I've Got My Music
I'm on the 6 train heading back to Brooklyn from Hunter College after helping a playwright friend workshop his thesis play that is set to receive a production in March 2013. As I ride I am listening to the music and with each song I'm transported, touched, and inspired. Real music does this to me at all times. If I may, I'm going to be honest with you. Music was, is and will forever more be my first Love. She is my life force as she makes love to my soul in ways no other woman could fathom. We connect on a level unseen because when we are being real with each other, our experiences inspire and bring out our true purpose.
If it weren't for music I wouldn't be an actor, singer or songwriter. From my conception to my day of birth to my first car accident, music has been a constant. She was there when my parents couldn't be and the things that go bump in the night haunted me. She was there for my being scolded for wanting to literally touch her as she spun right 'round as a 12 inch single on my Dad's turntable.
Ever changing and evolving like the kid from Kentucky she was molding and shaping, I met her as Funk from the soulful screams of James Brown and the horns, beats and provocative album covers of Parliament Funkadelic. She taught me how to dance in the form of a kid from Gary, Indiana who grew up to be known as the King of Pop and had me moonwalking in penny loafers and white socks. She taught me about sex and crime and parties and my older brothers in the form of hip hop. As hip hop she gave me a sense of style, an identity and lit a fire in me to tell stories over looped beats made by recording my favorite ConFunkShun, Earth Wind & Fire, and Cameo beats onto a cassette tape. These stories weren't just fantasy, they were real life accounts of what my life was like growing up in Paris, KY. I cut my teeth to MCs like Big Daddy Kane, D-Nice, Rakim, Heavy D, Slick Rick, KRS One, Chuck D, LL Cool J, The Fresh Prince (yes, he used to rhyme), MC Lyte, Queen Latifa, Monie Love, Hammer, Special Ed and Kid N Play. These cats gave parents a headache, politicians a break from focusing on important issues, and my fashion sense a kick in the ass! I was totally crossed out and even had little braids until my mom told me I looked like a little girl and kept me from being the third member of Kriss Kross.
Everything I heard from these artists in hip hop, yes, they were artists then, gave me a vivid picture into a reality out of reach in KY. Even the music over which they rhymed was real music. It may have been played by other bands but it was real music sampled from real bands, real artists. Eventually cats like The Roots began to proceed to rock the Mic making their own beats and sounds. Two dope boys in a Cadillac began to tell what it was like to grow up in the south and I was hooked. Music had me forever. Even when she became hardcore and wore parental advisory labels as if she were shunning me from things she didn't want me to hear. Thanks to my older brothers and friends I heard her and loved her even more... until she became commercial and began whoring herself to those who didn't see her beauty.
You see, Common and I share the same Love for hip hop and music. His profession of Love for H.E.R. was one of my favorite songs and I even used to pass it off as my own freestyle in the back of a few classes in high school to the delight of some of the girls who were paying attention. It's not just hip hop that I Love, it's music. All music, all genres. I Love how she can take heartbreak and make it beautiful or unite millions with her melodies and words. However, something has happened to her. She's not what she used to be. She is struggling to find herself again and that's okay because we all get lost on our journey through time. I know she's just gathering material for her return to glory.
There are a few people who are shedding a light to help lead her home. I'm privileged to personally know a few of those artists. I'd like to think of myself as one of those artists. People who play their own instruments or write their own songs and speak about their experiences in an ever creative, ever evolving way to the point that the music we share isn't just music, it's an experience. You feel as though you learned something or have been not only moved but transported to another place either mentally, emotionally, and sometimes physically. Beethoven does that to me. Buddy Guy, Albert King and Stevie Ray Vaughan show me the tin pan alleys of the world and they never looked so familiar. Rock helps me to shout and let it all out with a rebel yell while living on a prayer in a paradise city.
Below, is one of the artists who I believe has found his purpose through music. I am a bit biased because as a Coldweirdness team member and fan of real hip hop (there is a difference), I find that he along with fellow team members: J-Ideas, KingPen, SoBlessed, and Dee Dot, REAL tha Poet is taking the responsibility of caring for music very seriously without losing himself by not taking the seductive path of money, cars, and hoes for the overgrown paths of real MCs and artists who have a real Love and respect for the genre to which they contribute.
Music, my first and true Love, will live forever in the music of every artist listed here in this blog. In some genres she's experiencing growing pains. She's fighting acne and is a little awkward but when you really listen to her, you find her and perhaps even your purpose. You see her for what she really is beneath the cracking voice and peculiar choices. She is the universal language: a true gift from God.
If it weren't for music I wouldn't be an actor, singer or songwriter. From my conception to my day of birth to my first car accident, music has been a constant. She was there when my parents couldn't be and the things that go bump in the night haunted me. She was there for my being scolded for wanting to literally touch her as she spun right 'round as a 12 inch single on my Dad's turntable.
Ever changing and evolving like the kid from Kentucky she was molding and shaping, I met her as Funk from the soulful screams of James Brown and the horns, beats and provocative album covers of Parliament Funkadelic. She taught me how to dance in the form of a kid from Gary, Indiana who grew up to be known as the King of Pop and had me moonwalking in penny loafers and white socks. She taught me about sex and crime and parties and my older brothers in the form of hip hop. As hip hop she gave me a sense of style, an identity and lit a fire in me to tell stories over looped beats made by recording my favorite ConFunkShun, Earth Wind & Fire, and Cameo beats onto a cassette tape. These stories weren't just fantasy, they were real life accounts of what my life was like growing up in Paris, KY. I cut my teeth to MCs like Big Daddy Kane, D-Nice, Rakim, Heavy D, Slick Rick, KRS One, Chuck D, LL Cool J, The Fresh Prince (yes, he used to rhyme), MC Lyte, Queen Latifa, Monie Love, Hammer, Special Ed and Kid N Play. These cats gave parents a headache, politicians a break from focusing on important issues, and my fashion sense a kick in the ass! I was totally crossed out and even had little braids until my mom told me I looked like a little girl and kept me from being the third member of Kriss Kross.
Everything I heard from these artists in hip hop, yes, they were artists then, gave me a vivid picture into a reality out of reach in KY. Even the music over which they rhymed was real music. It may have been played by other bands but it was real music sampled from real bands, real artists. Eventually cats like The Roots began to proceed to rock the Mic making their own beats and sounds. Two dope boys in a Cadillac began to tell what it was like to grow up in the south and I was hooked. Music had me forever. Even when she became hardcore and wore parental advisory labels as if she were shunning me from things she didn't want me to hear. Thanks to my older brothers and friends I heard her and loved her even more... until she became commercial and began whoring herself to those who didn't see her beauty.
You see, Common and I share the same Love for hip hop and music. His profession of Love for H.E.R. was one of my favorite songs and I even used to pass it off as my own freestyle in the back of a few classes in high school to the delight of some of the girls who were paying attention. It's not just hip hop that I Love, it's music. All music, all genres. I Love how she can take heartbreak and make it beautiful or unite millions with her melodies and words. However, something has happened to her. She's not what she used to be. She is struggling to find herself again and that's okay because we all get lost on our journey through time. I know she's just gathering material for her return to glory.
There are a few people who are shedding a light to help lead her home. I'm privileged to personally know a few of those artists. I'd like to think of myself as one of those artists. People who play their own instruments or write their own songs and speak about their experiences in an ever creative, ever evolving way to the point that the music we share isn't just music, it's an experience. You feel as though you learned something or have been not only moved but transported to another place either mentally, emotionally, and sometimes physically. Beethoven does that to me. Buddy Guy, Albert King and Stevie Ray Vaughan show me the tin pan alleys of the world and they never looked so familiar. Rock helps me to shout and let it all out with a rebel yell while living on a prayer in a paradise city.
Below, is one of the artists who I believe has found his purpose through music. I am a bit biased because as a Coldweirdness team member and fan of real hip hop (there is a difference), I find that he along with fellow team members: J-Ideas, KingPen, SoBlessed, and Dee Dot, REAL tha Poet is taking the responsibility of caring for music very seriously without losing himself by not taking the seductive path of money, cars, and hoes for the overgrown paths of real MCs and artists who have a real Love and respect for the genre to which they contribute.
Music, my first and true Love, will live forever in the music of every artist listed here in this blog. In some genres she's experiencing growing pains. She's fighting acne and is a little awkward but when you really listen to her, you find her and perhaps even your purpose. You see her for what she really is beneath the cracking voice and peculiar choices. She is the universal language: a true gift from God.
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