Musical Mayhem

We begin this post with our visit to Chubby Checker and his Midsummer Night's Swing showdown throwdown (his performance isn't called Swing, but it's the name of the event at Lincoln Center). Anyhoo... the Brandster and myself had the pleasure of interviewing Mr. Checker about his life, his career, and music. He's a nice guy, although still bitter about what he perceives as a racist music industry - and who I am to disagree with him, although..well, I do disagree with him. The topic was his music, but delved into white artists getting more airplay. Ex: 'Why can't the rappers do a show? Eminem can do a show, why can't the other rappers do one?" My answer to this would be that they can do a show, and someone MIGHT get shot, but the show will go on. There were also comments about Britney getting more airplay than Beyonce, which, again, I don't think is true - but he is Chubby Checker and I am not, and what do I know? As a parting gift, Mr. Checker gave us t-shirts, chocolate Checkerbars, and Checkerbar Hats, so c'mon baby, forget the twist, let's move some merchandise!

From Mr. Checker, we moved onto Mr. Matisyahu, or Matisyahu as his fans call him (or Mitsiyeehoo as my dad calls him). Side note: in 2005 while trying to get through my master's program at Emerson College, I attempted to do a video project on Matisyahu on his influences in the hasidic reggae community. Long story short, after much thought, that idea was abandoned in favor of the more local Ju Tang Clan, a nice group of Jewish rappers in their own right, and the rest is history. The point being, I've always wanted to meet Mr. Yahu, and this week I finally got my chance. Oddly enough, I wasn't nervous, neither was he - he sat on his couch with his cigarette, I sat on the chair with my video camera, and WCBS 880's own Brandi Thompson asked her always insightful questions. I had my own questions, but of course, I forgot to mention to ask them, and now I will never know how it feels to be the front runner in an otherwise unknown music genre (hasidic reggae).

But I can guess it feels pretty flip flammin' awesome.

We interviewed, we shook hands, we got pictures, I was giddy on the inside, but calm on the outside - as was Matis. He seems like a nice jewish boy, but then again, find me a reggae artist who isn't?