Saul Williams @ West Hollywood Book Fair

Yesterday, Saul Williams appeared at a panel at the West Hollywood Book Fair.  I have known of the great Saul Williams for some time.  I have heard several tracks of his and even saw him perform live a while back on Def Poetry Jam, but I was not prepared for the genius that is Saul Williams.

Saul Williams is a poet/spoken word performer/underground hip hop star.  But, beyond that, he is incredibly smart and has brilliant musings on the state of hip hop today.  He appeared on a panel entitled "Beats, Raps and Rants: Hip Hop in Prose, Poetry and Spoken Word" with other artists/poets Jair and Mike Sonsken (aka Mike the Poet).  The panel was moderated by writer/critic Donnell Alexander.

Their conversations primarily focused on the hip hop as an artform.  Not surprisingly, Saul Williams said the most intelligent and thoughtful comments.  My favorite thought had to with his theory on sampling.  He said (and I am paraphrasing) that when an artist chooses to sample a piece of music for his or her own piece, he is making a statement about that song.  For example, if you look at "Ring My Bell" as a philosophy, 30 years later, you might not agree with the philosophy in its entirety, but you agree with one or two points.  So, you take those points and bring them into your music by sampling them. 

Sadly, Saul Williams is not performing in this area anytime soon, but I will be sure to let you know when he does. 

Until then, enjoy these tracks:
MP3: Saul Williams - This Type Love (from Def Poetry Jam)
Read the lyrics for This Type Love here
MP3: Saul Willaims - Black Stacey

Also, all four of them took the time to praise Ras Kass for being the best rapper no one has ever heard of.  I had never heard of him and have listened to a few tracks last night.  More to come on him.

Comments

[joel]

saul's my dogg. you seen slam? great movie. more later...

[Tennille]

Ok... I'm not sure why everyone seems to think "This Type of Love" is by Saul Williams... IT IS NOT. It is by a poet by the name of Shihan... You can watch the actual Def Jam performance of this here... You might wanna change up ya info because it's incorrect.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5WgmbMW7Ek

[Holly]

The link for the lyrics for Shihan's this type love does not work. Does anyone know where to find the lyrics? I really love them!

[leanne]

“Love like” not "this type love" by Shihan(I've added what was edited out when it aired)

I want a love like me thinking of you thinking of me thinking of you type love or me telling my friends more than I’ve ever admitted to myself about how I feel about you type love or hating how jealous you are but loving how much you want me all to yourself type love
or seeing how your first name just sounds so good next to my last name.
and shit- I wanted to see how far I could get without calling you and I barely made it out of my garage.

See, I want a love that makes me wait until she falls asleep then wonder if she’s dreaming about us being in love type love or who loves the other more or what she’s doing at this exact moment or slow dancing in the middle of our apartment to the music of our hearts.
Closing my eyes and imagining how a love so good could just hurt so much when she’s not there and shit I love not knowing where this love is headed type love.

And check this-

I wanna place those little post-it notes all around the house so she never forgets how much I love her type love
then not have enough ink in my pen to write all the love type love and hope I make her feel as good as she makes me feel type love and (I want her to distract me from whatever I'm doing type love)

and just like in high school I wanna spend hours on the phone not saying shit and then fall asleep and then wake up with her right next to me and smell her all up in my covers type love

and I wanna deal with my friends making fun of me the way I made fun of them when they went through the same kind of love type love.
The only difference is this is one of those real type loves

I wanna try counting the ways I love her then lose count in the middle just so I could start all over again

(I wanna breakdown the time we spend into seconds just so it sounds like we spend more time together type love)

(and also like in high school) I wanna celebrate one of those one-month anniversaries even though they ain’t really anniversaries but doing it just ‘cause it makes her happy type love

and I wanna fall in love with the melody the phone plays when her number's dial into it then talk to you until I lose my breath, she leaves me breathless, but with the expanding of my lungs I inhale all of her back into me.

I want a love that makes me need to change my cell phone calling plan to something that allows me to talk to her longer ‘cause in all honesty, I want to avoid one of them high cell phone bill type loves
and I want a love that makes me regret how small my hands are I mean the lines on my palms don’t give me enough time to love you as long as I’d like to type love

and I want a love that makes me st-st-st-stutter just thinking about how strong this love is type love and I want a love that makes me want to cut off all my hair...

Well maybe not all of the hair, maybe like I’d cut the split ends and trim the mustache but it would still be a symbol of how strong my love is for her.

I kind of feel comfortable now so I can tell you this I even be fantasizing about walking out on a green light just dying to get hit by a car just so I could lose my memory, get transported to some third world country just to get treated and somehow meet up again with you so I could fall in love with you in a different language and see if it still feels the same type love.

I want a love that’s as unexplainable as she is

And I'm married(that's the biggest clue, I'm married he's not) and she's the one I share this love with

[andy]

"this type love" is not by saul williams. it's by shihan. and that's shihan performing it, lol.

[Lana Shukri]

I have been looking for the lyrics everywhere! Thankyou so much! I raped my boyfriend's wall on Facebook and posted the whole thing, hehe. Great stuff!

[air jordan shoes]

I want a love like me thinking of you thinking of me thinking of you type love or me telling my friends more than I’ve ever admitted to myself about how I feel about you type love or hating how jealous you are but loving how much you want me all to yourself type love

[abercrombie and fitch london]

It is hard to say such a thing is clear.

Significant change, it is.
I saw on the news that the money they dumped at Shire was fake, to represent the money he had raised. It wasn't the actual money.

The first one is very nice.. I like it very much..

it’s nice ,i want to get one

i like it ,thanks

I liked this text and i appreciated. I've read all. When i was surfing , i watched a video

I love your site and the article is useful!This is my blog, Welcome!

[abercrombie uk]

will be happy to be proved wrong with this one.... but having done survival training during my Army days, I have to admit to a raised eyebrow with this as well.

[ed hardy clothing]

Well, it should be...

[links of london]

We must not allow our creative protestto degenerate into physical violence. again and again we mustrise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soulforce. the marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the negrocommunity must not lead us to distrust of all white people, formany of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence heretoday, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up withour destiny and their freedom is inextricably bound to ourfreedom.

[Appetite Suppression]

How to Lose Hunger will make you lose weight without a diet. Easy fat loss will be vital to losing weight healthily. Tiny Mints are a healthy way to lose weight.

[New Era Hats]

Many thanks for the article. I will have a link back to this information from our fresh blog.
http://cheaphatsstore.com
http://mvpcaps.org
http://caps2011.com
http://hats-club.com

[ScevaVah]

buy best coach purses wholesale to get new coupon