Kirsten Dunst & McG’s ‘Akihabara Majokko
by allbrice
WARNING: VIDEO CONTAINS NSFW IMAGES
By Special Correspondent Arturo R. García
At least she can sorta carry a tune.
After two viewings, that’s about all I can glean from Kirsten Dunst’s cover of “Turning Japanese,” which premiered late last year as part of an exhibition by Takashi Murakami at London’s Tate Museum. [...]

by Latoya Peterson
Artist Nohjj just made history with his music video for “Love” – for various reasons.
Reader Ron sent us the news that Nohjj was the first black male winner of one of the OUT Award.  Nohjj explains the concept behind the video:
Saying “I believe love is for everyone… homosexual and heterosexual….One day soon our [...]

By Sexual Correspondent Andrea (AJ) Plaid
My gut-honest reaction to finding out singer John Mayer admits that he doesn’t romantically or sexually like Black women is like finding out Tom Cruise saying doesn’t dig us sistahs: I’m not shocked because I didn’t get that vibe from him.  
Mayer’s highlighted history of dating the crowning White women [...]

In the middle of January, American Idol scored a huge ratings win when they decided to air a tryout clip of an elderly black man named General Larry Platt, singing his original composition “Pants on the Ground.” The song took off and is now a part of American pop culture…at least for the next few [...]

by Latoya Peterson
Recently, Beyonce released the video for her single “Video Phone.”
M. Dot took the opportunity to look at Beyoncé’s lyrics in the context of the societal position of African American men and women. In the comments to her post, commenter Luna put up a link to theory friction practice, a blog that is [...]

by Guest Contributor M. Dot, originally published at Model Minority

I am working on a paper titled, “How Beyonce and Capitalism Undermined R&B’s Ability to Normalize Black Love.”
The title may change to Beyonce Incorporated, as that is more focused and more appropriate for academia.
My professor wants me to l shift my focus to the media’s investment [...]

by Guest Contributor M.Dot, originally published at Model Minority

On a fluke a few of weeks ago, I picked up a dvd about the Black Panthers and the student and employee strike at SF State that created the first Black Studies department in the country.
It was in watching this video that realized that both crack and [...]

How can you call something “BlakRoc” when the black folks on the project only rap and the rockers are all white?
BlakRoc is the name of Damon Dash’s upcoming project, a collaboration between white rockers The Black Keys and rappers such as Mos Def, Q-Tip, Ludacris, and Raekwon, to name a few.  Ordinarily, I could care [...]

by Guest Contributor Kelvin

Last Monday, I was in the middle of my daily ritual of checking on my favorite online newspapers and blogs, when I happened upon a blog post on Slate.com written by Jody Rosen. The title of the post is “The DORF Matrix: Towards a Theory of NPR’s Taste in Black Music”. [...]

By Deputy Editor Thea Lim

It may very well be time we stopped giving Kanye West attention, but what do y’all think of this NSFW graphic from his blog, promoting his upcoming Fame Kills Tour with Lady Gaga?
Check it out after the jump…

By Guest Contributor Fiqah, originally published at Possum Stew

Some background:  for most of my adult life, I have been a fugitive from religion, the monotheistic “Big Three”, anyway. (Sorry, any faith doctrine that includes an interventionist, anthropomorphic, masculine god/godhead is prolly gonna earn some side-eye from me.)  Because my sociopolitical views and general life philosophy are [...]

By Special Correspondent Arturo R. García

As we noted in May, Wednesday marked Mexican Independence Day, which kicked off at midnight with the traditional Grito de La Independencia by not only President Felipe Calderón, but all executive office-holders, right down to the local level.
But rather than mark the date here with a history lesson, I want [...]

By Special Correspondent Arturo R. García
Dear Kanye,
What is it with you and MTV?
Even on a West Coast time delay, seeing you make a fool of yourself on live television because of a teenager – and I’m no Taylor Swift fan by any means, but she at least seemed to honestly enjoy winning Best Female Video [...]

By Special Correspondent Arturo R. García
These have truly been depressing days. Bad enough that the past few weeks of summer television hasn’t given us anything to rave about. But not even the bad stuff was inspiring – there was nothing that brought out the sweet, bileful taste of anger.
So thank you, Fox, for bringing Glee [...]

By Thea Lim

Reader Ray tipped us off to this musical currently playing at the Edinburgh Theatre Festival: Mercy Madonna of Malawi.
Putting an African spin on the story of four-year-old Mercy James who was adopted by the original Material Girl earlier this year, Mercy Madonna of Malawi is an upbeat musical that takes stock of a [...]