What’s good party people? I hope all is well with ya’ll. Things are going really well on this end. The Open Mic Night at Paint T.M.E. Studios is really turning into a thing. We’ve got a pretty good vibe going on there, and we had quite a few poets and singers take center stage.
This was the first time for a lot of the artists who came out. But even so, there were some really heartfelt lyrics dropped. A young cat named Raheem really got loose with the singing piece.
We had one shy young lady who at first asked a friend to read her poem for her, but the crowd was really supportive and encouraging, and we managed to coax her into the spotlight.
One lady, a burn nurse, had some really deep stuff about being a single mother. She actually had a couple good ones, as did this young Latina. I did record audio, but when I put the commercial together, it felt better without the actual lyrics.
Which kind of leads to the the purpose of my new studio, which is inside Paint T.M.E.
I believe I’m going to call this place Moonmind Productions. I want this to be a work space for me, but also a place where average people can have access to affordable but well-produced audio and video. I’d like to be able to record oral histories, take pictures and produce videos for people in the community.
In fact, I’ve already made a tentative agreement to shoot a one-location music video for one of the artists from open mic night. I think that will be a good angle to follow: make the videos from open mic nights available to the artists for a small fee, or produce their individual videos for a reasonable hourly fee.
This is where we will begin producing our podcast shortly, and I should be able to produce regular videos featuring my own work as well.
So, please stay tuned: there are a lot of things in the works. I believe this space will turn out to be a blessing for everyone involved, and I am very thankful and hopeful about it.
While setting up over the last week or so, I ‘ve been bumping that new Billy Woods. This cat is next level hip hop. It falls somewhere between spoken word and hip hop, laced with gritty, dark, slowed down jazz samples. Peep it out: