Tecktonik Craze

Yelle - Je Veux Te Voir


These videos are examples of an embryonic form of dance music called Tecktonik, which is also alternatively known as electro-dance, tck, and hardstyle. Predominantly evolved in Paris, the dance form has also been influenced by various types of electronic music being produced in Brussels and Amsterdam, as well as New Rave music (Cansei de Ser Sexy, MIA, Hot Chip), with the fashion mainly taking off with all types of neon in London. It's got a futuristic punk sensibility with heavily hip-hop overtones.

Yelle - Je Veux Te Voir (Remix)


The neon color schemes and attitude that Yelle takes on are quite similar to those of MIA (who needs to visit Mumbai sometime soon by the way - or, for that matter, any New Raver who stays popping, locking, vogueing, and wacking will do).

Yelle - A Cause des Garcons


These dance moves are relatively simple, but the style is killer. Not sure that I could pull of these hipster fashions any more than I could several years back when I first caught wind of hipsternation. But, all that needs to be said is that the Tecktonik movement is on.

Hamsters, Bodymore, and Bawlmerese

There are so many parochial facets of Baltimore that make this city's natives proud to call (c)Harm City home. The "o" in home is a long sort of "o," and there's a bit of a Hiberno-English or perhaps Cornish Enligh twang on the phoneme. All of you who are familiar with the highly particular "o" sounded in these parts will know of what I am speaking. While the accent and dialect of English spoken in Baltimore is similar to that spoken in and around Philadelphia, south Jersey, and up and down Delaware, the distinctly Baltimore accent is by far the most fascinating sort of mid-Atlantic English. Hyperbolic I am not, and you shall take a most pleasant trip to Highlandtown or Hampden to find out from where the mystique doth come.

In particular, the hamsters (Hampden hipsters) became enthralled so much by the accent most commonly found in Hampden that they began to flock to the neighborhood formerly inhabited exclusively by mill workers and other industrially-inclined folk whose ancestors migrated there from Appalachia. Though the neighborhood was in serious decline throughout the 80's and 90's, the urban locale is now one of the hottest areas in B-more. The main commercial artery of Hampden is known as the Avenue (36th st.), where a mix of true Hampdenites, hamsters, and assorted other Baltimorons roam the strip. Kitsch, schmaltz, and authentic indigenous crafts dot the landscape, but an uneasy feeling of invasion pervades. Is the old Baltimore reluctant to step aside, or can the two demographic segments coexist harmoniously? A-rabbers still parade their donkeys across the Avenue, peddling their produce to pedestrians while parroting paeans. And, Hampden plays host to a breed of urban dweller that is said to have missed the second half of the 20th Century.
The rudiments of Baltimore's unique flava are found in horrible haircuts, mispronounced consonants, and in the remarkably parochial citizenry who typically cannot name more than three neighborhoods outside of the one they inhabit. These attributes are beautiful, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Gentrificious, educated, and stodgy folks might lend human capital to their geographic niches, but the masses provide cities with a sense of tradition, a love of things that aren't so peachy, like stubborn murder rates and b-more club. However, don't let this laundry list convince you that Baltimore hasn't been well-served by its honorable mayor. Also, don't be deceived into thinking that I don't adore my native city (though I do in fact currently reside in the northwestern portion of the metropolitan region and not in the inner sector).

Lord O'Malley has indeed created a city that is more amenable for absorbing yuppies. Though this town ought not truthfully proclaim (as it does on omnipresent bus stop benches) that it's the Greatest City in America, this town has a lot going for it. One native, Spankrock, once said that Baltimore is the most under-rated party city in America. A budding anthropologist from Manhattan's Upper West Side once became so obsessed with both Dundalk and Hampden that he decided to excise his uptown Yankee demons and become baptized as a born again Baltimoron.

We got crabs, Berger cookies, and damn good police dramas abour our urban pharmaceutical industry. Stop Snitching, Babe Ruth, and Edgar Allan Poe all germinated in Baltimore. Long live Mr. Boh! How bout dem Ravens?

Me, I'm just impatiently waiting on the construction of two new mass transit lines: one, the Green, will be an extension to the NorthEast of the current Subway line that ends at Johns Hopkins Hospital; two, the Red, will run east-west from the Social Security Administration to Patterson Park, through downtown. These projects likely won't be completed til 2014 or so. We've got 1/3score to wait until Baltimore has a genuine public transit network. Citistat/Compstat may be able to pinpoint the locations of lead poisonings, waste removal, and property crimes, but it cannot provide sufficient impetus for an end to the tremendous favortism that city, state, and federal governments have exhibited for cars, highways, and sprawl. Enough is enough. Baltimore is back. JHU might be commandeering the Middle East community, but B-more is on the map now more than ever. After New York City, Baltimore was the 2nd city in the US to reach a population of 100,000. In fact, until 1870, Baltimore was indeed the 2nd most populous city in the nation. Rod Lee, show these knuckleheads what time it is!

Hipsters Galore

There's been a lot of talk regarding this semispecific species of early twenty-first century urban dweller who forms a large percentage of the fashionista, trendster, and scenester groups. The reason why it's so hard to pinpoint what's going on with hipsters is that there are so many of them who either explicitly deride the idea of being a hipster or are generally just pretending to be one. As with people who self-identify with hiphop culture or greaser culture, the hipster movement has its trailblazers, followers, and wannabes. The people at the forefront of the movement don't need to claim the hipster label because they are too busy creating and coming up with the future of the movement. Yet, there's so many people who mimic the manner of dress, hairstyle, speech affectation to give them a sense of social belonging.

Since this category is so broad, it's fairly ridiculous to declare a hatred for all hipsters. I personally am not that adept at subsuming myself to some large social movement, so I could never find ultimate solace in harboring hipster hankerings. Yet, I definitely do identify with hipsters much more so than lots of other people I know who really do despise them and avoid talking to them at all costs. The thing is, it's so fun to blame hipsters for being too elitist and fashion-conscious in the process of being egalitarian or tolerant. But, at the end of the day, cultural relativism only goes so far if you aim to discover superior cultural goods.

Devandra Banhardt isn't quite my favorite musician, but I can get down with that stuff. I like to think I have a diverse range of musical tastes. Well, another thing about hipsterdom is that it really includes so much different musical history (punk, glam rock, electro, folk) that it's impossible to narrow the broad social grouping to one genre. And, honestly, much of the time, hipster should be used as a label for a professional class of people who are involved concretely in doing and selling hipster thangs. However, the label describes the fashion sense, the social preferences, the vocabulary, etc. Though these types do often make solid use of their parents' economic status, there seem to be plenty of grimy, blue-collar hipsters that live in seedier settings than their hipster comrades who are bourgeois-boheme but in denial of this heritage. Maybe hipsters are just latter-day hippies in that, ultimately, all of their counterculture just gets subsumed into the massive corporate-driven spectacle that we operate.

On a Mission

What's up blogreaders worldwide? As I sit here in this neighborhood coffeeshop equipped with the finest hi-fi around, I'm reminded that this city probably has more mocha-sipping, iBook-rocking spaces than any other. I attempt to ingratiate myself into this cafe culture, but as of yet, I lack the accoutrements. First, I currently don't possess a machine with which to compute. I used to be a diehard desktop abuser, but it looks like I might go mobile and stop being a laptop virgin. Second, I'm pressed to find some black-rimmed spectacles that fit the part. Having only occasionally sported the glasses I procured 6 years ago upon my initial acquisition of vision enhancement devices (this pair has been known to bestow misfortune upon thee, and by thee, I mean, me), I sense the impulse to snatch up a fresh pair that replaces the merely "studious" type that I currently bear.

I'm perched at this borrowed laptop fiending for the words that could shed light on my current mindset. Fellow cafe-dwellers browse through philosophical treatises by French pointyheads and await a bluegrass mandolin recital. I quickly slurp down what is apparently known as a Mexican mocha. Though I'm not yet a regular consumer of such beverages, I could become more and more habituated to such things since every third establishment in my cultivated hood serves up coffee in an ambiance of sumptuous Argentine neo-folk and post-rhythmic singer-songwriter cacophonies.

Today is a grey day. Not the sort of day I could take pictures of my new abode. When the light strikes it right, I'll snap some shots of my pad in all its glory. In addition to being the oldest neigborhood in San Francisco, the Mission is also one of the sunniest, due to the hilly peaks to the south and west that block cloud movement into the the area. Unfortunately, the sunshine didn't roll in today.

I'm not feeling particularly garrulous at the moment. Perhaps the weather is cramping my blogsteez. The players toting mandolins begin to enter, and the show promises more amusement than the Oscar drama this evening. "Ya'll ni$%as be scramblin, gamblin/ up in restaurants with mandolins and violins..."