Ernest profile picture

Ernest

ernesthardy

About Me

I write about film and music from my home base of Los Angeles. My criticism has appeared in the LA Weekly, the LA Times, Vibe, the New York Times, Rolling Stone, the Source, Millennium Film Journal, Flaunt, Request, Minneapolis City Pages, and the reference books "1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" and "Classic Material: The Hip-Hop Album Guide," among others. I've written liner notes for "Chuck D Presents: Louder Than a Bomb," the box-set "Say It Loud: A Celebration of Black Music in America," "Curtis Mayfield: Gospel," and the box-set "Superstars of Seventies Soul." I won the 2006 ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for Excellence, honoring my liner notes for the Chet Baker CD, Career 1952-1988. I'm a Sundance Fellow and a member of LAFCA (Los Angeles Film Critics Association) who's sat as a juror for the Sundance Film Festival, the San Francisco International Film Festival, the Palm Springs International Short Film Festival and Los Angeles Outfest.My book, "Blood Beats: Vol. 1 Demos, Remixes & Extended Versions," was written from a critical center that is melanin-based, pro-people-of-color, pro-queer, and unabashedly-leftist. Subject matter ranges from underground hip-hop and American indie film to modern French cinema, from cool interviews with Warren Beatty, Meshell NdegeOcello and Les Nubians to an essay on gay rappers and queer rap audiences that pushes beyond the clichés of the media-stoked "down-low" phenomenon. You can buy my book at Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com (www.bn.com) or at my blog http://ernesthardy.com/

My Interests

You can buy my book at Amazon.com or at my blog: http://ernesthardy.com/You can also buy it directly from my publisher, Red Bone Press. Check the website: www.redbonepress.com or email [email protected]

I'd like to meet:

Everyone who reads this...
Click to zoom in on my visitor map!

Music:

Classic soulful House / Aretha Franklin (especially early '60s - mid '70s) / Nina Simone / Sade / Fat Lutha / Prince / Dinah Washington / Me'shell / Stevie Wonder / Lauryn Hill / Erykah Badu / Jimmy Scott / Diana Ross / Curtis Mayfield / Ledisi / Pharcyde / Kim Hill / Paris (the rapper) / Dead Prez / Massive Attack / Lewis Taylor / Mos Def / Levi Stubbs (Four Tops) / Temptations / Marvin Gaye / Bjork / Outkast / PM Dawn / Gladys Knight / Missy Elliott / the Pretenders / Hole / Inner City / the Lighthouse Family / Crack Whitney ("It's fine... fine, fine, fine, fine, fine") / isolated Armand Van Helden tracks / D'Angelo / early Deniece Williams / Barbara Tucker / Funky Green Dogs / Larry Heard / Frankie Knuckles / David Morales / Incognito / Jomanda / the Smiths / Housemartins / Shara Nelson / Aztec Camera / David Ruffin / Billy Lawrence / Rachid / Style Council / Teddy Pendergrass / Dolly Parton / Common / Auf der Maur / Linda Clifford / Marlena Shaw / Gabrielle / Ani Di Franco / Tindersticks / Art of Noise / Ten City / Rahsaan Patterson / Shalamar / Annie Lennox, Eurythmics / First Choice / Chic / Donnie / Delilah Harris / Martha Reeves & the Vandellas / Sinead O'Connor / Grace Jones / Teena Marie / Neneh Cherry / Chaka Khan / Q-Tip / Etta James / Mary Margaret O'Hara / TLC / Les Nubians / Ambersunshower

Movies:

Wong Kar-wai / Pedro Almodovar / Charles Burnett / Claire Denis / Douglas Sirk / Spike Lee / Catherine Breillat / Julie Dash / Mike Leigh / Stephen Frears (most) / Kristen Bjorn / Far too many to mention...

Television:

Oz / Six Feet Under / Chappelle Show / Buffy the Vampire Slayer / the White Shadow / Veronica Mars / Action / Twilight Zone / the Shield / the Boondocks

Books:

The usual suspects: James Baldwin, Octavia Butler, Toni Morrison, Zora Neale Hurston. Works by Fay Weldon, Zadie Smith, Greg Tate, Donald Bogle, Angela Davis, Jacqueline Susan, Dorothy Allison, Angela Carter, John Rechy, Arundhati Roy, Kathy Acker. Individual titles: "Oreo," "White Boy Shuffle," "Confederacy of Dunces," "Wide Sargasso Sea," "Things Fall Apart," "Caucasia." Too many to list...

Heroes:

Dorothy Allison, Pedro Almodovar, Erykah Badu, James Baldwin, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Bey, Kristen Bjorn, Donald Bogle, Octavia Butler, Jean-Daniel Cadinot, Don Cheadle, Countee Cullen, Manohla Dargis, Angela Davis, Miles Davis, Claire Denis, Electrifyin Mojo, Nikki Giovanni, Aretha Franklin, Herbie Hancock, Dianna Hardy, Essex Hemphill, Kim Hill, Lauryn Hill, Billie Holiday, Shirley Horn, Lena Horne, Langston Hughes, Frenchy Hodges, Diane Hurd, Zora Neale Hurston, Derek Jarman, Chaka Khan, Martin Luther King Jr., Gladys Knight, Frankie Knuckles, Spike Lee, Audre Lourde, David Morales, Toni Morrison, Meshell NdegeOcello, Huey P. Newton, Prince, Marlon Riggs, Diana Ross, Bayard Rustin, Sarah Schulman, Pamela Sneed, Billy Strayhorn, Sylvester, Greg Tate, Wallace Thurman, Wong Kar Wai, Jeffrey Wright, Malcolm X, Ledisi Young, Howard Zinn...

My Blog

Negroes On Film: The Guys from PSTOLA

After he takes a hit from the bong, Dre wheezes and hands it back to Nikki, gasping, "Yo, you need some more water in this shit!" Everybody laughs. Relaxed by the party favors, Jason begins to re...
Posted by Ernest on Thu, 03 Apr 2008 09:36:00 PST

Kara Walker: My Negress, My Enigma, My Conundrum

To read my essay on Kara Walker, click Kara
Posted by Ernest on Mon, 31 Mar 2008 01:01:00 PST

Meeting Ledisi on a Wednesday (Corrected link)

Here’s the correct link to the Ledisi interview. Apologies for the earlier post. MySpace is on the eff-up stride today......
Posted by Ernest on Sat, 29 Mar 2008 12:18:00 PST

Itty Bitty Hilary / Agnes Varda

Updated blog. Click Bloodbeats
Posted by Ernest on Wed, 26 Mar 2008 08:17:00 PST

Feedback

The book drops Tuesday. Blurbs from Jeff "Can't Stop Won't Stop" Chang and Saul Williams are right here.
Posted by Ernest on Mon, 25 Feb 2008 12:29:00 PST

My new book drops in less than a week

It's been a minute since I updated my blog. Been busy doing the corporate ho stroll and tying up the loose threads around my new book, which drops on the 26th of this month. Check it out Blood Beats V...
Posted by Ernest on Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:00:00 PST

Updated blog: Its been a minute

Back in November, when I attended the symposium on James Brown that was hosted by Princeton, the event's closing remarks were delivered by Cornel West and he was predictably amazing. I'd watched a who...
Posted by Ernest on Mon, 14 Jan 2008 01:22:00 PST

Meshell, Keyshia, Joni, Herbie, Jill... Fiddy & Ye

Click Meshell, Keyshia, Jill, Joni... Fiddy & Ye
Posted by Ernest on Thu, 08 Nov 2007 10:55:00 PST

Me & Mary J. Blige...

To read some snippets from my forthcoming interview with Mary J. Blige, go to Mary Mary
Posted by Ernest on Fri, 16 Nov 2007 08:44:00 PST

Deniece Williams, the Emotions, the Time

New blog on Niecy, the Emotions and the Time. Click Old School
Posted by Ernest on Tue, 21 Aug 2007 08:31:00 PST