Finally, here is my first blog post assignment. (“Discuss how the idea and/or history of 'turntablism' (and, more broadly, sampling, hip-hop, and DJ culture) relates to, extends, or elaborates some aspect of 'Afrofuturism' set forth in Kodwo Eshun’s theoretical essay, 'Further Considerations on Afrofuturism.'”) I need to say this before anything else, though: I'm still not too clear on how the two work together, and I have some misgivings about the essay as well (maybe I'll explain later). I also need to say that I understand “blog posts” and “essays” to entail two different and exclusive styles of writing, so I don't think I could ever write one in the mindset of the other.
As I understand it, “turntablism” is the art of manipulating LPs for the benefit of an audience, essentially using an analog form of reproducing music in a way not originally thought of as being even remotely entertaining – surely someone noticed that vinyl records produce a sound when suddenly stopped prior to Grand Wizard Theodore (according to the all-knowing digital entity that is Wikipedia)? The basic concept behind Sci-fi (and Spec-fi) is pretty much the same – distortion as entertainment, to paraphrase and butcher Samuel R. Delany – and so it's only from here that I begin to see a relation between turntablism and Afrofuturism.
“Afrofuturism, then, is concerned with the possibilities for intervention within the dimension of the predictive, the projected, the proleptic, the envisioned, the virtual, the anticipatory and the future conditional.” (Eshun 293) This isn't the set-in-stone definition of it, I think, but it comes close enough to describe it in comparable terms to turntablism. Which is predictive (a new use for old technology), projected (usually with a halfway-decent sound system), proleptic (according to Wikipedia, “turntablism” was never meant to be permanently attached to the art like it is now), envisioned, virtual, and anticipatory (it seems to be at least partially improvised off of pre-recorded LPs). I'm not so sure about how closely turntablism adheres to the phrase “the future conditional” though – I can easily imagine even the best DJs practicing and rehearsing for major events, and reserving spontaneity for a club gig or such.
Scratch wasn't bad or anything, but I didn't enjoy it in quite the same way as Hype: pretty much the same movie, only featuring Grunge and taking place almost entirely in Seattle – I think it might be the lack of any sense of locality for me. However, there was one scene in Scratch that really stuck out to me: where a turntabler – DJ Shadow, I believe? – was walking around in the basement of a record store, and it wasn't so much “walking around” as “sliding through the space between prodigious stacks of LPs with deceptive ease.” I guess I see it as representative of the creative process, or maybe just the massive result of it – like a collection of old books, but without the yellowing and deterioration common to acid-bleached paper.
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