Method Man in D.C.

Last Thursday I saw the legendary Method Man with Inspectah Deck, Mastah Killa and a host of Wu affiliates at the 9:30 club on V St. N.W. This was the third or fourth hip-hop show that I’ve caught at the venue and to be honest, I had some reservations about the $25 cover charge. I’m a fairly seasoned vet when it comes to live hip-hop. My experience has been that the only way to pull it off is to totally and absolutely transfer the stage energy to the audience. There is little live instrumentation in the traditional sense. Two turntables make up the entire rhythm section, so to get the crowd hyped the emcee really has to bring some stage presence. When done right there is no better live music to see; when done wrong, you wonder why you even listen to hip-hop in the first place.

So back to the Method Man show. He is currently on tour to promote his newest release 421: The Day After. I must say it’s a strong album, and there are very few mainstream hip-hop albums released this millennium that I would call ‘strong.’ What can I say; I’m not a huge fan of the synth-dominated dirty south movement that has dominated the radio waves for the last few years. I like the raw, boom-bap, sample-based beats of yesteryear (See: the RZA). And 421 brings back the boom-bap. Well, at least parts of it do.

So with high hopes I entered the club at 10 P.M. After making my way to the bar for a $5 Budweiser (on an intern’s budget…ouch) I reserved my little plot of standing room a few rows back from the stage. The opening act sounded pretty horrible and should never be allowed to grip microphones again. Luckily they did their thing quickly and got the hell off the stage (no offense, fellas). Next up was Mastah Killa. He did a few songs to get the crowd warmed up then turned the mic over to Inspectah Deck, who is actually one of my favorite members of the Wu. Deck did a decent job of building some momentum for the headliner, which seemed to be his goal. He definitely wasn’t out to steal the show.

As Deck’s set came to an end you could sense the crowd (which by this point was beginning to fill out nicely) start to buzz. Suddenly a chant of “MAKE MARIJUANA LEGAL! MAKE MARIJUANA LEGAL!” poured through the speakers. The beat drop and Method Man entered stage left. The energy level instantly quadrupled. He spit the intro verse to his newest album with intensity and the crowd erupted. I was pleasantly surprised. It’s good to see a guy have the same gusto for live performance 15 years into his career. As with any live show, the energy hit peaks and valleys. Strikes and gutters. However you want to say it, Meth put a ton of force into bringing the energy levels up when needed. And the crowd had no choice but to respond. Meth put his physical well-being on the line for the sake of crowd participation. The dude must have stage-dived at least four times (which was funny, although I’m not sure how I feel about being covered in sweaty rapper) and even used the crowd’s hands to walk and stand on. That was something I had never seen before.

At some point the pungent odor of pot smoke became apparent to my sensitive nostrils. If you’ve listened to Method Man before it shouldn’t come as any real surprise that 1) respecting laws and authority figures is not his forte and 2) the dude smokes copious amounts of weed. Now I’m not the type to either condone or impede the use of illegal substances amongst total strangers. Color me indifferent. But it let me know that this was Meth’s show, Meth’s crowd, and for the hour and a half he was on-stage, Meth’s 9:30 Club. At that exact moment and that precise time he was the authority.

At the end Mastah Killa and Inspectah Deck came back to join Meth and they kicked their verses from the classic ‘Triumph’ (which if you don’t know you undoubtedly better ask somebody). What impressed me most was Meth’s dedication to the crowd. On more than one occasion he let us know we paid a boatload of hard-earned money to see him and it was his job to entertain— a job that he took very seriously. In a time of self-serving musicians in both the underground and mainstream of all genres it was refreshing to hear this. He was also adamant about the current state of the music industry. His overall message was that in this era of internet and i-pods, the consumer has more control over the music than ever. Tune out the garbage on the radio (HEY! WHOA! Deep breaths, I’m pretty sure he was talking about commercial radio) and stop letting the record companies dictate what sells. I left in a very good mood and once-again reminded of the reason that I am such a rap nerd.

-Rob Charnley, Performance Today

Vicky's Pick

The band Taigaa! is my pick of picks from this week’s Open Mic.

Inspired by a variety of genres – Experimental Pop, pre-80's Korean Pop, Gypsy, Punk, Rock, Goth, Mexican Folk, and Middle Eastern Pop – their sound is hard to pinpoint.

When I first listened to them, I had this take on their music:

Hard-driving, straight-forward vocals and instrumentation reflect their punk side and remind me of some New Wave bands. They also have more whimsical elements in their lyrics and performance that reveal their pop influences.

In the band, Fantastico Pirato sings, K.O.K.O plays keyboard and violin and Dusty Gold handles drums.

They stuck out to me because of their originality. I haven’t really heard a band quite like them. Also, I’m in love with Dusty Gold’s drumming style.

Check out the Open Mic site to learn more about them! http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6458158

Also, they have a video of another of their songs, “Deep Moustache Forest.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCE9LVtzTOs

Behind the Scenes on Election Night

Coming into NPR 6:30pm Tuesday night, I was excited (and a little anxious) about my Election Night duties. My shift officially began at 7pm and wouldn't end until 5 the next morning.

When I got to Studio 4a, the studio built specifically for election coverage, it was already a whirlwind of activity, much of it centering around the buffet table.

My job was call runner, which meant handing out cards to Online, Newscast, and the Board that listed the House, Senate and Gubernatorial races and projected the winning candidate. Julia Moss, the election unit intern (better known as my "Cross-country Sprinter" partner) and I frantically checked off the names of the candidates that Ken Rudin and Ron Elving (NPR's political experts) projected would win. The two of us developed an excellent system -- although, one time, I almost knocked someone over (sorry!) as I hastily ran up to the stage where Linda Wertheimer and Robert Siegel sat.

During downtime, which there was a lot of -- NPR being extremely careful not to call races too soon -- I was able to enter the studio and listen to the show. I was impressed by how smoothly things sounded, despite how hectic things were on the other side of the glass.

I am sad to report that my call runner position will probably be eliminated next year due to a technical upgrade -- man replaced by machine. But a note to the Fall 2008 interns: find a spot on election night duty. It was incredibly fun, even though by 4am I was speaking with 5 minute pauses between sentences.

- Bertina Yu

More local knowledge

A few more ways to explore DC -- or at least start the process without getting out of your desk chair.
- Flickr user AlbinoFlea takes surprising photos from around the DC area. Find more photos in the Flickr Washington DC cluster

- FishbowlDC is a gossipy DC-area media blog.

- Upcoming: DC is an organized-by-date event listing that does not overlook big draws like Bob Saget at the GW Lisner Auditorium (Thursday!)

Vicky's Pick

Hello! I’m Vicky Markovitz, the All Songs Considered Intern. I put together the Open Mic page for All Songs, which features unsigned and independent artists. Each week, I’m going to put up my favorite of all the favorites I picked, or some artist that stood out to me in some way. So… here’s this week’s pick, Rising Appalachia.

Rising Appalachia includes sisters Leah and Chloe Smith and percussionist Forrest Kelly. Despite being incredibly jealous of them, because they are touring Europe right now and called me from Ireland, I enjoy their twist on traditional Appalachian music. They don’t stray too far from old tunes, but enhance the songs with sisterly harmonies and an energetic, plucked string sound adorned with the twang of a fiddle and occasional horns.

I picked their track "Say Darlin’ Say" because I vaguely knew the tune and liked being able to hear the personal touches in their version. The fact that Leah and Chloe knew the song because their father used to sing it to them as a lullaby also made it too adorable to turn down.

Another track of theirs I really liked, but isn’t on their Open Mic page, is "Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss," which includes trumpet. I’m a sucker for horns. You can listen to a snippet of it on their website.

Both the songs are off their self-titled album.

Here is the link to their Open Mic page if you want to check them out for yourself! http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6394253

Let me know what you think!

Rock and Roll Sunday

This coming Sunday, The Black Angels and The Black Keys are both performing at the 9:30 club in D.C. The Black Angels go on at 8:45pm E.T. followed by the Black Keys. For those of you not in town or who are here but simply don't want to brave traffic in the city, NPR is webcasting the live concerts and as usual, fans can chat to All Songs Considered intern Vicky Markovitz here. The link to the online chat will appear during the start of the concert.

-Bertina Yu

talking about elections...

It isn't any surprise that campaigns have been going extremely negative lately, but there seems to be a crucial difference between the way the people talk about male and female candidates. Why is it considered okay to invalidate female candidates based on their appearance? I have heard far too many comments by potential voters on why they're voting against say Katherine Harris, not because of her ignorant remarks like "if you're not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin, " but because they find her unattractive. As a young woman in her mid-20s, I find this disparity between men and women very, very disturbing. Does anyone else find this troubling?

election mania

After years of being a passive viewer of election news coverage and watching the election at home, I am amazed that I get a chance to participate behind the scenes! As a volunteer for NPR's election night, I am extremely excited over it but at the same time, I'm a little nervous that I'll make a huge mistake. So the countdown begins, just 5 more days until November 7th! And make that 5 more days of crazed squabbling among candidates and political pundits...

-Bertina Yu

I thought I saw a...giant chicken superhero?

Strange things are occurring up here on the 3rd Fl. We just got visited by a costumed Halloween superhero wearing a chicken mask. It is this particular superhero's duty to bring Halloween spirit here at the news desks. Too bad he wasn't giving out interviews. :)

If you spot the chicken, take a picture and put it on the blog. Maybe you'll get an extra treat.

yummy recipes to try

I know it’s only Halloween but it’s not too early to start dreaming of Thanksgiving food. Every year NPR den mother, Susan Stamberg, shares her mother-in-law’s recipe for Cranberry Relish, a “Pepto-Bismol pink” concoction that contains onion, cranberry, horseradish and sugar. Sound doubtful to you? Well it sounds (pun absolutely intended) delicious to me.

Her segments from past years are archived here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4175681

Her segment from last year with Martha Stewart is genius. It’s charming, warm and funny.

Check it out!

-Joanna Stein

3rd Floor Block Party

At this very minute, I can hear the strains of the Beatles' song "Here Comes the Sun" being played, cheering up everyone on the 3rd floor of the NPR building on Mass Ave. Thank you to whomever is giving it a spin on the speakers. I have a personal attachment to this song and if you haven't listened to it before, you should play it on a wintery, blustery day for warmth.

-a Beatles fan

Not Playing At A Theatre Near You: “Return of the Office Zombie”

As an NPR intern getting adjusted to the “nine to five” life, and being in this fast-paced, sometimes frenetic environment (which I love most of the time), I feel I’ve been transitioning pretty smoothly. However, it does require a lot of energy and I’m not exactly the most chipper person on the block. After years of late nights, erratic schedules, and confusing my biological clock to no end, I admit it’s a struggle to find that energy at times.

To avoid becoming a permanent fixture on the Halloween horror movie scene yourself, I've come up with a few suggestions I think are more realistic than the usual “go to bed at 9pm” dictate that the establishment likes to recommend. I mean, really, we all know how unlikely it is we’re going to bed early.

Beating the Zombie Syndrome:

1) Let’s face it, when the time comes to get ready for bed, it’s probably not anywhere near a reasonable hour. Common sense says try to squeeze in at least six hours of sleep.

2) It’s sorely tempting to crash on the couch immediately after getting home from work but beware—those 3 hour "naps" will keep you from getting great zzzz’s at night.

3) Personally, my bedroom has morphed into a multi-purpose kind of room, which includes me doing activities other than sleeping like watching movies. But experts suggest we only use our bedroom for sleep.

4) If you’re already at the office and feeling tired, a simple walk around the room may re-energize you. Plus, an added bonus is that when you’re at NPR, interesting things always seem to be going on and you never know who you might run into.

5) If all else fails, turn to the drink that never lets you down. I knew a girl who used to call coffee “ambrosia of the gods” and I think she was right.

-confessions from a former office zombie

New Feature Coming Soon

The Intern Edition Blog is going to be rolling out a new weekly post from All Songs Considered intern Vicky Markovitz very soon. Stay turned for further details. And don't forget tonight's concert featuring The Decemberists at 9:30 p.m. ET. There will be a live webcast from Washington D.C.'s 9:30 club. In addition, fans or newbies can chat with Vicky about the band. There will be a link to the chat from here.

-Bertina Yu, Blogmaster

"The Google"

If you want at least one giggle for today, you should go to Morning Edition's story titled "President and the Google." Apparently, bloggers are still having a laugh over President Bush's answer to a question in an interview on CNBC.

-Bertina Yu

Third Coast Festival

Maybe you, like me, were devouring updates from the Third Coast Festival Conference in Chicago last week... but if you weren't...

Third Coast is an annual gathering of audio producers from across the radio spectrum -- public radio, experimental sound, documentarians. It's held each fall in Chicago and draws regulars like Ira Glass and NPR's Robert Krulwich and Danny Zwerdling.

THIRD COAST AWARD WINNERS
Previews of all the winners' stories are available on the Third Coast site. Here are links to a few of the full stories:

Thembi's Diary -- Joe Richman, Radio Diaries
Kyenkyen Bi Adi Mawu -- Ann Heppermann, Kara Oehler and Rick Moody
Rhapsody in Bohemia, Alan Hall, Falling Tree productions
My Lobotomy -- Dave Isay / Soundportraits

99 WAYS TO TELL A RADIO STORY
Commissioned before the conference, each of these shortdocs represents a different production style, lasts 2 min and 30 sec, starts with some manifestation of the sentence "To begin with, they never got along," and includes the following sounds: a pre-recorded voice, a rhythmic noise and an exclamation (in that order). Some highlights:

#3: The First Attraction by Lawrence Lanahan and Bruce Wallace. The myth of Narcissus reimagined: the north pole of a magnet bar falls tragically in love with the north pole of another magnet bar. Production style: "mythomagnetic."

#27: The Secret Life of an Australian Mother by Eurydice Aroney, Tom Morton, Stuart Brown. A domestic duet for a mother and six year old. Production style: "hysteria verite."

99 Ways will continue accepting submissions until December 31 or until they reach 99 (they're currently at 73), whichever comes first. So get busy!

HOOKED? THERE'S MORE:
- Transom.org's blog about the talks and events at Third Coast (Transom.org, for the uninitiated, is a boundless audio resource). Bloggers include Robin Amer and Greta Pemberton of PRI's Open Source and, formerly, the world-famous Brown Student Radio.
- Third Coast's links to audio sites
- Third Coast 2006 audio archives, with stories by Rick Moody, Danny Zwerdling, among others.

That should be enough to keep you busy for a few months! Enjoy.

- Adeline Goss

After all, we live here.

I moved to DC from Providence, RI, where localism kind of goes without saying. The little blue state is full of progressives, community activists, and interesting characters -- like our former mayor, Vincent "Buddy" Cianci, indicted in 2001 on federal criminal charges of racketeering, conspiracy, extortion, witness tampering, and mail fraud. I mean, this is good stuff! Rhode Islanders tend to love Rhode Island, and even Brown University freshmen get hooked.

Which is why I was initially disappointed when I moved to D.C. At first glance, national news is local news. Local politics is, at least to a certain extent, national politics -- and vice versa.

But of course, it's our job to figure this place out, roam the streets and make it home. If Providence taught me one thing, it's that our nomadic digi-generation needs to care more about the people around us. Like, physically around us. Like, in our offices and subways and on our streets. A lot of good can come from it (beyond, say, meeting one's future husband).

But we do love the web. So here's a compromise: online, community-generated content about the big and little pleasures of living in DC.

Outside.In maps out new, user-generated information about events in our neighborhoods: a police report, a new high-rise... or, where did that mandolin-playing guy on the corner go?

DCist documents "the nation's capitol and all its quirks, one detail at a time." Check out the "Overheard" category and add those surreal moments you witness in the metro.

Now share your own!

-- Adeline Goss

A Uniquely DC Halloween Tradition

Talk of the Nation intern Carrie Wolfson observes a special Halloween tradition in Washington D.C. which took place on Tuesday, October 24th: the 17th Street High Heel race.

Drag Racing: An evening of glamour, high spirits, and ornately decorated candy logos for headgear.

On Tuesday evening I left NPR and headed to Dupont Circle for one of D.C.’s finest institutions: the annual 17th Street High Heel Race. Legend has it a handful of friends 20 years ago stumbled out of a gay bar, donned drag and performed a tipsy race up and down the street. Today, no one quite knows who spearheads the race each year, but it’s grown from a neighborhood tradition to a metro area attraction.

My date that night was my dad, a mustached physics professor in his late fifties who was wonderfully game through the whole shebang. We made our way up 17th, not entirely sure where the fabled race took place or what it would look like when we got there. A few blocks from Dupont we caught the sound of raucous chanting mingled with pumping disco classics and knew we’d arrived.

The streets were packed with onlookers clutching plastic cups. They stood on their toes, sat on each other’s shoulders, perched on car bumpers and leaned off apartment balconies all in the hopes of a better glimpse of the glamour. I’m almost positive I saw someone astride a streetlight, but maybe my memory’s clouded by the general larger-than-life quality of the night. Queens themselves dotted the crowd, which was largely non-gender bending folks along for the fun.

A call and response cheer of “High…Heels!” broke out in the tense moments before the competition. Fists shot into the air with each cry, along with deep baritone shouts of “let’s go ladies!” A collective countdown followed, and the queens were off. Unfortunately, at 5’8” all I caught was the shimmering progress of plumage from the ladies’ head ornaments. But what plumage! Each one was topped with an elaborate candy logo, a dazzling fashion statement which, admittedly, made little sense to me or to my co-revelers.

Alas, I have no idea which beauty prevailed that night. But I know I love drag queens for the simultaneous combination of irreverence and dedication they show to gender. They also know how to make a damn good show of it, and the crowd reflected that. After the race, I heard one couple lament “this used to be a neighborhood event, now it’s overrun by people from the ’burbs.” But when thousands of spectators­—many of them young, straight, and male—show up to cheer on the campy, marginal art of drag, it might just be worth it.

What a Day!

You wouldn't believe the day I had Wednesday, September 27th. It was busy as usual, but completely exciting because I was at the Capitol capturing sounds for my Intern Edition story.

First, I had to get my press pass, which by the way, I'm proud to say I accomplished obtaining it all on my own. Getting a press pass took a little maneuvering--I had to call the media office to find out about the process. I went through the correct paperwork and then obtained a letter from the news desk stating I was "legit."

It felt good walking freely around the Capitol building. What I really enjoyed was getting to hang out in the Speaker's lobby just outside of the House floor. The lobby is where members of Congress go to relax in between votes, and of course, it's also the place where the press likes to hang around in order to grab interviews. Once the votes started happening, it became pretty hectic, with lots of mingling between the press and the Representatives.

Incredibly, I was able to personally interview three members of the House: David Price, Adam Putnam, and Debbie Wasserman-Shultz. At first, I didn't think I would get any interviews with any of them, but there were ushers that helped me out. It was also really cool seeing the congresswoman from my home state, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, and the staff director I worked under as an intern with The Committee on The International Relations’ Subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia.

-Jason Hesch, Audience and Corporate Research

It's Not Easy Being Blue: Making Inroads With Republicans

Alexandra Caldwell is an intern with NPR's Online Department. Below she shares a humorous story of how her favorite radio story led her to an interesting revelation about the contentious nature of politics:

My Mother, the most liberal woman you’ll ever meet, has come around to the idea of censorship. It started when I left for college. It was then that my mother realized how much of a buffer I had been. Throughout high school I was the one subjected to conversations with my father that revolved entirely around politics.

My father works from home, thus my parents spend the entire day together. He works hard but because his job entails him conferencing via telephone it gives him a lot of time to surf the internet…finding all the liberal propaganda he can get his hands on. When George W. Bush won the election a piece of my father died inside. Since then he’s tried to fill this hole with that “liberal media” from the World Wide Web like those of Molly Ivins, the Crisis Papers, the Democratic Underground, JibJab, and You Ain’t a Cowboy, to name a few.

When I went to college my mother became the sounding board for my father’s outcries. She was bombarded before her coffee; she spent her afternoons trying to steal my father’s soap box away from him and her nights wide-awake listening to him mutter in his sleep about the state of the nation. Though I was off at school his obsession found me, too – from conversations with my mother and forwards from my father. I can’t tell you how many ‘Dancing Bush’ emails I received.

My parents never raised me to hate but I began to resent the hold that Conservative politicos had over my household. We were all angry. My father began to pull a Johnny Cash – wearing only black, in mourning over the Democratic Party. My Mother contemplated utilizing the parental controls on the TV and internet. Because of this outpouring of aggravation over all things Conservative I began to think of all Republicans as ‘the evil ones.’ This is why my favorite NPR story is the All Things Considered piece, "Doppelgangers Cause Confusion on Capitol Hill." All Things Considered told the story of look-alike Republican Congressmen, Steve King of Iowa and Tom Tancredo of Colorado. The piece was informative but also highly amusing. The best part? Besides the two men switching nametags at a White House Christmas party it was when Luke Burbank, NPR National Desk Reporter, questioned the Congressmen on their twin-like connection – “Can you feel each other’s pain?” he asked. I was driving while listening and was worried I’d wreck because I was laughing so hard. It taught me, in a Free to Be You and Me fashion, that along with it being okay to cry, it’s also okay to like the occasional Republican.

As of now, my Father has improved. He no longer bombards us 24/7 with liberal ranting, though I’m sure he wants to. His current obsession is much healthier – training our dog to, how should I say this, leave “presents” in neighborhood yards that once held Bush Cheney signs. You should know that I’m from North Carolina. That’s a lot of yards.

Sound Off

Many of us NPR interns started out as NPR addicts. We came to believe in radio, and the next logical step was to make radio. What were the stories that hooked us? Adeline Goss, the Executive Producer of Intern Edition, will start us off...

Alix Spiegel, This American Life, "Pray"
Dave Isay, Sound Portraits, "Ghetto Life 101"
Dave Isay, Sound Portraits, "The Sunshine Hotel"
Dave Isay and Richard Sandler, Sound Portraits, "The Gods of Times Square"
Dave Isay and Stacy Abramson, Sound Portraits, "Witness to an Execution"
Jay Allison and Joe Richman, Radio Diaries, " Laura Rothenberg: My So-Called Lungs"
Jay Allison, Radio Diaries/New York Works, "Walter the Seltzer Man"
Jay Allison and Annie Cheney, Radio Diaries, "Concerning Breakfast"
Jay Allison and Nubar Alexanian, Transom, "Perfect Hearing"
Joe Richmond, Radio Diaries, "Thembi's AIDS Diary"
Robert Krulwich, All Things Considered, "The Little Coffee Plant that Wouldn't Die"
Scott Carrier, This American Life, "Running After Antelope"
Scott Carrier, Transom, "The West Desert"

Interns: submit your own favorites by writing to byu@npr.org.