Wednesday, May 19th, 2010:
Brzowski was taking the bus down from Portland, Maine to meet up with me in Boston, Ma for the start of our tour. I had to swing by the Bus station and swoop him up, we went back and forth about the previous weeks of our lives, both had seen some turmoil and he was excited as I am to leave our home state for pastures unfamiliar to us. I ask how the show had gone the previous night and I was glad to hear that it was great! Brzowski is a performer unlike anyone I have ever seen and can hold the stage down for any sort of crowd. You might not enjoy all the music he does but you will enjoy his performance and probably support him for the human being he is in this world. We had 3.5 hours to go on the Mass Pike to get to the Albany show, we both had so many new songs to share on the trip that Brzowski just started hammering out new tracks for his upcoming release in Russia (Blood Drive volume 3!) and I was heavily impressed by the sound and structure he had taken with this release. I decided to show off my new group project (The Scribblenauts) with my best friends DJ Emoh Betta and Redlist. I had taken a more hip hop and technical approach when I decided to create that group with Redlist and DJ Emoh Betta.
The Chronicles Continues After The Jump…
It stills dwells on the emotional spectrum of anger/pessimism/resentment/pain/belief in yourself and like my good friend Recaall had said to describe it: Its like some torchured Emcee type of shit! While Brzo listened on to the whole debut ep I was trying to pound the miles down as best as I could. I had thought about the last time I was taking this trip to Albany and how me and Shane Blakemore were still touring together that time. We were tossed on the show as a late entry and were only allowed to do a few songs of our own and it just so happened we had material together.
I had previously been in a group with Shane Blakemore and we broke out some of the random songs made during that time. The crowd actually loved us and I felt good about that night. We probably had the best response out of every act that was not local. I was hoping for the same results this time around, but I was not sure how my emotional rap music would go over in a town like Albany. I have listened to and studied many acts from the Albany market including: Rick Whispers, Dezmatic, Dood Computer, Doomfist, Sev Statik, Shyste and a few others performers that are slipping my mind right now. They all have one common interest in the music they decided to make and that is: an Edge. I was an “emo rapper” from Boston, who no one out there had really heard of before this day. I had to play to my best qualities which are rapping, sarcasm, and my weird sense of humor. Albany, NY has one of the biggest cities I have ever been to that is just seeping with sarcasm, these people are harsh if you are not used to the rough jokes that I am used to being from Boston. I decided to play that to my favor by talking between songs about the first time I met Dood Computer and how he woke me up and called me a pussy for still sleeping at 7am after a show that got over around 5am. The crowd ate it up and the set went swell. I actually sold some cds and made some friends out there that I hope will return to the next show sometime soon. I love you Albany, you make me feel good about myself and my pursuits in life. here is another tip for aspiring rappers:
2. Always burn extra set cds, and don’t forget to pack them: What I forgot to mention earlier in this post is that I had burned 4 set cds for this tour, plus my sets all backed up on my Ipod. I also never mentioned that I lack the ability to remember just about anything in my life. I tend to forget people’ names immediately after they tell me their name. I did this to a girl I was dating for a little bit and actually confessed it to her later in the relationship, she broke it off a month later. I think it upset her quite a bit. So while in the rush of getting out of the house for the tour, I grabbed everything but my set cds! I am just glad I always bring my Ipod everywhere, or I wouldn’t have been performing on this tour at all.
Brzowski played well to the audience, breaking out some old tour stories from the previous trips around the country. The crowd was very responsive and attentive, something I was not used to in the states. I tend to talk down about playing in the United States to other rappers that want to come to my area, most hip hop shows aren’t well received in Boston unless you are pretty big! I have seen shows with household names such as Josh Martinez that had only 6 people there. It bothered him so much he actually wrote a blog post on Myspace about his terrible Boston show. I thought it was a real good time, but I’m getting off track. Albany was awesome and I will be glad to return to that city soon. We stayed with Dez and Dood Computer that night and his girlfriend told me how good I had done and that all the women were into it, only one girl actually came up to me and said they enjoyed it. I will still believe her for the sake of my self esteem.
Thursday, May 20th, 2010:
We had a driving day ahead of us on Thursday to get to Detroit for our last State show before bouncing to Canada and meeting up with our Canadian friend Jesse Dangerously. I was and am the only driver on this whole tour and let me tell you that I wish I wasn’t but such is life and I pounded out our driving in pretty good time to make it to Detroit for that night. We were playing at the Division St Gallery which is owned by our good friend Lord Dru. If you ever need a dope spot to play a show in Detroit and want to hang out with the best people Detroit has to offer I recommend hitting up Dru. We arrived late on Thursday night and he told us to find him at this old abandoned warehouse that had an open fire pit to it. I want to explain to you that Detroit is the Motor City and that random forests within the city just don’t exist, its more concrete and granite then anywhere else I have ever been. I was highly intrigued by an open fire pit in the middle of this concrete jungle, We found him, our sound guy, and some randoms all hanging out around this fire. I want to mention their was a stray cat there as well, his name was Tom (or Thom) cat. Dru had explained to me that this cat was the resident pimp cat of the neighborhood, he had kittens from every single stray there was in the Eastern Market area of Detroit. The cat was one of the friendliest cats I have come across in my time. respect. I also met this crazy woman who kept calling me “Boston” and making small talk about music and how great her band is from Detroit. I learned to hate this woman that night and I think I still do. We spent the night just talking about bands and how crazy it was that we had a huge fire-pit in an old warehouse in Detroit. I am going to take this moment and spit out some more words of wisdom, more so from Brzowski on this one:
3. Be nice to everyone: Simple statement right? well not for me, I tend to have no filter on my mouth and whatever I think about someone tends to come out, usually at the worst moment. I cannot pretend to be nice to strangers if they give me a bad first impression. I know what your saying right now “Josh, why not follow up on your own advise” I try to do this everyday, I’m just letting you in on the wise words that will help you further your career as a rapper. Being nice to others will help them love you and probably buy your music and also check for shows coming up featuring you. I am nice to everyone but as soon as you make a bad impression on me, I tend to shut you out.
Friday, May 21st, 2010:
We stayed with Dru at his spot for the show, and I was extremely excited to see that he had an extensive Nes/Snes collection for the people staying at his spot. I always feel so much at home when I’m in Detroit, its probably because it reminds me of my hometown (Fall River, Ma ; the place of my birth), very open and expansive. I decided that my goal that day was to beat Mike Tyson in Punchout, I spent the better half of the day just trying to develop my idea on how I was going to obtain this goal. If you ever have played Punch Out for Nintendo, you will know that this goal is extremely difficult to obtain. I have actually mentioned this several times on this tour and people are impressed and quite frankly shocked that I could beat him. I know this sounds very nerdy, but this is who I am, its probably a flaw in my design at birth but I enjoy video games, it helps me escape for a bit. the day was winding down and it was getting closer to showtime. I was actually excited to play this show because I had heard the opening acts prior to coming to Detroit and they were all very solid, do yourself a favor and check out “Of Mice And Musicians”, “Magnum Opus” and “Midcoast Most”, real nice groups and great human beings and talented. The night was to be Of Mice And Musicians release show and the crowd was amped to check them out. I was hopeful that they would enjoy my music since I traveled from the east coast to show my skills off and pursue this dream of mine. here is another tip for you:
4. Don’t quit school to be a rapper: I dropped out of college to pursue this dream and while it has been fulfilling quite often, it has had its heartbreak and hardship. I know many talented people who do hip hop music and have been on their grind for 10+ years and are still struggling to get by and most are very jaded. I’m not saying to give up on this dream, what I am saying is have a back up plan and be realistic about what your goals are with it. When I started my dream was to have a sold out show, I did that early. The next was to play the biggest/famous club in Boston (The Middle East), I’ve done that a few times now. The next goal is to make sure you all love me and my music (mostly my music). What I should’ve done while pursuing this goal was to finish college and get a backup plan. I know many rappers that are close to 40 and have not made it. I’m not saying its impossible but its highly probable that you won’t make it either. This is just the hard reality of being a non-famous rapper, its all about who you know and what your luck/heart has to give back to you.
The night was off to a great start with some of the opening acts, I then proceeded to jump on stage. If you have seen any of my photos I don’t have the appearance of a “hip hop artist” and that tends to work to my advantage being that when I do show up and start performing people are blown back by my charisma and dexterity on the mic. I also tend to enjoy talking quite often between songs about my life and whats going on at the moment. I can do this quite well more often then not but I also have a tendency to overkill the conversation, its funny to me because I am quite a shy and introverted person off the stage. I tend to avoid crowds and interacting with strangers whom I don’t believe share the same mindset as me. I am willing to hear your story out and listen and accept you for who you are, but chances are you won’t accept me. I went over pretty well with the audience, mostly the rappers enjoyed and respected the set. The night went on as I tried to hustle some merchandise to the randoms at the bar. Oh here is a great tip as well
5. Be Friendly and approachable: Too often people have told me I am unapproachable in real life. I am told I have a angry demeanor around me at shows and even my exes have told me that I have been real mean to them unintentionally. I try to be as nice as possible and friendly as well but I guess I haven’t quite worked out the kinks in those two attributes just yet. The better you are at communicating why your music and ideas are great for the people, the easier it is to sell an item. The friendlier and nicer you are the more people will want to interact with you and your music. This might seem like an extension of the previous tip but being nice and being approachable are two separate ideas and concepts altogether.
The merchandise didn’t move as well as I had hoped, all the articles and research I read that went into my choice of colors and such on my shirt just turned out to be wrong. I love my shirt design and its color scheme but people just dont seem to gravitate towards it. Brzowski brought it back with his set and the people vibed out most of the night. I spent the remainder of the evening just talking to other rappers about touring and what projects that they had in the works for the future. Overall the night was a great success and I was happy to be apart of it. The show didn’t end until 5am and the performances stopped around 4. Detroit runs on its own time. I accidentally fell asleep on a couch near the Nintendo system.
Next up: Canada!
The Author
