Nelson George

Sparkle essay for the New York Times By Nelson \| august 11, 2012 \| 1 comment http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/12/movies/sparkle-remade-with-jordin-sparks-and-whitney-houston.html?smid=tw-share This piece, published in the Sunday August 12th New York Times, compares the 1970s original and 2012 remake of the soul musical Sparkle with a focus on the musical stars involved and the narrative differences between the two.[...]
Summer 2012 By Nelson \| june 22, 2012 \| 1 comment This has been a great year for me and a busy summer. So fare in 2012 Brooklyn Boheme debuted on Showtime in February, The Announcement on ESPN in March and the short doc All Hail the Beat premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in April. Also quite pleasing was that The Plot Against Hip Hop [...]
Summer 2012 By Nelson \| june 22, 2012 \| Post a comment This has been a great year for me and a busy summer. So fare in 2012 Brooklyn Boheme debuted on Showtime in February, The Announcement on ESPN in March and the short doc All Hail the Beat premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in April. Also quite pleasing was that The Plot Against Hip Hop [...]
Documentary Times By Nelson \| march 7, 2012 \| 3 comments Lots of news right now on the documentary front. Brooklyn Boheme, which I co-directed with Diane Paragas, is still airing on Showtime, though going VOD is the fastest way to see it there. If you want to purchase or rent a copy of this doc on Fort Greene/Clinton Hill circa 1980s and '90s it launches [...]
New Directors Flesh Out Black America, All of It By Nelson \| january 10, 2012 \| Post a comment EARLY in Dee Rees’s film “Pariah” it journeys into a Brooklyn strip club where scantily clad young black women gyrate to a sexy, foul-mouthed rap song. Lascivious customers leer, toss money and revel in their own unbridled lust. It is a scene that could have been in any of “the hood movies” that once proliferated [...]
The Plot Against Hip Hop party - Oct. 27 at Mo's in Fort Greene By Nelson \| october 13, 2011 \| Post a comment Having a book party at a bar called Mo's in my beloved Fort Greene. Mo's is at 80 Lafayette Avenue near the C and G trains. When you get there you can buy a drink and, more importantly, to purchase a copy of The Plot Against Hip Hop, a murder mystery that uncovers a decades [...]
The Plot Against Hip Hop appearance schedule By Nelson \| august 20, 2011 \| 1 comment My new novel, The Plot Against Hip Hop, will be officially published November 1, 2011. But in the internet era that's a very elastic date. If you go to any of the major on line book sites (Barnes & Nobles, Amazon) or to www.AkashicBooks.com you can pre-order and receive the book well before publication. To [...]
The Plot Against Hip Hop appearance schedule By Nelson \| august 20, 2011 \| Post a comment My new novel, The Plot Against Hip Hop, will be officially published November 1, 2011. But in the internet era that's a very elastic date. If you go to any of the major on line book sites (Barnes & Nobles, Amazon) or to www.AkashicBooks.com you can pre-order and receive the book well before publication. To [...]
M I G R A T I O N (S) a film by Nelson George [teaser] By Nelson \| february 24, 2011 \| 3 comments M I G R A T I O N (S) a film by Nelson George starring Tigist Selam, Saul Williams, Osas Ighoduro, Epee Dingong, Ariane Plubel Coming in 2012 An Urban Romances Production http://nelsondgeorge.net/ http://twitter.com/nelsongeorgehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zrDcyLipvw [...]
Left Unsaid web series By Nelson \| september 22, 2010 \| Post a comment If you haven't checked out my webseries, what y'all waiting for? Go to www.leftunsaidseries.com or to my Nelson George YouTube channel. 19 episodes. 15 women. One brunch in Brooklyn on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. Be well.[...]
New Novel in 2011 By Nelson \| september 22, 2010 \| Post a comment Next fall my next novel, a noir piece that creates a paranoid vision of hip hop history, will be published. I'm holding back giving away the title right now, but will give more details in a few moths. Anyone who like my earlier novel, The Accidental Hunter, will recognize a few of the characters.[...]
New Novel in 2011 By Nelson \| september 22, 2010 \| Post a comment Next fall my next novel, a noir piece that creates a paranoid vision of hip hop history, will be published. I'm holding back giving away the title right now, but will give more details in a few moths. Anyone who like my earlier novel, The Accidental Hunter, will recognize a few of the characters.[...]
City Kid, Nelson George in Brooklyn April 8th and more news By Nelson \| april 6, 2010 \| 4 comments Spring/Summer 2010 is looking busy for the good folks at my company Urban Romances with book, TV, film and internet projects on their way. Thanks for checking out what's up at Urban Romances. City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success, my memoir of growing up in New York City, has just been [...]
Kingston: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 5 comments BLACKATLAS.COM – KINGSTON, JAMAICA Kingston, Jamaica has a tough reputation that dates back to the bloody political turmoil of the ‘70s and the crack wars of the ‘80s. Even dancehall, the hot music that has replaced traditional reggae as the island’s chief musical export, has a deservedly edgy vibe. Before I headed down to Jamaica’s capitol I had all kinds of [...]
Montego Bay: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 6 comments BLACKATLAS.COM – MONTEGO BAY It is near Midnight as I sit on the roof of a floating restaurant called the Houseboat Grill. The air is warm and soft, and moonlight bounces off the lagoon’s placid surface. The menu is filled with tasty Jamaican approaches to seafood. Standing on the deck below you can look into the lagoon and see frisky fish [...]
Toronto: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 2 comments BLACKATLAS.COM - TORONTO Where is the biggest Caribbean street fair in North America? Brooklyn? Maybe District of Columbia or Miami? Nope. It’s up across the Canadian border in the cosmopolitan city on Lake Ontario called Toronto. While you first thought when you hear the name Toronto is probably hockey, Canuck accents and cold weather, the reality of this city is much [...]
London: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| Post a comment BLACKATLAS.COM – LONDON I’ve been going to London since the mid-80s and have always enjoyed its vitality, culture and people. Its food – not so much. But within the last decade the food in this great metropolis has gotten better prepared and more diverse, making a trip to Londontown more rewarding than ever. This city, once the home base for [...]
Bay Area / San Francisco: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 1 comment BLACKATLAS.COM – BAY AREA When you talk about African-American history in Northern California, you have to talk about Willie Brown. He was the first black person to serve as speaker of the California legislature. In that role, Brown was one of the most powerful people in the nation's biggest state for 15 years. After leaving that post he served as the [...]
Miami: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| Post a comment BLACKATLAS.COM - MIAMI As I write these words I am stretched out on a beach chair overlooking the Miami Bay. The sun hovers over me but, in the distance I can see dark clouds slowly rolling my way. Despite being a busy, well traveled metropolitan area, the skies over Miami are quite clear and you can spend lazy vacations afternoons watching [...]
Philadelphia: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| Post a comment BLACKATLAS.COM – PHILADELPHIA Few cities in the United States have as rich, and still vital, African-American musical tradition as Philadelphia. Powerful, inspiring music emerged from the city of brotherly love (and sisterly affection) for decades, from the days of Harold Melvin & the Bluenotes to Jill Scott’s soulful expressions. A key figure in this legacy is Kenny Gamble, one of half of the [...]
Memphis: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 1 comment BLACKATLAS.COM - MEMPHIS On the night of April 4, 1968 I walked into the kitchen of my family’s Brooklyn apartment and joined my mother as she sat in front of a black & white TV with tears in her eyes. Together we watched the a news broadcast about the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at the Lorraine Motel [...]
Los Angeles: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| Post a comment BLACKATLAS.COM - LOS ANGELES For me there is Hollywood and there is Los Angeles, two closely linked but distinctly different places. When I fly to LA to do business a spend a lot of my time in Hollywood, not the geographic area, but an entertainment business state of mind, which encompasses a lot of buildings, restaurants, clubs and sound stages. So the [...]
Barcelona: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 8 comments BLACKATLAS.COM - BARCELONA Barcelona – City of Contrast By Nelson George I’d seen Woody Allen’s ‘Vicky Cristina Barcelona.’ I’d seen Jim Jarmusch’s ‘Limits of Control.’ I talked to several friends who’d either lived in or visited Barcelona. So I was prepared to be disappointed because the city had been hyped in movies, media and via word of mouth. Could it really be that beautiful [...]
Milan: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| Post a comment BLACKATLAS.COM – MILAN DANCING IN MILAN By Nelson George All of Southern Europe goes on vacation in August, a very practical thing to do since air conditioning isn’t nearly as universal as in the States. Milan, one of the world’s fashion capitals, is particularly hard hit, as designers, craftspeople and models all head for the beach or the mountains. So my time in [...]
Rome: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 2 comments BLACKATLAS.COM - ROME The Eternal City has a split personality, one that can work to your advantage when traveling there if you are adventurous and willing to stay up late. On a summer day Rome is a city of lines, if you want to tour the Vatican, the Coliseum, the Pantheon or any of the many magnificent architectural marvels of [...]
Madrid: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 2 comments BLACKATLAS.COM – MADRID Before landing in Madrid my head was filled with visions of bullfights, flamenco and the writer Ernest Hemingway and, to a great degree, the city did not disappoint. Plaza del Toros, Madrid’s massive bullfighting ring, is a beautiful structure that host battles between man and bull Sundays from March to October. Passionate flamenco performances can be seen nightly [...]
Chicago: BlackAtlas.com Blog By Nelson \| november 2, 2009 \| 7 comments BLACK ATLAS.COM – CHICAGO My first trip to Chicago was in February back in 1985 and it totally fulfilled every stereotype if the city. It was icy cold with wintery blasts that cut through my coat like a hot knife through butter. Parts of Lake Michigan were frozen solid and I swear I saw a wild dog scamper across [...]
news: Good Hair / Hip Hop Honors / Black Atlas By Nelson \| october 8, 2009 \| 2 comments GOOD HAIR opens Friday, October 9th! After over two years of hard work, appearances at the Sundance and Toronto film festivals, and much online chatter Good Hair debuts this Friday, October 9th in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Atlanta and [...]
more tales from NELSON GEORGE By Nelson \| july 29, 2009 \| 1 comment GOOD HAIR GOOD HAIR,the non-fiction film I produced with Chris Rock, will hit theaters on October 9 in New York, Los Angeles, [...]
MICHAEL JACKSON (1958-2009) BY NELSON GEORGE By Nelson \| june 26, 2009 \| 15 comments Contact: Nicole Nelch [...]
City Kid Philly/Boston/Chicago/ATL : Good Hair : VH1 Hip Hop Honors By Nelson \| june 16, 2009 \| 2 comments The City Kid is starting a east/midwest/southern trip to promote his memoir. Wednesday, June 17th I'm in Philadelphia at the Barnes & Noble at Rittenhouse Square 1805 Walnut Street to talk and read at 6pm.Tuesday, June 23rd I'm [...]
Nelson George: City Kid on CBS' Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson By Nelson \| may 20, 2009 \| 2 comments [...]
Nelson George: City Kid - BK, Philly, Boston & Chicago By Nelson \| may 11, 2009 \| 1 comment City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success Wednesday, May 13th, 2009Nelson George's Brooklyn: readings about Brownsville & Ft. Greene with Nelson George and Samson Styles of BET. City Kid books will be available via Mobile Libris. @ [...]
Nelson George: City Kid - Brooklyn! Brooklyn! By Nelson \| april 27, 2009 \| 2 comments After a book tour that's taken me to Washington DC, the Bay Area and Los Angeles, I'm back in Brooklyn doing events with the New York Times at the main branch of the Brooklyn Public Library and at the Brooklyn Historical Society. Following up on this local emphasis I'm back shooting interviews for my documentary on the black artistic [...]
Nelson George: City Kid - West Coast & NYC events / more videos By Nelson \| april 15, 2009 \| 1 comment As I roll through the West Coast with City Kid thought I'd post some more vids.. Los Angeles resident Akure Wall allowed me to adapt her spoken word piece 'Defying the Linear' a few years back and much of the footage of the then pregnant poet was shot at West Hollywood's Standard Hotel. '4 1/2 [...]
Nelson George: City Kid - Bay Area & Los Angeles this week! By Nelson \| april 13, 2009 \| Post a comment Though I'm a native New Yorker, the West Coast has played a powerful role in my career and personal life. So I hope you can come out and join me at events in the Bay Area and Los Angeles this week. My schedule follows. Thanks in advance for your kind support. Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 [...]
Nelson George: City Kid events NYC this week! SF/LA next! By Nelson \| april 6, 2009 \| 2 comments Monday, April 6th, 2009Hue-Man Bookstore 2319 Frederick Douglass Blvd btwn 125th & 124th NYC 6pm-8pmTuesday, April 7th, 2009Barnes & Noble Brooklyn Heights 106 Court St btwn State & Schermerhorn BKNY 7pm-9pmWednesday, April 15th, 2009Marcus Bookstore 3900 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd btwn Brockhurst & 32nd St. Oakland, CA 630pm-830pmThursday, April 16th, 2009Book Soup 8818 Sunset [...]
NELSON GEORGE: CITY KID in stores now! By Nelson \| april 2, 2009 \| Post a comment After fifty plus years of life I've published a memoir, City Kid, that looks at my life, friendships, loves, and sundry projects in print, film and television. In conjunction with its publication I'm doing readings on both coasts and posting plenty of content on the web. So come see me in your town and check out my many videos (and [...]
A Survivor's Tale By Nelson \| march 25, 2009 \| 7 comments written, directed & photographed byNELSON GEORGESAMSON STYLESas The Survivoredited byNICOLE NELCH© 2009 URBAN ROMANCES[...]
CITY KID: BookPage Review By Nelson \| march 20, 2009 \| Post a comment “Living for the City: Nelson George grew up in very different surroundings, in the projects of Brownsville in Brooklyn, where he and his kid sister were raised in a single-parent household. City Kid: A Writer’s Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success traces George’s ascent to influential journalist, author (books on hip-hop, Motown and more) and filmmaker (he is the [...]
Nelson George: City Kid "Voices Inside My Head" (excerpt) By Nelson \| march 15, 2009 \| 2 comments City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul SuccessbyNELSON GEORGEVOICES INSIDE MY HEADWhen Baker made her New York concert debut at Avery Fisher Hall on the heels of Rapture, I was in the fourth row. That night she certainly fulfilled my need for the transcendental. Many in the crowd must have shared my eagerness to hear her, [...]
Nelson George: City Kid "Talking Head" (excerpt) By Nelson \| march 8, 2009 \| Post a comment City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul SuccessbyNELSON GEORGETALKING HEAD (excerpt)Looking back, I can see that my career, and that of my eighties peers, was aided to a great degree by a profound change in white America’s attitudes toward black creativity. Despite the outright hostility of the ruling GOP administration toward the poor and people of [...]
Nelson George: City Kid "Kings from Queens" (excerpt) By Nelson \| march 2, 2009 \| Post a comment City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul SuccessbyNELSON GEORGEKINGS FROM QUEENS (excerpt)The next big hip-hop event I attended was the Sugarhill Convention held at the Harlem Armory. It was 1981, and rap records were becoming the hottest items uptown. On the bill were Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, the Treacherous Three, and several other uptown [...]
Nelson George: City Kid By Nelson \| february 22, 2009 \| 15 comments A mini-doc of Nelson George's upcoming book release: "City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Succes" (April 2009, Viking). City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success by NELSON GEORGE IntroductionThis book is called City Kid because, well, quite honestly I couldn’t survive in the suburbs or the country. I don’t drive. Malls give me hives, [...]
BLACKDANCE By Nelson \| january 26, 2009 \| 1 comment Tuesday was the inauguration of the 44th President of the United States. You don't need me to tell you what went down in Washington, D.C. It was a moment of triumphant American history. I watched this amazing event from a bar in Park City, Utah, where I was a small part of American cinematic history. I was in Park [...]
CITY KID: Publishers Weekly Review By Nelson \| january 24, 2009 \| 1 comment City Kid: A Writer's Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success Nelson George. Viking, $25.95 (248p) ISBN 978-0-670-02036-2 In his vivid and charming memoir, novelist and screenwriter George (Hip Hop America) recounts incidents from an eventful life that has ranged from a tough upbringing by his single mother in Brooklyn in the 1960s to a career of assorted writing [...]
Good Hair at 2009 Sundance Film Festival By Nelson \| january 14, 2009 \| 1 comment GOOD HAIRUS Documentary Feature FilmsU.S.A., 2009, 95 mins., colorWhen Chris Rock’s daughter, Lola, came up to him crying and asked, “Daddy, how come I don’t have good hair?” the bewildered comic committed himself to search the ends of the earth and the depths of black culture to find out who had put that question into his little girl's head! Director Jeff [...]
Best Music Writing 2008 (DeCapo Press): PowellsBooks.Blog By Nelson \| january 14, 2009 \| Post a comment In honor of editing the Best Music Writing 2008 for DeCapo Press Powell's Book had me as a guest author for their blog the first week of December 2008. My five blogs are titled: The Author as Sociologist and Politcian, The Return of Rhythm and Blues, Sweet Melvin's Baadasssss Song, The Sundance Sofa and Bleak [...]
A BARBER'S TALE on STARWORKS By Nelson \| january 14, 2009 \| 1 comment Catching up on the blog posts...Last year Jauretsi Saizarbitoria posted about my short film "A Barber's Tale on STARWORKS. Written & Directed by Nelson George, starring Reg E. Cathey (The Wire) and edited by TreVZ (The New Pop) Check it out here: http://starworksny.com/blog/2008/11/07/barbers-tale/[...]
Soul Cities CHICAGO Jerry "The Ice Man" Butler Interview By Nelson \| january 14, 2009 \| 1 comment Jerry "The Ice Man" Butler was the original lead singer of the R&B vocal group The Impressions and is also a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee. His work with Otis Redding and Cur He continues to perform and also currently serves as Commissioner for Cook County, Illinois.Due to technical difficulties we weren't able [...]
Soul Cities on vh1 soul By Nelson \| october 4, 2008 \| 12 comments My vh1 soul series, Soul Cities, is scheduled to debut on November 11 at 9p.m. with a trip to the City of Brotherly Love. It will be the first of six shows in the travel series. More info and pix to come. peace[...]
Looking for help with ‘Soul Cities’ By Nelson \| june 12, 2008 \| 13 comments I’ll be traveling around America this summer in search of bands, singers, bars, clubs and clothing stores and interesting stuff related to the feeling and culture of Soul for my VH1 series Soul Cities. I’m not looking for tourist spots but places and spaces that only the locals know. The cities I’ve visiting are New [...]
Soul Stuff: The James Brown Reader and Soul Cities By Nelson \| may 9, 2008 \| Post a comment There’s a great review of the recently published The James Brown Reader in the LA Times this weekend. Veteran music journalist R.J. Smith gave the book a fantastic write up. Go look it up. There are pictures from party’s for the book held in LA and NY on my Facebook and MySpace pages… In more [...]
Soul Stuff: The James Brown Reader and Soul Cities By Nelson \| may 9, 2008 \| 1 comment There’s a great review of the recently published The James Brown Reader in the LA Times this weekend. Veteran music journalist R.J. Smith gave the book a fantastic write up. Go look it up. There are pictures from party’s for the book held in LA and NY on my Facebook and MySpace pages… In more [...]
The James Brown Reader: 50 Years of Writing About the Godfather of Soul By Nelson \| april 21, 2008 \| Post a comment Next week a labor of love I’ve worked on over the last year is being published. ‘The James Brown Reader: 50 Years of Writing About the Godfather of Soul’ (Plume) was sparked by an email from the veteran music scribe Vernon Gibbs, who noted that he made an profile about James Brown in wrote while [...]
Vintage Soul By Nelson \| april 12, 2008 \| 2 comments Maybe because I’ve been developing a soul travel show for VH1 Soul I’ve been listening to a lot of new and old soul music. At first I thought it was just me, but there’s been extraordinary around the music and culture in the last two years. Lots of new live acts. Lots of new records, especially from the United Kingdom. [...]
My Life As an Erotic Writer By Nelson \| march 28, 2008 \| 1 comment Though best known as a writer of non-fiction about black culture, I have had a life n the DL as a writer of erotic fiction. My first foray was the swinger novel Show & Tell, which featured, not a love triangle, but a love square with four people involved in a series of erotic encounters. [...]
She’s Gotta Have It Revisited By Nelson \| march 25, 2008 \| 7 comments After years of negotiation and delay She’s Gotta Have It is finally on dvd. I watched it the other night after not seeing in ten or so years. It was a film that changed many things, including my life. After meeting Spike Lee through a friend, I found that he lived two blocks from me [...]
The Wire - Post Soul Series By Nelson \| march 9, 2008 \| 2 comments I know it wasn’t a “black” show. Most of the writers were white men. Only a few of the directors were of color, though more were the last two seasons. And black women weren’t as prominent or deeply explored as the brothers. Yet The Wire, which ended tonight after five mostly brilliant seasons, presented the [...]
Passing Strange: The Great Black Boho Rock Musical By Nelson \| march 8, 2008 \| 1 comment Stew and his band, the Negro Problem, had been making the rounds of the rock world for well over a decade. Like most black rock bands they were marginalized, not part of the world of mainstream black music and had found very little love in the rock mainstream. But Stew was a sharp witted, ambitious lyricist with facility in [...]
Baduism circa 2008 By Nelson \| march 6, 2008 \| 1 comment Erykah Badu’s New Amerykah:Part One (4th World War) is a complicated mesh of soul, electro sounds and references, simple and obscure. The lady is one of the great eccentric’s in pop music and it’s a pleasure to have her making music again after a six year absence. That much of the album is produced by [...]