On New Year’s Day, Oscar Grant III, a 22 year old young man, was fatally shot by a BART Police Officer while laying face down on the ground in custody at the Fruitvale BART Station. There are multiple witnesses, hard evidence, and video footage that captured this irresponsible, devastating event in action. The victim was restrained on the platform when a fatal shot from a BART police officer took his life. Please take time to educate yourself and spread the word- this is an injustice, and those responsible should be held accountable.

Read the full story here.

Jimmie Brown, a cousin of Oscar Grant, a 22-year-old Hayward man shot to death on New Year’s Day, signs a poster at a makeshift memorial at the BART Fruitvale Station, site of the killing. (Michael Maloney / The Chronicle)

5 Things You Can Do Right Now About the Oscar Grant Shooting

Share w/ your peeps

by Makani Themba-Nixon

1. Digg the story so that the national media can pick up on it (Thanks, Jabari For this link):
http://digg.com/world_news/Oakland_Police_Officer_Shoots_Unarmed_Man_Handcuffed_Man
or
http://digg. com/world_news/Oakland_Police_Officer_Shoots_Unarmed_Man_Handcuffed_Man?OTC-em-st1

2. Contact BART Director Carole Ward Allenand demand that 1) the officers involved be taken off duty without pay and charged and fully prosecuted; 2) there be an independent investigation of the shooting that includes a review of training and hiring practices; and 3) BART establish an independent residents’ review board for the police Call her at 510-464-6095 or email the BART Directors at BoardofDirectors@bart.gov

3. Call the BART police to complain about the officers’ conduct and demand immediate action:

Internal Affairs: Sergeant David Chlebowski 510.464.7029, dchlebo@bart.gov

Chief of Police: Gary Gee 510.464.7022, ggee@bart.gov

Call them toll free at 877.679.7000 and press the last four digits of the phone number you wish to reach.

4. Talk it up on your blogs, networks and talk radio shows (call Michael Baisden 877-6BADBOY or Rev. Al, etc. to get this on the national radar)

5. Stay tuned for other actions, protests, etc., especially if you are in the Bay.

peace,
makani

For those who haven;’t seen the horrific video take a look and note that this our tax dollars at work:

http://www.ktvu.com/video/18409133/index.html

Via Papalodown and Dj Phatrick.

The iLL-Lit blog is officially a year old!!!!!! We’re working on banging out an EP so we have something for you for real for real this year.  In the meantime, here are some more mottos for the new year, use to your own disclosure:

GRIND IN 09!

WAITED IN 08ed, GET MINE IN 09!

SUBLIME IN 09!

WINE AND DINE IN 09!

SWINE IN 09!

KEVIN FEDERLINE IN 09!

CLICHÉ TAGLINE IN 09!

iLL Homie Dandiggity is a poet, artist, teacher, PR manager for sneaker company PLSTK, and an extraordinarily wonderful being with a vibrant energy! AND he’s the only guy we know who can rock a Dragonball Z afro without fail. This month, he’s featured on, Design Rehab, a blog by Creative Strategist Barry Lai. You can find him under a segment appropriately entitled Healthy Hustle, featuring entrepreneurs and young hustlas like our Dandiggs!

Check out his feature HERE!

We finally got some pix from the Keys 2 the City show we did with Blu and U-N-I!  From all different angles, son!  Check them out after the jump.
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All right Barack, we did everything we could to get you in office, but only under the condition that we’d keep it real with you when you fucked up, and yo, you fucked up when you invited anti-gay rights pastor Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at your inauguration.  WORD???  Did you not notice that there were kind of a lot of people who were upset about Prop 8 passing?  Letting the grand wizard of homophobia kick off your presidency might not be exactly the kind of response we were hoping for from you.

For us commonfolk, there’s an online petition that’s circulating to convince the Obama transition team to give Warren the boot.  Hopefully Barack listens and switches that fool out.  That’s some change we can believe in.

Sign the petition here.

It’s been nearly a year since we launched the Papa Lo Down, following our publicist Paloma Belara’s one-stop guide to the independent artist’s hustle.  As we go into the second year, we’ve given the page a design makeover, and have a sharper focus on all the lo-down you need to get it poppin!  (okay that was lame, but the NEW PAPALODOWN.COM isn’t!)

*Keep it locked, we’ll be redesigning Adrizzle.com, Rubyisill.com, and *gasp, could it be???* Dahlak and Nico shall be joining the blogosphere.

“Veridiano-Ching adds a distinctive voice to timeless conversations…”

Read more

Calling all beauty queens (and kings too!)!! The saucy fly mamas over at M.I.S.S. Crew is sponsoring a Miss Universe Contest! Win your free copy of the Miss Universe book and Miss Universe Earrings (Made Jewelry) by submitting a poetry piece (no longer than 1 page) to Miss Crew’s website, and Ruby (aka Miss Universe herself) will be reading over the entries and helping pick the winner. Come onnnn…you know you got a poem handy already! Plus, it would make such a wonderful holiday present. Hint Hint. CLICK HERE TO ENTER CONTEST

What???? I thought we were on break???  Perhaps not.  Last night Dahlak caught a conference call with us to figure out our set for tonight’s show with Blu and UNI, and headed straight to rehearsal with the Hi-Lifes to prepare for tomorrow’s show in Sac.  Yessirreee, the Natural Electricity tour was a hit and we’re bringing it all back home now!  Tonight and tomorrow supposedly mark our last shows of the year, but you never know.

So it seems iLL-Lit has been upgraded to last-minute opening act status here in the Bay, and with the dope artists we’ve been getting stage time with, it’s not a bad place to be.  Tomorrow we’ll be hitting the Independent in San Francisco to kick it off for LA’s Blu and U-N-I! The show is a part of Imeem’s Keys 2 the City, a series documenting musicians like The Roots and Raphael Saadiq and their interactions with their hometowns.

Cop your tix here. And check out Blu and U-N-I’s Keys 2 the City pieces after the jump!
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Okay, so this birthday bloggy comes a day late, but for real, Pops.  Between you taking your sabbatical and sharing a bornday with Hova, I’m sure you can understand why it might’ve slipped from our blogconsciousness for a second.  But on the real, happy birthday, and we love you despite your eerie obsession with Atmosphere.

Read about Paloma’s adventures at Papalodown.com

Adriel has prepared a Kanye-style response:

It is beyond me why there are people who take the time to travel all the way to shows with unattainable expectations in their hearts and then who are going to be all pissy when what they get doesn’t fit into their tiny little world view of what should or should not happen at these shows… why not just STAY AT HOME AND REVIEW YOUR LEFTOVERS MOLDING YOU’D PROBABLY HAVE A BETTER TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I’M ALL FOR CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM BUT I REFUSE TO PAY ATTENTION TO PEOPLE WHO CALL THEMSELVES PRESS AND THEN USE SARCASM AND ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT THE AUDIENCE TO PIECE TOGETHER A SORRY EXCUSE FOR A REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1!!!!!!!!  OF COURSE THERE WEREN’T A LOT OF PEOPLE AT THE SHOW… WHAT PART OF “EXIBITION SHOWCASE AT A SMALL VENUE ON A WEDNESDAY BY AN INDIE GROUP DOING A NONCONVENTIONAL GENRE IN A NONCONVENTIONAL FORMAT” DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND??????????????????????  DID IT MAYBE CROSS YOUR CLOSED-MINDED MINDS THAT YES SOME OF THE PEOPLE AT THE SHOW ARE FRIENDS (BECAUSE WE HAVE FRIENDS, DOY) BUT THAT MOST PEOPLE THERE ACT FAMILIAR WITH US BECAUSE THEYRE RETURNING FANS FROM PAST SHOWS AND PEOPLE WHO FEEL PERSONALLY CONNECTED TO US BECAUSE WE KEEP IT TRILL WITH OUR FANS?????……. IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR A STADIUM OF PEOPLE WHO DON’T KNOW EACH OTHER MAYBE YOU SHOULD GO TO A MILEY CYRUS CONCERT I’M SURE IT WOULD BE RIGHT UP YOUR ALLEY. ILL-LIT IS DOING SOMETHING THAT IS OUT OF THE NORM, WITH NO OUTSOURCED PROMO OR MANAGEMENT SO EXCUSE US IF WE DON’T DRAW CHEETAH GIRLS NUMBERS… AND OF COURSE IF WE’RE GOING TO BE DOING HIP-HOP AND SPOKEN WORD THERE ARE GOING TO BE ASPECTS “TYPICAL” TO A HIP HOP AND SPOKEN WORD SET LIKE CALL-AND-RESPONSE. THERES A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THINGS THAT ARE CLICHE AND THINGS THAT ARE FOUNDATIONS.  NEXT YOU’RE PROBABLY GOING TO SAY THAT WE WEREN’T BREAKING BARRIERS BECAUSE WE WORE PANTS LIKE OTHER “TYPICAL” ARTISTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!… BUT HAVE YOU EVER SEEN IN-DEPTH SOCIAL COMMENTARY DISCUSSED AT A CLUB STANDING ROOM ONLY???  DID YOU SEE ALL THE PEOPLE AT OUR SHOW LOSING THEIR FREAKING MINDS AND SPAZZING OUT ON THE FLOOR?????  DID YOU NOT NOTICE OUR FULL BAND THE HI-LIFES, LIGHTING, AND 60-OUT-OF-75 MINUTES WORTH OF MUSIC ALL THAT YOU FAILED TO MENTION????  NO SO SHUT YOUR TRAP!!!! AND THEOPHILUS LONDON IS THE FUTURE OF BROOKLYN HIP HOP AND WHAT YOU CALL “EMO RAPS” IS ARTISTIC TRANSPARENCY THAT’S DIFFERENT FROM THE BLING AND HOS AND MONEY TALKS THAT YOU PRESS PEOPLE HAVE BEEN HAILING AS GROUNDBREAKING FOR CENTURIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AND ALSO CAN I SAY THAT IF A SHOW’S DOORS OPEN AT 8 AND IT ENDS UP STARTING AT 10:30…………………………..THAT’S PRETTY DAMNED GOOD!!!!!  WHAT TYPE OF BILL COSBY HIP-HOP SHOWS DO YOU GO TO THAT START ON TIME?????????????  YOUR NEGATIVE ENERGY CAN’T STOP US FROM CHANGING THE UNIVERSE AND YOU CAN’T REVIEW AN EXPERIENCE, SQUIDBRAINS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We got a chance to link up with the dope folk of Karmaloop TV while we were out in Boston College, and here’s what we created with them! Watch here for Adriel’s account on the true-life, secret history of iLL-Literacy- NEVER HEARD BEFORE!

Looks like Karmaloop had the exclusive. Now you can too.

2008 has been a big year.  We went on our first full music tour.  Ruby dropped a book.  Dahlak dropped a mixtape.  We elected Barack.  Nico started using the word “awesome” a lot.

This month, Adriel will be documenting the songs that soundtracked his year, and that inevitably, he forced into the lives of the rest of iLL-Lit through countless burnt CDs on countless roadtrips to rehearsals, gigs, and taco trucks.  Get your eardrums f*cked at Adrizzle.com.

Okay, that was an OJ quote.

It’s turkey day! Make sure you get all the sweet potatoes, mac&cheese, cornbread, and greens in your system, because you’ll be burning it all off on the dancefloor tonight at Dahlak’s Kanye West Tribute party!  Celebrating the release of Dahlak’s new mixtape Commencement, as well as Yeezy’s 808’s and Heartbreaks, the night is sure to be fiiiiiiiiiiiiyahhhhhhh!  You know everyone at the family party will be knocked out by 10 anyway.