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I had the pleasure of being courtside for a cool fashion show at Howard University the other night. It was a very well put together event with good music, good themes, and very talented models. Also ran into two good friends of Da Fam, Fresco & Matt. Below are some photos of the event courtesy of both of them.
I know I’m cheating by writing stuff here and then posting here but hey, what can I do? This site and that site attract two different types of readers but some of the content can be appreciated by both. Whichever you read, thanks.
I’ve never been big on these TV series’ that air once a week. Takes a lot of dedication and effort to be in front of the TV set at the same time each week and then sit through commercials, then just as the episode gets good, they cut to commercial and tell you to tune in the following week…aka torture. Luckily for me and through the power of Netflix I was able to watch ABC’s LOST (All 5 seasons) over the holidays. In a span of 2 months I covered more than 100 episodes and it was a great experience. What added to my experience was the fact that I knew nothing about the show for the 5 years it’s been on the air so to me it was brand new.
The synopsis is basically this: A bunch of people from various walks of life are flying from Australia to Los Angeles. Mid flight something goes wrong and the plain begins to descend. Ultimately they crashed on an island and that’s where things get crazy. We’re introduced to a doctor by the name of Jack, who assumes the leader role on the island. We meet Sawyer, a foul mouth, sarcastic, country pretty boy who calls everyone everything but their real names. John Locke is the elder in the group. Then you have Kate, the eye candy/tough chick of the group.
There are several other main characters that crashed on that island and overtime each of their stories are revealed. Basically what kind of lives they lived prior to boarding that plane. Although most seemed so normal to the naked eye, several of them had been through near death experiences, murdered people, alcohol and drug abuse, there’s even incest in the first few episodes of the first season. If all of this sounds crazy it’s because it is. LOST is about real life but at a very fast pace. They hook by showing the characters good sides as well as bad. You begin to learn not to judge people so quick and understand the motives behind certain actions. You see them problem solve as it becomes apparent that they may spend the rest of their lives on that island. You see them find creative ways to enjoy themselves like playing golf with clubs that were found on the plane. It’s pretty much about life, it’s complexities, and surviving and making the best out of them.
I’d give the first 5 seasons of the show an A-. At times the fictional aspects got a bit corny to me at times but not too much. It was done in the same sense that rappers rap about their “real life” but say lines like “money taller than the Statue of Liberty”. A little stretching of reality to drive home your point never hurt no one I guess. Overall LOST is a great show that I’d recommend to anyone. If you’re really focused you can watch tonight and catch up on most of the first 5 seasons over the next week. Your children would probably starve and you won’t pay rent but it would be worth it.
Sidebar: How sick are they for using Sade’s “Soldier Of Love” for the trailer? Her album drops a week after the premiere. The kind of cross promotion that would make Nike execs proud.
I personally will miss you. Thanks for the memories. No athlete, film star or political figure had the kind of impact you did on me. Even in these last few years when it became cool to mock you and laugh at you, I refused to partake. You made questionable decisions but so have the rest of us. Your death for me is bittersweet. I’m saddened that we’ll never see you grace a stage again and that I never got a chance to see you perform live, however I’m excited that you are now in a better place. This current state of the world is no place for people like you; it is unkind and unwilling to embrace creative spirits such as yourself. After 4 decades of service you deserve to rest. So go ahead Mike, moon walk on the moon. Watch over the new generation of entertainers who strive to be even a fraction of what you were. God bless you and once again, thanks.
I’ve listened to thousands of songs in my lifetime and I’m yet to find one that moves me the way this one does:
Man In The Mirror-Michael Jackson
Getting ready to turn things into high gear again. Well things actually are already in high gear but most of the work has been underground. Like my friend once said, “there are no cameras in the gym”. Trust me, work has been getting done and I think we’re about ready to step out into the public again.
Can’t step out into the public without current photos so here are a few courtesy of my homies Fresco, Shawn, and Chris. The event was really to shoot the album cover for my EP “Give Me A Second I Swear” but in the process we also shot the following for some promo stuff I’ll be doing with Da Fam Inc.
For today’s “I Am” interview we spend a few minues getting into the mind of Sherri, otherwise known as Go Getter. An intelligent young lady from New Jersey with a lot of ambition and knowledge. She shares some of that below.
I Am Go Getter
What’s going on in Go Getter’s world right now at this moment?
I think everything is going on in my world because I’m at a stage where I wanna do everything and see if I like it or not, so I try different things. I’m at that experimental stage in life where I’m trying to test the waters and dibble and dabble in a little bit of this and a little bit of that.
I think now the most important thing to me is my MBA, I’m in grad school and that’s kind of hard with everything else going on to stay focused and go to school. I don’t think that having a degree proves how smart a person is and because I feel that way it’s hard for me to keep going, but I know to get in certain arenas you need certain things. So I’m trying to get this out of the way so I’ll be 23 when I have my degree. I don’t want to keep holding it off till later when I get older. Plus I don’t have to pay my student loans back while I’m still in school.
Right, get to put it off for a little bit. So are your days pretty much routine or does your schedule vary from day to day?
It depends on the day. The first thing I always do is check my email. My Blackberry is always on and I have like 5 different email accounts on it. And that’s all I do, I check emails and what people need I try to help them with. If person A needs this, I try to get that. If somebody else needs something totally different, I’m just trying to produce results. Because a lot of people say “I’m busy” but they don’t really do anything, I don’t want to be one of those people.
Ok, so what inspires you to go and get something?
Well I think everybody has a story and part of my story inspires me. I’m from Newark; born and raised. And in that area you’re around people who say what you can’t do and what you’ll never be. And although my parents always told me I could do anything, it was that environment where it’s like “oh you’re from here? you’ll never do this”. I think that pushes me harder everyday. I came out of it and so can other people. I want to show other young people that you don’t always have to be a product of your environment. If you want it go get it.
What would you say is the worst part about being a Go Getter?
There is no personal life. You’re always so focused on what you have to do. With my personality I always feel like I’m behind. So even though I may be doing more than most people, I always feel like I have to play catch up and that makes me work harder. And in turn I don’t do typical things that 22 year olds do. I don’t always go out, I’m not the one that’s always partying or chillin, I’m always doing something. So it definitely affects the personal life but my motto is “I’ll work hard now and play later”. But I still have to find that balance.
You have a degree in Psychology, what attracted you to that field and what are the benefits of being a Psychology expert?
I’ve always been fascinated with people. I’ve always wanted to know why people think the way they do. What’s their next move going to be? I want to know before they do. At the end of the day life is full of strategies; it’s one big game and being a PSYCH Major you’re kind of ahead because you can pick up on certain things ahead of people. It’s just a fascinating thing and it’s useful no matter what field you go into because you’re always going to be working with people so it’s always going to come in handy.
What’s something people do that absolutely drives you crazy?
Wow, so many things drive me crazy. One of the things I hate is when people front. Like when they try to be flashy and say “oh I have this and I have that” or “I know this person and I know that person”. Like well who are you? I like to see results so people who talk and talk with no purpose really annoy me. That’s one of many.
Most of your blogs seem to be centered around a relationship theme. Are you trying to be Dr.Love for people?
(Laughing) I don’t know about all of that but I’m open to the idea. That just stems from personal situations and I feel like everybody goes through things for a reason and I’ve gone through some my issues for a reason. So I’m like why not share it? I’m an open book and since I’ve been there and done that, let me just share my opinion. At first I wasn’t even looking for feedback but then people started commenting and sending me emails and I’m like “wow people really relate to it”. I just like to share what I’ve been through and maybe somebody won’t make the same mistakes.
Do you find yourself taking your own advice or is most of it easier said than done?
A lot of it is easier said than done. Even in writing my blogs I may write something and say “wow I need to apply that to myself”. Most of it is easier said than done. I try to apply it to myself but it’s definitely hard.
I know people don’t like to publicize their goals for fear of jinxing them but can you share one life goal with us?
I have a real passion for youth and for young girls. If in my lifetime I can help one girl turn her life around or help one girl out by sharing my story then that’s fine to me; everything else really doesn’t matter.
Anything you have in the works that we should be looking out for?
Well I’ve been working on my website Gogetitgirl.com for a while now. It was finished but I’m very picky and I didn’t think the final design would work. Now I’m reworking that and I’m going to launch that soon. It’s an online magazine targeted mostly towards young African-American females where they can come and get music, fashion, and everything in one place. That’s the biggest thing I would say that I’m working on now.
For more on Go Getter you can follow her on Twitter and soon Her Website.
*The I Am interviews are going to be a recurring theme on this site. Trying to do my part in restoring journalism that goes into depth with the subject. I’ll be interviewing people from all walks of life, not just people in the entertainment business. After all we all are somebody.
Today we start off with FMos & Young M Clayton. Learn about FMos’ music industry journey and Young M Clayton’s plans for the future.
I Am FMos & I Am Young M Clayton
Just to start off, you have a “bring New York back” theme to your music. What exactly does that mean and what will it take to bring it back?
FMos- You know it’s interesting in the past 3 years working on this music and really trying to figure out what would make my music unique to the listeners. Just listening to the quality of New York music around that time, it really just seemed like it was lacking originality. We started seeing that the southern records were doing really well, copying those joints, saw some of the West Coast artists that were hot, started doing joints with them. At the time The Game was doing a lot of songs with East Coast artists. I thought that was cool but I thought that New York identity just wasn’t being maintained. When I decided to make this whole “Bring New York Back” theme that’s really what it was about. You know, they can take it or leave it but I feel there’s a quality there that people are looking for. And you know a lot of people are like “you bugging man, you’re putting yourself in a box” but I don’t think so. I think that it allows me to be who I am, try new things creatively but still have my vibe.
Your sound is kind of vintage or throwback. You have that classic New York type of flow. Is it a challenge to stay true to the roots of hip-hop while remaining relevant to the new age fans?
FMos- Yeah it’s definitely a challenge. It’s a challenge to connect with fans because with any artist that does anything, whether you paint or do music, from the gate you kind of already know what kind of fans you’ll connect with. But as an artist you want to connect with everybody so that’s the challenge and that’s the dope part about my creativity in being an artist. How can I take what I do beyond my expectations and take it where I can connect with people I thought would never be able to connect with me? I got this one record called Mr.Ego Mr.All That and it talks about my trials and tribulations in the industry when it comes to women. You would think well who would that connect to? But that connects with everybody. The reason why is because people want insight on what it’s like to be an artist in hip-hop; not just the cars, the bling and all that but the real stuff. I perform it all over the world and people come up to me like “I love that song”. Connecting with new fans is about taking what you do best to the next level and not being afraid to try different things.
Ok, to switch gears just a little bit, similar to a lot of rappers, you started off as a basketball player. Is there a part of you that wishes you stayed in that lane?
FMos- Right that’s a dope question. Nah, I actually don’t miss playing basketball at all. Main reason why is that I played hard body for many years and I got a point where I realized within myself that I couldn’t go to the NBA. It’s interesting that around the same time I felt like I reached the ceiling with basketball was when I really started rapping out on the block and writing rhymes, and spitting with my peoples on the staircase, and they really were really gravitating towards it. And I got to see that out of 50 dudes that’s doing this, I’m better than all of these dudes! I started to realize that I standout way more at this than I ever would with basketball. And I got friends that’s in the NBA, like my boy Ron Artest, I knew I wasn’t as good as him. I just went to college and I focus on my music and here we are.
Got it. Now tell us about the relationship and subsequent signing to Alicia Keys and Krucial Keys.
FMos- You know like I said when I started focusing on doing this music professionally a lot of it started with street battles. Out in the street battling for money, battling for respect, I spit three rhymes and you spit three rhymes and the crowd decides the winner; you either get embarrassed or you get glorified. And basically a barber who I used to go to came up to me one day and said “look my brother is a producer and wants to meet you. Him and his partner got this music label.” So I said cool. So they came out from Queens and eventually that relationship winded up being Terry “Krucial” Brothers and Alicia Keys and collectively they formed Krucial Keys. That was right before Alicia’s first project came out and it was basically like listen “we’re trying to form a team of people, we like your music and like your vibe”. So basically we just took it from there. Started with a handshake and then I just was going out on tour with her and I winded up signing a production and management deal with them. I got to see a lot but at that time it really wasn’t the right time for me to come out. I don’t know if people can remember back to that time when Alicia first came out, she was such an uber star, Rolling Stone magazine, five Grammys that first year, and it just wasn’t my time. And I was just feeling like I was missing my opportunity. And I think looking back now in hindsight I really should have had more patience, but at that time it was the right thing to do to move forward. I took the stuff I learned from them and moved forward and started my own music company.
Alright cool, so tell us about your music company?
FMos- It’s Street Heat Incorporated. It’s simple. Some really good friends of mine that I knew that were into music and had a specific set of skills trying to do something collectively but didn’t know how to, like “look man we need to all come together”. One of my guys DJ’s, Starks, Young M Clayton and my boy Ash’Cash, like we need to put together a company where we can showcase our music as well as other artists music. Our business model is basically based around mixtapes and events, you know in Atlanta, Savannah and of course the tri-state area. Just trying to expand opportunites to cats that I came up with that I saw that was real serious with the music. And we had the ‘best of’ albums and the first one being the “Hell Up In Harlem” and our goal was just to showcase artists in Harlem. There was no pay $5000 to get on the album or you gotta be cool with us, we just want the best music from Harlem. We got hundreds of submissions from new artists and the biggest artists. We just put them all together and showcased. So it’s cool, I think all that stuff that I learned from Alicia and Krucial it went right into what I do with Street Heat.
Ok let’s switch gears for a second to Young M Clayton. You specialize in marketing and promotion, what made you choose that as a career path?
Young M Clayton- Well I think for me how it really all started with was when I was at Lincoln University. You know I was a pretty popular dude in college. Just like Mos I played sports as well and when you play sports and you’re good at it, it puts you in certain social circles. I grew up in Queens around like Irv Gotti, the real Craig G, DJ Clue and Sha Money XL is a real good friend of mine. So being in that circle put me around a bunch of people that were in the music business. And one of my best assets is just being a cool person and being able to network. So just from being a cool individual the dude in charge of student affairs stepped to me and wanted me to host our Spring Bling concert. Originally I was kind of nervous a little bit but the gym was packed, like it was crazy. And right then and there I knew that I had to be in marketing or some type of form of advertising.
And it’s crazy because with Mos, not only do I work with him but he’s my little cousin. I remember days with him coming up to my room and I’d talk to him about hip-hop and the look on his face, he’d be crazy interested. So I went to school and I come back and I hear my cousin is like this big rap star that’s rocking with Alicia Keys and I’m like “word?”. Right around that time he had parted ways with Alicia and I was like look I want to bring my skill set in terms of being able to network and connect with people to go out there and let people know who you are. Ever since then it’s been history.
What’s the biggest challenge you face daily trying to bring exposure to your acts?
Young M Clayton- What really gets me upset, and me and Mos talk about this a lot, is the bullsh*t cosign. What I mean is that people are cosigning artists that aren’t really hot. It’s just like saying I work for this label and this dude is on my label so I’m gonna put a bunch of PR into him and make him hot. But then other people that really listen to the music, just because they have a relationship with the person at the label, they’ll cosign him. So now you have these artists coming out that don’t have hot music but they’re selling a bunch of records based on the strength of what other people are saying. So when a guy like Mos comes through it’s like “yeah your music is dope but who do you know?” It’s really getting these top level music executives, the blogs, and the PR people to listen to the music. Navigating through all the BS is like the biggest challenge. The music is always going to speak for itself. But it’s getting a lot better though. It’s about being persistent and waking up every morning and just having that drive.
I agree 100% and I also agree that it is getting better. How do you decide if a person is capable of successfully being marketed?
Young M Clayton- With me it’s all about that personal interaction and getting inside of their mind. What is it that they’re really trying to achieve? You get some people that are just attracted to the allure, another shameless plug, that’s one of Mos’ songs. It’s that allure of the music industry; “I wanna be in the music videos, I wanna have x amount of females stressing me”. That’s not really what it is. There’s going to be a lot of times when you’ll get doors shut in your face. So a major part for me is to really sit down and chop it up with the person that’s coming to us and based upon those answers compiled with the music is how we make that determination if we want to work with an artist or not.
Ok last question is for both of you. What do you have coming up and what do you want to say to people interested in what you guys have going on?
Young M Clayton- One of the things with Mos is concentrating on this real dope project. Just based on the feedback from certain people. The first single we have dropping is gonna be called “Fresh”. I’m totally pumped about this project because it’s the summertime, it’s hot, everybody wants to be fresh. You can go to any neighborhood in America and as soon as we get some consecutive days of good weather, everybody gets fresh. I think it’s a song that’s going to be real catchy. The production on it is dope, lyrically it’s fire. And we’re working on getting this single out and building a buzz for FMos then parlaying the success into the “Bringing New York Back” project.
Also I’m actually working on a major website that I’m about to drop within the next couple of weeks. It’s going to be like a one-stop-shop Street Heat Inc./Young M Clayton website. It’s about showcasing up and coming talent. I’m not just talking about music wise. We’re going to have poets showcasing their poetry, graphic artists showcasing their art; I’m really working on developing Young M Clayton as a brand and not just saying PR/Marketing, I want it to be a brand.
Anything else you want to add FMos?
FMos- Just a couple things. It’s interesting, Young M Clayton touched on why the song commercially is viable because everybody wants to be fresh. To me why I feel it’s going to have national success is because “fresh” is more than the clothes you wear, it’s like a state of mind. You know like fresh ideas, having a fresh attitude. When I first wrote this record was during the whole Barack Obama campaign and his whole way of doing things was completely different from everybody else who is in the same category with him and doing the same thing. That’s how I feel about the record. It’s completely different; the sound, lyrically, the flow of it is different. We shot an extraordinary video for it and again it doesn’t look like what traditional videos look like. And with this whole “Bringing New York Back” concept is a new project called “RIP New York” and the reason is that we’re trying to let people know that it’s at the point where if New York doesn’t regain it’s originality and the swagger that people expect from it then we might as well just kill it and start over. That’s why “Fresh” comes in. If New York is dead and the whole idea people felt about New York is dead then let’s just come back out with something new and let’s not follow nobody else. Just stay tuned. I’m going to be doing a lot of collaborations with some corporate sponsors in the summertime and doing some stuff with some folks of mine over at Roc 4 Life, so everybody just stay tuned.
March 2009
Interviewer:Phella
Subject:B.o.b
Affiiliated with T.I.’s Grand Hustle, B.O.B has received worldwide praise for his skilled production, infectious hooks, and thought provoking lyrics. I had a chance to chat with him briefly last month about something he’s not so Famous for; Fashion.
“….Because if you’re not it would just look funny. “-B.O.B
Phella:First off all you seem to have a very unique fashion sense, everything from the hats to the clothes. When did you first get into fashion?
B.o.b:Well really I haven’t always been able to express myself as much as I would like fashion-wise. But really I’ve always been fashionable to my best ability, even back in the day when I really didn’t have the resources and the means that I do now. But you know it’s not really fashion in a superficial way but more so fashion in a self-expression and artistic way. You know I’m an artist so my expression just bleeds from the inside out.
Phella:Yeah so it’s not just limited to music, it manifests in what you wear as well.
B.o.b:Yeah, exactly.
Phella:You talked about coming up as a young dude you probably weren’t able to afford the best of things but I’m pretty sure growing up you saw people and things that influenced you. Did you have any people or particular brands that influenced your dressing as a youngster?
B.o.b: No, really when it comes to fashion it’s more of a cultural thing. There’s really no specific individual. More so what I picked up from the culture and how people dressed in the south. You know they would wear Air Force Ones then I would want Air Force Ones. But now I’m at the point where I’m just content with whatever I get and I can be expressive with it.
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