Jottings from the Granite Studio

With all of the musicians out there Daoist or Buddhist influences to their music, where’s the love for the C-Man?…The brilliant (and it would appear slightly twisted) mind of Sam Crane at The Useless Tree has placed Linkin Park frontman Mike Shinoda (A.k.a. Fort Minor) into the Confucian pantheon. It’s a song made famous by seemingly a thousand different athletic apparel commercials and an equal number of movie trailers, but who knew that Confucius might approve…

Fifteen percent concentrated power of will
Five percent pleasure, fifty percent pain
And a hundred percent reason to remember the name!

Mike! - He doesn’t need his name up in lights
He just wants to be heard whether it’s the beat or the mic
He feels so unlike everybody else, alone
In spite of the fact that some people still think that they know him
But f–k em, he knows the code
It’s not about the salary
It’s all about reality and making some noise
Makin the story - makin sure his clique stays up
That means when he puts it down Tak’s pickin it up! let’s go!

Who the hell is he anyway?
He never really talks much
Never concerned with status but still leavin them star struck
Humbled through opportunities given to him despite the fact
That many misjudge him because he makes a livin from writin raps
Put it together himself, now the picture connects
Never askin for someone’s help, to get some respect
He’s only focused on what he wrote, his will is beyond reach
And now when it all unfolds, the skill of an artist….

It is Confucian, despite the profanity, in that it emphasizes the performative aspect of life over the reputational and materialistic elements. You have to enact the “name” in order to rightfully claim the name.

Sam’s further analysis is both tongue-in-cheek and simply brilliant and has given me some great ideas for a philosophy class I’m teaching this semester. Kudos, Sam.