I considered starting out my blog with a fascinating interview of a music taste-maker, an elegant review of DJ’s hot new release, an episode of my radio show, or maybe an article about a fascinating new artist who was still “undiscovered” I had found. I am not new to the world of blogging. I had a blog catering to artists for many years, which I now have taken down and begun to move the posts over to my company’s blog. I’ve also had several personal blogs years ago, but this is the first time I have really explored a professional blog on what I really love, music.
So thinking into what to write, I thought about starting out with something interesting or spectacular to kick off this voyage, however I thought it might be much more fitting to just say hello, give something that will allow my future readers (as this blog site is unpublished as I am writing this, I have 0 readers as of yet).
So, nice to meet you!
Being that this blog is intended to be a music blog – a place for both music lovers with an eclectic taste to casual listeners with a very specific, narrow window of what they will listen to – I thought I would describe the history of my love affair with music. Growing up I was always into art. I spent hours painting, drawing, sketching anything and everything I could see or imagine. My talents were noticed when I was 8 or 9 by my local high school art director (obviously far before high school) and she took me under her wing to excel.
I was a very sensitive, shy, loner, artistic type as a child, which sometimes made it hard to connect with people. While rounding the corner of puberty, I was desperately seeking a better connection with my peers. Music became my key. I got my first CD player for Christmas when I was 11; it was a “boom box” type of stereo with a double deck tape player/recorder and radio all rolled into one. I joined a BMG music club and started getting shipped CD’s, I started listening and putting together my collection. I really loved every type of music; everything from Greenday, No Doubt, Alanis Morsette, Hootie and the Blowfish, Bush, Keith Sweat, TLC, 2Pac, and Biggie. (It was the mid 90’s – pre Hanson – which I am admittedly a huge fan of still today, pre-DMX, before Jay-Z came out with Hard Knock Life and I was just getting started).
I really found that I was able to connect with my peers with music, and I blossomed with the real introduction of music into my life. I became a kid with my bedroom literally wallpapered with posters, had 10 CD books filled with hundreds of CD’s, and I listened to everything from the obscure to the popular.
I picked up a hobby of seeking out unknown pop or hip-hop oriented acts and trying to pick the ones that would make it. At the time, I loved watching “The Box” music video network because they did a good job of showcasing music that had not quite broke yet. During the popularity of the Backstreet Boys first single, I was already onto N’Sync, who were at the time fairly unknown in the U.S. but they were mine to discover. Black Eyed Peas’ single, “Joints and Jams”, was another favorite of mine around 1998; at least 6 years before they had a major hit in 2003. I became a huge fan of their conscious message, and unique upbeat flow – with songs like “Karma”, “Bringing it Back”, and “Positivity”, they had me hooked. Unfortunately, they lost me after the addition of Fergie and the redefinition into a more mainstream sound and style. Even Britney Spears, “Baby one More Time”, was a single that I knew was headed to something big before it hit the pop charts.
I certainly wasn’t right every time. I thought R&B “Boy Band”-type group, Imajin, was a shoe-in for a big hit, but the hit never came.
I went even further off the grid as a teenager, and in my early twenties, I got into bands and artists – some larger independent acts, some unknown and unsigned acts, like Slightly Stoopid, Dirty Headz, SOOP, Prolific, GFE (Granola Funk Express), John Butler Trio, G Love and Special Sauce, 2 ate 1, Panic and the Rebel Emergency, Borialis, Mishka, Ozzimati, Knowldegeborn, Awol One, Insolence, Adele (who at the time was unknown in the USA), Duffy, Yao Ming, Jack Johnson (again when he was fairly unknown), Ballyhoo, Dynamo Trio.
This came along with (of course) delving into all sorts of mainstream music; both new and old. I fell in love with hip-hop – artists like Beanie Sigel, Jadakiss, The Lox, Common, Pharaoh Monch, KRS1, Just Ice, Talib Kweli, NWA, Mos Def, Eve, The Roots, Freestyle Fellowship, Aceyalone, etc. I spent hours standing on street corners driving in cars, sitting in living rooms in Philly, South Jersey, and Camden, watching “battles” and cyphers spring up out of nowhere. It was live music all the time everywhere I went.
I soon fell in love with Reggae, and the Peter Tosh’s, Barrington Levy’s, Mr.Vegas’s of the world and even the Matisyahu’s. Finding some great old school music (blues, jazz, anything goes really – also I would like to point out I guess much of what I have already named in this article could be considered old school, so I guess it’s all relative), Louie Armstrong, Nina Simone, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, A Ragamuffin Band, Sammy Price, John Coltrain, Ella Fitzgerald, and many, many more.
To curb my spending hours rattling off artists, I will just say I really “dug in” with everything from Classical, Rock, Metal, Punk, Folk, Soul, etc. I got myself into everything at the time. I intentionally left Country out; simply because I just did not have a taste for it – although recently, I have broadened my horizons even to Country.
Of course, I attended many, many shows over the years. I certainly do not want to discount that. The live show is a huge part of the attraction. It is one of the places that you “fall in love” with the music and with the artist. I had the opportunity to talk to an acquaintance of mine, Dez Dickerson, about an artist “selling an experience”. His logic was that whether its at a live show, or hearing a song on an album or on the radio, it was about the experience. That is what makes a person “fall in love” with a song or with an artist. That was a sentiment that stuck with me.
Today, many of the artists I love I know personally and work with, but I approach each artist I work with as I did each song I fell in love with, in exactly that way. To work with an artist, above all else, I require that I fall in love with the music and with the live performance – I have to have that experience. I have to fall in love just like I did with each an every piece of music I experienced.
I still listen to just about everything, but if it is not some unknown artist I am getting excited about, I am definitely more partial to Kate Nash, Regina Spektor, Jack Johnson, Jason Mraz, or something along the lines of Portishead. Not that I am not just excited about Bruno Marz, Adele, Lady Gaga and the like, but usually my music fits my mood. Music absolutely transformed my life, my interests, and my relationships. It was truly one of my first loves, and a life changing experience. [contact-form-7 404 "Not Found"]
Hopefully, you are here because you are joining me on my journey on this blog, where I am attempting to share some great talent with you as I find it, be it new talent or new to me. I hope you enjoy the ride.
