What is hip? Soul Recollections from O.G. Keedah

What is hip? lyrics by TOWER OF POWER in bold print











What is hip?
Tell me, tell me, if you think you know.


She sat near the entrance door at USC collecting tickets for L.A. High School's 1993 Reunion.
As a favor to her sister-in-law Anita, she is there assisting a year after missing her 20th year reunion from that school.

Her brother in law Henry is jamming like nobody's business on his bass guitar as he did in and out of L.T.D.
And the band played on:
If you're really hip,
the question, "Will it show?"

She sings instead:
If you're really hip
"the passing years'll show"

A guy approaches and says "heeey didn't you used to dance on Soul Train. My brother had a big crush on you. I remember your mole. You look just like yourself."
She tells him it was a long time ago and she's still herself, as his woman yanks his arm.
He walked away bobbing his head.
Shortly after he came back out towards her.
The ex-dancer swirled her finger around 360 degrees and pointed to the door. He got the cue to go back to who he came with.

Seen in all the right places.
Seen with just the right faces.
You should be satisfied, but it ain't quite right.

She does not want another somebody's man again.

Hipness is. What it is!
Knowing Bobby "Blue" Bland was singing to and about her in "Going Down Slow" when she was 20 and trying to slow her row.

Hipness is. What it is!
Deciding when Linda Jones sang "Hypnotized" she had to make it be about The Revolution and not her fine boyfriend.

Hipness is. What it is!
She was alright with not wanting to know a current dance, clothing trend, style of skating, or hair do, she just 'made do'.

You went an' found you a guru.
In an effort to find you a new you,
And maybe even raise your conscious level

Time has been good to her and is "her friend."
She has all the time in the world.
From here to now on.

She watches no tv soap opera, SHE IS the soap opera.
She is The Movement... Inside and Out....It's in her hands and arms, the way she leans back into the chair.
She can silently speak of technique, for guiding her magical voice with the 'just right' inflection.
She runs with equestrian abandon, and her pony tail.
She positions her arched feet just right while standing.
She holds her long neck with ease and grace.
She winks to adults and children with perfect timing.
She is what it is all about. Everything is about her.

While you're striving to find the right road,
There's one thing you should know,
"What's hip today, might become passe'."

As she sways to the music she sees and feels nothing but herself. She reallly loves herself and it tired of being told it's too much.
She remembers when she didn't, but she wants to forget.
She tried to make herself into a dollar after feeling like less than fifteen cent.
Everything she's told to like and love is just for the minute and outside of herself.

What is hip y'all?
What is hip?
I wanna know.
What is hip?
Ahhhhhhh!
What is hip?
I wanna know what hipness is.



She commends the band members on how they played, "What is hip".

One of them say: "Is that what it's called?"
Henry had jammed it so long and so hard and was so in the groove it didn't matter what it was called.
He was just doing it, just feeling it, and just being it.

She glanced in the mirror at her mane and sang:
What is hip?
Is it in the style of your hair?

Is she hip?
Yes indeed.

S.urely
H.ip
E.nough

Born
that
way.


May 15, 2008
(O)riginal (Goddess) Keedah