Photo of the Day, November 24, 2009: Hook, Line, and Sinker
Photo of the Day, November 25, 2009: Boston as seen from the harbor
Cheap Eats: Burtons Grill
Sports Redux: Every Minute Counts
Bite Size News, November 24: Free Parking Edition
Bostonist already mentioned to you that the Diabolical Biz Markie will be playing at Axis this evening, but damn, we really need to exhort you to go. Part of it is that people need to realize that the Biz is so much more than just "Just a Friend." He's given the world many other hip hop hits, among which we must mention "The Vapors," the whimsical (but so true) "Pickin' Boogers," and "Nobody Beats the Biz," which is meta-awesome for having a refrain that was inspired by a TV commercial, which was inspired by a musical, which was inspired by the Wizard of Oz. Also, as hip hop ages, it's harder and harder to see some of the early greats on stage, so when one comes to town, everyone with sense ought to jump.
But really, there is a more important, and more personal reason why (this) Bostonist wants you to go see Biz Markie: We can't go because of a prior engagement, and our inability to see classic hip hop acts because of other plans has, in the past, been accompanied by low-level personal tragedy. We doubt this evening's plans (dinner with the in-laws) will be attended by calamity, but we want to ward off the evil eye by making sure as many people as possible are there having fun in our stead. To read the sad story of what happened when we almost got to see A Tribe Called Quest in 1997, click below. We know this story has nothing to do with anything and suspect it will have little use in persuading you to see the Biz tonight, but it may amuse you.
In college, when (this) Bostonist was still a Brooklynist, we were dating this girl who was drama, and we shouldn't have stayed with her so long, but she was really nice and really fly, and at 19 that was practically more than we could hope for. One time, we had a fight and agreed that the best thing was to spend a solid week doing our own thing. So Bostonist went out with our crew on Friday night, and quite happily got drunk, flirted (innocently) with other girls, made merry, and crashed at a friend's house in Manhattan. Saturday morning we had to get up and go meet up with the girlfriend because, notwithstanding the week apart, she and Bostonist had a prior agreement to go together to Planned Parenthood to split the cost of birth control pills (on the theory, of course, that Bostonist was as much the beneficiary of said pills as she was). So Bostonist dragged our terribly-hung-over ass off our friend's couch at 9:00 in the morning to ride our bicycle back to Brooklyn to meet our girlfriend and go buy the pill. Naturally, we hadn't gone even three blocks when we were stopped by the NYPD and ticketed for running a red light on our bicycle (at 9:00 a.m. on a Saturday! In an intersection with no crossing traffic and no pedestrians! Grrr). Anyway, while we were standing there getting a ticket, a friend wandered up randomly and said he had an extra ticket for one of those big summer outdoor concerts, at which A Tribe Called Quest, among others, would be playing. Unfortunately, we told him, we couldn't go because we had to go to Brooklyn to meet our girlfriend. So we got our ticket, continued downtown, and got hit by a car at on Chambers Street - not badly enough to put us in the hospital or wreck our bicycle, but enough to give us a huge bruise on our knee and be in a really foul mood. Finally, when we made it to our girlfriend's place in Brooklyn - on time, mind you - she unceremoniously informed us that she had cheated on us the night before. Needless to say, we didn't pay for birth control, opting instead to take the first opportunity we could to get out of town for the rest of the weekend, which depressingly put us at a kegger full of people we didn't know in Troy, New York.
All of which somehow proves that you should go see Biz Markie tonight.
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mmmm, if Big Daddy Kane was there, too, I'd definitely go!
Nobody beats the Biz. But it was a tough decision (why does this happen?) between the Diabolical, Modeselektor/Jan Jelenik and Soul Position (not to mention Atmosphere & Matisyahu . . . uh, ok I won't mention them).
And while I was moved by your plea and story, I decided that, in the end, things simply go better with RJ and Al (just got back from the Soul Position gig. It was the shit).
Hope you had a great dinner and that, for the sake of all concerned, the Mighty Biz rocked the house.