hey guise,

Many of you may know me as just the final tablist at the 2006 WSOP (fish on a heater), but i'm now an actor living in LA! Thought you guys would enjoy a personal project I'm working on.

I released a music video parody titled, "I'm Asian American" that I have created the concept for and performed in. As someone who went to Duke who has gone through the gauntlet of a typical "model minority" by becoming a management consultant, but is now involved in media and entertainment, I feel that I am uniquely positioned to give a balanced perspective on Asian Americans today.

Here is the link to the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9KsAw97oZY



More info (tl;dr section)

In short, the video is a parody of the song "Rockin the Suburbs" by Ben Folds, which is also a parody, in that it pokes fun at bands that write overly angsty lyrics about their so-called terrible lives (i.e. #firstworldproblems).

The video is social commentary on how I as an Asian American view myself in light of American media and portrayals. Much of what has been written about us recently has been from the perspective of a white male, which not to say that much of what has been written is inaccurate, but it's a bit biased. That's part of the reason I used this song, written by a normal everyday kind of dude (Folds) who also has a predominantly white male audience. My main goal was to give us a voice that is our own; I wanted to give a relatable character to people, to show a human quality to this object known as "Asian American".

I believe that much of the entertainment that has been conceived and produced by Asian Americans is either too explicitly overbearing on Asian American issues and therefore nauseating to a general audience, or is devoid of any lasting impact. Eventually, I want to bring stories of Asian Americans as just regular people who have real stories, who happen to be Asian American. But before that can happen, I believed there needs to be more groundwork in having people see Asian Americans as Americans. That's what I set out to do with this video.

Let me know what you guys think!



Thanks,
Doug

Fun video. I enjoyed watching it. And that's coming from someone who's mostly into heavier stuff and not so much pop/rock.

My only critique is that at just shy of 5:00 it's a little long for those who listen to this type of thing. I think it could stand to be trimmed down if you're interested in trying to really put it out there... Just my $.02

thanks...there was a concern of it being too long i know, i actually sped the tempo up from the original song and cut some parts, but felt the song would be changed dramatically if i cut any more.

I thought it was really funny... I liked all of it, didn't feel it was dragging on

thanks! there's a thread in NVG about it now, my friend posted and apparently it's news...lol