I saw the Wu-Tang Clan last night, apparently for their final tour ever.

Today I have been on a Wu-kick and was listening to an interview with RZA on the Broken Record Podcast. There are so many good quotes from this interview, but here's one that stuck with me about his film influences:

My first movie I ever saw was a Tom Sawyer / Huckleberry Finn movie. Second movie was Star Wars. Third movie was The Swarm. Fourth movie was … a Bruce Lee movie called Fury of the Dragon… and Black Samurai with Jim Kelly… Those are my first five movies… The force is my spirituality. The swarm, Killer Bees, kung fu movies… the writing of Mark Twain, that storytelling is all in my blood.

RZA's genius is his ability to sample not just sounds, but also key pieces of his influences to generate entirely new works and concepts.

What I also love about RZA is that he, at his core, is an unbelievable dork.

He is certainly not afraid to be goofy or silly (he covered Smells Like Teen Spirit last night to a crowd that was scratching their heads for a minute). That silliness suggests a certain kind of fearlessness. It takes extreme courage, especially in the conformist, often insecure world of hip-hop culture, to pull stuff like that off.

But the thing about RZA (and Andre 3000 for that matter) that separates him from being merely eccentric, is that his comfort-level with silliness is combined with a few other dangerous characteristics: ambition, work ethic, and vision.

RZA is a true leader and is someone who, creatively speaking, I admire deeply.

There are so many good what-the-fuck-is-going-on happening moments in RZA history. I will leave you with a few of of my favorites: