M is for Myg

Anonymous behind my shades, I surveyed the scene: bodies again, bodies in motion.

Funk is the music of determination. What else is there? The mechanistic drill of techno, the chilled beats of trip-hop? Funk is hard work and sweat. The body has to move, full of life, imposing its will upon the world. That’s all there is: what it is is what it is; it’s the beat; it’s being in time because time has come today, my friend. Are you with me?

Clockwork was hopping on Monday night. I’d tell you who was there, but who wasn’t there? — you know what I mean? But we’re there to bust a move, not make the scene, ya dig? Our minds tell us it’s Monday, that our meatpersons are back at work, but truth lies in solidarity: we don’t believe in the meatworld. We believe in life.

Can you feel it?
‘Cause I can feel it.
Can you hear it?
‘Cause I can hear it too.
Can you touch it?
‘Cause I can touch it.

Did you miss it? Do you want it again?

funk for the masses | 30 July 2007: download the podcast [set list after the break]

Yet, even as my head nodded to the funky beat of the Dynamites, I knew something was wrong…

Where was my body? The truth is that I can’t feel it, I can’t touch it. Do you feel me?

I’m talking about our bodies — the one’s we’ve lost, or can’t feel, or have shut ourselves out of. Do you remember?

But what kind of bodies? A reader asks:

Okay, wait one minute here. You’re saying that not only is there some meatperson who isn’t us making us dream we’re digital, but that we’re actually other meatpeople in the first place? Disgusting….I don’t like the idea that there are any meatpeople and the fact that I’m connected to one really bugs me.

If, as I believe is true, our avatar selves are downgraded versions of actual physical bodies, they must by necessity be completely unlike the decaying sacks of flesh which now seem to control our lives. Our bodies change at whim; they fly as if weightless; they do not sicken; they do not die.

Might we turn to the angelic doctor for illumination? The glorified body, Aquinas says, will be ours to inherit at the end of time: impervious to physical harm or decay, our bodies will possess subtility and agility – the ability to move all but instantaneously wherever we wish, unencumbered by gravity or physical distance — and they will shine, clarified, like the sun, full of light and splendor!

Sound familiar?

Set list:

The Dynamites - Can You Feel It
Aretha Franklin - Baby I Love You
The Soul Seven - The Cissy’s Thang
James Brown - Get on the Good Foot (Parts 1 & 2)
James Young & The Housewreckers - Barkin’ Up the Wrong Tree
Maceo & All The King’s Men - Got To Getcha
Charly Antolini’s Power Dozen - Nofretete’s Headache
Moses Mayes - Red Wings
Boom! - Corporate World
Bootsy’s New Rubber Band - Funk Express Card
3rd Bass - Pop Goes the Weasel
Aesop Rock - 9-5er’s Anthem
Ludditák - Buppina
Michael Liggins & The Supersouls - Loaded To The Gills
Funkadelic - Can You Get To That

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 2nd, 2007 at 7:00 am and is filed under Clockwork, DJ, Esteban, Music, Nightlife, Real Life, Second Life, estebanpodcast, funk for the masses, philosophyction, podcast.