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Shuffled! is a special BPR column that appears every Thursday. Check out the Shuffled! archive for past shufflers.

Today’s Shuffler: Ed Lin

Ed Lin is the author of two novels, “Waylaid” and “This Is a Bust.” He has been widely praised in a broad range of publications, including Hyphen Magazine, Playboy, Booklist and Time Asia.

Ed was born in New York City and grew up in several different towns in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Ed was an early member of the Asian American Writers’ Workshop and a founding member of a nutty theater group, Peeling the Banana. He has also played bass for a number of questionable bands, the latest of which is Raven Steals the Light. Ed is a music nut, with thousands of records, 7-inch singles, minidiscs and CDs. And, apart from having a few ipods, he owns turntables, cassette players and HipZip players!

Ed can be reached at his web site http://www.edlinforpresident.com/ or at http://www.myspace.com/edlinforpresident. He says he’s on Facebook too—but you’ll have to find him.

Let’s see what he shuffled up…

Sexuality
Billy Bragg
One of my favorite songs on his best album, “Don’t Try This at Home.” Once I hear one song on it, I pretty much need to hear the entire thing. Bragg proved that unabashedly left-wing commie songs could also be funny, sexy and catchy! “Sexuality” in particular makes me think of my old Sony Walkman circa 1991 (I didn’t get this album on CD until years later), and working endless hours at an Asian American newspaper that eventually folded—and probably for the better!

Nefi and Girly
Asobi Seksu
Bryan Ong, the drummer for the band Raven Steals the Light (I play bass in it), made me go see them a few years ago. I’m so glad he did. These guys take everything I love about the Cocteau Twins and Velocity Girl and put some crunch into it, like on this song. On one of their live albums, “Live at the Echo,” singer Yuki notes to the crowd that “Nefi and Girly” is about her cats. I saw Yuki a few months ago when I was eating lunch with a friend downtown. I was gonna say “Hi” to her, but then I didn’t, in case she thought I was hitting on her. See how considerate I am?

Kasama
Taiyo Na
This is great from the start, with the Fat Albert band keyboards and vinyl surface noise. Taiyo’s a young guy, but you know from this song that his soul has been on a long journey. It’s all old skool and shit with a neo edge in his voice. If “This Is a Bust” is ever made into a movie, I’d like this song to play over the closing credits. I tried to go to Taiyo’s CD (Love is Growth) release party, but I’m six-foot and more than two bills heavy, so I couldn’t push myself much past the front door.

Pay to Cum
Bad Brains
Aw man, this is where hardcore punk started, right fucking here. Furious and tuneful, and over in a minute and a half. Bad Brains still have never really got their due, possibly from notoriously unstable singer H.R. (I understand that at shows lately he sometimes refuses to sing and blows a trumpet instead.) Still, if they had only released this single, and not even their majestic debut album, this band’s place in Hardcore Valhalla would have been assured. When I heard this song as a kid, I couldn’t wait to see the madness that I thought CBGB’s would be. Instead, on my first trip to that club in 1987, I found about eight people sitting around drinking beer, barely watching this little-known band, Soul Asylum, play their set.

New Way, New Life
Asian Dub Foundation
This song makes me think about going to see them, back in 1999. The opening band were made of members of East Asian descent and the crowd was kinda sitting back and passively listening. But then ADF’s Deeder Zaman and Dr. Das came out into the audience and got a small pit going in the front. I feel good when I see pan-Asian unity. It gives me hope in the same way that this song is about earlier generations coming over and building a community for their children. I love the bass line Dr. Das plays in the outro.

Outtakes
Yellow Rage
Yeah, this is from Volume 2. Could this really be Yellow Rage? Who are these giggly little girls? Was this recorded at a pajama party? Was there a bong? Is there any pizza left? Where are their parents? Did they tie up and gag the babysitter? I just hope it’s not a school night. Go to sleep, Michelle and Catzie!

Last 5 posts by shuffled

• Shuffled! North Star of the BROWNSTAR Revolution - December 10th, 2009
• Shuffled! Pen Khek Chear - November 25th, 2009
• Shuffled! Maanav Thakore - November 19th, 2009
• Shuffled! Jerry Ma - August 13th, 2009
• Shuffled! Tanzila Ahmed - August 6th, 2009

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