Maybe I’m setting up a double-standard, but I don’t care: When indie rockers go ethnic and Mediterranean (that means you, Beirut), my gut reaction tends to be skepticism. (I guess I’m slightly more tolerant of Gogol Bordello, because Eugene Hutz is actually, y’know, from another country.) So why am I willing to give hip-hop producer Oh No a total pass for testing out the bouzouki tip? Maybe it’s because Dr. No’s Oxperiment, his “audio tour of Turkish, Lebanese, Greek & Italian psyche funk,” doesn’t purport to be a broad statement about cross-cultural unity (or emotional authenticity, for that matter). He’s merely sticking to a theme and indulging an urge, while managing that urge very closely. The results are unencumbered by over-arching identity issues, and yet the disc still seems to respect its source material deeply. Hip-hop can be good like that.

Who needs bass in the trunk, when you can have it on the trunk? The Final Destination Band:

I think these are the same people. Note the scolding at the end:

Erykah Badu will be “hosting” the Howard University homecoming show at Liv Nightclub tonight, but it looks like much of the music will come from 9th Wonder (whose new album, The Dream Merchant Vol. 2, is reviewed in this week’s City Paper); his protege, the Columbia, Md.-based DJ Cuzzin B; and the one-and-only Monie Love, who was in the middle at one time. (More recently, she had beef with Jeezy.)

Thus, it’s hard to say whether Badu will do one of my favorite soul-singer bits of all time. During a Smokin’ Grooves show at the Nissan Pavilion in the mid-’90s, there were girls sobbing in the front row. I assume they were stunned by Badu’s ankh-fueled soul power. Anyway, during a breakdown in one of her ?uestlove-fueled songs, she walked over to the girls and sang, “don’t cry,” then gestured to her backup singers, who repeated the phrase. I can’t remember if the girls stopped crying, or if they cried more. (I also have a faint memory that I’d seen Badu do this during another performance on TV.)

VH1 Crusty or VH1 Catatonic was replaying the 2007 Hip-Hop Honors last night, and only one image is burned into my brain: Busta Rhymes’ fat ol’ belly. Now, I’m not exactly lean. In fact, I’m only a few brownies or gyros away from having a similarly prodigious midsection. But I’m also not a rich rapper who has the resources to hire a professional trainer. So if you’re listening, Busta, please hit the elliptical machine more regularly, or I will continue to track your fatness with untold tenacity.

(I realize it’s been nearly two weeks since VH1 first aired the show, but the network isn’t exactly on-point all the time, either.)

The 9:30 and the DAM! Festival didn’t do much to highlight the fact that the club’s opening act last night was Childballads, the latest project from St. Albans grad Stewart Lupton, who fronted Jonathan Fire*Eater before the rest of the dudes went on to become the Walkmen. For those of us with only a cursory knowledge of Lupton’s career, there was only one tip-off: He did a shambolic version of “No Love Like That,” which is probably the catchiest tune from JFE’s 1997 album Wolf Songs for Lambs. Otherwise, I would’ve been like, “Who was that guy?”

Cat Power & Dirty Delta Blues was the headliner, duh. The clean-and-sober Chan Marshall had a scratchy throat; she ate lemon wedges after a few songs; she and the band sounded good anyway. Best moment of supportive heckling from the crowd: I think a dude in the balcony yelled “Thank you for quitting!”

It’s been a prolific year for D.C. studio whiz Trevor Kampmann, who records indie ditties under the moniker hollAnd. In February he released The Paris Hilton Mujahideen on TeenBeat Records; the label also will be putting out Love Fluxus on Oct. 23. Kampmann dropped a little preview on us: the track “Anorexic Colt Herd.” It’s durrty and schweet and complicated, and robots can hump to it.

Download: “Anorexic Colt Herd” (mp3)

Kid Rock might think he’s a sexier, funkier version of Steve Earle, but he’s really from the same planet as Schwarzenegger and Ventura: He’ll probably get bored with being a shtick man sooner or later, and he’ll start looking for a new venue for his ego. That “Amen” song from Rock N Roll Jesus is Exhibit A. The hit list includes poverty, warmongerers, scummy lawyers, skeevy priests and racism (obliquely)–then Rock delivers a positive-tip message about faith in human nature, the merits of good lovin’ and the need to keep yer shit together, dudez. (It’s also possible that the line “Pull your future away from the flame” is a nod to the fight against global warming.)

I smell a run for the Michigan governorship.

Fox Searchlight apparently is desperate to find its Notorious B.I.G., because the movie studio is not only still collecting audition tapes from would-be Biggie Smalls and testing out actual rappers, it’s also holding an “in-person casting call” at 10 a.m. on Saturday in Manhattan.

This begs the question: Why not scrap the plan for a flesh-and-blood actor to play the lead in Notorious, and simply go with computer animation? I mean, if fuckin’ Beowulf can be animated, why not Biggie?

Lanham-based producer Solograph had a nice idea for promoting his downtempo, J. Dilla-esque beat called “Ooh Baby!!!”—he made two “commercials” for it and posted ‘em on YouTube and MySpace TV:

Commercial 1:

Commercial 2:

I don’t know if Reading, Pa., has ever been on anybody’s road-trip hit list—and as a native Keystone Stater, I can emphatically say that I’m not sure it should be—but for one glimmering Friday night in September, the city will host a harmonic convergence of stultifyingly quasi-awesome proportions.

The Reading Phillies (the AA club that is currently one notch below the Bowie Baysox in the Eastern League standings) will be rawking your ‘nads off Sept. 28 with five, count ‘em, five tribute bands: Live Wire (AC/DC), Separate Ways (Journey), 2U (U2), Bad Medicine (Bon Jovi) and Draw the Line (Aerosmith). Rawking promo video from the ballclub here. Super-useless trivia here:

The amazing thing about the tribute bands is how well they play their roles. Aerosmith front man Steven Tyler once told WBCN Radio in Boston that “Draw the Line is the bomb, they are Aerosmith,” and lead guitar player Joe Perry added “I actually went up on stage and played with them.” The Boston Globe has called Draw the Line’s lead singer Neill Byrnes’ resemblance to Tyler “freakish”. Bad Medicine also boasts a pretty strong endorsement from their role model. Jon Bon Jovi once hired them to play a private party he hosted.

It ain’t Disco Demolition Night, and it ain’t Ten Cent Beer Night, but you know some people are gonna get tore up on the power of all that approximationism. And oh yeah, there’s gonna be a demolition derby on Saturday, too.

(Tip ‘o the mug to Deadspin.)