MAKE NEW YORK GRIMEY AGAIN

In the summer of 1991, a white supremacist from Canarsie by the name of Brian Fining was seized as the suspect of fire bombing of a real estate agency, which took place on July 27. The motive behind it: the real estate agency was showing and selling homes to black and latino buyers in south Brooklyn. Then 20-year old Fining grew up at 9312 Avenue M – an all-white block where residents said no home had been sold in 28 years. Fining lived four blocks away from the Fillmore Real Estate office at 9301 Flatlands Avenue he terrorized. The Fillmore Real Estate office was targeted several times by Brooklyn white supremacists for selling to black and Latino home buyers, as well as other non-white owned businesses in the area that was increasingly becoming less white. At least 13 incidents of racial violence was reported by police in the area that July.

 

In response to the CLEARLY racial motives behind the terror act and other incidents, 300 black demonstrators protested the incident to be met with racist hecklers who shook watermelons at them; Brian Fining was amongst them and participated in the racist counter-response. Marches and demonstrations were met with counter-responses led mostly by young white men holding signs saying “End Racism — Kill Al Sharpton”,” chanting “Go Home” at protestors.

Officials said other arrests could be made in connection with the firebombing. “We do not believe that there are a lot more people involved,” Mr. Brown said. “Our investigation is proceeding with the assumption that there’s at least one more suspect.”

He said Mr. Fining was being questioned about the earlier firebombing, which was preceded by a call warning that the company would be punished for selling and renting homes to minority families. Other Canarsie realty companies have received similar calls. (NY Times)

Indeed, another person was involved: Frank Scire, also from Canarsie. Fining ratted Scire out!

Mr. Fining identified Mr. Scire as a longtime friend living in the same neighborhood. On the night of the firebombing, he said, the defendant took him for a ride in a car, stopped at a gas station to fill a small bottle with gasoline and drove to the real-estate agency. Mr. Fining added that the defendant put a rag in the gas-filled bottle and told him to “throw this in the window.”

“I went over to the driver’s side,” Mr. Fining went on. “He lit it,” he said, testifying that the defendant lighted the firebomb. “I walked over there and put it inside the window.”

They drove away, he said, leaving the smoking bomb inside the office. – (NY Times)

Between 1990 to 2000, Canarsie saw its shift in racial demographics. Whites fled as an incoming number of West Indians moved in from East Flatbush and Brownsville. This “white flight” landed white Canarsie residents in Long Island, Staten Island and neighboring borough, Queens.

Mr. Palmer found his house in Brooklyn near the border of Flatlands and Canarsie. It is a two-family house that he jumped at so fast he says the real estate broker thought he was crazy. There were just a handful of black families on the block back then. But within a few years, he recalled, most of the white people up and left.

”I guess they see black people coming,” Mr. Palmer said, chuckling. ”And they run away from black people.”

In the decade between the 1990 and the 2000 censuses, the racial makeup of Canarsie changed more dramatically than that of any neighborhood in the city. The black population grew to nearly 60 percent from 10 percent. What many new residents, Caribbean immigrants, say they wanted was an integrated neighborhood; what they have ended up with is increasingly black. (NY Times)

The former white residents of Canarsie didn’t want to be amongst black people clearly. They fought until they could to keep their “white paradise” in a borough that is filled with black people. When they couldn’t fight any longer they decided to up and leave. The lengths that white supremacists go to…

 

 

 

Jah Huey is a 20-year old lyricist from Brooklyn, NY out of the ORGornothing collective. Born in Crown Heights and raised in DC, Jah Huey was always submerged in music with a Hip Hop journalist for a father; blasting classic New York rap such as Nas, Biggie, Boot Camp Clik, Slick Rick, A Tribe Called Quest, and even the likes of Outkast and Ice Cube. The conditions of his environment led him astray although getting his mind right, moving back to NYC in 2012 and rediscovering the music of his childhood. This was enough for him to gain motivation to pursue music, join ORG and intern at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. “Early Morning Hues” is an 8-track lyrical and soulful, yet exciting listen. All tracks are performed solely by Jah Huey, except “Pray” featuring ORG Prophecy & Cliche of Sacred Gzz, which is now available on iTunes and Google Play.

“The EP “Early Morning Hues,” by Jah Huey, is a lyrical, energy-driven mix of the flow of classic New York hip-hop and elements of D.C style and lyricism. I have been putting together this EP song by song for the past 3 years. Some songs were written this year and some were written when I was still in high school, revising verses and instrumentals and cutting out songs thats didn’t make the cut. I am speaking from the perspective from what I’ve experienced growing up in Brooklyn and Southeast D.C as a young man. The concept behind it is being and loving your truest self in order to become who you want to be, understanding that life is about the ascension of energy, just like the sun in the morning. I want to inspire listeners to realize their aspirations are achievable no matter what they might be, as long as passion and love are put into it and they trust their paths. I want people to wake up in the morning, play this album and feel fired up, ascending with the sun, ready to own the day and create their own reality. And most of all I made this album to express myself. To really tell the world who Jah Huey is, and what I think and feel on a daily basis. Coming from a kid that used to censor himself and had no confidence in the path he wanted to pursue in life. I made this EP primarily to free myself, and hopefully I can free many other people in the process.” – Jah Huey

STREAM “EARLY MORNING HUES” EP BELOW:

Contact Jah Huey:

 

When Bill Clinton moved to Harlem after his presidency, he opened his office at 55 West 125th Street. He received a huge welcome from loyal Harlem Democrats but was also met with discontent from Harlem residents who definitely weren’t fond of his presence in the historic neighborhood known as a “Black Mecca.” Publications such as Vanity Fair and The Wall Street Journal were calling his arrival to Harlem a “resurrection” of the neighborhood and even the “Second Renaissance.”

Some are even calling it Harlem’s “second renaissance,” after the vibrant black cultural and civil-rights movement of the 1920s and ’30s. But detractors say the term “renaissance” is a misnomer: this time around it’s not about culture or ideology–it’s all about money. “I don’t know where people are coming from with this ‘second renaissance’,” says Murphy Heyliger, a Harlem native and owner of the boutique shop Harlemade. – (Newsweek, 2001)-

Gentrification was a huge thought for people who opposed the former President:

 At Clinton’s rally, a militant group of New Black Panthers carried signs that read CLINTON = GENTRIFICATION (the white takeover of black Harlem). Nearby, a man stood at a folding table with taped-up fliers that said rent is too damn high. (Newsweek, 2001)

In the 1920’s, Harlem became the home of the Harlem Renaissance, known as the New Negro Movement during that time.  The Harlem Renaissance, or New Negro Movement, was a political, artistic and cultural movement emerging out of emancipation and frustration with living under racist conditions. Approximately 6 million African Americans migrated out of the Southern part of the United States to other urban parts of the country. This migration gave fuel to the Harlem Renaissance leading to African American men and women alike, asserting themselves intellectually. Figureheads such as Langston Hughes, Marcus Garvey, W.E.B DuBois, Jessie Fauset, Zora Neale Hurston, Gwendolyn Brooks, Paul Robeson and countless others made great contributions to the Harlem Renaissance with many of them having streets, schools, and other institutions named after them in their honor. Harlem was a new cultural, sociopolitical landscape; it was militant. Literature, music, stage productions, and visual art flourished as African Americans used creative expression to create a golden era that also developed the neighborhood of Harlem.

How can we compare this to Bill Clinton? The man once dubbed “the first Black president” because of his sax-playing appearance on “The Arsenio Hall Show?” The same man responsible for this:

When Clinton left office in 2001, the United States had the highest rate of incarceration in the world. Human Rights Watch reported that in seven states, African Americans constituted 80 to 90 percent of all drug offenders sent to prison, even though they were no more likely than whites to use or sell illegal drugs. Prison admissions for drug offenses reached a level in 2000 for African Americans more than 26 times the level in 1983. All of the presidents since 1980 have contributed to mass incarceration, but as Equal Justice Initiative founder Bryan Stevenson recently observed, “President Clinton’s tenure was the worst.” (The Nation, 2016)

Exactly what renaissance was it? I’m inclined to believe that this “renaissance” was synonymous to exactly what Harlem’s Clinton opposers were shouting: GENTRIFICATION. Ain’t no way in hell, can a white man resurrect a neighborhood built on Black excellence. To even use the word renaissance in reference to the Harlem Renaissance is a complete slap in the face to our ancestors. This renaissance led to affluent motherfuckers moving to Harlem because of property value spikes. A white ruling class man could never recreate or “continue” A BLACK MOVEMENT in a historically BLACK NEIGHBORHOOD.

The same 125th Street strip is now reminiscent of downtown Manhattan with even a Whole Foods that’s been opened since July. Harlem has been subjected to gentrifications with gentrifiers trying to rename a section of the neighborhood (Central Harlem), “SoHa”.

Danni Tyson, a real estate broker and a member of Manhattan Community Board 10, which covers Central Harlem, says the move is “pretty arrogant.”

“I totally disagree with it,” said Tyson.

“To me, personally, it’s like trying to take the black out of Harlem.

“Harlem is Harlem.”

Tyson said when she says she’s from Harlem people “know it exactly what it stands for.”

But, SoHa?

“It’s not something longtime residents use,” she said.

(DNAInfo, 2017)

The Clinton Foundation moved out of Harlem in 2011, ten years after Clinton’s move but what’s done has been done.

 

 

 

“Born left hand, I’m already different.”
The LeftHand EP is a collaborative effort by Fatally Cool’s Manny Blanco and Be.Geniu$. The standout tracks on Be.Geniu$ & Manny Blanco’s LeftHand EP are “Bag Talk,” the title track “LeftHand” and “Forth & Back.” “Bag Talk” is Brooklyn braggadocio rap and is emergence of what could be an updated authentic NYC Hip Hop sound. “Left Hand” sends shots to mumble rappers and unoriginal artist. “Forth & Back” showcases Blanco & Geniu$ going back and forth with bars similar to Jadakiss and Styles P. Left Hand EP is a 7-track enjoyable listen laced with immaculate production, bars with a fresh Brooklyn sound.

BE.GENIUS: @beatgeniuss

MANNY BLANCO: @mannyblanco

 

Straight outta Queens is a prolific lyricist by the name of Alpha Memphis of the Genius Sounds Family collective. Produced by Mike Lightz, “Gritty” is a clear-cut example of what a New York record should sound like. Exceptional wordplay and a forceful delivery propels the track as it gives you that New York feel. 

@AlphaMemphisGSF

#Artisans and Brooklyn’s own, iR8 (pronounced eye-rate), releases his first single off of his anticipated project, “36 Ways To Paradise.” Produced by Thundaa, “God Complex” is easily a tale of the black man’s plight living in the United States of AmeriKKKa. iR8 highlights the disparities of black and white in a nation that was built off the backs of cheap African labor, which continues to thrive through institutionalized racism. With the use of insightful lyricism, iR8 addresses poverty, incarceration,and harsh living, as well as the white supremacy ideology that is the “god complex.” “God Complex” is a clear-cut listen that is sure to resonate with us.

Listen to iR8 address the “God Complex” below:

There’s this long running joke that spans through the hoods facing gentrification through NYC. If a Starbucks pops up, the neighborhood is lost. Sort of like when people say “there goes the neighborhood,” when black people move into predominately white neighborhoods. Bed Stuy and Bushwick are two neighborhoods that have been infiltrated by yuppies and their bourgeois art shows, trash pizzerias, bike stores, bars and weak ass coffee shops. Standing at 774 Broadway is Fat Albert’s Warehouse, a store that borders Bed Stuy and Bushwick. Fat Albert’s Warehouse is all that’s right with a discount store. From over-the-counter products to clothing to appliances and household items, Fat Albert’s got you for dirt cheap! Growing up in Sumner Projects, I’ve always known the greatness that is Fat Albert’s Warehouse. Hearing that Fat Albert’s Warehouse is soon to be replaced by STARBUCKS, is hearing a nail being hammered into a coffin for both Bed Stuy and Bushwick. To soften the blow, Starbucks is saying this location will be a “community store” that will offer job training for 16-to-24 year olds currently out of school. I CALL BULLSHIT. The people of Bed Stuy and Bushwick don’t need your shitty, overpriced coffee. There’s about 4 bodegas in that area serving coffee that’s way tastier and cheaper than what you have. All the Puerto Ricans on Graham Ave are drinking Cafe Bustelo. As far as your “community service,” you’re only training young, poor teens and adults to work for businesses that will continue to steal their labor in return for cheap wages that are impossible to live on. Your “community service” is not enough when we are being displaced out of the same community you’re getting ready to cash out in. Can those 16-to-24 year olds take those checks and go rent themselves one of those little luxury apartments popping up on Broadway? NO, NIGGA! Don’t try to act as if you care about the people who have long felt at home in Bed Stuy and Bushwick. I want to give a big FUCK YOU to the representative of the real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield, for vouching for this particular location as a “smart choice” due to Woodhull Hospital being directly across the streets and the “influx of young professionals.” Young professionals as in yuppies, right? GTFOH and keep your shitty, dark roast.