This latest Mash-Up of the Week is a refreshing change from the usual mash-ups being produced these days. Typically mash up producers base their tracks off of either solely contemporary pop songs, or else current pop hits mixed with an older era pop tune (such as Lady GaGa + Kei$ha with Michael Jackson). But "Whole Lotta Sabbath" works exclusively off of classic hard rock sources -- namely Zeppelin and Sabbath.

The audio/video mixer of this mash up is Wax Audio out of Australia, who has been creating mixes for the better part of the past decade. I first learned about him six years ago during the Bush administration when, like myself and the DJs of Mass Destruction crew (DJ Pone, Dawgisht, DJ ALF), he was also doing remixes of George W. Bush speeches. One of Wax Audio's greatest pieces was his remix of John Lennon's "Imagine;" retitling it "Imagine This," he chopped, word by word, Bush saying each lyric of the song and matched it over an instrumental.

I caught up with Wax Audio earlier today (later today in Australia), who told me that the "Whole Lotta Sabbath" video is indeed brand new but that the audio track has been done for a minute. "To be honest, my main motive to make the mix at the time was just to get a real classic rock/metal mash-up out there," he told the Amoeblog. "I'm a big fan of the old bands and there didn't seem to be too many mashes of them at the time. But once I started, I thought the concept was really cool. Sabbath singing about the evil of men and war and Zeppelin praising women and love. The track is entirely comprised of the original Zeppelin and Sabbath tracks ("War Pigs" and "Whole Lotta Love") but there's also plenty of other Zep samples in there too -- "Dazed & Confused" mostly, but a few other bits and pieces. The video shows footage from the Vietnam and Iraq wars and also shows Sabbath performing from both those eras, which is interesting. There's also stuff of the Hindenburg disaster, which relates to the Zeppelin name and a photo of a Celtic Cross I took in Scotland (relating to Sabbath and their penchant for crosses)."

I'm really not an early riser. I sure don't like the cold. And I certainly don't care for standing around for hours on end in freezing temperatures after getting out of bed really early and without enough sleep. But on Tuesday this week in Washington DC I gladly put aside all of these personal disinclinations to be on the National Mall for the inauguration of the 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama. 

Sure it was uncomfortably cold as I waited, standing in the one spot for five long hours in frigid temperatures after being up since 4AM. Not only that but, like the majority of the other people that crammed all the way from the Lincoln Memorial to the Capitol Building on Tuesday, I didn't even catch a firsthand glimpse of the miniature faraway figure of Barack Obama on the steps of the Capitol Building. Instead I only got to see him (and everything else) on one of the many JumboTrons that were set up along the National Mall. But none of these temporary, uncomfortable inconveniences mattered one iota to me or seemingly to anyone else who had gathered in the numbingly cold pre-dawn to late morning hours patiently waiting for the historic ceremony to begin. It was all well worth it.


While varying reports I have read estimated Tuesday's turnout to be anywhere from 1.5 to 2 million, all seem to agree that it was a landmark event with a stunning turnout. Consider in comparison that for the last inauguration, George W Bush's second in January 2005, that a mere 100,000 showed up, and many of them were protesters. Meanwhile, for this year's inauguration festivities an estimated 10,000 charter buses, packed with revelers from as far away as Chicago and California, descended upon Washington for Tuesday's events and the couple of days leading up to it. So crazy were the numbers arriving in the nation's capitol that not only were all hotels in the DC area completely booked (many reportedly jacking their rates way up in a direct correlation to demand) but hotels up to a three hour drive in all directions out of DC were also booked up. One guy told me how his friend had rented out his DC apartment for $2000 for a night. In fact, get this, even all the campgrounds in the greater DC area were all booked up, and trust me, this is not camping weather on the East Coast. Many, like me, were lucky to have friends living in the DC/Maryland/Virginia areas who they could stay with.

Published this week online on his ZSpace page, the following timely essay This is Your Nation on White Privilege was written by Tim Wise, who is the author of White Like Me (Soft Skull, 2005, revised 2008) and Speaking Treason Fluently, which will be published later this month, also by Soft Skull.
Thanks  to Wise and his publishers for permission in reprinting this essay on white privilege in America today. For more information on the author visit timwise.org.

This Is Your Nation on White Privilege
by Tim Wise

For those who still can't grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are constantly looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help.

White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a personal matter, and that no one has a right to judge you or your parents, because "every family has challenges," even as black and Latino families with similar "challenges" are regularly typified as irresponsible, pathological and arbiters of social decay.

White privilege is when you can call yourself a "fuckin' redneck," like Bristol Palin's boyfriend does, and talk about how if anyone messes with you, you'll "kick their fuckin' ass," and talk about how you like to "shoot shit" for fun, and still be viewed as a responsible, all-American boy (and a great son-in-law to be) rather than a thug. White privilege is when you can attend four different colleges in six years like Sarah Palin did (one of which you basically failed out of, then returned to after making up some coursework at a community college), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement, whereas a person of color who did this would be viewed as unfit for college, and probably someone who only got in in the first place because of affirmative action.

Usually anniversaries are times of celebration; opportunities to rejoice a landmark in the life span of someone or something notable, positive, inspirational, etc. etc.  But today's date, March 19th 2008, which marks the five year anniversary of the war in Iraq, is hardly a time for any sort of celebration for anyone.  Even those few remaining staunchly pro-American, anti-terrorist, die-hard Bush supporters must find little to celebrate today.

For even if they choose to blindly dismiss & ignore all of the damage done to Iraq and its people (approximately half a million citizens of Iraq killed & countless more maimed or left homeless and/or with their lives in total disarray) and just focus on the American lives lost, not to mention the incredible damage done to the US economy that is not even fully felt, and won't be for years, nay, generations, to come -  then even the most stubborn supporters of this war would have to agree that is a losing battle in every sense of the word.

One life lost is one too many no matter how noble a cause might seem. But in this case, in this war, there is no noble cause at stake. There is no honor. Just a tragic waste of lives and money and a huge stain on the future - especially for the USA.  If we were to just forget about all the human lives lost and were to just ponder the financial drain of this war it is simply mind-numbing.  Currently the US has wasted over $500 billion on this war.  And estimated figures point to the US spending close to a total of a trillion dollars (a thousand billion) before this whole war in Iraq can be brought to a close.  Now considering the needs of so many poor struggling American citizens at home, with so many living below the poverty level and dealing with poor medical care, housing, and schooling, etc., this war is not just a terrible waste. It is horrendous crime.