2.0: The artist formerly known as Mos Def

Editor’s note: 2.0 is a feature on this blog trying to identify the artists, the scientists, the writers, the thinkers, the makers — the people who will (or should) get a mention in the next generation’s history books (which will probably be history e-books).

Yasiin Bey (formerly known as Mos Def, born as Dante Smith) has moved from world to world — from actor to rapper to poet, then back to actor (or from the streets of Brooklyn to Carnegie Hall) — swiftly and successfully.

Not many of Bey’s peers have been as successful in navigating between music and acting. He helped revive socially-aware hip-hop from the cacophony of gangsta rap’s explosion in the 90s with two critically acclaimed albums — Mos Def & Talib Kweli are Black Star (1998) and Black on Both Sides (1999). He hosted HBO’s Def Poetry for six seasons. He’s won awards for his acting on Broadway (Topdog/Underdog) and on screen (The Woodsman), was nominated for awards in other acting work (Brown Sugar, Something The Lord Made, etc.), and gained respect for his acting chops in still other roles (The Italian Job, Be Kind Rewind, etc.).

But, maybe more importantly, as Mos Def, he also got involved in the discussion of our times. He’s spoken a lot of truth. He’s also spoken a lot of craziness (apparently, he thinks landing on the moon was a hoax). An appearance on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher showed Bey (then as Mos Def) being thought-provoking (hmmmm), dumb-founding (say what?!) and hilarious. He was one of less than a handful of artists to attend a rally for the Jena Six in 2007. He rolled up to the MTV Video Music Awards and played his song “Dollar Day,” a sharp (and blunt) criticism of the Bush administration’s handling of Hurricane Katrina, in the street, for which he was arrested (despite having a permit).

In every endeavor, he’s executed his craft with this … (what’s the word I’m looking for?) … smoothness. He’s been vintage in a plastic industry.

Classic song: Definition, on Mos Def & Talib Kweli are Black Star

My favorite: History, on The Ecstatic

Quotable: “It’s one thing to be the greatest; it’s another thing to be necessary, and that’s the aim for me. The best are the most necessary: those who take less than they give and love more than they hate.”

His legacy: The mainstream finally caught on to Mos Def with his second solo album, The New Danger, in 2004. All five of his Grammy nominations came after Black Star and Black on Both Sides. But those two albums pinpoint Bey’s arrival in our culture. They were released after the deaths of superstar rappers 2-Pac and Notorious B.I.G., and were saturated with philosophy, spirituality and commentary on the state of rap and urban America, among other topics. Bey has stretched his musical prowess with each subsequent album — working in elements of jazz, rock and roll, Arabic tones (and more) into his sound — and continued to rhyme about issues of cultural substance. But Black Star and Black on Both Sides will forever be uniquely linked to their time.

Super Bowl XLVI and public discourse

Editor’s note: This is a post in place of one I should be writing. Basically, to cover for my procrastination. But this is also something worth doing regularly — checking out others thoughts on our times.

What?

Charles Barkley says something worth listening to? (Kidding. I have no opinion, yay or nay, on Barkley. Just don’t let him host Saturday Night Live anymore)

He did. He was quoted in this article by ESPN.com Senior Writer Howard Bryant, saying this:

Media and expectations have changed everything. Everyone’s afraid of it because if you miss a shot, if you miss a play, that overshadows the whole series, your whole career. So guys just want a ring, but they don’t want to risk losing. If you don’t want to risk losing, you shouldn’t even be playing.*

*This is somewhat ironic to hear from Barkley, who now makes a living as a professional basketball color analyst, providing snap judgments, sometimes within seconds during a game, more often minutes after its over. Is he ranting against the very thing he creates?

But, regardless, it sounds like there rings a bit of truth to it. Bryant’s writing about the outcry from the public (mostly football fans) over the New England Patriots’ loss to the New York Giants in Super Bowl XLVI this past Sunday. Fantastically consistent and indispensable players (Wes Welker) have been vilified for mistakes during the game. A first-ballot Hall of Fame quarterback (Tom Brady) is being cut down to size for not leading his team to victory.

Bryant doesn’t like where the state of public discourse — or, more specifically, public reaction — in our country has gone:

If the only takeaway by fans and media pundits from two teams that hit hard and compete hard to win is blame assessment instead of a recognition of a terrific drama, then a very important component of the sporting experience has been lost. The opportunity to succeed is worth the risk of failure.

TED Time: The intention of invention

Editor’s note: Here’s an attempt at RM 2.0′s first feature — taking a video from TED and digging into its intellectual juices.

The storyteller: Malcolm Gladwell’s reputation is solid. Behind his work at The New Yorker, but more so from his bestselling books, The Tipping Point, Blink and Outliers, Gladwell (regardless of his views) holds the title of America’s best storyteller. Spaghetti sauce, crime in New York City, hush puppies, Rosetans, the 10,000-hour rule and on and on and on. Some of these subjects are fascinating just by themselves. I mean, how many crime shows are there on television? But to get thousands of people to read richly into the subject of developing different kinds of spaghetti sauce, is, well, really some kind of gift.

Synposis: So, here we have Gladwell telling another story. It’s the story of Carl Norden, a Swiss immigrant, an American engineer, devote Christian and the inventor of the Norden bombsight. Gladwell takes us back to World War II, to a United States about to enter into an international conflict with memories of the first World War still vivid. Specifically, memories of over 100,000 American casualties. America’s looking into how to end wars more quickly, with fewer American deaths. To do that, it assumes it must get better at killing. What better way to demoralize the enemy, and thus expedite their surrender. And the method of killing America wants to improve at the most is dropping bombs.

Enter Norden. His invention — the Norden Mark 15, a 50-pound machine of gauges and gizmos — is designed to drop bombs on targets with miraculous accuracy. All a bombardier must do is log wind speed, flying speed, altitude, etc., etc., set the Norden Mark 15′s cross-hairs on the target, and let it go. BOOM! Mission accomplished. America buys in, purchases 90,000 units at a cost of $14,000 (in 1940s money), trains 50,000 bombardiers, and sets out for Europe and the German army. The U.S. ends up spending $1 billion on the Norden bombsight.

But, when the U.S.’s planes get over to Europe, there’s a problem: The Norden Mark 15 doesn’t work. It doesn’t work for five reasons — 1) War conditions aren’t perfect; 2) this machine tends to break down a lot in the middle of missions; 3) it’s a really complicated machine to operate, and not all 50,000 bombardiers are proficient with it; 4) Norden made his calculations at low altitudes, but planes flying at low altitudes get shot down; and 5) the higher you fly (to avoid enemy contact), the more clouds there are, and thus the harder it is to make visual contact with a target, which is vital in operating the Norden Mark 15.

Moral of the story: Gladwell adds at the end of his story a footnote — that the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima was dropped using the Norden Mark 15. Of course, the bombsight didn’t work; the bomb missed the target by some 800 feet. But, really, you’re dropping an atomic bomb. How precise did you need to be?

But here is Gladwell’s point:

“Meanwhile, back in New York, no one told Carl Norden that his bombsight was used over Hiroshima. He was a committed Christian. He thought he had designed something that would reduce the toll of suffering in war. It would have broken his heart.”

The story is about war, Gladwell says. It’s about much more than that. Here he is again:

“We think the things we make can solve our problems, but our problems are much more complex than that. The issue isn’t the accuracy of the bombs you have, it’s how you use the bombs you have, and more importantly, whether you ought to use bombs at all.”

Perspective: Gladwell chose a politically-, ethically- and morally-charged example (war) to convey his idea, and, judging by the viewers’ comments, that can make it hard to separate the story from the lesson. On face value, Gladwell might be a pacifist, leaving me to wonder if he sees any use/need for a military, a mechanism used by mankind in some form (stones, sticks, knives, spears, chariots, guns, tanks, etc.) since, well, forever.

But his larger point is spot on, and one commenter on his video put it beautifully:

“This is the story of humankind and the paradox of our lifestyle … And Malcolm’s conclusion is simply that we need to change our patterns of thinking, not invent better ‘things.’”

I love better things. I love this computer I’m typing on right now to write this post, much better than I would sharpening my pencil for the fifth time. But the computer doesn’t, by itself, enhance my life. The way I choose to use it can enhance my life — by reading insightful writing to broaden my knowledge, or watching hilarious videos to lift my spirits, or sending pictures of my little boy to his relatives miles away, by which I’m (hopefully) enhancing several lives.

There’s been a movement out there for awhile now on minimalistic living, of living with less, and it’s a really noble and hard thing to do in this time of history. A person living with less isn’t normal. Ostensibly, because they don’t participate as a full American consumer, that person doesn’t help people get jobs. That might be a stretch, but if it were true, that person would make a lot of enemies. A lot of people are out of work these days.

But, that person living with less should get them back to the basics, back to relationships, back to nature, and perhaps back to better understanding and knowing themselves. A computer could help them do that. But only if they know how to use it. Or maybe they don’t need a computer at all?

Sneak peek: What to expect in February

You know what they say: The first step is the hardest part (In fact, Google that phrase, and you get 14,000,000 results in 0.19 seconds. I guess A LOT of people say it). Well, here it goes …

One of my three goals for this blog was to plan ahead. So I give you the February plan:

Feb. 1: A little bit of story time with New Yorker staff writer and author Malcolm Gladwell. It’s got everything — innovation, war, greed, irony.

Feb. 8: Our first ‘Renaissance Man of the Month’ goes to rapper/poet/actor/activist Mos Def. We’ll go into his genius (and sometimes wacky) mind.

Feb. 15: Awwww yeeaaaa, we’re already going political in Month One of RM 2.0.

Feb. 22: Our first book review goes to Jay-Z’s “Decoded.” Lot to talk about with that.

And so it begins.

The blogging plan

Admittedly, I embark on this blog reluctantly, because the cynical voices in my head — who I call the “Pags haters” — say there’s so much working against me: “You don’t have time to maintain a blog.” “How are ya gonna keep it fresh?” “Pags, EVERYBODY already has a blog. The bandwagon’s been full for years.” Yea, I hear it. So what? Who cares?

So, to neutralize the Pags haters, I developed a plan. Albeit, a brief one. But I have one. They say writing out your goals is powerful. Goals that float around in your head get lost at sea. Goals that are written down get done. They’re right there, captured in permanence, ready for action, and then the brain — and, sometimes, strangely, the forces of fate — gets to work on making them happen.

Here are mine for this blog:

1. Publish a new post at a rate of once a week. As far as the 2012 calender year goes, I’m three weeks behind (I published my first “post” last week). By the end of the year, I hope my post count is at 49.

2. Establish regular categories of posts. ‘Renaissance Man of the Month,’ to look at some of the contemporary gents out there dabbling and succeeding in everything. ‘My tunes,’ to dive into a music topic. ‘Inside the cover’ (not sold on that name), to dig into a great book. I’ve also got a list of topical categories — fashion, sports, food, religion, art, philosophy/thought, history, etc. — to run the gamut of the Renaissance Man 2.0 thinks about.

3. Plan content up to one-month ahead. At my day job (I’m a journalist at a super small newspaper), if you don’t plan ahead — especially weeks ahead — you’re just treading water trying to survive from day to day. In our biz, a budget is about what it sounds like: A plan of what stories are published on what days. If those Pags haters don’t think I have time to maintain a blog, then a budget is my best weapon against them.

It’s brief, but it’s going to get this started.

“That’s it?! Three silly goals?!”

Yea? Well, we’ll see come December 31st.

If you write it, will they come?

I’ve seen the blogs a guy can make a living off of. They get 10,000 hits a month. That entices advertisements, then requires the complimentary Facebook page, Twitter account, Google+ profile, etc., etc. Frankly, it looks scary (where’s health insurance, the 401k plan?). But it also looks awesome (freedom!).

If I stumble upon that, great. I won’t push it away. I’m not for messing with the plan.

But this isn’t for that. This is for de-cluttering my mind. Because I’m all over the map. And I know I’m not the only one.

There’s gotta be guys out there as interested in watching the NFL conference finals (Go Ravens!) as the next GOP presidential debate. Or as thoughtful about their appearance as they are about their beer. Or as concerned about how to be a good father as they are about finally learning the mandolin their wife bought them as a wedding gift. Listen to Mos Def or Pat Methany? Both, thank you! Rather read about Jay-Z or the end of poverty? Both, of course! Prefer music over history? Not necessarily. Depends on the music. And the history. Both can be awful. Both can be captivating.

So, in here, this blog, is where I’m going to filter all the interests one man’s mind can ostensibly stand. I’m going to look at music, politics, religion, comedy, history and sports (and more). I’m going talk about books, movies, articles and photos (and more). I’m going to take inventory of all that rattles in my brain.

I invite you to do the same.