one last round through the same cycle. And the last thing \u003cem>Succession \u003c/em>could ever end in is any sort of compromise. So what’s a storyteller to do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Critically, though, at\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2021/12/12/1063561827/succession-recap-season-3-finale\"> the end of the third season,\u003c/a> something else changed in a way it never had. It wasn’t the dynamic between Shiv, Roman and Kendall and their father one-on-one, but the dynamics \u003cem>among\u003c/em> the three of them. Logan, even in winning again, had become so galled at their effort to defy him that he took his eye off the ball. He gave up his greatest advantage, the one he’d been using to control them all their lives: playing them against each other. He told them \u003cem>all \u003c/em>that they were fools. He had spent decades trapping them in separate emotional cells and giving them different information and different promises. Now, he had effectively shut them in a room together and walked out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wisely, the fourth season begins a while later, rather than dwelling on the immediate aftermath, which seems to have played out as one would expect. Family relationships? Busted. Shiv’s marriage? A wreck. The sale to GoJo? About to close. What’s more, it’s Logan’s birthday again.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/t3D3ewle7XY'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/t3D3ewle7XY'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We find Roman, Shiv and Kendall hanging out at a compound somewhere beautiful, looking at mountains and blue sky through enormous windows that emphasize their opened-up world — particularly compared to the dark-wood family home, where Logan is celebrating another trip around the sun with his usual joyless scowl. The siblings are working on a terrible but brutally plausible idea for a new company, and their fixation is mostly on making fun of proposed logos. They are eyeing each other suspiciously now and then, wondering whether anyone is going to break with the group, but they are together, truly, more than we’ve ever seen. Meanwhile, only two members of the family remain in Logan’s circle: Tom, who proved his loyalty to his father-in-law by shivving Shiv, and Greg, who was won over by Tom’s appeal to the utter irrelevance of the human soul.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>So while his kids are still trying to survive Logan Roy, they are oddly, suddenly, liberated from him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Maybe. Sort of.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first episode of this final season (of the four offered to critics) asks a new question, and hints at the way this story problem will be solved and stasis avoided: Without their father setting them against each other in the way he always has, and without the dynamic they have all known since birth that has prevented them — Shiv, Kendall, Roman and Connor — from developing durable and meaningful relationships with anyone as adults, who \u003cem>are\u003c/em> these people? What will drive them, if not that competitiveness for his approval? And without them as his playthings, will Logan somehow manage to … miss them? Can torturing Greg and being exasperated by Tom ever give Logan anything close to the visceral pleasure he gets from emotionally abusing his children?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The first episode also introduces an important choice that comes back over and over in the first few episodes: the comedy and the tension that’s inherent in the unseen. There is a discussion between Logan and Greg that sounds \u003cem>so\u003c/em> funny, the kind of exchange that the writers would dig into and that the actors could devour like a Christmas ham — but we don’t see it, we only hear Greg describe it. There is a series of telephone conversations where we seem to be watching the wrong side, the less important side — the listening side rather than the speaking side. Information arrives first via a telling flicker in the eye of a person who’s receiving it, who only later makes explicit what was said. \u003cem>Succession\u003c/em> has always been a sharply written show, but there is a delicious restraint in this season that feels new.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To do less, to say less, and to leave out scenes that could have been dramatic or comedic or both, requires confidence in both the writers and the cast. Jeremy Strong, Sarah Snook, Kieran Culkin and Alan Ruck have in common a talent for summoning both childlike, love-me expressions and loathsome, snide, ice-cold ones. They can sneer and snivel with only seconds separating the two.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>And doing without much in the way of contact between Logan and his children in the early going requires him to be surrounded by people who give his character shape. There’s Tom, and there’s Greg, but critically, this season also sees new opportunities for Logan’s cadre of suit-wearing opportunists played by the genius supporting cast. Gerri (J. Smith-Cameron) (whose relationship with Roman seems to be far less complex to her than it is to him) has managed to stick around even after the Photo That Shall Not Be Named, and she remains a ruthlessly efficient cipher. Karl (David Rasche) and Frank (Peter Friedman) continue to be the dry-witted Weasel-Dee and Weasel-Dum of corporate goobers, and poor Hugo (Fisher Stevens) and Karolina (Dagmara Dominczyk) are over and over forced into the position of translating this family’s disasters for the entire world. They are uniformly divine when called upon in new ways.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This is a season the creators are holding close to the vest for obvious reasons. But in the early going, it’s off to exactly the emotionally complicated, darkly funny, backstabbing, bantering, betraying, bewitching, tragicomic punch-packing start that the people who have followed the Roys since Kendall first sang along in the back seat of a limo are craving.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Succession%27+returns+for+a+fourth+and+final+season+of+family+back-stabbing&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Season 4 of ‘Succession’ premieres on HBO Max on March 26, 2023. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "‘Swarm’ is About How We’re Doing Fandom Wrong",
"headTitle": "‘Swarm’ is About How We’re Doing Fandom Wrong | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Many spoilers for Season 1 of \u003c/em>Swarm \u003cem>lie ahead. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925147']Once upon a time, not so long ago, an internet personality dared to publicly criticize a very famous musician with an overly zealous fanbase. Those stans descended upon the critic swiftly, hopping into their mentions and DMs to talk trash and even go so far as to post death and rape threats. The involved parties shall remain nameless here because I’m not particularly interested in dealing with these stans myself. But let’s just say said artist — whose admirers are collectively named after a popular children’s toy — has elicited and even encouraged this behavior many times before. It’s one of the more nightmarish scenarios that can play out on the internet, an all-too-common “love” language spoken across fandoms of all kinds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Swarm\u003c/em>, a bizarre new series created by \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3958656/\">Janine Nabers\u003c/a> and Donald Glover and streaming on Prime Video, takes that nightmare and pushes it to its most extreme limits, concocting a thriller that serves as a spikey admonishment of celebrity worship. Like Glover’s previous project \u003cem>Atlanta\u003c/em> (which Nabers also contributed to), it expresses a discomfort with and cynical attitude toward social media and fame to sometimes frustrating results.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Hive mind\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>An excellent Dominique Fishback plays Dre, a socially inept retail worker with just two interests in life: Her sister Marissa (Chloe Bailey), an up-and-coming makeup artist, and the global pop superstar Ni’Jah (Nirine S. Brown). As kids, Dre and Marissa bonded over their shared love for Ni’Jah, but now that they’re both young adults rooming together and with bills to pay, Dre’s fandom remains in arrested development; she speaks breathlessly of the artist, and she takes anything that registers as less than glowing praise of the singer as a very personal affront. She can barely sustain a conversation without mentioning Ni’Jah and spends half of the rent on tickets to a concert, a surprise for Marissa’s birthday. From the get-go, it’s clear something is \u003cem>off\u003c/em> about Dre.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDHxie2QcJI\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of the first episode, Marissa is dead (she dies by suicide after finding out her boyfriend Khalid, played by Damson Idris, cheated on her) and Dre’s already simmering obsession with Ni’Jah boils over into fully unhinged. She sets off on a killing spree, hopping around various cities under assumed aliases and identities; most of her victims have spoken ill of Ni’Jah either online or in Dre’s presence. “Who’s your favorite artist?” she baits them. If they don’t say Ni’Jah or fail to muster up much enthusiasm for her artistry — which is often — they’re doomed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unlike me, the writers of \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>are far less opaque in their references to a pop culture icon and their devoted followers: Ni’Jah’s legion of fans are known as “The Swarm,” and the bumblebee emoji is their insignia; she’s revered as a \u003cem>queen \u003c/em>and a \u003cem>goddess\u003c/em>. She’s won dozens of Grammys; her husband is a famous rapper with whom she’s done a joint tour called “Running Scared.” There’s surveillance camera footage of said husband being attacked by a woman in an elevator while an expressionless Ni’Jah stands by and does nothing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13831328']She is an obvious, translucently veiled analog for the real-life \u003cem>queen\u003c/em> and \u003cem>goddess\u003c/em> Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter — right down to the show’s clever depiction of a notoriously odd incident \u003ca href=\"https://www.essence.com/gallery/rihanna-was-the-fashion-queen-of-the-night-at-the-2023-oscars/\">long rumored to have involved the actress Sanaa Lathan\u003c/a>. Yet for all the highly specific Beyhive Easter eggs — or honeycombs? … actually, let me not force this metaphor — strewn throughout, there’s the dreadful understanding that this is only about Beyoncé in an abstract sense. Really, it’s about taking the idea of the devoted fan and stretching it to its limits, in calling upon the tendencies of obsessive fans and sadistic serial killers both fictional and real — like \u003cem>Misery\u003c/em>’s Annie Wilkes, Mark David Chapman, Jeffrey Dahmer, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/03/09/1162167877/you-is-back-and-joe-is-still-chaotic-evil\">\u003cem>You’\u003c/em>s Joe Goldberg\u003c/a> — and putting them in the shoes of a Black woman. To add to the surrealness of it all, Marissa’s ghost seems to be “communicating” with Dre via text message, egging her on like the dog that “inspired” the Son of Sam.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘Falling Through the Cracks’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>There’s been a small uptick in amoral or morally dubious Black women TV characters lately (see \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/12/03/941425173/hbos-industry-features-the-most-fascinating-character-on-tv-right-now\">\u003cem>Industry’\u003c/em>s Harper\u003c/a>, for one), but there’s something especially notable about \u003cem>Swarm\u003c/em>, and its creators are absolutely aware of it. In the first couple of episodes, it falls into the trappings of many serial killer narratives by leaning into the shock value and novelty of a Black woman dropping bodies left and right; Dre is seen primarily through a series of tics (binge eating, rattling off Ni’Jah’s accomplishments) and a singlemindedness to commit murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nevertheless, Fishback is mesmerizing and clearly committed to the role. And the show begins to find its groove a bit later when Dre ends up at a commune made up of woo-woo influencer types, including one played by Billie Eilish, who coerces Dre into unpacking her traumas and confronting, to some extent, her crimes. It feels like a direct reference to \u003cem>Get Out\u003c/em>’s Sunken Place, allowing a bit of Dre’s humanity to crack through to the surface and for us to more deeply contemplate what it means to form an attachment to an iconic figure you have no real interpersonal connection to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926524\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926524\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-800x534.png\" alt=\"A young Black woman sits in front of a campfire, a serene expression on her face. A white woman sits nearby, a half-smile on her face.\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-800x534.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-1020x681.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-160x107.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-768x513.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM.png 1518w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dominique Fishback in ‘Swarm.’ \u003ccite>(Quantrell D. Colbert/Prime Video)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The series suggests Dre has been able to get away with her crimes largely because of her invisibility as a Black woman, and the penultimate episode (one of the show’s best) is a faux crime documentary show-within-the-show called “Falling Through the Cracks.” It profiles a Black detective named Loretta Greene, who presents herself as uniquely capable of recognizing a Black woman serial killer based on explicit cultural clues like Hot Cheetos and shea butter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925365']That Dre is ultimately seen in this way by another Black woman echoes how the show attempts to be in dialogue with its audience — it’s a very specific type of viewer who will recognize the irony in casting Paris Jackson in a cameo as a stripper who claims to be Black on her dad’s side. (As well as this kicker: “That’s why my stage name is \u003ca href=\"https://www.allure.com/story/halsey-cover-interview-august-2021\">Halsey\u003c/a>.”) Like the fandoms it’s satirizing and critiquing, it speaks a language all its own, one that requires being constantly online, knowing your memes, and staying up on your Black celeb gossip to even begin to unpack it.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>“Stan correct”\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Even if the reference points are plentiful and Dre is a refreshing spin on the sociopathic serial killer, what should we make of this funhouse mirror interpretation of fandom’s twisted facets? A bit can be gleaned from the second episode of \u003cem>Atlanta\u003c/em>, where local rapper Paper Boi (Brian Tyree Henry) encounters a fan at a restaurant. The interaction starts friendly enough, but then the fan’s tone gets more serious, almost grave: “Don’t let me down, man. If you let me down – I don’t know what I’d do.” Paper Boi’s confused and creeped out, as he should be.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The moment moves on quickly, but the man’s plea to the stranger he admires says a lot about how many of us project onto artists and perceive intimacy with them where none exists. Dre embodies that Paper Boi fan to the nth degree. Her relentless preoccupation ostensibly leads to a complete break from reality upon the death of her sister Marissa, and we’re left wondering whether what we’ve witnessed is only a product of Dre’s troubled mind: In the final moments of the last episode, Dre makes her way into a Ni’Jah concert, jumps on stage and stops the show. Ni’Jah encourages Dre to sing, though in a shocking reveal, the face of Marissa is now superimposed upon Ni’Jah’s body. Then Ni’Jah whisks Dre away into a limo and cradles her in her arms. Dre seems, finally, at peace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926517\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926517\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"A young Black woman wearing a low-cut, sequined lilac top looks inside a black envelope with the word Ni'Jah on the front, and smiles.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Fishback in the Beyoncé-inspired thriller series. \u003ccite>(Warrick Page/Prime Video)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This is the most time we spend in the presence of “Ni’Jah” for the entire series; heretofore, she’s only been refracted as a flat symbol, a montage of fleeting images, musical snippets, social media reactions and glowing adjectives. Who Ni’Jah really is as an artist is less important to Dre and the story than who she supposedly represents to her and other starry-eyed fans — and that, \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>implies, is the problem. The show’s tagline is “Stan correct,” a play on words that could possess multiple meanings; one that takes on the perspective of Dre and her ilk or one that points the finger at Dre and her ilk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Curiously, this also makes it so that all the onus falls on the stans and that the many ways artists can fuel these responses, either directly or indirectly, are left uninterrogated. (It’s perhaps not a coincidence that Donald Glover and Chloe Bailey have had close working relationships with Beyoncé. It’s also probably not a coincidence that Glover once \u003ca href=\"https://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/donald-glover-interviews-donald-glover\">infamously and irritatingly interviewed himself\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>is at its best when it leans into the absurdities of social media and the ease of slippage between internet selves and “real” selves. Ultimately \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>seems to want viewers to recognize a bit of themselves in Dre — the part that might put a little too much stock in celebrity, the part that may occasionally forget that everyone, including those strangers you argue with on the internet, is human, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Swarm%27+is+about+how+we%27re+doing+fandom+wrong&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Swarm’ is streaming on Prime Video now. \u003ca href=\"https://www.amazon.com/Swarm-Season-1/dp/B0B8NLVH1L\">Details here\u003c/a>. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Many spoilers for Season 1 of \u003c/em>Swarm \u003cem>lie ahead. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Once upon a time, not so long ago, an internet personality dared to publicly criticize a very famous musician with an overly zealous fanbase. Those stans descended upon the critic swiftly, hopping into their mentions and DMs to talk trash and even go so far as to post death and rape threats. The involved parties shall remain nameless here because I’m not particularly interested in dealing with these stans myself. But let’s just say said artist — whose admirers are collectively named after a popular children’s toy — has elicited and even encouraged this behavior many times before. It’s one of the more nightmarish scenarios that can play out on the internet, an all-too-common “love” language spoken across fandoms of all kinds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Swarm\u003c/em>, a bizarre new series created by \u003ca href=\"https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3958656/\">Janine Nabers\u003c/a> and Donald Glover and streaming on Prime Video, takes that nightmare and pushes it to its most extreme limits, concocting a thriller that serves as a spikey admonishment of celebrity worship. Like Glover’s previous project \u003cem>Atlanta\u003c/em> (which Nabers also contributed to), it expresses a discomfort with and cynical attitude toward social media and fame to sometimes frustrating results.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Hive mind\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>An excellent Dominique Fishback plays Dre, a socially inept retail worker with just two interests in life: Her sister Marissa (Chloe Bailey), an up-and-coming makeup artist, and the global pop superstar Ni’Jah (Nirine S. Brown). As kids, Dre and Marissa bonded over their shared love for Ni’Jah, but now that they’re both young adults rooming together and with bills to pay, Dre’s fandom remains in arrested development; she speaks breathlessly of the artist, and she takes anything that registers as less than glowing praise of the singer as a very personal affront. She can barely sustain a conversation without mentioning Ni’Jah and spends half of the rent on tickets to a concert, a surprise for Marissa’s birthday. From the get-go, it’s clear something is \u003cem>off\u003c/em> about Dre.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/SDHxie2QcJI'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/SDHxie2QcJI'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of the first episode, Marissa is dead (she dies by suicide after finding out her boyfriend Khalid, played by Damson Idris, cheated on her) and Dre’s already simmering obsession with Ni’Jah boils over into fully unhinged. She sets off on a killing spree, hopping around various cities under assumed aliases and identities; most of her victims have spoken ill of Ni’Jah either online or in Dre’s presence. “Who’s your favorite artist?” she baits them. If they don’t say Ni’Jah or fail to muster up much enthusiasm for her artistry — which is often — they’re doomed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unlike me, the writers of \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>are far less opaque in their references to a pop culture icon and their devoted followers: Ni’Jah’s legion of fans are known as “The Swarm,” and the bumblebee emoji is their insignia; she’s revered as a \u003cem>queen \u003c/em>and a \u003cem>goddess\u003c/em>. She’s won dozens of Grammys; her husband is a famous rapper with whom she’s done a joint tour called “Running Scared.” There’s surveillance camera footage of said husband being attacked by a woman in an elevator while an expressionless Ni’Jah stands by and does nothing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>She is an obvious, translucently veiled analog for the real-life \u003cem>queen\u003c/em> and \u003cem>goddess\u003c/em> Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter — right down to the show’s clever depiction of a notoriously odd incident \u003ca href=\"https://www.essence.com/gallery/rihanna-was-the-fashion-queen-of-the-night-at-the-2023-oscars/\">long rumored to have involved the actress Sanaa Lathan\u003c/a>. Yet for all the highly specific Beyhive Easter eggs — or honeycombs? … actually, let me not force this metaphor — strewn throughout, there’s the dreadful understanding that this is only about Beyoncé in an abstract sense. Really, it’s about taking the idea of the devoted fan and stretching it to its limits, in calling upon the tendencies of obsessive fans and sadistic serial killers both fictional and real — like \u003cem>Misery\u003c/em>’s Annie Wilkes, Mark David Chapman, Jeffrey Dahmer, and \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/03/09/1162167877/you-is-back-and-joe-is-still-chaotic-evil\">\u003cem>You’\u003c/em>s Joe Goldberg\u003c/a> — and putting them in the shoes of a Black woman. To add to the surrealness of it all, Marissa’s ghost seems to be “communicating” with Dre via text message, egging her on like the dog that “inspired” the Son of Sam.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘Falling Through the Cracks’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>There’s been a small uptick in amoral or morally dubious Black women TV characters lately (see \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/12/03/941425173/hbos-industry-features-the-most-fascinating-character-on-tv-right-now\">\u003cem>Industry’\u003c/em>s Harper\u003c/a>, for one), but there’s something especially notable about \u003cem>Swarm\u003c/em>, and its creators are absolutely aware of it. In the first couple of episodes, it falls into the trappings of many serial killer narratives by leaning into the shock value and novelty of a Black woman dropping bodies left and right; Dre is seen primarily through a series of tics (binge eating, rattling off Ni’Jah’s accomplishments) and a singlemindedness to commit murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nevertheless, Fishback is mesmerizing and clearly committed to the role. And the show begins to find its groove a bit later when Dre ends up at a commune made up of woo-woo influencer types, including one played by Billie Eilish, who coerces Dre into unpacking her traumas and confronting, to some extent, her crimes. It feels like a direct reference to \u003cem>Get Out\u003c/em>’s Sunken Place, allowing a bit of Dre’s humanity to crack through to the surface and for us to more deeply contemplate what it means to form an attachment to an iconic figure you have no real interpersonal connection to.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926524\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926524\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-800x534.png\" alt=\"A young Black woman sits in front of a campfire, a serene expression on her face. A white woman sits nearby, a half-smile on her face.\" width=\"800\" height=\"534\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-800x534.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-1020x681.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-160x107.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM-768x513.png 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/Screen-Shot-2023-03-20-at-11.38.09-AM.png 1518w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dominique Fishback in ‘Swarm.’ \u003ccite>(Quantrell D. Colbert/Prime Video)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The series suggests Dre has been able to get away with her crimes largely because of her invisibility as a Black woman, and the penultimate episode (one of the show’s best) is a faux crime documentary show-within-the-show called “Falling Through the Cracks.” It profiles a Black detective named Loretta Greene, who presents herself as uniquely capable of recognizing a Black woman serial killer based on explicit cultural clues like Hot Cheetos and shea butter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>That Dre is ultimately seen in this way by another Black woman echoes how the show attempts to be in dialogue with its audience — it’s a very specific type of viewer who will recognize the irony in casting Paris Jackson in a cameo as a stripper who claims to be Black on her dad’s side. (As well as this kicker: “That’s why my stage name is \u003ca href=\"https://www.allure.com/story/halsey-cover-interview-august-2021\">Halsey\u003c/a>.”) Like the fandoms it’s satirizing and critiquing, it speaks a language all its own, one that requires being constantly online, knowing your memes, and staying up on your Black celeb gossip to even begin to unpack it.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>“Stan correct”\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Even if the reference points are plentiful and Dre is a refreshing spin on the sociopathic serial killer, what should we make of this funhouse mirror interpretation of fandom’s twisted facets? A bit can be gleaned from the second episode of \u003cem>Atlanta\u003c/em>, where local rapper Paper Boi (Brian Tyree Henry) encounters a fan at a restaurant. The interaction starts friendly enough, but then the fan’s tone gets more serious, almost grave: “Don’t let me down, man. If you let me down – I don’t know what I’d do.” Paper Boi’s confused and creeped out, as he should be.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The moment moves on quickly, but the man’s plea to the stranger he admires says a lot about how many of us project onto artists and perceive intimacy with them where none exists. Dre embodies that Paper Boi fan to the nth degree. Her relentless preoccupation ostensibly leads to a complete break from reality upon the death of her sister Marissa, and we’re left wondering whether what we’ve witnessed is only a product of Dre’s troubled mind: In the final moments of the last episode, Dre makes her way into a Ni’Jah concert, jumps on stage and stops the show. Ni’Jah encourages Dre to sing, though in a shocking reveal, the face of Marissa is now superimposed upon Ni’Jah’s body. Then Ni’Jah whisks Dre away into a limo and cradles her in her arms. Dre seems, finally, at peace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926517\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926517\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"A young Black woman wearing a low-cut, sequined lilac top looks inside a black envelope with the word Ni'Jah on the front, and smiles.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-1020x679.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834-1536x1023.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/yllw_s1_ut_101_220322_pagwar_00129rc3_3000_custom-8b665313d191d451f55e985192df1d65f1f6dca4-scaled-e1679337819834.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Fishback in the Beyoncé-inspired thriller series. \u003ccite>(Warrick Page/Prime Video)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This is the most time we spend in the presence of “Ni’Jah” for the entire series; heretofore, she’s only been refracted as a flat symbol, a montage of fleeting images, musical snippets, social media reactions and glowing adjectives. Who Ni’Jah really is as an artist is less important to Dre and the story than who she supposedly represents to her and other starry-eyed fans — and that, \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>implies, is the problem. The show’s tagline is “Stan correct,” a play on words that could possess multiple meanings; one that takes on the perspective of Dre and her ilk or one that points the finger at Dre and her ilk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Curiously, this also makes it so that all the onus falls on the stans and that the many ways artists can fuel these responses, either directly or indirectly, are left uninterrogated. (It’s perhaps not a coincidence that Donald Glover and Chloe Bailey have had close working relationships with Beyoncé. It’s also probably not a coincidence that Glover once \u003ca href=\"https://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/donald-glover-interviews-donald-glover\">infamously and irritatingly interviewed himself\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>is at its best when it leans into the absurdities of social media and the ease of slippage between internet selves and “real” selves. Ultimately \u003cem>Swarm \u003c/em>seems to want viewers to recognize a bit of themselves in Dre — the part that might put a little too much stock in celebrity, the part that may occasionally forget that everyone, including those strangers you argue with on the internet, is human, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=%27Swarm%27+is+about+how+we%27re+doing+fandom+wrong&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Swarm’ is streaming on Prime Video now. \u003ca href=\"https://www.amazon.com/Swarm-Season-1/dp/B0B8NLVH1L\">Details here\u003c/a>. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Robert Smith of The Cure Convinces Ticketmaster to Give Partial Refunds, Lower Fees",
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"content": "\u003cp>One cure — or a treatment, at least — for high Ticketmaster fees turns out to be The Cure frontman Robert Smith, who said he was “\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/RobertSmith/status/1636188988238077953\">sickened\u003c/a>” by the charges and \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/RobertSmith/status/1636496816521748481?s=20\">announced Thursday\u003c/a> that Ticketmaster will offer partial refunds and lower fees for The Cure tickets moving forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13923059']“After further conversation, Ticketmaster have agreed with us that many of the fees being charged are unduly high,” Smith tweeted. Smith said the company agreed to offer a $5-10 refund per ticket for verified fan accounts “as a gesture of goodwill.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cure fans who already bought tickets for shows on the band’s May-July tour will get their refunds automatically, Smith said, and all future ticket purchases will incur lower fees.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/RobertSmith/status/1636496816521748481\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The announcement came a day after Smith shared his frustration on Twitter, saying he was “as sickened as you all are by today’s Ticketmaster ‘fees’ debacle. To be very clear: the artist has no way to limit them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In some cases, fans say the fees more than doubled their ticket price, with \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/Tim_Burgess/status/1636357859192569856?s=20\">one social media user\u003c/a> sharing that they paid over $90 in fees for a $80 ticket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13921777']Ticketmaster has been in a harsh spotlight in recent months. Last November, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/11/17/1137465465/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-klobuchar-tennessee\">Taylor Swift fans waited hours\u003c/a>, paid high fees and weathered outages on the Ticketmaster website to try to score tickets to her Eras Tour. A day before the tickets were set to open to the general public, the company canceled the sale due to “extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement on Instagram, Swift said it was “excruciating for me to watch mistakes happen with no recourse.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January, following that debacle, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/01/24/1150942804/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-senate-hearing-live-nation\">the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing looking at Live Nation\u003c/a> — the company that owns Ticketmaster — and the lack of competition in the ticketing industry. Meanwhile, attorneys general across many states initiated consumer protection investigations, Swift’s fans sued the company for fraud and antitrust violations and some lawmakers called for Ticketmaster to be broken up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ticketmaster did not immediately respond to NPR’s request for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Robert+Smith+of+The+Cure+convinces+Ticketmaster+to+give+partial+refunds%2C+lower+fees+&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“After further conversation, Ticketmaster have agreed with us that many of the fees being charged are unduly high,” Smith tweeted. Smith said the company agreed to offer a $5-10 refund per ticket for verified fan accounts “as a gesture of goodwill.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cure fans who already bought tickets for shows on the band’s May-July tour will get their refunds automatically, Smith said, and all future ticket purchases will incur lower fees.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>The announcement came a day after Smith shared his frustration on Twitter, saying he was “as sickened as you all are by today’s Ticketmaster ‘fees’ debacle. To be very clear: the artist has no way to limit them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In some cases, fans say the fees more than doubled their ticket price, with \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/Tim_Burgess/status/1636357859192569856?s=20\">one social media user\u003c/a> sharing that they paid over $90 in fees for a $80 ticket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Ticketmaster has been in a harsh spotlight in recent months. Last November, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2022/11/17/1137465465/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-klobuchar-tennessee\">Taylor Swift fans waited hours\u003c/a>, paid high fees and weathered outages on the Ticketmaster website to try to score tickets to her Eras Tour. A day before the tickets were set to open to the general public, the company canceled the sale due to “extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement on Instagram, Swift said it was “excruciating for me to watch mistakes happen with no recourse.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January, following that debacle, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/01/24/1150942804/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-senate-hearing-live-nation\">the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing looking at Live Nation\u003c/a> — the company that owns Ticketmaster — and the lack of competition in the ticketing industry. Meanwhile, attorneys general across many states initiated consumer protection investigations, Swift’s fans sued the company for fraud and antitrust violations and some lawmakers called for Ticketmaster to be broken up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ticketmaster did not immediately respond to NPR’s request for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Robert+Smith+of+The+Cure+convinces+Ticketmaster+to+give+partial+refunds%2C+lower+fees+&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "The Third Season of ‘Ted Lasso’ Basks in the Glow of Its Quirky Characters",
"headTitle": "The Third Season of ‘Ted Lasso’ Basks in the Glow of Its Quirky Characters | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp>How you feel about the latest — and possibly last — season of Apple TV+’s hit comedy \u003cem>Ted Lasso\u003c/em>, likely depends on how you feel about the characters in \u003cem>Ted Lasso\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because star/co-creator/executive producer Jason Sudeikis and his crew spend a lot of time this season savoring the quirky, familial vibe of the show’s signature personalities — serving up longer episodes at 43-50 minutes each, creating more complex storylines and cooking up new characters who have their own unique stories going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13926110']As the third season opens, Sudeikis’ breathtakingly optimistic coach Ted Lasso is dropping his son off at Heathrow airport, returning him to America after a visit. The exchange prompts Ted to rethink his decision to leave a career in college football and lead a scrappy soccer team in Britain — where he still, inexplicably, doesn’t understand many of rules and doesn’t know who the biggest star players are.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ted’s about to face off against his former assistant, Nick Mohammed’s unctuous strategist Nate Shelley, who left Ted’s team AFC Richmond in a jealous rage to become head coach for a rival team owned by the self-absorbed Rupert Mannion — ex-husband of Richmond’s owner, Rebecca Welton (Hannah Waddingham).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I expected this season to focus on the rivalry between Ted’s determinedly folksy good nature — he disagrees with one of his coaches by saying “I beg to differ, Claudia Schiffer” — and Nate’s darkly insecure hostility. But the first four episodes of the season made available to critics don’t spend much time on the competition between the two — even though the teams eventually play a match against each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, we catch up with many different characters — from Juno Temple’s chirpy publicist Keeley Jones, who has started her own publicity firm, to Brett Goldstein’s superstar player-turned coach Roy Kent, who makes a fateful decision about his relationship with Keeley. Regret is a common theme this season, as various characters reconsider roads not taken and choices made, pondering the imponderable question of whether they would have been better leaving well enough alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IR9yjn7Lkdg\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ted seems to have his panic attacks from last season under control, with a nod to continued therapy sessions. But he’s still struggling with a sense of melancholy, as he wonders whether his time in Britain is worth being apart from his family as they move on without him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925147']Roy, in particular, grows sad after AFC Richmond plays against the team he retired from, despite the fact that fans of the opposing team gave him a hero’s welcome. He admits, part of him wonders if he shouldn’t have stayed in the game longer, enjoying his time on the field, instead of leaving the sport before his skills deteriorated until he was let go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of folks think it’s better to quit than be fired,” Ted tells him, leaving little doubt he was also talking about something else. (Can’t say exactly what because — spoilers. But its a huge deal for Roy.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926465\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926465\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"A South Asian man with grey hair wearing a smart black suit stares up at a taller white man with a mustache, more casually dressed. In the distance between them, another man watches. A soccer emblem is displayed on the wall behind.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nick Mohammed, Anthony Head and Jason Sudeikis in ‘Ted Lasso.’ \u003ccite>(Apple TV+)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For those who find such obvious signals in a character’s journey irritating or amateurish, this third season will likely be a tough slog. Characters here often reveal themselves in ways few people actually do in real life, offering emotional speeches with perceptive insights into how they’re really feeling, beneath the façade they usually present to the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13924713']But if you’re a fan who enjoys \u003cem>Ted Lasso’\u003c/em>s extended family of characters and how they bounce off each other — yes, there is a moment where every member of the coaching staff names their favorite character played by Julie Andrews — then you’ll savor every minute of this season’s long stretches spent hanging with people in ways that often advance the show’s actual plots only incrementally.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The toughest challenge for established TV shows focused on a family — connected either by blood or through work and friendships — is to find new, believable ways of separating that family over the course of a TV season and then reuniting them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926467\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926467\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"Two tanned, blond women stand side-by-side smiling. One is middle aged and smartly dressed. The other is younger and a quirkier.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Juno Temple and Hannah Waddingham in ‘Ted Lasso.’ \u003ccite>(Apple TV+)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>It’s one reason why I suspect Sudeikis has been telling press the show’s current storylines will wrap up with this third season. The goodwill that binds these characters this season is nearly palpable. And as fun as it is to bask in the glow of entertaining characters who enjoy each other, it’s not often the source of deeply compelling television, especially long term.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite Sudeikis’ talk that this season \u003ca href=\"https://deadline.com/2023/03/jason-sudeikis-ted-lasso-season-3-spoilers-series-finale-spinoffs-1235280998/\">wraps up the story he wanted to tell\u003c/a>, Apple TV+ hasn’t said for sure if \u003cem>Ted Lasso \u003c/em>will end here. And, so far, it’s tough to see if the fun and funny moments from these first few episodes will rise to fuel a truly great TV conclusion, if it does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it remains a measure of \u003cem>Ted Lasso\u003c/em>’s quality that even a gentle end to these characters’ journeys would be better television than most series these days can muster.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=The+third+season+of+%27Ted+Lasso%27+basks+in+the+glow+of+its+quirky+characters+&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Ted Lasso returns as folksy as ever, but one wonders if there’s enough personality to carry the series to a compelling end.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>How you feel about the latest — and possibly last — season of Apple TV+’s hit comedy \u003cem>Ted Lasso\u003c/em>, likely depends on how you feel about the characters in \u003cem>Ted Lasso\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because star/co-creator/executive producer Jason Sudeikis and his crew spend a lot of time this season savoring the quirky, familial vibe of the show’s signature personalities — serving up longer episodes at 43-50 minutes each, creating more complex storylines and cooking up new characters who have their own unique stories going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>As the third season opens, Sudeikis’ breathtakingly optimistic coach Ted Lasso is dropping his son off at Heathrow airport, returning him to America after a visit. The exchange prompts Ted to rethink his decision to leave a career in college football and lead a scrappy soccer team in Britain — where he still, inexplicably, doesn’t understand many of rules and doesn’t know who the biggest star players are.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ted’s about to face off against his former assistant, Nick Mohammed’s unctuous strategist Nate Shelley, who left Ted’s team AFC Richmond in a jealous rage to become head coach for a rival team owned by the self-absorbed Rupert Mannion — ex-husband of Richmond’s owner, Rebecca Welton (Hannah Waddingham).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>I expected this season to focus on the rivalry between Ted’s determinedly folksy good nature — he disagrees with one of his coaches by saying “I beg to differ, Claudia Schiffer” — and Nate’s darkly insecure hostility. But the first four episodes of the season made available to critics don’t spend much time on the competition between the two — even though the teams eventually play a match against each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Instead, we catch up with many different characters — from Juno Temple’s chirpy publicist Keeley Jones, who has started her own publicity firm, to Brett Goldstein’s superstar player-turned coach Roy Kent, who makes a fateful decision about his relationship with Keeley. Regret is a common theme this season, as various characters reconsider roads not taken and choices made, pondering the imponderable question of whether they would have been better leaving well enough alone.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/IR9yjn7Lkdg'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/IR9yjn7Lkdg'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Ted seems to have his panic attacks from last season under control, with a nod to continued therapy sessions. But he’s still struggling with a sense of melancholy, as he wonders whether his time in Britain is worth being apart from his family as they move on without him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Roy, in particular, grows sad after AFC Richmond plays against the team he retired from, despite the fact that fans of the opposing team gave him a hero’s welcome. He admits, part of him wonders if he shouldn’t have stayed in the game longer, enjoying his time on the field, instead of leaving the sport before his skills deteriorated until he was let go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of folks think it’s better to quit than be fired,” Ted tells him, leaving little doubt he was also talking about something else. (Can’t say exactly what because — spoilers. But its a huge deal for Roy.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926465\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926465\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"A South Asian man with grey hair wearing a smart black suit stares up at a taller white man with a mustache, more casually dressed. In the distance between them, another man watches. A soccer emblem is displayed on the wall behind.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030401_wide-d87c23336f4051da2470ee0d087e6b084a6421a2-1-scaled-e1679075001244.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nick Mohammed, Anthony Head and Jason Sudeikis in ‘Ted Lasso.’ \u003ccite>(Apple TV+)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For those who find such obvious signals in a character’s journey irritating or amateurish, this third season will likely be a tough slog. Characters here often reveal themselves in ways few people actually do in real life, offering emotional speeches with perceptive insights into how they’re really feeling, beneath the façade they usually present to the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But if you’re a fan who enjoys \u003cem>Ted Lasso’\u003c/em>s extended family of characters and how they bounce off each other — yes, there is a moment where every member of the coaching staff names their favorite character played by Julie Andrews — then you’ll savor every minute of this season’s long stretches spent hanging with people in ways that often advance the show’s actual plots only incrementally.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The toughest challenge for established TV shows focused on a family — connected either by blood or through work and friendships — is to find new, believable ways of separating that family over the course of a TV season and then reuniting them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_13926467\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-13926467\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"Two tanned, blond women stand side-by-side smiling. One is middle aged and smartly dressed. The other is younger and a quirkier.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/ted_lasso_photo_030106_wide-c0e97d2d08a2c96df46b63b6500bde44e63280cd-1-scaled-e1679075185885.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Juno Temple and Hannah Waddingham in ‘Ted Lasso.’ \u003ccite>(Apple TV+)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>It’s one reason why I suspect Sudeikis has been telling press the show’s current storylines will wrap up with this third season. The goodwill that binds these characters this season is nearly palpable. And as fun as it is to bask in the glow of entertaining characters who enjoy each other, it’s not often the source of deeply compelling television, especially long term.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite Sudeikis’ talk that this season \u003ca href=\"https://deadline.com/2023/03/jason-sudeikis-ted-lasso-season-3-spoilers-series-finale-spinoffs-1235280998/\">wraps up the story he wanted to tell\u003c/a>, Apple TV+ hasn’t said for sure if \u003cem>Ted Lasso \u003c/em>will end here. And, so far, it’s tough to see if the fun and funny moments from these first few episodes will rise to fuel a truly great TV conclusion, if it does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it remains a measure of \u003cem>Ted Lasso\u003c/em>’s quality that even a gentle end to these characters’ journeys would be better television than most series these days can muster.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">\u003cem>Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">visit NPR\u003c/a>.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=The+third+season+of+%27Ted+Lasso%27+basks+in+the+glow+of+its+quirky+characters+&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/em>\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Willem Dafoe has said that, for him, the process of making a movie always eclipses the finished product.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But after more than 130 film credits, the 67-year-old actor has finally found a project whose final form is on par with the experience of creating it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925905']“When I watch this movie, I say, ‘Okay, I feel like I’m there again,’” he said. “Although there’s lots of stuff that we had invented that gets cut out, it feels like the making of it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That assertion is impressive, given how much \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em>, Vasilis Katsoupis’ fiction directorial debut, asked of its lead and virtually only actor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It really required a lot of different states and different approaches, I would say. But it was great fun,” Dafoe recalled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Set entirely inside a single apartment and with no foils for Dafoe’s character to rely on, \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em> is completely dependent on his performance, which is so compelling you forget he is the only person on screen for the better part of 100 minutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It follows an art thief named Nemo (Dafoe) who gets trapped inside a collector’s apartment during a botched heist. Nemo is pushed to his limits, braving extreme temperatures, flooding and limited access to food and water, all within the confines of a luxury Manhattan apartment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjODCllZj4w\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite the physical and psychological toll that Nemo suffers throughout the film, Dafoe said he was able to distance himself from his character’s tribulations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to some maybe dramatic places or some difficult places, but you’re also enjoying the interplay with the other people,” he said. “You’ve got the camera, you’ve got the film language behind you, so you’re playing with these things.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than just a psychological thriller, \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em> considers the ways in which art rescues humans in modern society from an isolated existence — a way out from being trapped inside of ourselves. Through his meditations on William Blake’s \u003cem>The Marriage of Heaven and Hell\u003c/em>, Nemo discerns that liberation can only be attained through creation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Dafoe, the philosophical exploration of the human relationship to art was not as apparent in the script, but “really came out in the doing of it,” the actor recalled, reflecting on the ways he found beauty in making art pieces for the film.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postid='arts_13925466']“That was so enjoyable. You lose yourself in those things. You don’t necessarily know what they’re for, but they feel so useful and so healthy and so necessary,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite his prolific career, Dafoe said \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em> allowed the Oscar-nominated actor to flaunt chops he rarely gets to display.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are certain things that are purely physical, and you don’t always get to do these scenes with no dialogue,” he said. “Meditative sections that you’re really by yourself and there’s nothing to accomplish.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And while the specifics of the plot of \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em>, which wrapped filming in June 2021, may not ostensibly feel universal, almost everyone on this side of the coronavirus pandemic will relate to the film’s scant human interactions, vague conception of time and claustrophobic cinematography.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Inside’ hits theaters March 17.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 Associated Press. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/\" rel=\"noopener\">visit AP\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“That was so enjoyable. You lose yourself in those things. You don’t necessarily know what they’re for, but they feel so useful and so healthy and so necessary,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Despite his prolific career, Dafoe said \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em> allowed the Oscar-nominated actor to flaunt chops he rarely gets to display.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are certain things that are purely physical, and you don’t always get to do these scenes with no dialogue,” he said. “Meditative sections that you’re really by yourself and there’s nothing to accomplish.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And while the specifics of the plot of \u003cem>Inside\u003c/em>, which wrapped filming in June 2021, may not ostensibly feel universal, almost everyone on this side of the coronavirus pandemic will relate to the film’s scant human interactions, vague conception of time and claustrophobic cinematography.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-12127869\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/arts/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-800x78.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"78\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-400x39.jpg 400w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/09/Q.Logo_.Break_-768x75.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>‘Inside’ hits theaters March 17.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Copyright 2023 Associated Press. To see more, \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/\" rel=\"noopener\">visit AP\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"info": "KQED’s statewide radio news program providing daily coverage of issues, trends and public policy decisions.",
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"order": 8
},
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"source": "City Arts & Lectures"
},
"link": "https://www.cityarts.net",
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"order": 1
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"info": "\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em>, which listeners will hear in the first part of the hour, has fearless and much-needed conversations about race. Hosted by journalists of color, the show tackles the subject of race head-on, exploring how it impacts every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, sports and more.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em>, which will be in the second part of the hour, guides you through spaces and feelings no one prepares you for — from finances to mental health, from workplace microaggressions to imposter syndrome, from relationships to parenting. The show features experts with real world experience and shares their knowledge. Because everyone needs a little help being human.\u003cbr />\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510312/codeswitch\">\u003cem>Code Switch\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />\u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/lifekit\">\u003cem>Life Kit\u003c/em> offical site and podcast\u003c/a>\u003cbr />",
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"id": "commonwealth-club",
"title": "Commonwealth Club of California Podcast",
"info": "The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. As a non-partisan forum, The Club brings to the public airwaves diverse viewpoints on important topics. The Club's weekly radio broadcast - the oldest in the U.S., dating back to 1924 - is carried across the nation on public radio stations and is now podcasting. Our website archive features audio of our recent programs, as well as selected speeches from our long and distinguished history. This podcast feed is usually updated twice a week and is always un-edited.",
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"source": "Commonwealth Club of California"
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"link": "/radio/program/commonwealth-club",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3d3dy5jb21tb253ZWFsdGhjbHViLm9yZy9hdWRpby9wb2RjYXN0L3dlZWtseS54bWw",
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"title": "Forum",
"tagline": "The conversation starts here",
"info": "KQED’s live call-in program discussing local, state, national and international issues, as well as in-depth interviews.",
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"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Forum-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 9
},
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"meta": {
"site": "radio",
"source": "WNYC"
},
"link": "/radio/program/freakonomics-radio",
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"tuneIn": "https://tunein.com/podcasts/WNYC-Podcasts/Freakonomics-Radio-p272293/",
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"id": "fresh-air",
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"info": "A live production of NPR and WBUR Boston, in collaboration with stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it's happening in the middle of the day, with timely, in-depth news, interviews and conversation. Hosted by Robin Young, Jeremy Hobson and Tonya Mosley.",
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"hidden-brain": {
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"info": "Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7pm-8pm",
"meta": {
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"source": "NPR"
},
"link": "/radio/program/hidden-brain",
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"how-i-built-this": {
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"info": "Guy Raz dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built.",
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"airtime": "SUN 7:30pm-8pm",
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"link": "/radio/program/how-i-built-this",
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"hyphenacion": {
"id": "hyphenacion",
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"tagline": "Where conversation and cultura meet",
"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Hyphenacion_FinalAssets_PodcastTile.png",
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"order": 15
},
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},
"jerrybrown": {
"id": "jerrybrown",
"title": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown",
"tagline": "Lessons from a lifetime in politics",
"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"order": 18
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},
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"id": "latino-usa",
"title": "Latino USA",
"airtime": "MON 1am-2am, SUN 6pm-7pm",
"info": "Latino USA, the radio journal of news and culture, is the only national, English-language radio program produced from a Latino perspective.",
"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/latinoUsa.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "http://latinousa.org/",
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},
"link": "/radio/program/latino-usa",
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"apple": "https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?s=143441&mt=2&id=79681317&at=11l79Y&ct=nprdirectory",
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"rss": "https://feeds.npr.org/510016/podcast.xml"
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},
"marketplace": {
"id": "marketplace",
"title": "Marketplace",
"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 4pm-4:30pm, MON-WED 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Marketplace-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.marketplace.org/",
"meta": {
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"source": "American Public Media"
},
"link": "/radio/program/marketplace",
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},
"masters-of-scale": {
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"title": "Masters of Scale",
"info": "Masters of Scale is an original podcast in which LinkedIn co-founder and Greylock Partner Reid Hoffman sets out to describe and prove theories that explain how great entrepreneurs take their companies from zero to a gazillion in ingenious fashion.",
"airtime": "Every other Wednesday June 12 through October 16 at 8pm (repeats Thursdays at 2am)",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://mastersofscale.com/",
"meta": {
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"source": "WaitWhat"
},
"link": "/radio/program/masters-of-scale",
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"rss": "https://rss.art19.com/masters-of-scale"
}
},
"mindshift": {
"id": "mindshift",
"title": "MindShift",
"tagline": "A podcast about the future of learning and how we raise our kids",
"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Mindshift-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
"imageAlt": "KQED MindShift: How We Will Learn",
"officialWebsiteLink": "/mindshift/",
"meta": {
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"source": "kqed",
"order": 12
},
"link": "/podcasts/mindshift",
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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"stitcher": "https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/kqed/stories-teachers-share",
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}
},
"morning-edition": {
"id": "morning-edition",
"title": "Morning Edition",
"info": "\u003cem>Morning Edition\u003c/em> takes listeners around the country and the world with multi-faceted stories and commentaries every weekday. Hosts Steve Inskeep, David Greene and Rachel Martin bring you the latest breaking news and features to prepare you for the day.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 3am-9am",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Morning-Edition-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/",
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},
"link": "/radio/program/morning-edition"
},
"onourwatch": {
"id": "onourwatch",
"title": "On Our Watch",
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"imageURL": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Nav-News-Nov2026ElectionCoverage@2x-7bd4aad4.png",
"description": "Get informed in minutes with our Voter Guide for California’s November 3 election."
},
"podcasts-radio": {},
"video-tv": {},
"events": {},
"support": {}
}
}
}