Title says it all, right. Let’s go.
Prince. And really, I’m not sure why. Having the music is enough for me, and I don’t think there’s anything about meeting women he could tell me. Not because I know it all, but because I’m sure the game that works for him works only for him. But if I want to talk to him, I know what I should do–move to Minneapolis and wait at home for him to knock on my door passing out pamphlets he picked up at Kingdom Hall.
Jim Brown. Because I want to know what it’s like to stare the scariest cat on earth dead in the face.
Beyonce. I doubt I’d have anything to say. But I would have time to throw something on the ground behind her and hope she’d have to bend over to pick it up. With no bend in her knee. And a smile and “thank you” when she got back up. And she’s got a card for free food from Popeyes.
Jay-Z. Before I meet Beyonce, I’d like to make sure he won’t be hatin on the folk. In a somewhat related note, I wonder who’d take over Def Jam if something untoward were to happe to President Carter.
Nas. To give him the list I compiled of all the factual errors on “I Can.” Once a teacher, always a teacher.
Terrell Owens. Just so I could shake the shit out of him and tell him to act like he’s got some damn sense. I do think he’ll be on his best behavior this season, though.
Kanye West. Just so I could shake the shit out of him and tell him to act like he’s got some damn sense.
Dave Chappelle. If only to find out how in the world he does it. Perhaps the smartest entertainer working today.
Bob Johnson. I’ve never been able to figure Bob out. Is he really a shameless profiteer or is he somehow conflicted by some of the things he’s done? Only he could tell.
Clarence Thomas. Because no one can be that self-loathing. It’s just not possible. I’d have to meet him myself.
Ric Flair. So I could take notes and learn what it’s like to be the Nature Boy.
Glen “Big Baby” Davis. Really, he looks like a lotta fun to hang out with. However, he might be the dude that you just tell, “man, shut that up and watch TV.” But then again, I think someone told me that last night.
Big Boi. To see what it’s like to be the coolest dude in Atlanta. And have a VIP parking spot at every shake joint in the South. I don’t know if he has that, but if anyone does…
Jack Nicholson. Because I’m sure that within twenty minutes, I can talk him into letting me hang with him at a Lakers game. But then again, I couldn’t convince Simmons to let me hang with him at a Clippers game. Maybe I need to shoot for Dyan Cannon instead. She ain’t cool as Jack, though.
Devin the Dude. Because you know it would be the most fun imaginable, and probably on a budget of about eight bucks.
Oprah. Just to look in her fridge. My sister once said she thinks Oprah probably just eats the hearts of watermelons. No seeds, just the good red in the middle. If that’s how it’s gettin down in Oprahland, I’d play it just like Chappelle did.
Wyclef Jean. Cuz you know he’s got prime Lauryn Hill stories. You just know he does.
Bernie Taupin. Cuz you know he’s got prime Elton John stories. You just know he does.
John Hope Franklin. True story–I’ve got a friend here whose brother keeps dodging John Hope Franklin. The professor knew him when he was a little boy, and my boy’s brother seems totally disinterested in going to see him. If it didn’t involve tricking an old man, I’d go to his house and pretend to be this dude. Just to soak up the knowledge. Probably the greatest living scholar in this country.
Too $hort. It seems I’m the only person in Atlanta that hasn’t had a chance meeting with Too $hort. But I’d want to meet him because every story involves him just being the coolest cat ever. Totally unassuming, just hangin’ out and playing pool. Oh yeah, while slews of bad women parade around his house. Gettin it…
IMr Whitefolks (from Pimps Up, Ho’s Down). Because there’s no way he’s a real person. Except that he is.
Hal Varian. To ask him why his graduate micro book doesn’t have more examples. Forgive me, but I just saw it on my shelf and had to mention that point.
David Ritz. Because he wrote my favorite biography, Divided Soul: The Life and Times of Marvin Gaye, which is essential reading for anyone that claims to love Marvin’s music. An incredibly engaging book, one tha thelped me dcide that I wanted to do this for a living.
Chuck D. I once saw Chuck in Lenox Square in Atlanta, and it remains the only time I’ve ever been starstruck. And all he was doing was sitting down on a rail or something. I had so many things to say, but I was too busy letting my eyes glass over to get those things out.
You. I think. Not sure. But if you’re smokin hot, we can do that. Send a pic if you’ve got it, shit.
16 Comments
by Lil' Tiffany
Nice list. Oprah is definitely on my list of people to meet in my lifetime. And not only Beyonce but the entire group of Destiny’s Child, but for different reasons than you. And for reason I would like to sit down and talk with Whitney and Bobby, just want to know what is going on inside of their heads.
by Quibian 'Q' Salazar-Moreno
I’m not going to send you a pic… i’m spoken for. Sorry to disappoint you…
I met Chuck D once, he was doing a signing at my school and he signed my book, the one he wrote. Anyway, it was the year that the Broncos and Falcons played in the Super Bowl and on his website, Chuck was really pulling for the Falcons, sort of dissing the Broncos. So the Broncos won and all that.
When he came to my school (a state college), he was sporting a Broncos hat and the idiot that I am, I called him out on it. Why was he wearing a Broncos hat when he was rooting for the Falcons? He said, “I rooted for the Broncos the year before (they beat the Packers), and I always go for the underdog. But since i was Denver today, I thought I’d represent”
So yeah, out of all the things I could have talked to Chuck D about, I had to be stupid and try to start an argument about football…
by Cobb
Here’s the scoop on Jim Brown. He looks at you like he’s a lion. Remember the comic sketch by Richard Pryor talking about how an African lion looks at you like if took your narrow ass out of that Land Rover…
I was at a party up at his house and he was basically holding court and randomly swatting people out of ass-kissing range. He’s like a tired rock star trying in this particular case to remind people exactly how close he was to God made flesh. After about ten minutes of this I had had my fill.. it kind of degenerated into.. Raquel Welch? Yeah I fucked her. Sonia Braga? yeah her too.. the list went on and on.
I basically left with the distinct impression that he was a caged lion. Here he was in your standard 12,000 foot Beverly Hills mansion (yes he had a full basketball court in the basement – I think of it every time I hear the Charlie Murphy / Prince joke) and he seemed trapped. At the time, some lawyers were all over his ass about some tramp he bothered to pay attention too, but slapped around. Bet he wished he was back with Raquel.
He walks the walk. No doubt he would have been a king. I think it’s hard for people to get their heads around the fact that there are people like this in the world and they simply live in a different plane of existence. Yet even the lions don’t have their historians.
by Cobb
Hey I just realized that I met John Hope Franklin too. While I’m at it, I’ll mention other notable blackfolks I’ve had the privilege of meeting.. nah, why give you the traffic? heh.
But seriously, a couple things. I want to first acknowledge that I don’t disrespect Jim Brown in any way, but that I wanted to express how much larger in life he is in some ways and how disconcerting it is to know that most of us, his tribe as it were, are completely unable to grasp how large a character he is. Plus I wanted to say that this party was back in ’88 or so. More on that later…
Regarding John Hope Franklin. I met him at Wyatt Tee Walker’s church in Harlem around about ’91. He is, bar none, one of the classiest people I’ve ever met. He is a completely genuine scholar – one whom you can tell has a complete grasp of his subject matter and loves to see when people get it. I detected a touch of sadness in the kind of idolatry tossed up at him. He’s all about the subject.
He’s like a gentle mother changing a baby. He obviously smells the shit, but for him its just part of the natural process. He can talk about the most disturbing aspects of slavery or whatever and never cross the line into politics. He’s simply all about what happened and what makes it interesting and the lessons that might perhaps be learnt. He just wants people to get it right and not be afraid to look at it straight. He’s not about ‘ought to do’ but ‘ought to know’.
You can look at him and still see a little gifted smiling black boy in short pants and shiny shoes without an angry bone in his body. And yet in his eyes you know he sees everything. The world doesn’t surprise him. He just wishes he had more time to make you get it.
by Rex
You may want to ammend your statement regarding Okies, Bo.
🙂
You know John Hope Franklin is an Oklahoma native?
Interesting list. I’m not sure it would be as easy for me to compile a list of 25 living people. Most people I’d want to meet have passed on…
by Shot Clock
Regarding Dave Chapelle and how in the world he does it: WEED, lots and lots…and lots of WEED.
I don’t know if walking away from the biggest cable television contract in the history of television helps the whole “smartest entertainer” thing. I totally support him for being a stand-up guy (not the comedy kind), but he should have somehow made it work while maintaining his creative freedom. It would have been a legendary show, even though his first 3 seasons already are without a doubt. I just don’t know if he will be able to touch that many people on a constant basis with his humor again. We need his humor badly. And we need someone to touch those topics that he only dares to touch. I just fear that he’ll just give up knowing that he had his big chance to let everyone hear him and now it’s over. I have to utmost respect for him, I just wish the show would have gone on, and Comedy Central wasn’t trying to make him change.
Anyways, Jiggaman would be a trip to meet. You think he would just rap his whole conversation with you? I’ve seen video of him where he’s just pulled out rhymes from all different cd’s on the spot when people ask him questions. It’s so effortless and real that you see that he’s really an artist.
Also, how do you leave MJ off the list? You don’t want to meet the GOAT? I might want to meet him more than anyone, he seems like a real bright and introspective dude. I mean, he’s responsible for all this big paper that ballers are getting away from the game, including the shoe deals, and the sports drinks…I just think the man’s a living legend.
by nikki
and if ‘you’ are a smoking hot GUY, send your photo to ME (cuz i’m sure bomani ain’t gonna do ish wit it).
by jdiva216
It’s funny, When I was at FAMU (**cough** back in the day) “From Slavery to Freedom” was of course, required reading for history classes. My son is there now as a freshman and when he emailed his book list for his classes….there it was.
by Fred Batiste, A Weapon of Mass Destruction
Say Shot Clock…
Bo already knows the GOAT (wink, wink). Six or seven years strong, kin folk. But I digress…
But Naitch, Jigga, Mr. Whitfolk$, Too $hort,
Jim Brown, Prince, Chuck D, Wyclef and Devin the Dude…Dude great minds DO think alike..
But for me, I would want to meet Victor Newman (I know he’s just a character). But just to tell the dude that plays him that he’s had such an impact on my young life.
by Kirk
Fred, you got the wrong damn Vince. Vince McMahon is the one, for many reasons, not all of them good. If it’s the whole McMahon family, so be it, even better. I’d pay good money just to see Shane and Stephanie get into some petty sibling argument that ends with Shane dropkicking a garbage can lid into her face from the roof of the house. And don’t even lie, you know damn well that’s what happens. But, I digress…
No list of my own, but could care less about most of these. Oh well.
by Mr Carter
Nice one, sans Maya Angelou. I had the privilege, and no bullsh*t, if you were ever to meet Jesus, it would probably be something like that. The stature. The wisdom. The burden of a people.
by Stephanie
Met Jay Z in ’95. We lived in the same building (Not in Marcy. It was a condo building on State St. in Brooklyn, around the corner from the proposed new Nets stadium.) Pre-Reasonable Doubt, and the beginning of world domination. Back when he had the Lex featured in the “Feelin’ It” video. He drove that car everywhere. Whatever was jumping off in BK that summer, you saw that Lex outside. My car broke down and he made a show of taking a look at it. One line spoken to me while peering at my engine, “I don’t really know anything about cars.” It was pretty obvious at that point, but also proof that chivalry is not dead. I was co-producing a short film at the time, which led to a meeting with Dame Dash re: Streets Is Watching. Not pleasant.
Most of my list are dead people. If time travel were possible I would love to meet Miles Davis (late sixties, early seventies) and Jean Michel Basquiat. Re: Miles I would have been a total groupie.
Miles groupie, ha? Hope you’ve got a concrete jaw.
by Rachel S.
Damn, I’m not on the list. LOL!! Just kidding….but seriously that list is devoid of women. I know there are a few, but not many.
by Stephanie
Perused the list again, and must agree with Rachel S. Also, met Too Short when I was working as a P.A. on the video for “Top Down” (Cocktails album) He mistook me for one of the dancers. (I did used to wear the “daisy dukes” pretty short back then). Seemed cool I guess. He’s definitely a cat that’s used to having things his way. ’95 was a hell of a year.
by Miss_Swizzle
Bomani Jones. I can only imagine the meaningful conversation we would have..
by ChapsMom
I’m smokin’ hott but you already know that!
Why isn’t Chaplin Moore on your list? Don’t tell me you don’t like white people!