![]() He also said, "You are eligible for a 25-dollar rebate. He said, "No because you haven't accessed our services and so we cannot do anything for you (yet they still charged me all these months)." He said that it is a "valuable service" and that I can go online right now to get my credit report. PrivacyGuard and Credit Alert are registered service marks of Affinion Publishing, LLC.I asked if they had been monitoring my credit report since August 2004. PrivacyGuard is not available to residents of Rhode Island. Any part of the service may be modified or improved at any time and without prior notice. ![]() does not receive any compensation from the sale of the identity theft insurance benefit included as part of the PrivacyGuard service. PrivacyGuard is a service of Trilegiant Corporation in conjunction with Trilegiant Insurance Services, Inc. If no information has been added or changed, then you will receive a quarterly notification stating that no information has changed within your credit file.ģ Trilegiant Corporation, Trilegiant Insurance Services, Inc., and Alliance Marketing Association and their credit information subcontractors shall not have any liability for the accuracy of the information contained in the credit reports, credit scores, Credit Alert® reports or other reports which you receive in connection with the PrivacyGuard service, including any liability for damages, direct or indirect, consequential or incidental. Your score(s) may not be identical or similar to scores received directly from those agencies, from other sources, or from your lender.Ģ Daily monitoring will notify you of certain new inquiries and derogatory information, accounts, public records, or change of address that have been added to your credit reports as reported by one of the major credit reporting agencies. The version of VantageScore provided here is used by some, but not all, lenders. ![]() The VantageScore model, with scores ranging from 300 to 850, was developed jointly by the three major national credit reporting agencies â?" Experian®, TransUnion®, and Equifax®. How often should I check my credit report?ġ Your VantageScore credit score(s) are provided by VantageScore Solutions LLC. Public information stays on your credit report for up to 7 years. Public Records: Public records obtained from government sources including bankruptcies, tax liens, collections and records of overdue child support are also recorded on your credit report. ![]() Inquiries remain on your credit report for up to 2 years. Credit Inquiries: Each time a third party, such as a creditor, potential lender, or insurer pulls your credit report, it is recorded on your file as a credit inquiry.Closed or inactive accounts, depending on the manner in which they were paid, stay on your report for 7-11 years from the date of their last activity. Details about these accounts, including the date the account was opened, the credit limit or amount of the loan, the payment terms, balance and a history of your payment records on each account is also included. Credit History: The majority of your credit report is comprised of information on credit accounts that were opened in your name.Personal information: Includes your name, current and previous addresses, social security number, telephone number, date of birth, and current and previous employers.Your credit report consists of four main categories of information:
0 Comments
![]() I can successfully add the 'send from' account in the gmail interface, it just doesn't allow me to actually send from it.Ĭlick to expand.On the face of it, that looks to me like a genuine case of MWeb blacklisting Google's mail submission server(s). From the person's Zimbra Mweb interface, they can send out emails, no problem. Mweb technical support can't see anything wrong on their side. ![]() The .za gives the same error no matter which port I use for either smtp or relay.Īny ideas? I really want to help this person out. The error that the other server returned was:ĥ50 This account is locked out because of abusive behaviour" Google tried to deliver your message, but it was rejected by the relay .za. I have set this up many a time for other folks, and it works wonders.īut now, when trying to send an email 'from' the mweb account within gmail, it gives the error I am trying to set up someone's email to flow through a gmail account (a Google Apps account), and to also be able to send from the gmail account as if from the mweb account. I assume that's because mail placed there is subject to more rigorous scrutiny than normal. In practise, I find that mail sent to .za sometimes takes a little while to get sent, and the server itself is sometimes offline for a few minutes at a time (can't honestly say if it's more (or less) frequent than the normal MWeb SMTP server). It works for me for sending mail via MWeb from a variety of non-MWeb networks. So, if you can't connect to .za from a "foreign" network, try connecting instead to .za using port 587. (I think the relay server also handles mail that has been submitted on port 25 and relays that to port 587 on the SMTP server, but I'm not 100% sure of this). This relay server is at .za and mail sent there is forwarded to .za after scrutiny. ![]() They also provide a "relay" server which handles mail requests that are directed at the MWeb SMTP server, but which originate from non-MWeb networks. MWeb's SMTP servers use the "correct" port for mail submission (port 587). ( PS: Read a bit more about the background to SMTP and ports on Wikipedia here. Trying to connect in this way is referred to as "relaying" (I think).Īs a mail user, the usual way of handling this is to use a different SMTP server depending on how you are connecting, eg .za when you connect from MWeb, or .za when you connect from Telkom. But - to use the same MWeb example - when you try to connect from a "foreign" network (eg MTN 3G, or Telkom LTE), you can't access MWeb's SMTP server. When you're sending via your own ISP's connection (eg using MWeb ADSL to send mail on .za), there's no problem. It's point (4) that tends to cause most problems. In that respect, and even though it's not the "correct" port, port 25 has almost become the "usual" port used for email submission to an SMTP server. Although port 25 is actually designated for use between SMTP servers, it is very common for ISPs to use port 25 for mail submission as well. Referring to point (3), the "proper" port for submitting mail to an SMTP server is port 587. Disallowing connections from any network other than the mailbox owner's "home" ISP. Using "unusual" IP ports for submission of mail.Ĥ. Using an encrypted connection for submission of mail.ģ. Requiring authentication to send email.Ģ. To guard against this, the ISP's have introduced various safety measures, including:ġ. This is in line with the increased precautions to curb spam mail, phishing and general abuse of outgoing mail servers. However they are a lot more cautious about allowing a user to connect to an outgoing (SMTP) server and send mail, especially when that user tries to connect from a "foreign" network (ie not the ISP's own network). ISP's will generally allow a user to connect to an incoming mail server (eg a POP3 server) and download mail from pretty much any network, provided of course that user properly authenticates himself to the server. Hopefully this might help other people struggling with the same issue. Apologies for re-opening a very old thread, but the topic is still relevant. ![]() He played bass on four records before he struck out on his own in 1994, partly for a solo project. It's a production that takes three months in advance to perfect, and it necessitates a team of dedicated artists, designers and technicians.īishop first joined the band in 1986 as the original Beefcake the Mighty. They've appeared onstage dressed as barbaric interplanetary warriors whose adventures we've heard unfold over 13 studio albums, numerous singles, videos and comics. The shock-rock band sprayed the audience with fake blood and ejaculated and pissed on them with fake bodily fluids. Throughout their career, Bishop says, GWAR never wanted to be like Slayer and “play the same damn songs over and over again.” They tried it for a short time in the '90s with their early albums, earning accolades from critics and a Grammy Award nomination for Best Long Form Music Video. But what is more interesting is the fact that you have this unique combination of artists and musicians working today.” “What we do on stage is fun and people love it and that is the product we put out. “So, this has always been the most interesting part of GWAR to me,” Bishop says. The long-awaited documentary has a limited theatrical run, but hits the Shudder streaming service on July 21. The band will be playing in Dallas on Oct. It also includes never-before-seen footage of GWAR frontman Dave Brockie, the legendary Oderus Urungus, who died of a heroin overdose in 2014. This Is GWAR is a documentary that takes fans behind GWAR’s black magic and tells the inside story of the monster band with interviews from past and present members and artists such as Alex Winter, Bam Margera and Weird Al Yankovic. GWAR is forever changed, and it is a good thing.”Īnother surprising thing to happen: GWAR’s latest offering. “So some surprising things happen,” he adds. This idea of the multiverse is real, and it is here because people are plugged into whatever perception of the image of the world, that sort of sense of fractured existence. “We wrote about how people have lost trust, people have lost truth, can’t agree on simple facts, like people choosing their own realities. “The world looks a lot different now,” Bishop says. Released in late June, The New Dark Ages and The Duoverse of Absurdity offer another adventure, an Avengers kind of scenario, for Blóthar the Berserker, guitarist BälSäc the Jaws o' Death, bassist Beefcake the Mighty and drummer JiZMak da Gusha. Not all the stories are related, and not everything in the comic is on the album.” It puts you in the emotional space, and that is what music does for the comic. You can almost think of it as poetry plus. “It’s difficult to invoke a mood with a comic book and that is the strength of music. “Two products have this piece of art that relate to one other,” says GWAR vocalist Mike Bishop, aka Blóthar the Berserker, of the dual release. The battle, fueled by GWAR's latest album The New Dark Ages, unfolds in the pages of Z2 Comics’ new graphic novel GWAR: In The Duoverse of Absurdity. The Scumdogs of the Universe army stood beside him, stoked and ripped. There was no Bruce Campbell on that lone hill overlooking the undead swarm. A wave of them, thousands strong, appeared on the battlefield, armed with iPhones, filters and social media accounts. ![]() Their gray and blue uniforms, dirtied and bloodstained, were the only remnants of a cause that was never lost. Their flesh, or what was left of it, hung in tatters from their bones. Blóthar the Berserker looked upon the Civil War soldiers crawling from their graves around Richmond, Virginia, where the band GWAR was founded in 1984. ![]() UPDATED: R – Weaver’s Wall no longer goes on cooldown when Taliyah damages wards or traps.NEW: Hitting jungle monsters with Taliyah’s boulder (created when activating Q on Worked Ground) now stuns jungle monsters for 3 seconds.NEW: Taliyah’s passive cooldown will no longer reset due to proc damage (like Liandry’s Anguish).Health Regeneration at 18: 23.8 > 16.7.Lingering Damage Reduction: For 0.5 seconds after Meditate ends, but not exceeding a total of 4 seconds > For 0.5 seconds after Meditate ends.Mana Cost: 50 > 40 + 6% maximum mana per second.During Alpha Strike, Master Yi may right click to instead be placed 75 units in the direction clicked NEW: When Alpha Strike ends, Yi is placed 75 units in front of his primary target > By default, Master Yi will be placed 75 units in front of his primary target.UPDATED: Recast resets after damaging an enemy champion > Recast resets after 1 second.NEW: Minions below 20% health take 1000% bonus damage instead.NEW: Now deals 75% damage against minions with more than 20% health.Center Snip: 100% true damage > 75% true damage.Health Regen Growth: 0.55 > 0.9 per 5 seconds.REMOVED: No longer gives Sivir and her allies an initial movement speed burst.REMOVED: Sivir no longer gains bonus attack speed from R – On the Hunt.NEW: Sivir’s basic attacks during R – On the Hunt now reduce her basic ability cooldowns by 0.5 seconds per attack. ![]() NEW: If Sivir assists with a recent takedown while her R – On the Hunt buff is active, its aura will now refresh its duration.Duration: 8 seconds at all ranks > 8/10/12 seconds.REMOVED: Blocking an enemy ability with E no longer refunds mana.NEW: Blocking an enemy ability now procs Sivir’s Passive – Fleet of Foot.NEW: Blocking an enemy ability now heals Sivir for 60/65/70/75/80% of her total AD (+50% total AP).Ricochets will prioritize new targets first. NEW – Bounce Boost: Ricochets can now bounce back to targets that have already been hit, but only one additional time.Bounce Range: 450 > 500 (note: approximately 1 additional Teemo).Max Bounces: Unlimited bounces > 8 bounces per Attack.NEW: Now deals 80% damage against minions.NEW – Speed Boost: Activating Ricochet now grants Sivir 20/25/30/35/40% bonus attack speed.UPDATED – Buff Duration: 3 attacks > 4 seconds.NEW: Now scales with critical strike chance, dealing up to 50% bonus damage at 100% crit chance.Missile Speed: 1350 > 1450 outwards and 1200 inwards.Cast Time: 0.25 seconds > 0.25-0 seconds (scales down with attack speed).Cooldown: 7 seconds at all ranks > 10/9.5/9/8.5/8 seconds.Bonus Movement Speed Duration: 2 seconds > Decays over 1.5 seconds.Base Mana Regeneration: 1.6 > 1.2 per second. ![]() ![]() "The problem, I believe," she said, "when we look at these discrepancies in pricing is that toy manufacturers do not produce Black dolls in proportion to the number of people in the human population."īack in 2014, a father of a 6-year-old girl came to us with a similar complaint after finding Target selling a Black Barbie for twice the price of the same white Barbie. Sabrina Thomas says she has seen them sometimes cost more. With Black dolls less common, and often hand-crafted, Duke University professor ( and doll historian) Dr. This is not the first time shoppers have found pricing discrepancies between white and Black toys. ![]() "But one set is $39.97 the other is $25." "There are seven Black babies and there are seven white babies," she said of the two doll sets. She shared, “The problem, I believe, when we look at these discrepancies in pricing is that toy manufacturers do not produce Black dolls in proportion to the number of people in the human Walmart doll pricing discrepancy (since corrected) Sabrina Thomas, a doll historian, docent for the North Carolina Museum of History, and senior associate academic dean at Duke University, says that the price discrepancy is more about supply and demand versus flat-out racism. Both dolls should have reflected the same pricing, however, due to a systems issue this change did not occur.”ĬNBC reports that both dolls went on sale for $20.99, a tad cheaper than either was originally priced. ![]() When confronted with the discrepancy, the company released a statement that said, “It is never our intention to offend our guests with our product assortment. Once the store sold the African-American fashion design marker Barbie at $49.99 while selling the white version for $23.49, more than twice the price. This is almost the same thing that happened with Target. In the past, Walmart and Target claimed that these types of discrepancies are indeed “errors” and have issued promises to keep dolls, despite ethnicity, at the same price.Īccording to CNBC, after a customer called the retail store out in 2014 for an African-American ice skater Barbie costing $2 more than the white version, Walmart called it a “pricing error,” corrected it immediately and offered gift cards to people who had paid the higher price when they purchased the doll. This is not the first time that prices around differently colored dolls have made the news. This was an unintentional error on our part and we sincerely apologize to anyone it may have offended.” “Unfortunately, we overlooked the impact these changes would have on similar items whose price did not change. We lowered the price on a select group of toys, including only one of these dolls, to help drive sales,” the megastore offered. “The price difference in the two items was the result of price changes made systemically. Walmart issued a statement claiming that the price difference is tied to a “systems error.” Or better yet if you don’t have the same black doll find another third party who has it for the same or similar price?! /ygS5aGzHJ7- Sicily!!! December 22, 2020 This is crazy! Even if you are letting a third party use your stores why not at least make the price point comparable? Some even more egregious than Brown’s tell me why the black doll cost more ?,” asked one Twitter user of a doll set that appeared to cost nearly $40 more than the white version.Īnother added about the same pricing discrepancy, we are sick of this!!! Why is the black doll soooo much more expensive than the others” On Twitter, several users found other examples of price gouging around dolls. “But one set is $39.97 the other is $25.” “There are seven Black babies and there are seven white babies,” she continued. The Black dolls and accessories ran for $39.97, while the white counterparts were sold for $25.00.īrown shared, “They were 14 dollars and 97 cents more expensive than the white babies I saw in the store.” She decided to purchase the doll online from the store’s website and made a shocking discovery: the Black and white doll collections, with the same accessories and number of individual dolls totaling 48 pieces, had different prices. WCPO reports that Asheria Brown, a mother of three living in Kentucky, wanted to buy her oldest daughter a Kid Collection doll set from Walmart. A Duke professor says that while racism does play a part in the price increase, economics is the real problem. Retail giant Walmart is apologizing after a customer noticed that a Black baby doll set cost almost $15 more than the white doll set. In addition to the basic rules of the game on the screen will draw the middle of the war on the player's block, the other rules are as regular tower defense works in the venue there will be an established march route, as the target group of balloons along The route through, players will have to deploy the monkey soldiers on both sides of the road or nail gun tower, will float the balloon one by one break! Green long bar just above is the life and death of both enemies and meters, whenever players stop Can not pass the balloon to make it through the line of defense will be deducted a certain amount of value, the value of life before returning to zero is the loser.īlue sky green setting, the game with bright colors, the overall style of bright, diverse venues with a variety of arms, the overall style of the game is witty lovers, set to see the balloon as the main enemy of the "bloody" two Word is completely missed. ![]() They each called for their own monkeys to transform into various attack towers to protect their goddess. The first is the game background, the game is built in a world because of a beloved woman and a banana downtown world booming story, the blue hat monkey vowed to get the woman and banana, so and Red Riding Hood launched a fight. "Bloons TD Battles", where players are required to face each other on both sides of the balloon army, compared to see who can continue to storm under the last. The game, as always, kept the previous cute cartoon style, at the same time the game joined the new tower defense systems and weapons systems, the game also supports online PK, and their friends to contest it and see who the stronger city defense. ![]() Bloons TD Battles is a classic and fun strategy tower defense game. Using multi-hit attacks increases the gauge faster. As the fighter performs special moves and takes damage, the POW Gauge builds up, depending on the special moves used. Can be used the new rolling sidesteps to quickly rout the enemy and build up your POW Gauge using your special moves. This mode employs aggressive tactics and the gameplay from The King of Fighters '96 & ' 97. This game has two systems: Advance Mode and Extra Mode. Since this game did not have a storyline, the SNK staff decided to return Rugal Bernstein as the boss character noting that "he's the only character who truly represents the ultimate KOF boss." Additionally, some of his special moves were redesigned, which the staff found to have made him the strongest version of Rugal as well as one of their favorites. The introduction of this version was noted to be "a hit" within gamers, the staff kept adding new alternative versions of other characters in KOF '98. However, the original moveset was still popular among gamers and as such, an alternative version of Kyo was added to The King of Fighters '97. In The King of Fighters '96, several moves from Kyo Kusanagi were changed in order to adapt him to the new game system. Japan Team, Protagonist Team or Kyo Team) The series' canon storyline continues in The King of Fighters '99. Instead, it was developed as a " Dream Match" game featuring characters from all previous King of Fighters canonical games, including killed-off characters in the story. The original game was then released on the mobile systems (iOS and Android) on July 24, 2014. ![]() A remake titled The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match was released in Japanese arcades on March 18th, 2008, and later on the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 4 and PC (through Steam and GOG). ![]() The Dreamcast port of the game was titled The King of Fighters: Dream Match 1999. ![]() The game was released for the Neo Geo system and later ported to the SONY's platform PlayStation 1. The King of Fighters '98: Dream Match Never Ends ( ザ・キング・オブ・ファイターズ '98 ( ナインティエイト ) ドリームマッチネバーエンズ), subtitled as The Slugfest in international releases, is the fifth game in The King of Fighters series. And now it comes, say here we go, KOF is here again, nothing's gonna stop. Fell in place in '96, it came to an end in '97. In addition to the series’ iconic characters, “Iori” and “American Sports” teams as well as “Shingo Yabuki” and “Rugal Bernstein” edit characters return in “KOF ‘98” to complete the gorgeous roster of 38 characters and for a never ending dream match!ĪDVANCED MODE: Various jumps for different ways to bring the pain to your enemy! A must if you think offense is the best defense! You can stock your Power gauges to enter in MAX mode or to unleash deadly Desperation Moves! Depending on your characters’ affinity, get extra Power gauges even after losing a round!ĮXTRA MODE: Use the Evade move wisely as you are being rushed and send your opponent flying! Fill your Power gauge to automatically enter Power Max mode for a set amount of time! As you are close to exhaustion, your health bar will turn red and blink, then you will be able to unleash your Desperation Moves to your heart’s content, as long as you are the last one standing!īe Patient.Processing may take a minute in some games after the loading bar finishes.The King of Fighters '99 Two, three! It all began in '94, kept on rollin' in '95. ![]() This can be easily done provided you have limited number of email ids. URL, hit the FullContact database and save the JSON received. One is to manually take each email id, create a query Now say I have a requirement where in I have a list of email ids and I need to save the JSON received for each of the email id. There are two ways in which I can accomplish this. I queried FullContact database for my own social profile details using my email id in the query and this is the response that I received from the website. For accessing all the social profile data of a particular user, we need to query the FullContact database with the email id and an API Key (the key is generated and provided by FullContact once a user registers with the site). FullContact stores all the social profile details of a particular user registered with it. So again, a webhook is a REST service that accepts data or stream of data.Ĭoming to a sample example, let’s consider a website. In simple words, a webhook is nothing but a web service that accepts HTTP POST requests (rather, listens to requests) from a source. The above lines are an excerpt from wikipedia. The source site makes an HTTP request to the URL specified as a webhook. In technical terms, a webhook is basically a user-defined HTTP callback that is triggered when a particular event occurs at the source site. Please do correct me if I’m wrong somewhere because I don’t want to spread wrong information. Comments and suggestions are more than welcome…. I want to say that the article below is purely my own understanding. So I decided to write one myself in my words. But when I actually got the whole idea, I understood that a webhook is nothing but a simple HTTP POST!ĭuring my search to understand webhooks, I referred a lot for an article that would give the whole idea properly at one place but couldn't find it. ![]() I had had to implement the webhook url concept recently and because it was the first time I had heard of webhooks, I had to struggle a lot for understanding what a "webhook" actually meant and also how to create one. When using a webhook in actions for internal events: in the action operation configuration, check the Custom message checkbox and define the custom message, otherwise, a notification will not be sent.This article discusses about webhooks , webhook Urls and finally how a sample example where webhooks are used.It is also ok to use this webhook in different actions if the actions will not be applied to the same problem event due to different filter conditions. Using the webhook in several operations is allowed if those operations or escalation steps belong to the same action. This applies to Jira, Jira Service Desk, Mattermost, Opsgenie, OTRS, Redmine, ServiceNow, Slack, Zammad, and Zendesk webhooks provided by Zabbix and to the majority of webhooks that utilize Include event menu entry option. For such a case, a new tag name should be used in the webhook to store updated values. Check the webhook's Readme.md file for parameter description.įor new webhooks, several common variables are included by default (URL:, HTTPProxy:, To: already exists, and is updated in the webhook, then its resulting value is not defined. Specify the webhook variables as the attribute and value pairs.įor preconfigured webhooks, a list of parameters varies, depending on the service. The following parameters are specific for the webhook media type: The Media type tab contains various attributes specific for this media type:Īll mandatory input fields are marked with a red asterisk. Configure the webhook according to instructions in the Readme.md file (you may click on a webhook's name above to quickly access Readme.md).The webhook will appear in the list of media types. Import the file into your Zabbix installation.xml file in the templates/media directory of the downloaded Zabbix version or download it from Zabbix git repository ) in the profile settings of a designated Zabbix user. To convert Zabbix notifications into Spiceworks tickets, create an email media type and enter Spiceworks helpdesk email address (e.g. In addition to the services listed here, Zabbix can be integrated with Spiceworks (no webhook is required). ![]() ![]() I think that's characteristic of many Super Mario 3 levels, though, because pipes and doors that send you backwards aren't that uncommon. There are other levels that have doors or pipes that either do or don't send you somewhere useful.īut solving any of these mazes without a strategy guide will probably call for multiple lives because you almost certainly won't be able to find the complete solution in a single run-through. being sent back, which is kind of similar to some of the earlier maze fortresses like the first fortress in World 3. I think it's visually apparent in Bowser's Castle when you've made progress vs. If you are looking for a Myst style puzzle world to lose one’s self in in 2018, Jonathan Blow’s game “The Witness” is arguably a strong modern spiritual successor. The standards of adventure games improved dramatically in subsequent decades. This might be an unpopular opinion, but I don’t think it holds up all that well as a ‘game’ in 2018, our expectations of video games are rightly so much greater. My experience was that Myst and Riven found fans among people not traditionally PC gamers, often via word of mouth that this was something interesting one could do on their relatively expensive new fangled PC investment. Timing was critical too for Myst too I think it came at the point when many ‘ordinary’ (for want of a better word) families were buying their first home PCs. It was also one of the first to give us an excuse to do something cool with our fancy new CD-ROM drives. ![]() I’d argue that much of the appeal of 90s Myst for some was that such a world could be made at all, let alone be a reasonably competent adventure game to boot. Myst was very much “state of the art of the possible at the time”. At the time I loved it, but in the early 90s one was willing to forgive a game a great many short-comings in sympathy to the state of modern games technology. It had a huge impact on my life.įor me, this is where memories of Myst are best left. So thanks to Robyn and Rand Miller for the awesome memories. The times spent understanding and "hacking" Myst are among my fondest memories.Īll of this led to me learning HyperCard and HyperTalk myself, and eventually moving on to CodeWarrior/C, Perl, PHP, Ruby, etc. ![]() And I'd be lying if I claimed I didn't use this access to "solve" a few of the more difficult puzzles. Myst was amazing for its era, so of course, wanting to know how such a game was possible, I took full advantage of being able to read all of the HyperTalk code. And all the HyperCard scripting was unlocked and viewable by the player. Only, someone screwed up, and instead of the CD containing a demo, it actually contained almost the entire game in a just-before-release, playable state (only a single world was unfinished). It's entirely possible that the only reason I'm a programmer today is because of Myst.įor reasons that I either never fully learned or fail to remember, my father received a CD in the mail from Myst's publisher (Broderbund?) containing a demo of the game. It’s no wonder, then, that he grew up into a griot, a walking, talking encyclopedia of late-20th-century musical history. He sucked up every dance craze and coquettish smile, every interview between Don Cornelius and the acts, every vaunted cultural moment - Michael Jackson unveiling the robot (1973), David Bowie so nervous to perform that he supposedly got drunk beforehand (1975), Aretha Franklin and Smokey Robinson reminiscing about Detroit and duetting “Ooo Baby Baby” (1979), Teena Marie revealing that she was white (1979), Kurtis Blow inaugurating the show’s slow embrace of hip-hop (1980) - and lodged it in his brain. With Thompson, though, everything was a draw. It instructed not by lecture but by breadth, showcasing a wide selection - appearances by everyone from Donna Summer to Richard Pryor to Hugh Masekela and even a few white singers, invited over to the proverbial barbecue - that producers hoped would draw you in. ![]() He has described the show as a “sibling, a parent, a baby sitter, a friend, a textbook, a newscast, a business school and a church,” ultimately culminating in a single role: a teacher. Thompson loves the show holistically - the music and the dancing and the all-Black commercials (advertising Afro and Ultra Sheen) and the Afrocentricity. “Retrieving these episodes allows me a chance to remember it - I didn’t have camera phones - and my memory breaks are all that I had in processing my childhood.” There is true love, which you can find time and time again, and then there is “Soul Train.” “ ‘Soul Train’ served as a diary of what happened that week,” he said. The first time we met in person, “Soul Train” was playing on both television screens of his tour bus the last time we talked by phone, he had just arrived home from a trip and, before even taking off his coat, had flipped on the show. He plays the episodes in a constant loop on whichever screen is closest to him. “Soul Train,” he explained, is his comfort food, his shortcut to joy. Thompson now owns around 600 episodes of the show, which ended in 2006, though his collection is clustered mostly in the 1970s and 1980s. For days, all he did was sit and watch and weep - he felt as if he had his childhood back. A Patti LaBelle episode sounded like getting snowed in with his cousins and making banana pancakes Johnny (Guitar) Watson playing “Tarzan” took Thompson back to burning Jiffy Pop with his sister. It was 1997, and because of licensing issues, the trove was the first time he had been able to rewatch full episodes in decades. Thompson missed the day his close friend and collaborator D’Angelo recorded his career-defining single, “Untitled (How Does It Feel),” for “Voodoo,” an album otherwise stamped with Thompson’s fingertips - because he was in Japan, digitizing 100 old episodes of “Soul Train,” refusing to get back on the plane home until he finished. For decades, he was branded with a burn in the shape of a train track. An afternoon episode of “Soul Train” was playing - Curtis Mayfield, the Main Ingredient - when a 2-year-old Thompson rushed from the bathtub and toddled, still wet, into the living room, where he slipped and fell, his skin making contact with the radiator about 90 seconds into Mayfield’s performing “Freddie’s Dead,” right when the horns start crying. The two are knotted together so intricately that the archive of the show and the archive of his brain are the same. Right at 1 a.m., he was greeted by a magical locomotive - chugging along so rhythmically that it almost seemed to dance, flipping gray buildings it passed into psychedelic colors - for his regular dose of peace, love and “Soul Train.”īecause “Soul Train” was the only show, besides “Sesame Street,” that he was allowed to watch as a child, and because Thompson, who you might better know as Questlove, grew up into the sort of adult who relies on an extensive knowledge of music to make sense of the world, his childhood memories are impossible to separate from which episode of “Soul Train” was playing at the time. He would grab his crocheted-by-Grandma blanket and head downstairs, where he would switch on the television, wait for it to warm up and then crank the dial to Channel 48 as quietly as he could. But on the weekends, they bent the rules and, around 12:45 a.m., nudged him awake. When he was 3, he had taken a fruit-drink commercial too literally - “Hey, how about a nice Hawaiian punch?” ended with a fist to his mother’s face - so his parents decided to limit his television consumption. ![]() Most Saturday nights from age 5 to 10, Ahmir Thompson would go to bed at 8 p.m., only to be woken up a few hours later. To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |