You Sound White (RR)
DB_Cooper
Manhatin' 7,823 Posts
James White and the Blacks - Off WhiteVery interesting and, at times, enjoyable record. BUT IS IT RACIST?Consider: According to Rip It Up and Start Again, he was originally going to call the project James White and his Blacks. Of course, the record is full of direct references to racial stereotypes as well. But are they mocking? Sincere? A bit of both?Discuss. And please, give in to your anger. 
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But on the real this record is the joint.
Yeah, "Contort Yourself" sounds like it could be a new 12", it's so fresh, although it seems we're the only two who've heard it, or at least care to comment.
Get familiar!
That's the whole album. Make with the DLs.
To me, Contort Yourself is the beginning and end of James Chance's legacy. Everything else is not that great. With regards to the racism question earlier, please see the Lester Bangs essay "White Noise Supremacists" for further enlightenment.
For the purposes of argument, could you paraphrase? And yes, the rest of the album does go pretty avant-noise. But "Christmas With Satan" is pretty entertaining, in its own way. Not in a "worthwhile contribution to music" way, but entertaining nonetheless.
It's been a while since I read it but James Chance makes a bunch of obscenely racist remarks in a misguided attempt to be edgy.
As a big fan of Lester Bangs' style and work, I would caution against anyone taking that article in particular as gospel. While overall it's an interesting take on the racial attitudes of the predominantly White punk scene in NYC in the late 70s, I think a lot of folks were taken to task and tried in the court of public opinion with no way to respond to Lester's allegations (which themselves seemed spurred in no small part by his own self-loathing at his own racially-insensitive tendencies). From what I heard a lot of people completely stopped speaking to Lester after that article, but I guess you could draw a number of conclusions from that.
That said, read the shit out of it.
To sum up I think they are racists because they suck.
I think Oingo Boingo opened but I don't remember a note. To think that I saw the future creator of the Simpsons theme and didn't know it.
Ahh. So, essentially, he's the equivalent of the worst contingent of modern hipsters? Well, at least he was ahead of his time. He should be DJing those "Kill Whitey" parties in Brooklyn.
Nice.