I have to other links to show off in this Web log:
http://public.csusm.edu/signo001/index.html
http://csignorino.wordpress.com
http://signorinovideo.blogspot.com
They both feature some of the work I did in my other classes.
And here are the pictures I think you’d like:
My short-lived comic, Go Cougars!
Be sure and check out my other works on this Web log.
This one’s for you, Jolie Jones. Thanks to your Web site, I was able to get a glimpse of how the music video was put together and the recognition it garnered (for a short time).
There aren’t twelve songs by MC Skat Kat (and the Stray Mob), but thirteen, with the inclusion of Get a Grip, which I have on the LP version of Skat Strut from the UK. I wondered if there’d be any more rap songs I wouldn’t mind listening to. As my father once told me, “Why don’t you write a song?” And looky here, I came up with a new song for the rapping cat: House Kat.
Yo, Leo, you know what time it is?
(Leo: What?)
(Skat Kat, Fatz, and Taboo: It’s time for home improvement!)
Skat Kat is back in action! Sorry to keep you waitin’.
Life in the streets isn’t always bad, find a happy place so you don’t get mad.
Dumpsters, alleys, wherever you wish, as long as you can grub some tasty fish. (Fatz: Yum!)
Me? I’m a cat who hopes for the best, looking for a place just to chill and rest.
The Mob could use a little R and R – it’s tiring to back up this rapping star. (Fatz: You said it.)
Where will I live? Where will I go? Not having a house will bring me woe.
Real estate would be my final resort for a crib for me and my cohorts.
Sure, my old place is fine and standing, but the tattered walls leave me demanding
something better, something phat. I need a new home – I am the House Kat.
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street)
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat)
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street)
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat)
If I were Mister Rogers, I’d change my shoes, greeting other neighbors who have heard the news
of Skat Kat living in a humble abode, unless I’m in the limo out on the road.
Home is where the heart is, that’s what I hear, so lemme get it pumpin’ when I come near.
I’ll make you move and jump around so the floorboards get that thumpin’ sound.
What a place, ain’t no way that we’re ditchin’ - livin’ room, dinin’ room, rec room, kitchen,
bedrooms, bathrooms, backyard, too. A three-car garage would excite Taboo. (Taboo: Yeauh!)
It’s all we need to kick back and unwind. Now try to remember, keep it in mind.
It’s something better, something phat. This is a home for me, the House Kat.
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street)
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat)
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street)
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat)
(Beat box break)
(Micetro: That’s it! Keep it up, big boy! Don’t mind me – I’m setting up a mouse hole in the wall. And Silk, you can come visit me anytime.)
(Silk: Thanks, but I’m too big to fit through a mouse hole.)
(Micetro: Ah, c’mon, I’ll make it bigger for ya-)
Don’t even think of it, Micetro. You’ve done just enough damage to the home.
(Micetro: Whatever.)
To get this house I had to pay, but don’t think that won’t make us stray.
We are who we are, we’ll never change, we just keep rollin’ like chuggin’ trains.
Don’t put my name on the sliding gate, or fans will set up camp and wait.
This is our hideout, who woulda guessed? Suburban livin’, more for less.
I gotta work to pay these bills by rapping and dancing, greater thrills. (Katleen: Greater thriiiiills!)
A cat’s home really is his castle, but owning a big one? What a hassle!
We need no money to score us a mansion – it’s all about my being, didn’t I mention?
It’s something better, something phat, it’s all too much for this House Kat.
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street) On the prairie… on the range…
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat) By the beach… nothing strange…
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street) Skat Kat doesn’t need a penthouse…
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat) Just his feline friends and mouse…
(House Kat, livin’ it up across the street)
(House Kat. Give him a home that can’t be beat)
(Fade out)
So what do you think? All done in true Skat Kat style. It could probably use some fine-tuning. What matters to me the most is that the lyrics must be clean.
Note: Last updated April 30, 2012
More than twenty years ago, Paula Abdul’s Opposites Attract introduced MC Skat Kat, an animated feline rapper (the clean kind). His physique might remind some of you of that of Roger Rabbit. I created some artwork (colored with Adobe Photoshop) in preparation for Abdul’s 50th birthday and as a surefire way to acknowledge the existence of MC Skat Kat and the Stray Mob, since no one else has ever thought of it before. I think it would look great in all sorts of places (sans my logo and notes): posters, bags, folders, lunchboxes, gift cards, desktop wallpapers, jigsaw puzzles, even three-dimensional dioramas! I could go on. This might not be the final version, however. I often have to make revisions to remain faithful to the source material.
The Stray Mob, of course, consists of Fatz (the short cat), Taboo (the cat wearing red shorts), Leo (the burly creature whose species I cannot verify at this time), Micetro (the mouse you see sitting on the hood of the limo/Skatmobile), Katleen (the cat in the pink hairdo) and Silk (the cat with blue eyes). You can read more about Skat Kat and the Mob in the pages I recently discovered on a blog devoted to Paula Abdul memorabilia: 
Did you know it’s been twenty years since Skat Kat’s album came out? Sadly, it was one of the most underrated albums in the early 1990s. Don’t get me wrong – the songs on it are pretty good and decent once you get to know them. If you have RealPlayer on your computer, you can listen to the tracks at http://www.paula-abdul.net/html/mc_skat_kat.html.
Read what Jon Mendicina had to say about the album. He liked it.
And take a look at the review of the album here: albumreviews
And you know what? The song Skat Strut was released off the album as a single and got its own music video, which became the most requested on MTV in 1991. No question. Many people actually liked it. Check it out in high quality.
Believe it or not, the video was once used to demonstrate the potential of US Animation’s computerized animation system, and it was well-received.
Skat also had a second single called Big Time, and it was given its own music video with revised music; however, it was never fully shown to the public. Look at this. And if you listen carefully, you’ll hear the lyrics “a mutt named Leo.” Unless the term ’mutt’ refers to someone unintelligent, I’ll never know what Leo really is.
I don’t get it. If the video was finished in January 1992, why didn’t Kafka upload the whole thing? I never quite understood why nobody was sure what to do with the cat. Hopefully, we’ll get to see the entire video when Abdul’s 50th birthday approaches.
I’m not going to lie to you all, there are fans out there who think MC Skat Kat and the Stray Mob should be reintroduced, and I believe it would be best if he was brought back in the same appropriate style and appearance. Plus, he still has to be hand-drawn. We don’t want to disappoint the fans, you know. As the lyrics in the UK-exclusive song Get a Grip from the Skat Strut LP say “I gotta be Skat Kat, the MC, not what society wants me to be.” I wish I could upload the sound file of the song, but I’d have to pay to do it. We’ve got to get iTunes to make the album, the videos, and the UK-exclusive song available to purchase.
If there’s one company that should bring him back, it would have to be The Walt Disney Company. I have my top ten reasons for this and I might work as an animator/director for the company someday. As for my artwork, I wonder if I should duplicate it with Adobe Illustrator so it doesn’t have any pixels. Hopefully, the artwork will be enough to convince Mike Patterson, whom you can contact at USC School of Cinematic Arts, to give Skat Kat another chance.
December 16, 2011
After looking at the credit item list, I figured I had to put this up right away.
Good – The colors on this page are mostly warm, and the text stands out exceptionally well. And the figures you see are all on bronze-colored shapes, giving them a significantly satisfying feeling. Plus, there’s just the right amount of space between the figures, and the image of Link holding his sword up high is well-centered and doesn’t obscure the Nintendo Power name too much.
The layout of this page is not particularly well-balanced. There’s too much detail on the right and a wide open space on the left. It doesn’t work very well this way. The black Duracell object practically blends in with the black sky. Dark colors don’t look good on dark backgrounds, mind you. If I were the designer responsible for this, I’d switch places of the object and text next to the object (Today, there’s no reason to run out of power) and shrink down the size of said text. I’d also make the object a little lighter and make it a little bigger.
