The Fufu Stew Blog

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This post is in memory of my best friend... the one who put the crazy notion in my head to create some sort of franchise called Fufu Stew some twenty five years ago... I will never NOT miss you, Mike. Fly on, brother...

"I hope to refine music, study it, try to find some area that I can unlock. I don't quite know how to explain it but it's there. These can't be the only notes in the world, there's got to be other notes some place, in some dimension, between the cracks on the piano keys." - Marvin Gaye

...or, perhaps shoving square pegs into round holes is more my speed. Yeah, that's it.

In any event, this time around finds me still settling into a groove of sorts. Real life, way too many mortality checks, and the recent addition to the fur family that I like to call Champion... his name is officially Champ, with a not so subtle nod to Alan Hawkshaw and Willie Mitchell, but I've been binge watching old wrestling TV from the 90s. Yeah, my mental health is in question every second, but I have a damn good support team, without whom, I wouldn't be typing this annual post right now. Also, while living in the armpit of the country continues to be a challenge, I still prefer it over living in Baltimore to a fault. I miss all my friends to pieces, but yeah, that explains away the last twelve months. I'm older, in more pain, and still trying in earnest to continue producing a weekly show... I missed a few weeks along the way, but again, real life.

Before I go another step further, I must thank Larry once again... also Chris, Dave and Darren, Todd, Chas and Ivy, Phast Phreddie, of course Kev and Denise, Connie T. Empress and Kitty the DIsc Jockey, the Safe As Milk Media Club, the #45bandits team, Timothy, Snoop and Bob... most assuredly, Leslie, for putting up with, and subsequently enabling my never ending habit, which is still far and away more rewarding than that six year stretch back in the early 90s... and with the aid of a newly acquired ultrasonic cleaning apparatus, I still fully intend to play every record I own, archive a bunch, purge a bunch more, and continue to produce not just one weekly show, but four. Here's the Readers Digest version of what I hope to accomplish:

-The week will begin with trying to simulcast the Funky16Corners Radio Show as often as I can, along with a classic from the archives... in the event that I miss a week (which is almost inevitable, no thanks to the demands of the day job), you can always catch it at thefaceradio.com, as well as the Iron Leg Radio Show
-Fufu Radio will always be the constant though... if I follow my work schedule, then the show should happen without fail once a week on alternating Tuesdays and Wednesdays... and there will be a twist added, once the final setup is complete. You may or may not recall when one of my desktop PCs blew up a few months back. Thankfully I only lost a small, yet insignificant amount of data during the transfer, but the aim is to still get everything I've stockpiled over the last twenty years on to one hard drive and store it like I store my records... I'm always discovering things that I've long since forgotten I even had.
-Thursday or Friday will start to see me return to the old tried and true mixtapes, just like I used to make when I was blogging, complete with yet another twist. I'm taking good notes. This should happen once a month, because careful preparation...
Saturday or Sunday will see an all new season of NoShow, and the long awaited return of Deviants From The Norm, or some reasonable facsimile. These will also happen once a month.
I chose those days for those shows because they all fall on a day off from work, except for the weekend... I get a huge workload every other day, so the days off alternate. That works well because I get most of the day and the night before to prepare...

And there you have it. It's the best I have to give, and it also affords me the opportunity to not have to rely on streaming fails. The debate rages on about using Spotify... personally, I don't use streaming platforms anymore if I can help it. I like tangible objects first and foremost, that much has been well documented. Streaming is good from a "try before you buy" standopint though, failing not being able to find a link on YouTube. Ive loved making mixtapes for the last forty years, and I've got to give a shoutout to Morgan for planting that seed in my head back in 1984... I still do love it, and will continue to do so until I can no longer. As I reach the golden years as it were, I'm gonna look at life just like my Champion does... I may be old but I still think young. Of course there's limitations involved, but I simply cannot give up this passion. I won't give it up. It's only natural that I share it with all of you, whenever you "click the link". If it offers you a even a small measure of enjoyment... that makes me happy... but with the ongoing tribulations that go along with keeping this 10X10 corner of living space controlled, I've got way too much music to digest, and hardly any time to really enjoy it. This is where my trusty cell phone comes into play, because even when I can't be in "The Box", I still listen to my records, CDs and files whenever and wherever I can. It gives me solace, and trust, I need all the solace I can get... As always, thank you for your continued patience and patronage, as I continue to work on this perpetual work in progress.

My social media presence has changed too, but all of that will be explained away as we move into what is supposed to be a new year... remember what Janis Joplin plainly stated: "it's all the same fucking day, man". I mean, a customer said to me that yesterday is gone, and tomorrow hasn't happened yet, which ties in with my "live one second at a time" credo right nicely. Do it now. Do it good. All that aside, here's hoping that 2024 will reveal better things than we've been forced to see for so many years before... most of us could use a break from the monotony.

I sure hope to see you all soon. Have fun(k), and PLEASE be safe because it really ain't safe no more. I love you all.

Peace and blessings.