Dublin has been called “the rapper for people that don’t like rap”. He’s been referred to as “a crooner” and “residential white boy smart ass”. He doesn’t appreciate any of these labels.

“People enjoy making up genres for me since it’s a little hard to pin down when you first hear it. I except them all and reject them all at the same time.”

Then what would he define himself as? “A song writer with deep roots in hip-hop I guess. If I had to label it. Is that pretentious?”

After gaining a loyal following as the emcee and front man of San Francisco jazz and hip-hop band The Shotgun Wedding Quintet Dublin is expanding out with a solo record entitled “Ease the Pain” that is dropping October 27th on independent label Jazz Mafia Recordings. Completely produced by frequent collaborator Elon.is “Ease the Pain” is a collection of what Dublin does best: intricate story telling, melancholy hip-hop ballads, and straight ahead rapping with Dublin’s signature grace and wit.

“Elon and I tried to make the production sound raw like the early days of hip-hop but still with a series of ironic twists here and there. Alot of blues influence. And alot of vocal styles that bounce around featuring singers like Emily Schmidt and Forrest Day.”

Mr. Day is featured on the title track and contributes his usual mixture of stirring melodies and intricate word play. “While we were keeping it in sort of throw back rap style I still got to reach out to some of the Jazz Mafia guys and have them do their thing on it.” Jazz Mafia don Adam Theis, who had Dublin work with him on Theis’s hip-hop symphony “Brass Bows & Beats” and is a member if The Shotgun Wedding Quintet, is featured on several tracks along with Eli “The Funky Hebrew” Herowitz and turntabelist Teeko of the 41Funk DJ collective. “It was gratifying to work with my friends and people I respect. Me and Elon got to set up all the songs and had our folks come in and lay the sauce down.”

Why the title “Ease the Pain”? “Well the name of the album works on multiple levels. There’s joy and melancholy all through it but overall it’s an upbeat mood in the music. Plus the album is about life and alot of us spend our time trying to ease different kinds of pain whether we’re aware of it or not.”

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Dublin’s Thoughts: on Gomorrah

I read about this movie over a year ago and was intrigued. I am fascinated by mob movies, always have been, and was interested in seeing a film about mafia activity in Italy. The impression I’ve gotten from news and little things I’ve read here and there is that the mob in Italy is very different from in the states. It almost seems like it’s out in the open, an excepted part of society. Anyway, this movie didn’t really clue me in any more than I was before, mostly because it zeros in so closely on a few different stories and doesn’t give you any sort of view of the big picture. God bless Marty Scorsese and his voice overs. Think about it: if Goodfellas had just played without Ray Liotta explaining what was going on and who all these guys were would you make any sense of what the hell’s going on? Sure, maybe, but the voice over explained the big picture, how it all worked, and I really appreciate that.
Now of course Gomorrah isn’t that type of quick edit/voice over epic, it’s one of those movies that doesn’t explain things right away and allows the viewer to slowly expand their perspective and understanding as the movie progresses. Sometimes this slow progression works and creates a film of genius (City of God) and sometimes it just sucks ass (Babel) . In Gomorrah’s case: half way through your view is expanded about as much as it’s going to and you watch the rest of the film with this pretty basic and shallow understanding of the characters and situations. There’s a war of some kind going on in these housing projects but you never know what it’s about or who’s who or what. There’s a scene where a character mentions separatists which gave me the impression there was a political struggle of some kind but the violence we see is never justified beyond a common turf war of some kind. I’m ignorant and maybe that was the point. Maybe they didn’t want us to know the reasons for the war because the characters didn’t know either.
Good camera work abounds in this movie especially the shots of the ugly ass projects in the Italian fields. Something that bothered me but which I’m sure is realistic is the way all the gangsters dress like douche bags from Jersey and listen to techno. Euro trash for real.
In conclusion: I wanted to be blown away but what I got was a little too “Babel” and not enough “City of God”. Might be a dumb way to put it but I’m going to say it gets a B and now I’m going to go read the book it’s based on to get the “big picture” I was talking about.

12-8-09

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DUBLIN’S THOUGHTS: On Obama’s speech last night. ”.

It was a bummer, no doubt about it. There was a slight hope for something new last night and I didn’t hear that. I heard the story of 9/11 which was appropriate but unfortunately brought back memories of many of W’s speeches and just made me feel sick. Let’s face it: Obama sounded like a smart and articulate GW Bush last night.
All I could think while riding down San Pablo Avenue with the speech coming from the radio is that things are going to get UGLY. Probably very ugly. And maybe there’s no other choice for the U.S. to get ugly but like so many others have pointed out: the Soviets got ugly in Afghanistan almost thirty years ago and I don’t think anything very positive came out of that.
There had been a rumor going around a few weeks ago that Obama was going to tell us the hard truth: that there is no means to a military solution in Afghanistan, and pull us out. That rumor shriveled up and died a few days ago when the additional 30,000 troop surge leaked. But I was still naively holding onto the rumor last night and listening to his speech brought me low. I had no choice but to turn to my trusty mood enhancing drugs: hot chicken noodle soup and the second season of Arrested Development.
Is there any hope in Afghanistan or is it the land where hope goes and dies? After reading ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’ and ‘The Kite runner’ I really hate the Taliban and I have no problem gunning down a bunch of those ignorant bearded thugs. But please, the reality is that most of these guys are desperate ignorant kids who probably don’t have much of a choice. They are going to get killed along with our troops and the farmer and the farmer’s family that’s caught in the middle. Obama being Obama I thought he might be spending the last couple months coming up with an interesting new plan with his advisors that involved a more humanitarian effort than a military one. But no, he didn’t. It seemed like he spent those months coming up with the same vague strategy that’s been in place the last eight years. Like I said at the beginning of this thought: it’s a bummer. A bummer for everybody.
(12-2-09)

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DUBLIN’S THOUGHTS: on the “Ease the Pain” Record Release Show

It was about 7 o’clock when I got the first text: “The Bay Bridge is shut down in both directions. No joke.” I looked up at the sky and cried: “Whyyyyyyy?!!!” and then there was the distinct bellow of a chuckle coming from the heavens. It was a laugh. A laugh from God. God had chosen to test me on the night of the release of “Ease the Pain”, the new album me and Elon were putting out.

The old All Powerful One was doing this by shutting down the Bay Bridge, the main route to the City from the East Bay. I live in the East Bay, as do a shit ton of my friends that were all planning on coming out that night to Coda on Mission St.  Then, with all his (or her) infinite power, God had forced a chunk of metal to break off the top of the Eastern span of the bridge and crash into two cars, shutting it down indefinitely. Everyone in the cars had survived but I was far from jubilant. God was fucking up my numbers man! But the show must go on, and on it went, with P-Dub on the turntables and the Hip-Hop Medicine Band backing me up as we did the first set.

The sound was a little off, and I had the worst cotton mouth known to man (probably from the vicadon I had taken without thinking earlier. I had popped it in my mouth with the idea it was a vitamin or something. Never take pills while you’re on the phone. Or at least use a hand held device). The Med Band was great. We all had our fair share of fuck ups here and there but the acoustic rap jug band vibe was right.

Giving Tree rocked in the break and it was the first time they had played together in over a year. They did they’re thing. Even with the Bridge closed they made it over as did Forrest Day who was sniffling and under the weather. My boy Cure One was manning the merch and he was super under the weather but still held it down. That’s real love when you put your health on the line for your boy’s record release show. Even Elon dragged his sick self across the Golden Gate to be there, but he had to be there. He made the frigging record for God’s sake.

Speaking of God, his/her plan to foil me by destroying the Bay Bridge wasn’t working out. People were showing up to support “Ease the Pain” and it was warming my heart. We sold our first chunk of albums and we rocked the last three songs with Adam Theis and Jon Monahan joining us on stage. Forrest came up and killed Ease the Pain. It was great. After the show was done and people filtered out I had a couple of shots and realized that the closing of the bridge screwed me as well. To get home I would have to take the Golden Gate and go all the way to the Richmond Bridge adding a good 45 mins to the trip home. Forget that. I stayed at a friend’s house in Pacifica and awoke to a phone call at seven in the morning from my Mom. “Your sister is having a baby!” she cried through the phone. Off I went to the UCSF hospital where I met a little butter ball of a baby named Caedryn Meredith Pierce. She weighed nine pounds! It was my sister’s turn to curse God for that one.

All and all, it was quite a twenty four hours for the Bay Area and my family in particular. The Bridge died, but with that temporary (we hope) death came the birth of my niece and my album. All in a day’s work. THANK YOU to everybody that showed up, especially those that came the long way from the East Bay. Big ups to the Coda staff and SAURAS, SENECA, NOAH WILKINSON, SASHA LEVASHOFF, THE MED BAND, ADAM THEIS, JON MONAHAN, and FORREST DAY. Fun times, great show. See you at the next one.