Night time TV shows consists of The Flash, Green Arrow, Game of Thrones, Happily Ever After, Star Wars Rebels, and Supergirl. My wife watches all those shows. I watch only one of them: Star Wars Rebels and Im currently behind on Season 3. Im more of a Youtuber. In any case, they reason I mention this is because if there is one day time channel my wife and I can happily agree with is the History channel. She loves it. I love it. History is awesome.

This past Veterans Day, I went out with my brother [in arms], JD. We talk about all things as we enjoyed our free meals. Towards the end of the night, he introduced to me The Hamilton Mixtape. He only shared a few minutes of one song but told me the story about the mixtape. I found it fascinating that a broadway show had brought all these artists together. He also told me how crazy it was to get tickets for the broadway show.

PSA: If you can get tickets, let me know! I want to go. Ill be up north really soon.

Okay, back to JD and The Hamilton Mixtape. The next day I downloaded the soundtrack to the Broadway musical. I was hooked. It was too good. It was a hip-hop cultured twist on the events that started up our country. Ill admit, I was embarrassed to not know the story of Alexander Hamilton. If I was taught his story, its buried somewhere in the remote areas of my brain. The musical has caused me to do research and to know more about the start of our great nation.

The thing about history is that its subjective. The winner gets to tell the story. Another good friend of mine, Ralphie, whose family too, recently visited Japan. During his time there, he visited a museum. He came across an area that was dedicated to The Great War, referring to World War II. The wall started in Japanese with English translations, in a timeline format. It talks about the reason the US got into the war (not because of Nazis, the Axis Powers, Pearl Harbor, etc) and how they [the US] forced Japans hand into joining. The details of this version are interesting. However, the timeline stops a little after they bombed Pearl Harbor. Why? Well thats when the US invaded Japan, was winning, and ultimately dropped the atomic bombs. Although those parts are not included in the timeline, everything after Pearl Harbor is written in only Japanese. Their perception and understanding of World War II is very different from ours.

Back to American history, if you have a music streaming account, I highly recommend Hamilton: An American Musical. Its phenomenal! If youre into hip-hop and RB, check out the mixtape after. Although the album features 46 tracks, it never feels dry and boring the way history can feel sometimes. What are your thoughts? Into history? And do you know about Alexander Hamilton or am I the only one who didnt know his story? Tweet me @ippyg ~ until next week!

Originally published at www.ippyg.com.